Caving

It was night, the moon was bright and the stars were sparse.

The Magical Beast Mountain Range was quiet at night. Aside from the occasional startled birds and the chirping of insects, the entire mountain range exuded a silent and secretive aura.

Swish!

Swish!

Swish!

A figure shuttled rapidly through the dense forest.

Every leap landed precisely on the thick branches of the giant trees, using the rebounding force to propel himself further away.

Three clusters of beast fire followed him as he advanced.

"Shu'er, why don't you rest for a while?" Danxia inside the ring was a little worried about his condition. "Traveling like this consumes a huge amount of stamina and spiritual energy. When we reach that secret treasure ground, there will still be traps to deal with."

"No need, time is the most important thing right now."

Ye Shu shook his head.

The miraculous effects of the Cosmic Starlight had already begun to show. As spiritual energy was consumed from his dantian, the rest of his acupoints would naturally absorb spiritual energy from heaven and earth to replenish it, providing an endless stream.

Unless he encountered a battle, he could keep running forever.

Seeing this, Danxia said no more.

Looking at the youth's resolute face, she could not help but feel a little heartache, yet also a bit proud of him.

Moonlight flowed down, and beast fire paved the way.

Time passed minute by minute.

Finally, there was no road ahead in the distance.

Ahead was a sheer cliff, and further down was a boundless sea of clouds, wreathed in mist, making it impossible to see the depth.

Ye Shu stopped here and looked down.

Below was a crooked-neck tree. Other than that, there was absolutely nothing. The cliff was steep, and there was no path to take.

Not bad, the classic cliff-falling fortuitous encounter.

"Is there really a cave down there?" To ensure nothing went wrong, Ye Shu still asked in advance.

After all, if he just jumped down this thing...

Actually, he could fly back up on his sword.

"Yes, in your past life, you fell off the cliff here with a little girl, and then discovered a cave hidden on the cliff face. Inside is the cave dwelling of an ancient mighty figure, with many good things."

"However, be careful. Some of the pills inside cannot be eaten recklessly. After all, that little girl isn't here this time. If you get poisoned from eating them, your master has no way to give you mouth-to-mouth detoxification."

Danxia said faintly, her tone somewhat jealous.

"Speaking of which, Shu'er, hasn't it been a long time since you refined any pills? You don't look like an alchemist at all."

"Where would I find the time to refine pills?"

Ye Shu smiled with a bitter expression.

"Anyway, I've figured it out. With you, Master, a ninth-tier alchemist around, why the hell would I refine pills myself? Whatever I want to eat, I'll just ask Master to refine it. You can take your disciple's body and use it however you want. Refine whatever you want, horizontally or vertically, it's all fine."

"You bad disciple, you're treating your master as a tool, aren't you?" Danxia said in an exasperated tone.

"Hehe, Master treats me the best."

"Then what if one day I'm no longer around, what will you do?"

"If Master is gone, I'll just die together with you."

Ye Shu manipulated the fragments of the Male Mandarin Duck Sword in his body, arranging them piece by piece in the air to form a staircase, and replied as he walked down.

"Pah, pah, pah!"

Danxia hastily spat a few times. "Hurry up and shut your dog mouth. You're always saying unlucky things all day long."

"Weren't you the one who brought it up first?"

Ye Shu replied with a bewildered face.

"In short, you're not allowed to say such unlucky things. I don't like hearing it, and you're not allowed to say it in the future." Danxia snorted coldly, hiding back in the ring and ignoring him.

What a bad disciple, saying such cheesy things.

Seeing this, Ye Shu only smiled and walked down the cliff step by step along the staircase paved with fragments.

The mist was only a thin layer.

Passing through the mist, a cave could be seen. It was particularly eye-catching on the smooth cliff face, but because of the mist above, no one had discovered it for a long time.

Entering the cave, it was extremely narrow at first, only allowing a single person to pass.

After walking dozens of steps further, it suddenly opened up.

The originally muddy soil turned into a stone path paved with bluestone, three zhang wide and one zhang high, pitch black.

After only taking a few steps, a rustling sound suddenly came from the passage in the distance.

Ye Shu paused his footsteps, waiting in full readiness.

From the pitch-black corridor, a giant python over a person's height and half a bucket thick slowly poked its head out. It stared fixedly at the intruder with a pair of scarlet vertical pupils, its entire body exuding a cold, sinister aura.

Judging by its aura, it was at least a Tier 3 demonic beast.

This should be the classic guardian divine beast. According to the original plot, he and the Little Fairy Doctor should have fought it with all their might, and then, in order to protect her, he would accidentally be bitten, the toxin would invade his body, and he would fall into a coma.

When he woke up, he would find the Little Fairy Doctor feeding him water mouth-to-mouth.

But now, there was no Little Fairy Doctor.

And no him playing the hero saving the beauty.

"Vile beast! Are you not going to scram?"

Ye Shu cast a cold glance at the giant python. As he walked forward, he spread his five fingers, and a cluster of glazed purple fire appeared in his hand. Within the fire, the howling of ten thousand beasts could faintly be seen!

Hiss~

A trace of fear flashed in the giant python's vertical pupils. That violent aura completely vanished. As Ye Shu advanced, its body constantly retreated backward, eventually squeezing itself forcefully into the corner of the corridor.

Even as he walked past, it only watched warily.

Ye Shu held his head high and puffed out his chest, striding forward.

This was the confidence brought to him by the Myriad Beast Fire. Could anyone else do this?

"You clearly could have killed it, right?" Xiaobai sat on Ye Shu's shoulder, muttering softly.

"This kind of venomous snake is the most hateful, you should kill it!"

"No bro, it was doing a perfectly good job guarding the door for its old master. If you just go up and hack it to death, aren't you just causing trouble?"

Ye Shu looked at her in surprise and shook his head.

"Public morals are degenerating with each passing day, how corrupting."

"Wait, I'm corrupting morals?" Xiaobai pointed to the tip of her own nose, her face full of disbelief. "You running over here in the middle of the night to dig up someone else's grave isn't corrupting morals?"

"What do you mean digging up graves? Say it a bit nicer."

Ye Shu had a serious expression.

"I am doing archaeology. Do you know what archaeology is?"

"Do you see me destroying anything? No, right? I came here with the mood of protecting cultural relics."

"You Hachi-rat guy." Xiaobai was so exasperated by him that she was completely speechless, and simply turned her face away to ignore him.

He walked further inside for about a quarter of an hour.

The end of the corridor finally opened up, revealing a massive stone chamber, about two hundred square meters in size. A thick layer of dust had already accumulated on the floor.

In the center of the stone chamber, there was a withered skeleton, sitting cross-legged.

Beneath the withered skeleton was a futon.

Beneath the futon were three quaint, ancient books.

On the stone slab in front of the skeleton were a few lines of words, looking as if they had been forcefully carved by someone's fingers. The handwriting was vigorous and powerful. Even though an unknown amount of time had passed, one could still feel the master's astonishing will.

"Why cry out in sorrow? Sighing over how few years of lifespan remain."

"If a fated person comes here, kowtow with a sincere heart."

"I swept through the mortal realm with martial skills, but alas..."

"What is this?"

Xiaobai curiously examined the writing on the ground. She loved reading these little stories about the tragic fall of experts the most.

Ye Shu walked forward and slightly bent over.

And then...

Smack!

He suddenly reached out his hand and slapped the corpse flying.

Crash—

The skeleton flew straight out, rolling over a dozen times on the floor, and finally smashed into the stone wall. With a bang!, it fell to pieces, shattering into countless fragments.

Danxia: "..."

Xiaobai: "..."

The Golden Core stage paper puppet inside the stone chamber: "Buzz!"

Ye Shu: "?"