37: Chapter 37 A Battle Against the Demon General, A Division of the Mineral Vein

Beneath the deep sea trench, it was as cold as a dark well buried for a thousand years.

The deeper they dove, the darker the surrounding water became. In ordinary waters, one could still see floating spiritual light and small schools of fish, but here, only cold stone walls, horizontal cracks, and wisps of deep blue cold energy seeping from the rock layers met the eye. That cold energy was the ore evil accumulated over the years from the deep-sea Cold Iron ore vein; even through spiritual shields, it made one's bones ache.

Lu Changyuan stayed at the very front of the third line, his gaze scanning forward along the route Leng Feng had marked out in advance.

Deep in the trench, a bedrock embedded with deep blue ore veins lay quietly in the darkness, as if the entire seabed fissure had been frozen into iron. The Cold Iron ore vein was buried within it; even though it had not been mined yet, just the exposed layer of ore crust was enough to make one's heart race.

But what was actually pressing down in the center of the bedrock was even more eye-catching than the ore.

It was a sea demon over twenty zhang long.

Its shape resembled a lizard, but it was incomparably more fierce than an ordinary sea lizard. Its spine bulged high, growing a row of blade-like bone fins, and its chest, abdomen, and limbs were covered in thick, bluish cold armor. With each breath, the surrounding seawater seemed to freeze, forming rings of white frost. It coiled right there on the thickest protruding rock of the Cold Iron ore vein, sleeping with its eyes half-open, yet its sheer presence weighed down the entire trench so heavily that it seemed afraid to make a sound.

Giant Abyss Demon General.

Even before it had fully stood up, the malevolent aura of the Late Foundation Establishment Stage was already incredibly heavy.

Further out was a dense crowd of sea demon minions.

Some clung to the rock walls, some crouched in the crevices, and others swam slowly along the edge of the bedrock. There were at least a thousand of them, like rings of vicious dogs dozing around a mountain of meat. If Blue Moon Island had tried to tackle this alone, let alone the ore, they would likely have been dragged to their deaths by this pack of beasts the moment they touched the outer perimeter.

But tonight, they were not the first to move in the trench.

The Seventh Elder raised his hand.

The bronze seal he had been holding in his palm finally lit up for the first time.

There was no world-shaking roar, only a heavy, almost muffled hum that suddenly rippled out from the deepest part of the sea. In the next instant, the seawater that had been flowing slowly in all directions seemed to be pinned down by an invisible giant hand, causing the entire trench to freeze in place.

The sea demon horde was the first to fall into chaos.

Before the sea demons clinging to the edges of the crevices could react, they were pinned down by this sudden heavy pressure, their bodies sinking. A few that were closer were even crushed to pieces against the rock walls on the spot.

And in the center of the bedrock, the Giant Abyss Demon General, who had been sleeping coiled over the ore, finally opened its eyes.

A pair of pale, white vertical pupils suddenly lit up in the darkness, followed by a roar full of rage and ferocity. It clearly had not expected that anyone would dare to sneak all the way under its belly, much less that the first thing to press down on it would be a sealing force so heavy that even it found it oppressive.

Just as it was about to rear up and strike, the Seventh Elder thrust the bronze seal forward.

"Suppress."

The bronze seal expanded upon contact with the water, turning into a giant seal about a zhang wide in the blink of an eye. The profound runes on its surface lit up completely, crashing down with an overbearing, heavy force.

The Giant Abyss Demon General roared and raised its front claws, the bone fins on its back and its cold armor lighting up simultaneously as it tried to withstand the seal. However, it was only at the Late Foundation Establishment Stage, not a False Core, and certainly not like those old fellows from human clans who had nurtured Magic Treasures as their family heritage.

The moment the seal fell, the entire bedrock beneath its feet sank by half a foot.

Seawater exploded and the cold current surged backward. Half of the Giant Abyss Demon General's body was forced back into the pit of the ore vein, and even its raised head was slammed down.

At this exact moment, Young Master Lu Qingshan moved.

More than twenty Zixiao Sword Guards had already taken up their respective positions. At this moment, their Sword Intent rose in unison, resembling over twenty white lines suddenly opening in the deep sea. Young Master Lu Qingshan himself led the formation from the center, his moon-white sword light splitting into seven, striking directly at the four most vital nodes of the Giant Abyss Demon General: its head, neck, spine, and abdomen.

"Activate the formation."

There were no unnecessary flourishes.

Only the most overbearing encirclement and slaughter of a clan's Sword Cultivators.

The Giant Abyss Demon General had just been pinned by the sea-suppressing seal and had not yet had time to break free when the sword formation crashed down from above. The first wave of sword light directly shattered the two rows of bone fins on its shoulders and back, while the second wave pierced into its newly opened maw and the corners of its eyes, forcing it to twist its body frantically while spitting out cold currents.

It finally realized something was wrong. With a whip of its tailbone, it tried to use the terrain of the trench to dive into the deeper crevices.

But the Seventh Elder gave it no chance to change locations.

"Still trying to run?"

The old man sneered and pressed his palm down again, adding another layer of sea-green spiritual glow to the sea-suppressing seal. The water in the entire trench seemed to be wrung into mud at this moment. The Giant Abyss Demon General's tail whip, powerful enough to shatter a warship, was actually pinned firmly in place, only stirring up a messy wave of turbid water.

Only now did the outer sea demons truly erupt into chaos.

A massive tide of shrieks, bizarre howls, and cold currents surged forward at the same time, but before they could even get close to the core mining area, they crashed into the sword barrier cut by the outer layer of the Zixiao Sword Guards. This time, Young Master Lu Qingshan did not even bother to slay those minor demons, only ordering the sword guards to focus on cutting down commanders, personal guards, and any high-level nodes that might rush out to send a message.

Meanwhile, the Seventh Elder kept his eyes solely on the most valuable one the entire time.

Standing on the third line, Lu Changyuan saw it more clearly than ever.

The Giant Abyss Demon General possessed the cultivation of the Late Foundation Establishment Stage in vain; in any ordinary faction of the outer seas, it would be enough to rule as a ferocious tyrant. But tonight, it faced a False Core clan elder suppressing the field, a half-step Golden Core Sword Cultivator leading the decapitation formation, and over twenty main branch elites sealing off the perimeter in layers.

It did not even have time to finish a single proper threat.

Having struggled for less than half an incense stick's time, its right eye was first pierced through by Young Master Lu Qingshan's sword, and then the cold armor on its abdomen was violently cracked by the sea-suppressing seal. It frantically spat out a massive cloud of cold evil, trying to use the exploding ore evil and blood mist to obscure their vision and drag a few humans down with it, but the Seventh Elder flipped the bronze seal in his hand and smashed that cold evil along with half of its head directly into the pit.

When the final muffled thud echoed out, the Giant Abyss Demon General's hideous demon head had been beaten into mush. Its massive demon body twitched twice before falling completely still.

The trench fell silent.

The sea demons that had been desperately charging inward from the outer perimeter seemed to have suddenly lost their courage, their movements falling into complete disarray. With a wave of Young Master Lu Qingshan's hand, the Zixiao Sword Guards immediately dispersed and began clearing the second layer. After a few breaths, the nearby sea demons were slaughtered to pieces, while the remaining ones with some intelligence turned and fled frantically into the deeper trench and side crevices.

"Harvest."

The Seventh Elder uttered only a single word and stopped looking at those fleeing minor demons, as if he couldn't even be bothered to chase them down.

And this was precisely the moment Lu Changyuan had been waiting for.

"Go down and identify the ore!"

At his command, the mining team that had come with Blue Moon Island immediately rushed toward the Cold Iron bedrock. Su Qingli and Leng Feng took the left and right sides, first placing ore-sealing talismans along the main lines of the vein they had marked earlier, while Lu Hu led his men to vigorously chisel at the richest exposed ore zones. The Cold Iron was extremely heavy to the touch, carrying an intense chill and a slight blue metallic luster; even a fist-sized piece would be enough to make Loose Cultivators fight to the death in the outer seas.

But tonight, no one had the mind to look closely.

Because everyone knew that at times like this, harvesting the ore depended even more on speed than the fighting itself.

The half-incense-stick window of time that the Seventh Elder had secured for them was not meant for leisurely bookkeeping.

Storage Pouches were filled one by one, and ore-sealing talismans were slapped down one after another. Naturally, the main branch was not polite either, directly cutting away half along the largest main vein first. Yet, Lu Changyuan did not feel the slightest bit of heartache.

Without the Seventh Elder, this entire mine would have belonged to the Giant Abyss Demon General.

Being able to take away the other half now was already a massive profit.

Not to mention, what he truly wanted was more than just the ore.

"Lay out the traces."

Leng Feng immediately scattered the pre-prepared tattered flags of the Blood Shark Pirates, barbed darts, and ashes of Explosive Talismans into the pit of the demon general's corpse and the outer crevices. Su Qingli was even more ruthless, directly washing the edges of several sword wounds with Explosive Talismans and chaotic blade marks to specifically create the illusion that 'someone had used heavy talismans and bandit methods to violently smash everything to pieces during a mine heist.'

Lu Hu dragged several pre-prepared mangled corpses of Merfolk into the outer edges of the trench, intentionally leaving them in a side ditch not far from the mining area.

He practically wished he could carve the words 'The Blood Shark Pirates fought ruthlessly here and provoked the Merfolk along the way' directly onto the scene.

Standing by the bedrock and watching Lu Changyuan's seamless sequence of actions, the Seventh Elder finally couldn't help but laughingly curse, "You boy really don't let anything go to waste."

Lu Changyuan cupped his hands. "The fewer eyes we draw, the more ore we can consume later."

"Reasonable." The Seventh Elder nodded, clearly finding this junior more and more pleasing to the eye. "Then this old man will take my share and leave first. You tidy up the rest of this mess yourself."

With that, he waved his hand, and a large amount of the severed main Cold Iron ore was immediately collected into large bags by the main branch. Young Master Lu Qingshan led the sword guards to patrol the outer perimeter once more, confirming that no survivors dared to hide nearby and spy, before returning with his sword.

This operation had come quickly and ended just as fast.

But just as Lu Changyuan was preparing to lead the Blue Moon Island crowd out of the trench, the heavenly secret jade slip in his Sea of Consciousness suddenly lit up without warning.

It was as if someone had directly ignited a blindingly white crack of light in the depths of his Sea of Consciousness.

Lu Changyuan paused in his tracks, his Divine Sense sinking into it almost instinctively.

In the next moment, an extremely bright guiding line suddenly pierced through the Cold Iron bedrock, crossing the corpse pit, fractured walls, and black water to point straight toward the pitch-black great rift valley at the deepest part of the trench, which had gone almost unnoticed before.

[Detected fluctuations of a high-grade purification-type spiritual plant.]

[Target is located at the bottom of the rift valley at the deepest part of the trench.]

[Risk: Within the sleeping range of a Tier 4 Great Demon.]

Tier 4.

Even just these two words made Lu Changyuan's pupils contract slightly.

Yet, surging up alongside that danger was a heartbeat that he could barely suppress.

The Cold Iron ore was already valuable enough.

But if it could make the Jade Slip light up like this, the value of the thing at the bottom of the rift valley would only be higher.

Young Master Lu Qingshan noticed the slight change in his expression and turned his head to ask, "What is it?"

Lu Changyuan did not explain clearly on the spot. He only looked up at the pitch-black great rift valley that seemed to have split the seabed directly open, lowering his voice to the extreme.

"In there... there might be something else."