473: Chapter 473 Burying Oneself

On the other side, Zero's space rift tore open.

But this was no longer the smooth, precise incision she was familiar with, the kind that sliced through coordinates like a scalpel.

It was more like an irregular gash, violently ripped into an old canvas that had already been ravaged and riddled with holes, using the very last ounce of strength—the edges frayed and jagged, bearing a hideousness akin to a death throe.

Inside the rift, there was none of the Void Realm turbulence she had expected, not even the most dangerous kind.

There was only a patch of darkness that was thicker, and... more unwilling.

Deep within the darkness, something seemed to have been "sticking" there all along, waiting.

Or rather, it "was" the place this rift was supposed to lead to; it was the destination itself.

That face emerged.

It did not "crawl" out, nor did it "squeeze" through; it simply "appeared."

It was as if the rift had merely lifted a thin veil covering it—it had always been "here."

This was a human face, meticulously peeled and completely hollowed out.

The skin was so thin it was nearly transparent, radiating an unnatural, waxy yellow hue, revealing the clear contours of the skull beneath—the ridges of the cheekbones, brow ridges, and jawline, akin to a topographic map of death.

Beneath the skin, there was a complete, absolute "emptiness."

There were no muscle fibers, no fat deposits, no brain convolutions, no support for eyeballs.

The eye sockets were merely two sunken black holes covered by thin skin; beneath the bridge of the nose were two tiny, shadowy orifices, and the lips were a slightly sunken, tightly sealed slit.

It "stuck" onto her, precise and silent, with only a distance thinner than a strand of hair between it and Zero's cheek—a distance that practically did not exist.

Zero could even "feel" the faint chill radiating from that thin skin; it was not a temperature belonging to any living thing; it was a constant, icy coldness originating from the Void Realm itself.

She could "see" the network of purplish-black capillaries beneath the skin, long dried out yet still clearly defined—an abstract map of destruction drawn upon the skull.

Then, that tightly sealed slit of lips slowly split open toward the sides.

There was no pulling of muscles, no change in the curve of the mouth; the skin simply tore along its original texture, pulled apart by some invisible force, revealing the bottomless black hole of the mouth cavity below, which was equally empty.

It was not a "cavity" capable of housing a tongue, vocal cords, or breath.

It was a pure, conceptual "orifice"—connected to the "Void Realm," connected to "deprivation," connected to "absolute emptiness."

It inhaled.

This was not even an inhalation in the physical sense; the air did not flow.

It was a part of Zero's "existence"—that which was known as "life force," "vitality," and "Origin life Qi," everything that supported her standing there as a "living being"—being forcibly dragged out by an irresistible "pulling force" generated within that "orifice," a force directed at "existence" itself.

"Urgh—!"

Zero only had time to emit a stifled groan, short to the extreme, as if her throat had been strangled.

The next second, colorful, misty streams of light, bearing her unique life imprint, surged uncontrollably from her eyes, ears, mouth, nose, and even every open pore.

The sight was beautiful yet cruel—like a firework, accelerated a billion times over, where life bloomed and withered in an instant.

The streams of light did not dissipate; instead, like a brook guided by invisible conduits, they were precisely and ceaselessly poured into the gaping, pitch-black mouth of that "face."

Zero's body withered rapidly amidst this colorful "sacrifice."

Her skin—once perhaps smooth and supple—lost its moisture and luster at a speed visible to the naked eye, taking on a deathly gray hue, clinging tightly to her rapidly shrinking bones, forming layers of withered wrinkles.

Her outstretched hand, fingers still maintaining a feeble posture as if trying to grasp something, had fingertips like dead branches that had lost all life; starting from the tips, they silently turned into grayish-white powder, bit by bit, falling away in rustles.

Her hair lost all color, becoming snow-white and fragile, then broke and dissipated inch by inch.

Finally, it was her body—the moment the colorful streams of light were completely drained, like dying embers caught in a final breeze, it completely collapsed and disintegrated, turning into a handful of fine, grayish-white dust identical in color to the scorched earth, before being gently brushed away by the malicious, Death Qi-laden breeze that permeated this place, leaving no trace behind.

From beginning to end, it took no more than two or three breaths.

A living powerhouse possessing the ability to tear through space had vanished from the world in this most thorough, most "void-like" manner.

After draining the last wisp of light, the "mouth" of that "face" slowly closed, and the skin returned to a smooth state, as if it had never opened.

It hovered silently at the rift's edge, that hollow, skin-covered skull turning slightly at an angle.

The "eye sockets" without eyes seemed to "sweep" over the remaining few, and then, together with the space rift, it silently merged and vanished, as if it had never appeared.

All of this was "seen" by Burial Son, who was curled up at the edge of the giant pit, his aura as weak as a candle flickering in the wind.

No, he was not "seeing" with his eyes.

After unleashing the forbidden technique of "Burying Oneself" and suppressing his life fire to a spark that was nearly extinguished, his five senses had long been mostly sealed.

His perception of the outside world relied more on the faint and special connection between his Burial Dao Divine Body and this "Burial Land," as well as his spiritual perception, which had been amplified to its limit on the edge of life and death, becoming almost instinctive.

What he "perceived" was the entire process of how Zero's vibrant and sharp spatial fluctuations were forcibly torn apart, captured and devoured by a deeper, colder "void," and returned to nothingness.

What he "felt" was the absolute deprivation and negation of "existence" itself that accompanied the appearance of this "face."

He saw—perceived—how Youying, amidst the "Burial Song" from the withered tree that struck directly at the Soul, went from initial painful wailing to hysterical, collapsing pleas for mercy, then to unfocused eyes and viscous black blood seeping from his seven orifices, until finally, all sound, all struggle, and all consciousness and emotional fluctuations belonging to the individual "Youying" were extinguished completely, like a burnt-out wick.

That once agile and treacherous body collapsed limply to the ground, like a discarded skin bag that had been emptied of its stuffing, silent forevermore.

Only the slightly twitching fingers proved the final, meaningless passing of life.

He saw how A-Pan's rock-like body was burst open from within by that malicious power representing "deadly growth."

First came the fine, mournful sound of his rock armor shattering, then the terrifying writhing and swelling beneath his skin.

Finally, the pitch-black, twisted sapling that burst from his heart position greedily unfurled its first similarly black, similarly twisted tender leaf, stained with A-Pan's scalding blood, rich with the vitality of the earth.

A-Pan's hulking body, meanwhile, was like a mountain range instantly drained of all its Foundation and spiritual essence—flesh withered, bones turned brittle, and amidst the roaring sound of the sapling bursting forth, it collapsed and disintegrated with a crash, turning into a pile of gray, ruined rubble beneath the roots of the newborn evil tree.

The thick, resilient life aura belonging to "A-Pan" was entirely absorbed and converted by that sapling, becoming the initial nutrients for its continued growth.

He saw Zero's life light drained away, her body turning to ash and completely annihilated.

He saw the azure water screen that Cang Ming had raised at the last moment, and how it was passed through as if it were nothing by the scarlet Blood Infant Mist Nightmare.

The moment those faceless, circular-toothed monsters within the mist lunged at Cang Ming, they did not bite, but rather "merged."

They transformed into wisps of viscous blood mist, drilling into Cang Ming's seven orifices, drilling into his skin, drilling into every one of his pores.

Cang Ming's scream was extremely short, as if someone had grabbed his throat, or like some musical instrument being suddenly snapped at its highest note.

His handsome face was instantly covered and devoured by countless tiny, writhing protrusions of blood mist; his body withered away as if leaking air, and beneath his skin, it seemed as if a billion tiny mouths were sucking simultaneously.

In just a breath or two, nothing remained on the spot but an empty, fluttering robe stained with a few dark red water marks, slowly drifting down.

Those eyes that once glimmered with the starlight of wisdom, that brain that once divined the secrets of heaven, along with his entire "existence," had all been devoured, leaving not a trace behind.

Four people.

Four lamps of life that once shone with different lights, representing different paths and possibilities.

In the time of a mere dozen heartbeats, they were extinguished one by one in four completely different, yet equally Soul-freezing ways.

The light dispersed, leaving only dead silence and darkness, and the lingering, not-yet-dissipated echoes of their despair and pain from their final moments in the air.

Burial Son was still "alive."

It was not because he was stronger, tougher, or more prepared than them.

It was merely because—at the instant the first rift exploded, the Necro-Bone Titan's skeletal hand propped up the earth, and the truth of this cognition-shattering horror and the "sacrifice" poured down upon him like ice water—in the one-thousandth of a second when the instinct to survive overwhelmed all reason, dignity, and luck—he performed a final forbidden technique that inheritors of the Burial Dao Divine Body would only use when they were certain of death and unwilling to be annihilated just like that, a technique with an immeasurable cost.

He bit off the tip of his tongue.

Not a gentle prick, but using all his remaining strength to ruthlessly crush that small piece of flesh containing his purest life Origin, Divine Soul brand, and the core aura of the Burial Dao Divine Body.

The excruciating pain, like exploding fireworks, instantly swept through his remaining consciousness, but it also brought a final moment of extreme clarity.

His scalding heart blood, mixed with golden light specks, gushed out, but it did not spill; instead, guided by a mysterious, Bloodline-instinctual pull, it was evenly sprayed upon the thin, dim layer of protective gray Qi surrounding his body.

"Bury... Oneself..."

These two words were not uttered by his throat, but branded into the Void Realm and into the core of his own life using his Soul, his Bloodline, and his last shred of clear will.

The gray Qi trembled violently, then rolled back like a living thing—not for defense, but for "devouring."

It devoured the remaining temperature on his body surface, the sound of his blood flowing, the power of his heart beating, the fluctuations emitted by his Divine Soul, and everything—every external sign and internal vitality—that he possessed as a "living being."

His body temperature plummeted until it was no different from the surrounding scorched earth, his heartbeat slowed until it was nearly at a standstill, his breathing became imperceptible, his Divine Soul fluctuations were compressed and condensed to the extreme, buried deep within his Sea of Consciousness, and even the sparks of his thoughts barely flickered anymore.

He was "burying" himself alive.

Using the power of the "Burial Dao," he was "burying" himself in this place, at this moment.

In terms of presence, energy level, and every dimension perceptible from the outside, he was doing his utmost to disguise himself as a true "corpse" that had been dead for unknown ages, one that had merged with this scorched earth.

This was not a turtle-breathing technique, nor was it a feigned death; it was a deeper level of "self-burial" that touched the very essence of existence.

The cost was that once unleashed, it was like sinking to the deepest part of the ocean—without strong external interference and guidance, relying solely on himself, there was almost no possibility of ever "waking up" again.

He would fall into an eternal slumber that was colder and lonelier than death, one that approached "nothingness" infinitely.

Yet, he still used it.

Without hesitation.