637: Chapter Thirty-Seven of the Sixth Year: The Stars Faded

Luo Xiaojiu looked at his smile, her brows knitting together almost imperceptibly.

Deep within those golden pupils, a faint, fleeting trace of emotion seemed to flash by.

It was like confusion, or perhaps a sense of being disturbed and ill at ease.

She looked away, bluntly tossing out an assessment:

"Your smile is truly ugly."

"..."

The curve of Blood Butcher's lips stiffened for a moment.

Immediately after, however, the smile widened, even taking on a slightly roguish air.

So what if it's ugly.

Anyway, this is the only way he knows how to smile.

"Let's go."

Luo Xiaojiu stopped looking at him and turned around, her orange sleeves tracing a sharp arc in the night wind.

"Where to?" Blood Butcher immediately asked, bracing his hands against a broken wall as he tried to stand.

The movement aggravated his injuries, causing another bout of muffled coughing, but his eyes remained fixed on her back, never wavering for a second.

Luo Xiaojiu did not look back.

She simply tilted her face up slightly, gazing toward the Starry Sky Altar in the distance.

There, the stars were sparse.

Above the altar, the massive square golden tripod continued to emit a ten-colored radiance.

Yet, deep within her golden pupils, she seemed to reflect a scene that ordinary people were unable to see.

Her gaze was distant, as if piercing through layers of space and time to land on a place that was extremely far away, yet connected to her Bloodline.

"Over there."

She said softly, her voice drifting in the night wind, carrying a strange sense of certainty mixed with faint confusion, "Something is calling to me."

This call was faint yet persistent, like a resonance from the depths of her Bloodline, like an echo long lost.

Having traversed the desolation of eons, it finally reached her ears at this moment.

Blood Butcher did not hesitate.

He braced himself against the broken stone pillar behind him, his knuckles turning white from the exertion.

The excruciating pain in his chest felt as if thousands of red-hot needles were stabbing in simultaneously, churning his internal organs—his vision went black for an instant, and a thick, metallic taste surged up his throat.

With a muffled grunt and gritted teeth, he forced back the groan of pain that was almost on the verge of escaping.

He merely used his sleeve, already soaked with blood, to fiercely wipe the corner of his mouth, clearing away the newly spilled warm liquid and leaving a deeper, dark red mark.

Then, he stumbled forward, dragging his body as if it were filled with lead and ready to fall apart at any moment, stepping unsteadily but with unwavering determination to follow that orange figure ahead.

This figure was the only beacon of light that could guide him in the darkness he was currently sinking into.

His steps were unsteady, uneven, treading upon gravel and soft scorched earth, stumbling from time to time.

Yet he recovered quickly, his gaze always locked on that splash of orange, following closely—like a traveler lost in a snowstorm, desperately pursuing the only visible sign of life ahead.

The two of them, one after the other, silently traversed this land, devastated and scarred by battle.

Underfoot lay shattered rocks, melted metal fragments, and soil baked into a glass-like state by intense heat.

The air was filled with dust, the smell of burning, and a faint, unsettling Aura of nothingness originating from those who had been "erased."

The moonlight cast its pale radiance stingily, stretching their shadows into fluctuating lengths, twisting them across the ruins.

The night wind moaned as it swept across the plain, stirring up the lingering, scorching warmth from the Qi and Blood of the Desolate Ancient Sacred Body, and also catching Luo Xiaojiu's ink-black hair that fell to her shoulders, causing it to dance lightly behind her.

The wind also brushed against the tattered hem of Blood Butcher's clothing, which was stained with dust and blood, causing it to snap loudly.

It carried a sense of desolation akin to a dead end, while also revealing a desperate, all-or-nothing resolve.

The outline of the altar became increasingly clear at the end of their sightline.

This ancient structure, standing at the end of the plain as if it had existed there since time immemorial, was built entirely from massive, solid blocks of unknown dark stone.

The stone material was neither jade nor metal, yet it possessed a cold, hard luster like metal.

The weathering of ages, the beacon fires of antiquity, and the endless torrent of time had all left deep marks on its surface—mottled erosion, crisscrossing cracks, and indentations from massive impacts.

Yet, these traces did not diminish its Aura; instead, they imbued it with an indescribable sense of desolation and solemnity, standing tall despite the vicissitudes of countless eras.

It stood there silently, not like a man-made structure, but more like a silent black mountain growing from the depths of the earth, overlooking the tiny living beings and the passing time beneath it.

The altar was perfectly circular, narrowing in nine massive, tiered steps from bottom to top.

Each step was a zhang high and exceptionally wide, built from the same massive stone, with edges as neat as if carved by blades or axes.

Viewed from afar, these nine steps were layered and majestic, truly resembling a miniature, steep mountain for gods to walk upon.

The area around the altar was an incredibly empty wilderness, with no auxiliary buildings, no inscriptions, no statues, no guards, and even weeds seemed afraid to approach.

Only it stood there, solitary yet domineeringly occupying the center of the land.

Above was the vast, boundless, and deep dome of the sky studded with stars, forming a highly impactful scene—between heaven and earth, only this altar stood, connecting the ancient earth with the eternal starry sky.

And at the very top of the altar—a massive square golden tripod was suspended there.

The body of the tripod was not a dazzling golden color, but a more reserved, heavier dark gold, as if it had absorbed all the radiance and dust settled by time.

On the tripod's body, there were no complicated or redundant decorative carvings, only mountain and river patterns outlined with the simplest, most primitive lines, yet containing the charm of the Great Dao.

These patterns were not flat engravings but slightly raised, like a miniature of real mountains and rivers, casting faint shadows under the moonlight.

Each of the four sides of the massive tripod formed an independent yet harmonious world—

The east side was carved with the sun and moon shining together, the rising morning sun, and a crescent moon like a hook, containing endless vitality and rotation;

The west side was carved with stars filling the sky, countless star points arranged in mysterious trajectories, as if a miniature Universe galaxy had been branded upon it, deep and unfathomable;

The south side was carved with mountains and rivers stretching for ten thousand li, mountain ranges undulating like Dragon spines, rivers flowing like jade belts, magnificent in Aura, encompassing the Nine Provinces;

The north side was carved with the withering and flourishing of all things, on one side lush vegetation and thriving life, on the other the killing chill of autumn winds and the withering of all things, enacting the ultimate truth of life and death Reincarnation.

These four patterns, though simple, possessed a weight and majesty that pointed directly to the Origin, making one feel awe upon seeing them, as if catching a glimpse of the scene when heaven and earth first opened.

The tripod had four legs, square and upright like massive pillars supporting heaven and earth, steadily holding up the tripod body.

What was wondrous was that such a massive tripod was not resting on the top of the altar, but was steadily, motionlessly suspended in the Void Realm about three feet above the altar top—as if held up by invisible force, or as if it were meant to be there, integrated with this space.

At this moment, this dark golden square massive tripod was emitting a soft and sacred ten-colored radiance.

Red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, purple, black, white, gold... each color was incomparably pure, as if possessing life, slowly flowing, intertwining, and changing between the mountain and river patterns on the four sides of the tripod.

The light surged from the depths of the patterns, finally gathering and achieving Fusion in the air above the center of the altar, forming a dreamlike, magnificently colorful ten-colored light curtain, like an inverted glazed bowl, gently yet firmly enveloping the entire uppermost area of the altar.

The light curtain swirled, with mysterious Dao rhythms faintly flowing, as if chanting an ancient song that no one could understand.

Luo Xiaojiu stopped at the base of the lowest level of the altar.

She tilted her face up slightly, the night wind blowing the stray hairs on her forehead.

These eyes, which appeared purely golden under the moonlight, now clearly reflected the ceaselessly swirling, magnificent, and mysterious ten-colored radiance at the top of the altar.

The light leaped and flickered in her eyes, as if igniting a spark hidden deep within her Soul.

And this call, the moment she stepped here, became incomparably clear and intense.

It was no longer a vague, distant, and tenuous sensation.

This voice seemed to pierce through the barriers of time and space, resounding directly in her ears—no, in the depths of her mind, in every inch of her Bloodline.

"Future Sacred Body..."

The voice was ancient, like boulders that had weathered the frosts of eons rubbing against each other.

It was deep and imposing, carrying a supreme majesty capable of suppressing mountains, rivers, the sun, and the moon.

Yet it was strangely gentle—this gentleness was not a disguise, but a natural inclusion and call, like the sun toward all things, or the earth toward vegetation.

It was as if a kind elder who had waited for endless years had finally seen a descendant who had traveled far return home.

This call was filled with the anticipation and gratification accumulated over countless years.

Luo Xiaojiu's long, thick eyelashes trembled ever so slightly.

From this call that spanned time and space and acted directly upon her life's Origin, she felt an indescribable, bone-deep sense of familiarity.

This was not a throb of kinship—she knew very well that in this strange and vast world, she had no close relatives connected by Bloodline.

This was a resonance deeper and more essential than kinship.

It originated from her life form, from her Desolate Ancient Sacred Body Origin that looked down upon ancient and modern times, and from the core imprint of her Soul.

It was as if the owner of this voice had walked the same path as her, had reached the same destination, and possessed the same essential nature of power.