158: Chapter 158 Star Marks on the Stone Slab and the Undercurrent of Murder

After leaving Tianshu Pavilion, the Wind Patrol Envoy's exclusive flying boat traveled through the sea of clouds for three full days, finally landing deep within a nameless black mountain shrouded in gray miasma all year round.

This was their newly established temporary camp, surrounded by twelve interlocking concealment Formations set up jointly by Commander Ling Wuying and Ying Wu, so that even the most sensitive avian Spirit Beast in the high sky could not detect the aura of this place.

Night fell, and the mountain wind whistled through the branches of the withered trees, sounding like the cries of night owls.

Lin Chen sat cross-legged alone inside a simple stone tent at the deepest part of the camp. A heavy sound-insulation Talisman shielded out all the noise from the outside, leaving only the faint scent of agarwood and his own steady breathing in the air.

He slowly exhaled a breath of turbid Qi and rested his right hand flat on his knees.

A pitch-black, jagged fragment of a stone slab lay quietly in his palm.

This was an item he had secretly retrieved from an abandoned evidence vault at the very bottom of Tianshu Pavilion after the incident at the Spirit Suppression Tower, using his privileges as the deputy commander of the Wind Patrol Envoy.

According to the records, this fragment came from a battlefield where an evil cult was wiped out a hundred years ago, but for many years, no one had been able to fathom its secrets.

Lin Chen's gaze remained locked onto this unremarkable black stone.

Intuition told him that the truth Master Jianzhen had gone to such great lengths to cover up, as well as the death trap set against him, were all related to this substance that contained some kind of extraterrestrial Law.

He calmed his mind and tentatively mobilized a wisp of spiritual energy within his Dantian, slowly injecting it into the stone slab fragment like a probe exploring the deep sea.

The moment his spiritual energy touched the cold barrier inside the fragment, a sudden change occurred!

Lin Chen felt a sudden, sharp pain in his right thumb, as if a branding iron were searing his bone marrow.

The rough stone ring that had always been with him suddenly erupted with a terrifying suction force, as if it were a starving wolf that had caught the scent of blood.

Without Lin Chen's consent, this suction force violently tore through his Meridians' defenses, and like a whale swallowing water, drained a full thirty percent of the pure spiritual energy in his Dantian in a single breath!

The intense feeling of emptiness and the stinging pain of torn Meridians made Lin Chen grunt, and his forehead was instantly covered in a fine layer of cold sweat.

But he couldn't spare the time to regulate his breathing, because the scene before his eyes had completely stolen his attention.

The surface of the stone ring, which had absorbed the vast amount of spiritual energy, saw its originally dull textures light up with a blinding silver-red glow, as if molten lava had been injected into it.

This light surged along his fingertips and violently poured into the black stone slab fragment.

The stone slab emitted a teeth-gritting cracking sound, and immediately after, countless points of light erupted from within the fragment, weaving and projecting a three-dimensional star map that radiated an ancient, dead atmosphere inside the dim stone tent before Lin Chen.

In the center of this floating star map was a slowly rotating blood-red vortex that seemed capable of swallowing all light and vitality.

Around the vortex, seven stars, each flickering with different lights but all equally broken, were moving along some extremely bizarre trajectory.

The tent curtain was lifted by a faint, ghostly breeze, and Commander Ling Wuying's spectral figure was already standing silently inside the tent, no one knew when he had arrived.

His eyes, which were usually as calm as an ancient well, were now locked onto the star map in mid-air, and his usually steady breathing was now showing a rare hint of disorder.

He didn't ask what Lin Chen was doing, but instead spoke coldly in a voice as raspy as two pieces of sandpaper rubbing together, "Those are the Seven Killings Star and the Greedy Wolf Star; their positions are exactly the same as the celestial phenomena over the Central Continent tonight."

But his withered finger slowly lifted, pointing to the other five gray-colored stars that seemed as if they could extinguish at any moment, and his tone carried a deep sense of dread, "But these five are only recorded in the oldest ancient star map Incomplete Manuals of the Listening Wind Valley."

"They are called Fallen Stars; they fell from the starry sky of this world and vanished completely as early as the ancient war between gods and demons tens of thousands of years ago."

Before he finished speaking, the stone ring on Lin Chen's thumb suddenly emitted a high-frequency, violent vibration.

This vibration surged straight into his mind along his finger bones, and Lin Chen felt as if his Divine Soul had been struck hard by a large hammer, his vision instantly blurring.

The projection of the star map twisted and collapsed in an instant, forcibly and crudely stuffing a broken scene that had spanned endless years into his Sea of Consciousness!

In the scene, there was a collapsed Void Realm.

That blood-red vortex was magnified countless times, like a festering wound in the Universe.

A giant hand that blotted out the sky, its surface covered in bizarre star imprints and festering flesh, was carrying the pressure of destroying heaven and earth, trying to break free from the depths of the vortex.

The aura emitted by that giant hand, just by perceiving it through the remnant image, made Lin Chen's Golden Core tremble crazily, giving rise to a feeling of despair that made him want to prostrate himself in worship.

However, just as the giant hand was about to reach out of the vortex, countless thick chains shimmering with five-colored strange light emerged from the Void Realm out of thin air.

The chains, like wild Dragons with a life of their own, tightly coiled around that giant hand with star marks. Accompanied by a silent, shrill roar, the five-colored chains tightened abruptly, forcibly grinding that giant hand into a sky full of shredded flesh and starlight!

The scene ended abruptly there.

Lin Chen opened his eyes abruptly, gasping for air, his chest heaving violently, as if he had just survived drowning in the deep sea.

That massive stream of residual information and chaotic extraterrestrial energy did not retreat with the disappearance of the scene; instead, it flowed back up along the stone ring, rampaging through the Meridians of his right hand.

Lin Chen gritted his teeth tightly, a flash of ruthlessness flickering in his eyes.

He immediately mobilized the remaining spiritual energy in his body, attempting to use the foundation of the Cultivation Technique bestowed by the System to forcibly refine this remnant energy belonging to that giant hand.

But he underestimated the dominance of the power of the extraterrestrial alien god.

The moment the two forces clashed in his palm, the flesh of his right palm, which had originally been lying flat, was seemingly cut open by some sharp, invisible blade, and a bizarre, thin silver line suddenly split open.

This silver line did not look like a wound, but rather like a miniature doorway opened on his Mortal body leading to another dimension.

Immediately after, drops of silver blood, not bright red but emitting faint specks of starlight, seeped out from that crack.

The blood dripped onto Lin Chen's black sleeve, instantly emitting a harsh, screeching sound.

"This blood is wrong!"

A cold female voice suddenly sounded in the corner of the tent, and accompanied by a faint ripple in space, Ying Wu, dressed in a tight-fitting night-travel suit, appeared like a ghost.

Her eyes, exposed outside her black mask, were as sharp as an eagle's. She instantly caught sight of the large hole being rapidly corroded on Lin Chen's sleeve by the starlight blood; even the surrounding space showed a hint of distortion under the erosion of that blood.

Without any hesitation, Ying Wu flicked her hand, and three isolation Talismans flickering with faint blue light turned into streams of light, precisely sticking onto the acupoints around Lin Chen's wrist, instantly forming an airtight film of spiritual energy, wrapping the dripping blood inside.

A scalp-tingling scene appeared.

Those few drops of starlight blood wrapped in the Talisman's light shield seemed to possess an independent life, starting to twist and elongate crazily within the narrow space, vaguely intending to turn into a miniature star-marked palm, and were frantically gnawing at the spiritual energy of the Talisman.

Ying Wu's eyes sank abruptly, and just as she was about to activate her magic technique again, the stone ring on Lin Chen's thumb felt like an angry king whose territory had been provoked.

The surface of the stone ring erupted with a blinding cyan light without any warning.

This cyan light contained the most primitive and pure Law of devouring; it was like an ancient Vicious Beast opening its giant mouth, violently piercing through Ying Wu's isolation light shield, and swallowing those twisted starlight blood drops clean in one gulp.

The silver crack in his palm also healed rapidly under the soothing effect of this cyan light, as if it had never appeared.

The tent fell back into dead silence.

Lin Chen wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, looking at his palm that had returned to normal with a solemn gaze, his heart filled with turbulent waves.

The stone ring's ability to restrain and devour this extraterrestrial alien god energy was even more powerful than he had anticipated, even exceeding the category of a dead object.

But this also meant that he had been dragged into a terrifying vortex far beyond the cognition of the Central Continent's cultivation world.

Before he could sort out his thoughts, the originally silent night outside the stone tent was suddenly torn apart by an extremely shrill scream.

That was the highest-level warning issued by the second-tier Spirit Beast, the Scent-Seeking Beast, carried by Shi Lei, who was responsible for the night shift at the outer perimeter sentry post!

"Enemy attack!"

In the same microsecond that the alarm sounded, the stone ring on Lin Chen's thumb became intensely hot, as if scorched by raging fire; the premonition of danger poured down like ice water, making the hairs on his body stand on end.

Without any hesitation, relying on the instincts honed through countless brushes with death, Lin Chen exerted force under his feet, and instead of retreating, he Advanced, rolling frantically into the shadows on the right in an extremely awkward posture.

Almost within one-tenth of a breath after he left his original spot, three crescent-shaped, invisible blades with cold starlight dancing on their edges silently cut through the tough stone tent, crossing and slashing down onto the position where Lin Chen had just been sitting cross-legged.

The hard black stone floor was easily cut open like tofu into three trenches a zhang deep, the cut surfaces as smooth as mirrors, emitting a nauseating smell mixed with scorched and fishy odors.

If the starlight blades had been even half a beat slower, Lin Chen's body would have been cut into four pieces by this unstoppable force.

"Such sharp perception; those old useless people from the Tianji Academy losing to you is not too unjust."

A raspy, sticky voice, as if a poisonous snake were crawling across an eardrum, resounded over the camp.

Accompanied by this voice, the shadows around the camp, which had originally been covered by heavy Formations, began to churn violently like boiling water.

Five figures cloaked in wide black robes, their bodies radiating an atmosphere of dead silence, slowly emerged from the shadows like ghosts, vaguely sealing off all of Lin Chen's retreat routes.

Walking at the very front was a man with a withered face, his eyes revealing a hair-raising fanaticism and distortion.

Lin Chen recognized the aura on him at a glance; it was the same foul stench as the energy Master Jianzhen had secretly channeled within the Spirit Suppression Tower.

This person was none other than Ming Xing, a high-ranking priest of the Star-fallen.

He did not hide himself, and what was even more shocking was that his left arm, severed at the root, was neither bandaged nor healed; instead, it was densely covered with layer upon layer of writhing, silver star marks that moved like living creatures.

These star marks formed half a phantom arm, emitting a heart-palpitating fluctuation.

Ming Xing looked at Lin Chen, cracking his withered lips to reveal an incomparably ferocious smile.

He did not waste any more words, because the first rule of assassination is that if a strike fails, one must immediately unleash their trump card.

His only remaining right hand suddenly formed a seal and slammed heavily into the ground.

"Die, and become the sustenance for the Lord's descent!"

Accompanied by his frantic roar, blinding starlight suddenly erupted from beneath the entire temporary camp.

It turned out that before triggering the perimeter alarm, they had already used some kind of deceptive secret technique to bury a terrifying starlight Formation deep beneath the camp.

At this moment, the Formation was instantly detonated, and countless fine streams of starlight erupted from the ground like a waterfall flowing in reverse, weaving together in mid-air to form a massive, airtight, hemispherical starlight barrier, completely sealing Lin Chen, Commander Ling Wuying, Ying Wu, and the entire camp within.

Inside the barrier, the air seemed to instantly turn into solidified mercury, and the immense heaviness pressed down until people's bones creaked.

Once those wisps of starlight touched their protective spiritual light, they eroded it frantically like maggots on a bone, bringing a pain that penetrated to the marrow.

Cannot be trapped here, otherwise, we will be worn to death sooner or later!

Lin Chen did not activate a Magic Treasure to hard-clash against this indestructible barrier; instead, he surged forward, bearing that terrifying pressure, and charged straight to the edge of the barrier like a cheetah.

Under Ming Xing's mocking gaze, not only did he not dodge, but he made a suicidal move.

He raised his right hand without hesitation and slammed the thumb wearing the rough stone ring heavily against the barrier of light, which was flowing with violent starlight energy!

"Seeking death!"

Ming Xing sneered, about to detonate the killing Formation on the barrier to blast Lin Chen into dregs.

But the smile on his face froze completely the next instant.

Lin Chen's finger was not shredded by the starlight.

On the contrary, the moment it touched the barrier, countless silver veins, a hundred times finer than a strand of hair, suddenly appeared on the surface of the stone ring.

These veins, like a swarm of starving leeches, greedily and frantically plunged into the starlight barrier.

Accompanied by a teeth-grinding sucking sound, the terrifying energy on the barrier, which was enough to shred a Golden Core Late Stage Cultivator, actually flowed toward the stone ring along these silver veins at a speed visible to the naked eye, as if a huge depression had been gnawed out of it alive.

The stone ring was devouring it!

It was not just devouring; it was even rejoicing, converting those deadly Other-God powers into some kind of more mysterious foundation.

"Impossible!"

"What is this thing?!"

Ming Xing was terrified to the point of despair; he could feel the energy of the barrier draining away frantically, and even the mental connection between him and the Formation was being torn apart by that terrifying suction.

In panic, Ming Xing fell into total madness. He roared and desperately drained all the remaining starlight power in his body, gathering it at his fingertips to form a pale, substantial light spike. With a shrill whistle that pierced the Void Realm, it went straight for Lin Chen's glabella.

This strike condensed the entire vitality of a Star-fallen priest and was fast to the extreme. Lin Chen was currently fully controlling the stone ring to devour the barrier and had no time to dodge.

Just at this critical moment of life and death, a streak of pure, ink-like black blade light seemed to emerge from thin air, striking the pale light spike without warning.

It was Commander Ling Wuying!

He had been hiding in the deepest darkness, and only at this moment did he reveal his life-bound Magical Artifact, the Wujian Blade.

This blade had no reflection whatsoever; even the surrounding light would be swallowed by it.

The blade light collided with the light spike, producing no deafening roar, only a dizzying sound of energy annihilation.

With his formidable Golden Core Late Stage cultivation, Commander Ling Wuying forcefully blocked this desperate strike. However, the bizarre starlight power attached to the light spike remained incomparably powerful. Although its center was severed, its massive aftermath was forcibly deflected by the Wujian Blade at a fatal angle.

As luck would have it, this deflected, violent aftermath, like a cannonball fired from its chamber, slammed heavily into Lin Chen's stone ring, which was currently devouring the barrier's energy with all its might!

This strike was like pouring a ladle of ice water into a boiling wok of oil.

The struck stone ring did not shatter; instead, under the extreme compression of this external force, it erupted with a blinding silver light a hundred times more intense than before!

The light was so intense that even the air was scorched and distorted.

Immediately after, a chain of bizarre mutations occurred that would be unforgettable for a lifetime.

The Other-God power inside the stone ring, which had already been gorged to the point of bursting, formed an extremely terrifying reverse energy vortex the moment it received the heavy blow.

This was like a spring compressed to the extreme suddenly snapping open. The stone ring, mixing all the starlight barrier energy it had previously devoured with the remnants of Ming Xing's attack, rolled back in all directions in a more violent, purer manner!

With a loud boom, a visible ring of silver air waves swept across the entire scene like a tsunami.

Lin Chen, at the center of the energy explosion, had his blood and Qi roiling from the massive recoil force, but he clearly saw that in the silver energy tide rolling back, there were densely mixed cyan light spots peculiar to the stone ring.

These cyan light spots seemed to possess some kind of absolute kill attribute targeting the Origin of the Star-fallen.

The three black-robed assassins charging at the front didn't even have time to scream. The moment they were hit by this silver energy tide mixed with cyan light, their protective spiritual light shattered like paper.

Immediately after, an extremely bizarre scene appeared.

Starting from the parts where they were hit, their living flesh and blood bodies began to crystallize at an appalling speed!

The grayish-white, semi-transparent crystals crawled over their entire bodies like frantically growing vines in just half a breath.

A breeze blew, and the three bodies, now completely turned into crystal sculptures, emitted a crisp cracking sound, then, like shattered glass, completely crumbled into tiny crystal powder all over the ground, with even their Divine Souls thoroughly wiped out.

"Retreat! Retreat!"

Ming Xing's eyes were splitting, and his liver and gallbladder were chilled.

He never imagined that the sure-kill trap he had set would be backfired upon in such an inconceivable way.

Facing the sweeping cyan tide, he did not hesitate to crush a teleportation Talisman hidden deep in his palm, which was emitting spatial fluctuations.

Space was forcibly torn open into a black hole, and half of Ming Xing's body had already lunged into it.

However, the edge of the tide still grazed his left leg.

In the last tenth of a second before the spatial rift closed, Lin Chen clearly heard a scream so wretched it didn't sound human coming from the rift. The last image he retained was Ming Xing's left leg rapidly crystallizing at a speed visible to the naked eye, even beginning to spread toward the root of his thigh.

The battle subsided as suddenly as it had erupted.

The crystal debris all over the ground shimmered with a bizarre light under the cold moon.

Ying Wu walked out from the darkness, her movement technique light as she searched among the debris.

Soon, her gaze rested on a somewhat larger cluster of crystals.

She wrapped her palm in spiritual energy, carefully picked up something, and handed it to Lin Chen.

It was a jade token with only half remaining. The material was of superior quality, and although half of it had been shattered, the remaining part still clearly had a line of small characters engraved: Tianji Academy, Earth-Rank, Seventh Treasury.

Lin Chen took a deep breath, calming the spiritual energy rolling within his body from the continuous use of the stone ring.

He looked down at his right hand.

The originally mottled patterns on the surface of the stone ring had become somewhat clearer, and beside the original two silver veins, a third, extremely fine silver crack had shockingly appeared.

Lin Chen subconsciously rubbed this new silver crack with his fingertip, and a scene flashed through his mind like lightning.

It was on the top floor of the Spirit Suppression Tower; when Master Jianzhen waved his wide Daoist robe to demonstrate how to extract Geng Metal Qi, his cuff had exposed, for a fleeting moment, a piece of hanging cord used for suspending an identity jade token.

The weaving method and material of that cord were exactly the same as the small piece of charred rope remnant on this half of the jade token before him.

So that was it.

Just at this moment, from the outskirts of the camp, the Wind-Scenting Beast's frantic barking, full of agitation and unease, came again, the sound several times more wretched and sharp than when the enemy attacked before.

Shi Lei flew over from the perimeter, carrying his heavy shield, his face ashen.

Commander Ling Wuying's gaze suddenly turned to the southeast, and a trace of gravity flashed across his face, which was like an eternal iceberg.

Lin Chen followed their gaze. In the night sky about thirty miles to the southeast, the originally thick dark clouds were forcibly torn apart by a nauseating, dark red light.

It was an extremely massive energy fluctuation, filled with blood and resentment, even faintly outlining a terrifying phantom of a blood sacrifice totem pole in mid-air that reached straight to the sky.

And the black stone tablet fragment that Lin Chen had just retrieved into his Storage Pouch was now, as if receiving some kind of intense summons, emitting bursts of eager tremors in his palm.