171: Chapter 171 Little Finger, Old Snow Mountain

Li Xiuyuan had never heard of a Mountain Spirit being able to bear offspring before.

Hearing from Qing'er that this Mountain Spirit had actually beguiled the Bodhisattvas and Buddhas of the Western Heaven made Li Xiuyuan feel a bit better.

He had cultivated to such a level and had been extremely cautious from the moment he saw the fake Queen Mother of the West, yet he still ended up falling for her trick.

He had thought it was his own failing, but looking at it now, this wanton Mountain Spirit indeed possessed some formidable means.

"Qing'er, thanks."

Li Xiuyuan said to Qing'er in his heart.

"There is no need for such formalities between us. First, take a look at where you are and find a way out,"

Qing'er's voice calmed down as she spoke placidly.

Li Xiuyuan gave an acknowledging grunt, averted his gaze from the shriveled human skin by his feet, and began to carefully examine the cave.

The cave was not large, with rough walls and not much else worthy of note.

Li Xiuyuan swept his gaze inch by inch across the walls, his golden vertical pupils shining like two dim lanterns in the dark rock face, illuminating the details hidden in the shadows one by one.

"Since you can contact me using your Spiritual Sense, it means there shouldn't be any Restriction isolating your perception here,"

Qing'er's voice echoed within his mind and Spiritual Sense.

Li Xiuyuan should still be within the range of the Kunlun Mountains, rather than having been dragged into another dimension.

Li Xiuyuan nodded. "I can feel it. Although the fluctuations of Spiritual Qi here are chaotic, there is no fundamental disconnection from the outside atmosphere. It's just that the structure of this cave is somewhat peculiar, not looking like a natural formation."

He raised his hand, his fingertips brushing against the stone wall beside him, which felt coarse and damp. He then paced slowly along the wall, his gaze scanning back and forth across the space of about twenty to thirty square feet, taking in every single corner.

After a moment, his footsteps came to a halt in front of the wall directly ahead of him.

There was a small, recessed niche in the wall, about a foot wide. The edges of the opening were polished very smooth, unlike the marks of natural erosion.

It was empty inside, with a thin layer of dust settled at the bottom, the shape of which outlined a neat rectangle.

Something must have been placed here before, but it had been taken away at some point.

Li Xiuyuan's gaze lingered on the empty niche for a moment, and then he noticed that there was something else in the shadows to the left of the opening.

He reached two fingers into the niche. The moment he touched the object, a hard, bone-like texture was transmitted to his fingertips.

He pinched it gently and brought it before his eyes.

It was a human pinky finger. The bone was intact, but the skin had shriveled and shrunk, presenting a waxy yellow texture like a specimen that had been air-dried for a long time.

The cut was flat and smooth, appearing to have been severed cleanly by something extremely sharp.

Just as he was about to put the finger back, Qing'er's voice sounded in his Spiritual Sense, her tone slightly tense: "Look closely at the base of that pinky finger. Are there a few distorted marks carved on it?"

Hearing this, Li Xiuyuan turned the finger over again, his gaze falling on the knuckle at the base.

Indeed, on the dry skin on the outer side of the knuckle, there were three extremely faint, distorted lines.

Those lines were not natural skin patterns, but looked more like they were Acquired, carved on later. However, after being eroded by long years, they had become very faint, almost unrecognizable without close observation.

"Yes, three in total, all squiggly and distorted,"

Li Xiuyuan said.

Qing'er fell silent for a moment, and then her voice rang out again: "That belongs to the Queen Mother of the West."

Upon hearing this, Li Xiuyuan was incredibly surprised. He hadn't expected that his first "meeting" with the real Queen Mother of the West would actually be seeing her pinky finger.

But why would there be a pinky finger of the Queen Mother of the West here?

And what were those three distorted marks?

"What are these marks?" Li Xiuyuan asked.

"Back then, the Queen Mother of the West suffered the backlash of the Heavenly Dao, and those three marks are the brands left by that backlash,"

Qing'er's voice sounded in his Spiritual Sense, carrying a quietude unique to reminiscing about the past.

"Those marks would erode her divinity day and night without stopping, like maggots on a bone, impossible to eliminate. Over time, she simply severed that pinky finger from the root and hid it in a corner where the Heavenly Dao could not perceive it."

Li Xiuyuan looked at the waxy yellow finger in his palm, his golden vertical pupils flickering slightly. "Right here?"

"Yes."

"This cave was a hiding place she chose herself. In the depths of Kunlun, beneath an abyss that never sees the light of day, the Heavenly Dao is hard-pressed to reach. She hid the finger here and set up layers of Restrictions to ensure it wouldn't be discovered by anyone,"

Qing'er said.

At the same time, she also provided a way to leave this place.

Since that finger was where the backlash brand of the Heavenly Dao resided, there existed an extremely weak yet unbroken connection between it and the Heavenly Dao.

If Li Xiuyuan could briefly borrow the aura of that finger and allow the Heavenly Dao to perceive its presence, a thread of connection would be generated in the unseen, allowing him to find the exit.

As for how to borrow it, he only needed to infuse it with Spiritual Qi to make this finger briefly possess vitality.

His connection with Qing'er was temporarily suspended.

Li Xiuyuan hesitated no longer. Holding the finger in his palm, he slowly infused it with Spiritual Qi.

The instant the Spiritual Qi surged into the fingertip, the waxy yellow, dried-up finger was like dead wood soaked in water for a long time, beginning to plump up at a speed visible to the naked eye.

The shriveled skin smoothed out again, and the waxy yellow texture gradually faded, replaced by a warm, blood-toned luster.

The finger bone glowed faintly beneath the skin, and even the three distorted lines became clearer, as if something long-dormant was awakening within this severed finger.

...

At the same time, Li Xiuyuan felt an extremely heavy gaze descend from high above in the unseen.

The gaze was formless and shadowless, yet it felt as if the entire sky had pressed down by an inch, weighing heavily upon his shoulders.

His Spiritual Sense had nowhere to hide under that gaze, as if he were being scrutinized from head to toe by an invisible pair of eyes, unable to conceal even his slightest thoughts.

It was a gaze from the Heavenly Dao!

It had sensed the existence of this finger and, following that faint thread of connection, penetrated the layers of barriers of the Kunlun Mountains to land upon this dark abyss of a cave.

Li Xiuyuan did not look up, for it was not something that could be captured by the naked eye.

He steadied his mind and, using the pull of that gaze, spread his Spiritual Sense in all directions.

Sure enough, at the end of that gaze, Li Xiuyuan sensed a direction.

Deep within the stone wall directly ahead of the cave, an extremely narrow crack was flickering in and out of his Spiritual Sense.

Just as he was preparing to retract his Spiritual Sense and step toward the crack, the finger in his palm suddenly trembled slightly.

Li Xiuyuan looked down. The finger, which had just regained its flesh-and-blood luster, was now drying up at an extremely rapid pace in his palm. The skin shriveled once more, and the joints disintegrated joint by joint, turning into fine powder that trickled down through the gaps between his fingers.

In just a few breaths' time, the pinky finger of the Queen Mother of the West was completely reduced to ash.

Looking at the remaining powder in his palm, Li Xiuyuan had not expected this finger to dissipate so quickly.

But there was no time to ponder, for the gaze of the Heavenly Dao was receding at an equally fast pace. Once that thread of connection vanished completely, finding the exit again would likely require a great deal of trouble.

Thus, Li Xiuyuan made a prompt decision. With a shift of his body, he stopped maintaining his human form.

A silvery-white light exploded around him, illuminating the cramped cave as bright as day.

His Qiu Dragon body stretched out in that instant. The silvery-white scales reflected fine glints of light on the rock walls, and the towering horns atop his head almost brushed against the stalactites on the cave ceiling.

He lowered his head, his golden vertical pupils locking onto the direction of the crack.

Then, gathering all his strength, he slammed fiercely against the stone wall.

*BOOM!!*

A deafening roar exploded inside the cave. The entire cavern shuddered violently under the impact, and the stalactites overhead snapped one after another, crashing to the ground and shattering into several pieces.

The stone wall finally cracked with several fine, dense fissures. These fissures spread out like a spiderweb, emitting a creaking, fracturing sound.

Until the entire stone wall could no longer hold out, completely disintegrating and turning into countless fragments that flew to both sides. Sunlight crudely forced its way into the pitch-black cave, and the mountain wind poured in from the outside, carrying a fresh scent of vegetation and the chill of high altitudes, blowing away the decay and dust that had accumulated in the cave for who knows how many years.

And at the very moment the stone wall shattered, the entire Kunlun Mountain range seemed to be shaken by this power.

On the distant ridges, snow avalanched down from the steep cliffs, making a dull, rumbling sound like the breath of a giant beast. The gravel and pebbles sleeping in the valley began to slide down the mountain slopes, kicking up grayish-white dust.

In the few villages closest to the foot of Kunlun Mountain, the mountain folk working in the fields stopped their chores at the same time. They looked up toward the towering mountain range in the distance, feeling the ground beneath their feet trembling slightly.

"Is it an earthquake?"

"It doesn't seem... like an earthquake, does it?"

"There's a noise coming from the mountains, did you hear it?"

"Has the Mountain God awakened?!"

Standing on the ridges of the fields, they looked at each other, their expressions gradually turning from confusion to solemnity.

...

A dragon's roar echoed for a long time among the Kunlun Mountains, as if an ancient will that had slept for ten thousand years had finally awakened, issuing a declaration to heaven and earth.

The silvery-white Qiu Dragon body soared through the clouds, its scales reflecting a piercing brilliance in the sunlight. Wherever it passed, the clouds were torn in half by the massive body, like silk sliced by a sharp blade.

The mountain folk at the foot of the mountain fell to their knees one after another, murmuring prayers for blessings that had been passed down for who knows how many generations.

They did not understand cultivation and could not distinguish between a Dragon and a Jiao; they simply assumed that the legendary Mountain God had manifested and was patrolling his domain.

Li Xiuyuan did not pay attention to them. Instead, he locked his gaze onto the Golden Gate still standing in the valley in the distance.

In front of the tall and towering lintel, the vast mountains and the clear sky formed a distinct boundary, like a fixed brand eternally embedded in this earth.

He landed steadily back in front of the Golden Gate and transformed back into his human form. His moon-colored robe billowed in the wind, his long hair fell loose, and his golden vertical pupils stared at the scene behind the gate, which was no longer pitch black.

The darkness behind the gate had completely dissipated, replaced by a vast, boundless white.

Snow mountains rolled continuously, covered in thick snow, while in the far distance, several towering snow peaks pierced through the clouds like swords stabbing straight into the sky.

That mountain range was completely different from the Kunlun Mountains just now, carrying a tranquility that seemed forgotten by time.

Qing'er's voice sounded in his Spiritual Sense: "This time behind the gate, there shouldn't be any more danger."

Li Xiuyuan fell silent for a moment, then lifted his foot and stepped over the threshold.

His feet stepped onto the snow, making a soft creaking sound. A chill spread up from the soles of his feet, carrying the unique, crisp scent of the snow mountains.

He raised his head, his gaze piercing through the filling snow and the distant ridges, looking toward the summit of that snow mountain.

A magnificent, golden palace stood majestically there.

There was no fierce beast in front of the main gate of the palace, and the stone steps were empty, with only snow covering each tier of the staircase.

Li Xiuyuan began to walk up the snow-covered mountain path.

The mountain path was winding and rugged, flanked by towering snow peaks and jagged rock walls. Occasionally, a few cold-resistant pines and cypresses poked their branches out of the rock crevices, laden with deep white snow, swaying gently in the wind.

The air was crisp and thin, carrying the dryness and cold unique to snow mountains, giving a nearly stinging sensation when inhaled into the lungs.

As Li Xiuyuan walked, he spread his Spiritual Sense in all directions.

His Spiritual Sense pierced through the snow layers and those ancient trees that had been frozen for who knows how many years, slowly wandering along the edge of this independent world.

Gradually, it outlined the contours of this heaven and earth.

This was a Small World independent of the outside, sharing a subtle similarity with the Lord River God's Ancient Grotto-Heaven.

Only, the structure of this world was even more exquisite, and its Spiritual Qi was denser, carrying a sense of order that had been meticulously maintained.

The boundaries here were clear and stable, by no means a natural formation; some extremely powerful existence had personally carved it out and maintained it to this day.

His Spiritual Sense continued to probe deeper.

Just then, Li Xiuyuan suddenly noticed an extremely subtle anomaly: there seemed to be a delicate discrepancy between his footsteps and the flow of time in his perception.

The time he perceived did not match the changes in the things he saw with his own eyes.

He stopped his footsteps and looked back.

The winding mountain path behind him had already extended quite a distance. He had already reached the mountainside, and the palace ahead was much closer, its outline clearly visible in the wind and snow, even the snow on the roof tiles could be distinguished.

But he clearly remembered that from just now until now, he had walked for less than two minutes, and he hadn't deliberately used any travel techniques. How could he have suddenly reached this spot?

Li Xiuyuan stood in place without moving.

"Does this world possess some kind of mechanism that makes me subconsciously ignore the passage of time?"

To verify this conjecture of his, he looked toward the palace at the summit and took a few more steps forward. Li Xiuyuan forced himself to concentrate, looking down at his feet, even counting the steps silently in his heart.

"One, two, three... fifteen..."

When he counted to fifteen, a flash of golden yellow appeared in the corner of Li Xiuyuan's vision.

Turning his head to look, he was astounded to find that he had actually already walked to the main gate of the palace at the summit.