56: Chapter 56 Qi Meridian Stealth, Ironclad Aberration

Underground Palace Level 1, inside the Qi meridian tunnel.

In the extremely narrow and oppressive square refined iron pipe, Gu Shen crawled forward silently.

The tunnel was pitch black, filled with the smell of rust and aged dust. If not for his Qi Refining Level 7 night vision ability, an ordinary person would have already suffered a mental breakdown in such a claustrophobic space where even turning around was difficult.

Yet he remained extremely calm.

In his mind, the veins of the Qi meridian tunnel map were incredibly clear.

"The Artifact Refining craftsmanship of this Ancient Sect is truly divine. These crisscrossing underground Qi meridians are all forged from extremely thin yet exceptionally tough exotic refined iron, surviving the ages without decaying."

Gu Shen crawled while inwardly marveling.

Following the guidance of the map, he was currently sliding down a main trunk line at an extremely steep angle toward the Underground Second Level.

About an incense stick's time later.

In the darkness ahead, a faint trace of red light appeared.

Gu Shen slowed down, sticking to the cold pipe wall, gliding toward the light like a falling leaf.

It was a grid louver made of hundred-refined steel. The red light was shining in from outside the window.

Gu Shen suppressed his breathing to nothingness and looked down through the gaps in the grid.

Below was an extremely wide hall. Unlike the dense, narrow dwellings on the first level, this hall had rows of thick load-bearing pillars standing around it, and several glazed Magical Artifacts that were still struggling to survive, emitting a faint red light, hung on the walls.

The Formation hub of this Ancient Sect actually still had a trace of remaining power after thousands of years!

But the scene inside the hall made Gu Shen's pupils shrink.

Tragic.

Extremely tragic.

The ground was covered in dried, blackened bloodstains, and the walls were densely covered with bottomless small holes. With Gu Shen's experience, he could tell at a glance that these were traces left by some kind of terrifyingly powerful rapid-fire hidden weapon.

And in the center of the hall, a behemoth was wandering.

It was a humanoid monster nearly a zhang tall. Its entire body was wrapped in a set of extremely heavy, matte black battle armor. Even its head wore a face mask inlaid with transparent glaze.

But from the gaps in the battle armor, clumps of deformed tumors oozing yellow fluid were squeezed out. Its right arm had completely mutated, the bones piercing through flesh and arm armor, transforming into a pale bone blade three feet long.

"A guard wearing heavy armor in life, polluted by poison light after death, causing his Physical Body and this set of refined iron battle armor to undergo Fusion?"

Gu Shen saw through the monster's background at a glance.

The pressure of a Middle Stage of the Second Order. It was twice as powerful as the Aberration encountered on the first level!

Coupled with that battle armor that had almost no blind spots, if they clashed head-on, even with his top-grade gold-severing saber, Gu Shen would have to expend a lot of effort. Once the commotion grew too large and attracted the siege of other unknown monsters on this level, he would fall into a dead end.

"Occupying the high ground, assassination is the best approach."

Gu Shen's eyes were cold, his right hand quietly gripping the hilt of his blade.

He did not use the power of thunder to avoid exposing his position prematurely due to the lightning. He simply injected a wisp of pure Geng metal magic power into the blade.

Click.

An extremely slight crisp sound. The four corners of the louver were instantly severed by the sharp blade tip.

Just at the moment when the armored Aberration was dragging its bone blade, swaying as it walked directly beneath the ventilation duct.

Gu Shen moved.

He held the severed iron window with his left hand and plummeted from the ceiling several zhang high!

The sound of the wind from his descent finally alerted the monster.

Roar!

The armored Aberration suddenly looked up. That face, already rotting and twisted beneath the glazed face mask, let out a roar, and the thick bone blade instinctively slashed upward.

But Gu Shen's speed was too fast.

"Solidify!"

In mid-air, a flash of green light appeared, and the Wood Armor Technique instantly covered his entire body.

Gu Shen did not dodge or avoid it, letting the pale bone blade slash fiercely onto his shoulder. The Wood Armor Technique emitted an extremely grating friction sound, vines snapped, and the huge reactive force numbed half of his body, but he forcibly withstood the blow.

Borrowing the momentum of the fall and the monster's counter-force.

Gu Shen gripped the blade with both hands, following the momentum downward.

Soul-Shocking Spike!

In his Sea of Consciousness, the transparent spike instantly shot out, penetrating the glazed face mask without any obstruction, fiercely stabbing into the monster's remaining central hub in its Sea of Consciousness.

The monster's movements suddenly stiffened, and it let out an extremely painful muffled groan.

Clang!

The thunder pattern gold-slaying blade finally erupted with blinding, dark blue lightning!

Gu Shen's blade did not hack at the hard helmet, nor did it cleave at the heavy chest armor. Instead, it was extremely precise and ruthless, following the extremely narrow gap in the neck armor exposed when the monster looked up, and stabbed in with one strike!

Sizzle!

The lightning exploded deep within the monster's cervical spine!

The overbearing thunder-magnetic power instantly destroyed all the nerves and mutated flesh connecting its central hub.

Thud.

The massive body, like an iron tower drained of strength, smashed heavily onto the blood-stained floor. Green, foul-smelling bodily fluids slowly flowed out from the gaps in the face mask.

Instant kill!

Gu Shen knelt half-way beside the corpse, exhaling a long breath of turbid air. The spiritual light of the Wood Armor Technique on his left shoulder had dimmed and was throbbing with pain, but he did not even frown.

Killing a Middle Stage Aberration only consumed twenty percent of his magic power; this was the highest efficiency of the Dao of Survival assassination.

He stood up and pressed one hand on the corpse.

In his Sea of Consciousness, the virtual fire of the [Heaven and Earth Furnace] swept through.

"This monster polluted by poison light, though its Physical Body is strong, the quality of White Dew extracted is still inferior. On the contrary, these armor plates fused with mutated bones and refined iron are exceptionally tough and are excellent spiritual materials for refining outer armor."

Gu Shen put the two drops of White Dew and that piece of mutated iron armor, which was the size of a washbasin and exuded a cold metallic luster, into his storage ring.

After clearing the battlefield.

Gu Shen then raised his head and carefully examined the hall.

All around the hall lay a dozen skeletons that had long since turned into white bones. Judging from the black clothing and refined iron short staves scattered beside them, this must have been a guard outpost for the underground palace during the refuge.

In the corner were several extremely heavy refined iron weapon racks, but they were already empty.

Gu Shen's gaze followed the holes of the hidden weapons all over the walls and finally landed on a giant door directly in front of the hall.

That was the passage door leading to the Underground Third Level.

But at this moment, the state of this door was hair-raising.

The door was not opened, but was struck by some kind of extremely terrifying brute force from the inside (the direction of the third level), causing it to bulge outward into a huge bump!

On the half-foot-thick profound iron door panel, there were dense, inch-deep fist prints and claw marks.

Even the gaps at the edges of this door had been completely cast shut by the guards using a high-temperature Spell (electric welding), as if to Seal the things behind the door forever down below.

"The guards in this outpost were not defending against external enemies back then."

Gu Shen walked to the bulging profound iron door, and through the cold iron plate, he seemed to be able to still feel the despair and madness of that time.

"They exhausted all their hidden weapons, used up all their weapons, and in the end, they went to the extent of welding the door shut completely. What they were defending against was the terrifying wave of Aberrations rushing up from the lower levels... that is, from the depths near the thunder pool hub!"

The Thirteenth Underground Level had a poison light leak. The further down one went, the heavier the pollution, and the monster's order and level of terror increased exponentially!

The first level was the graveyard for refugees.

The second level was the desperate defensive line of the guards.

Then what about the third level and the fourth level?

Gu Shen took a deep breath, forcefully suppressing the palpitation in his heart.

The waters of this underground palace were even deeper than he had imagined. But he had no choice. He could not return to the Cultivation World for the time being, so he could only seek life from death in this dead zone.

He turned around and walked toward a row of closed iron doors inside the outpost hall.

As a vital guard area, there must be supplies or a higher-tier mundane armory. Since the guards here were all dead, the things here belonged to him.