Having survived the catastrophe at Feathering Immortal Valley, they had grown far more cautious. The Black Emperor had already scouted the area carefully from a distance, confirming there were no terrifying restrictive formations.
The tiger den remained just as before, dry and spacious, once home to fierce beasts, still lingering with a trace of killing intent.
Pang Bo’s expression froze — he had actually spotted divine crocodiles, their black scales gleaming with cold light, numbering over a dozen, lying motionless in a heap.
“Truly the persistent little runts — no matter where we go we run into you, back then you killed so many of my classmates.” Pang Bo lashed out with his large foot, kicking wildly.
“That’s not right — they’re all dead. Been dead for who knows how many years already.” said Li Tian.
Ye Fan and Pang Bo both loathed divine crocodiles intensely. Back when crossing the star region, these creatures had left an indelible impression of cruelty on them, having taken the lives of many dear friends — the sight of them stirred deep hatred.
“Dead for over twenty years, all died of old age.” The Black Emperor stepped forward, extending a large claw to poke and examine them carefully before making this pronouncement.
Ye Fan crouched down and examined them carefully as well — it seemed likely that when they had escaped from the primordial ancient forbidden ground back then, these creatures too had had their lifespans stripped away, and thus had died.
“Back then, there were actually this many divine crocodiles that didn’t die — they must have hidden inside the corpses of our old acquaintances, avoiding our notice, and then followed us out.” Pang Bo said with bitter resentment.
The divine crocodiles’ flesh and blood had long since decayed, but the black scales on the outside still gleamed with a faint dark luster, making them look eerily lifelike, cold and sinister.
Everything from that year had exceeded their imagination — some unknown presence had followed them across the star crossing, and it was not until they discovered Lin Jia’s phone that the first hints had begun to emerge.
“They… actually really did die!” Ye Fan’s pupils contracted — this outcome was beyond his expectations.
At the very deepest part of the tiger den, three figures appeared to have died from extreme terror, huddled together in the farthest corner, their bound arms still wrapped in decayed cloth strips and belts.
Over twenty years had passed, and they had long since turned to dry bones, with only a few key pendants, hairpins, and the like remaining, along with some rotted, tangled hair — a ghastly, frightening sight.
“Were we wrong?” Pang Bo murmured to himself.
Liu Yunzhi, Li Changqing, and Wang Yan were all dead — they were not the malicious hidden enemy targeting them in the shadows. Had they gone too far back then, abandoning them here like this?
Not far from the divine crocodiles lay the skeletons of two saber-tooth tiger cubs, no more than a foot long, and beyond that, a massive tiger skeleton lay sprawled there as well, with a small hole between its brows, pierced clean through and killed.
Back then, as they had left, they had heard a tiger’s roar, originally assuming it was the saber-tooth tiger returning to its den, discovering Liu Yunzhi and the others invading its lair and growing enraged — but it turned out this was not the case at all.
They stepped forward and carefully examined the three skeletons — each one had their jaw hanging slack, having died in extreme terror, pierced through the brow, killed by the divine crocodiles’ jaws.
“Based on my years of experience, these people died over twenty years ago. Judging by their bone quality, each of them lived to around twenty-five or twenty-six years of age — of course, if we brought in a tomb robber to examine the site, the assessment would be more professional.” said the Black Emperor.
“That’s right, it’s them without a doubt.” Pang Bo said in a low voice.
Though the three people’s hair had grown brittle, it still remained, and the hairstyles were completely different from this world’s — based on their bone structure and height, it matched the three of them from back then.
The female’s remains still had a necklace around the neck, hanging a blood diamond, stained with dried blood, still gleaming with a bloody light even now — it was precisely Wang Yan’s favorite piece.
“That sheep-fat jade piece Liu Yunzhi always used to show off — it’s here too. That was his most treasured possession — they undoubtedly died here.”
Such an outcome left both Ye Fan and Pang Bo feeling a wave of melancholy, a sense of loss — they had thought they’d finally uncovered the truth, only to find this instead.
Ye Fan had always assumed Liu Yunzhi wasn’t truly dead, that the enemy in the shadows was him — but now that the truth had truly been revealed, he found himself at a loss.
“Were we too heartless back then?” Pang Bo muttered to himself.
A gust of wind blew past, scattering fallen leaves in the distance, leaving them both in silence for a long while, neither speaking.
The Monkey and the others stood outside the cave — there was nothing they could do to help with this, only offering words of comfort, that whoever had wanted to kill them deserved this fate, nothing to feel guilty about.
“Exactly, they were fully intent on putting you two to death — leaving them alive would have been a great danger. Dying is only what they deserved.” said Li Heishui.
Ye Fan crouched down again, examining everything carefully once more, and finally let out a long sigh, standing up and saying: “I actually wish they hadn’t died.”
Who was the black hand behind all this? It remained utterly elusive — they had thought they’d figured it out, but it turned out to be nothing. Seeing this outcome left Ye Fan feeling very unsettled.
“No need to keep agonizing over it — let this Emperor perform a minor technique, restore their original appearance, and see what the final result reveals.” said the Black Emperor.
A beam of faint light shot out from between its brows, and the heads of the three skeletons instantly grew something resembling flesh and blood, reconstructing the facial features, restoring their original forms.
“Correct, actually it’s quite simple — this minor technique alone can reveal the truth.” the Monkey nodded. That was not truly flesh and blood, only spiritual power, reconstructing the original appearance based on the bone structure, able to recreate the deceased’s true likeness.
Ye Fan and Pang Bo watched tensely. After a moment, the faces of the three gradually filled out, taking their original forms, leaving them both filled with melancholy — it truly was Liu Yunzhi, Wang Yan, and the others, all three of them.
“That’s enough — no need to reconstruct further, it’s them.”
They left the tiger den, heading back out of the forbidden ground. Ye Fan fell deep into thought, wondering where exactly they had gone wrong, why the outcome contradicted their instincts, ran counter to their deductions.
“There’s no suspicious point at all — it dealt us a heavy blow out of nowhere.” said Pang Bo.
Ji Ziyue said: “The fact that there’s no suspicious point is exactly what’s most suspicious. It’s clear someone anticipated that you would come to verify this, and calculated every single detail with precision, misleading you into believing they truly had died.”
“Exactly right!” Ye Fan nodded.
“Summon Duan De!” said Pang Bo.
“Correct, call the tomb robber over — he has special methods, able to discern truth from falsehood.” said the Black Emperor, even it had to admit admiration for Fatty Duan’s specialized expertise, trusting in his methods.
Summoning Duan De was actually quite simple — they only needed to spread a rumor that some ancient great sage’s tomb had emerged somewhere, and that fat man would surely come running eagerly.
Of course, this time it wasn’t even necessary, because the Battle-Triumphant Buddha’s great battle here had shaken the entire Southern Region, and surely all the major powers, along with people like Duan De, would come to investigate.
Sure enough, that very same day, numerous cultivators arrived at this stretch of wild mountains, all coming from various great powers.
The Black Emperor, lacking patience, roared: “Summon Duan De.”
It spread a rumor among the crowd that the outer edge of the primordial ancient forbidden ground had cracked open, revealing many great chasms, and that an ancient tomb had appeared, suspected to be a sacred tomb.
The effect was superb — Duan De appeared full of energy, moving at a speed that left people astonished. When Ye Fan, the Black Emperor, and the others showed themselves, Duan De immediately jumped up and cursed and swore at them, saying they were too vicious — this wasn’t the first time — forcing him to rush back all the way from the Central Prefecture in a hurry.
“Brother Duan, you sure are busy these days.”
“Amitabha, this poor Daoist is practically becoming your summoned pet. Damn it, next time don’t call me unless the payment is a king-tier weapon.”
When they returned to the tiger den, every hair on Duan De’s body stood on end, and he stumbled back several large steps, his expression turning grave, saying: “Just what kind of existence did you people provoke?”
“You fat man, are you trying to scare us so you can charge us an outrageous fee?” the Black Emperor bared its teeth.
“I’m telling the truth — there was an extremely terrifying malevolent spirit dwelling here. I’ve only encountered something like this once before, in the tomb of an ancient Great Sage, and I nearly died in there.” Fatty Duan’s heart pounded with fear.
Duan De took out an ancient mirror, one he had looted from that very ancient great tomb he had just mentioned — this was also the reason Ye Fan and the others had asked him to come, needing this treasure, having once used it beneath the Abyss of the Falling Eagle Cliff, in the Purgatory.
This was the sole remaining Dao-bone left behind by a human-clan Great Sage after achieving the Dao — the frontal bone piece, eternal and everlasting. It was the immortal platform bone of a human, and a mirror ground from it possessed innate Dao patterns, endlessly profound, with numerous wondrous uses.
The mirror’s light flashed, illuminating the ancient cave, revealing a dim scene — Liu Yunzhi, Li Changqing, and Wang Yan’s terrified expressions reappeared, the female tiger returning to her den, the divine crocodiles crawling forth as well — everything unfolding exactly as they had previously deduced.
Right at the critical moment, the mirror’s light flashed again, and a blurred figure entered the cave, killing the divine crocodiles and the tiger, and grabbing hold of the unconscious Liu Yunzhi, Li Changqing, and Wang Yan.
“It really has changed — someone concealed the truth here!” Pang Bo cried out, clenching his fists.
At this moment, Duan De actually broke out in a cold sweat, unable to stop himself from trembling, saying: “This time we’ve run into something big — the biggest I’ve ever seen in my life!”
Suddenly, the mirror’s light flashed one final time, and just as that blurred black shadow carried the three people out of the ancient cave, it suddenly turned back, revealing to those watching in the mirror a cold, sinister smile — showing its true face for the first time, and it turned out to be a terrifying malevolent spirit!
Until this moment, everything had been blurred, its form indiscernible — but now, for the very first time, they truly saw it, ferocious and terrifying, gleaming white teeth, dead-fish eyes, pitch-black flesh, without a trace of life, an aura of death permeating the air!
Everyone instinctively stepped back — this malevolent spirit was simply too terrifying, appearing abruptly in the mirror, causing even the little golden phoenix bird in Ji Ziyue’s arms to have every golden feather on its body bristle upright.
The light within the bone mirror dimmed, and everything vanished, unable to be shown again. The stone cave fell into utter silence, a chilling, oppressive atmosphere lingering in the air.
“It’s the same malevolent spirit we saw in the bronze ancient coffin!” said Pang Bo.
“Correct, it’s exactly him — so he really did follow us out.” Ye Fan’s heart sank.
Those three people had never actually been killed by the divine crocodiles at all — they had been rescued by that malevolent spirit, who had concealed the truth of this place, leaving all of them feeling a chill down their spines.
Ye Fan and Pang Bo simultaneously thought back to the past — back then, in the bronze coffin, a classmate had died inexplicably, his neck covered in dark bruising, filled with blood marks, resembling exactly the fingerprints left by a malevolent spirit, as if he had been strangled to death.
Because of this, a confrontation had even broken out, dragging Ye Fan into it. Although he had eventually proven that person had been killed by the divine crocodiles, the purple fingerprint marks on the neck had been too obvious to explain away, and at the time the deduction had felt rather forced.
“So that means, back then, that classmate was first strangled to death by the malevolent spirit, and then the divine crocodile crawled inside his body afterward.” Pang Bo shuddered, a cold chill running through him.
Back then, that person had been right next to Ye Fan, practically pressed up against him, and had died so bizarrely just like that — now that the truth was finally clear, Ye Fan couldn’t help but shudder — that malevolent spirit had once been that close to him!
Duan De broke into a cold sweat, saying: “Damn it, you people always drag me into trouble. This kind of malevolent spirit is completely different from the ordinary yin-spirits we usually deal with — its cultivation runs frighteningly deep, probably a six or seven thousand-year-old ghost. Once it fixates on someone, it clings for an entire lifetime, until it achieves its goal!”
“Liu Yunzhi, Li Changqing, and Wang Yan aren’t dead after all, and now there’s also this malevolent spirit, plus the divine crocodiles — is there anything else that followed along with us when we crossed the star region?” Pang Bo muttered to himself — the process of crossing the starry expanse had been far more complicated than they had ever imagined.
“Wait a moment — you’re saying you two once set foot on the Ancient Star of Ominous Brilliance, a place suppressed by someone called Śākyamuni, some bald monk?” Duan De’s eyes lit up with sudden insight, as though something had just come back to him. “I remember now — when I went to do archaeological research at an overseas sea-demon’s great tomb, I met an old bald-headed man, who turned out to be one of that Śākyamuni bald monk’s Ten Great Disciples. We chatted through most of the night, and he told me some things…”