Crash!
Like a blade-hewn precipice, a jagged black ridge stood slanted against the earth. No wind stirred, no clouds drifted; night hung low and heavy.
Only colossal waves, thick as city walls, surged from afar to smash against the foot of the cliff with deafening roars.
Crash after crash, yet the black cliff remained towering and unyielding.
The turbid yellow waves seemed powerless against it, gradually receding after countless futile assaults.
As the roar of the tide dwindled to the panting of a cornered beast, a glimpse of the scenery at the base of the cliff was revealed.
Pebbles worn smooth of all edges blanketed the shore like pearls, intermingled with scattered bones of unknown demonic beasts strewn everywhere.
A breeze began to stir, rolling a skull across the smooth shore until it bumped against a charred corpse.
Thud!
From the charred corpse, a wisp of blue-white flame suddenly bloomed.
The skull, already riddled with hairline cracks, instantly crumbled into dust.
And the blue-white flame, as though entirely drained of strength, died down completely, dissipating back into the corpse.
"Ugh..."
A muffled groan abruptly sounded, and the corpse stirred eerily!
A wrist twitched, fumbling over the ground for a moment before straining with agonizing effort to turn the body over.
That single turn seemed to exhaust every ounce of his strength.
A pair of eyes abruptly opened. All within sight was pitch blackness, devoid of moon and stars.
Where am I?
Luo Chen struggled to move his lips, but no sound came; he could only murmur within his heart.
He attempted to unfurl his divine sense, yet for reasons unknown, barely a hundred zhang beyond his body it met tremendous suppression, unable to probe an inch further.
This suppressing force was even harsher than when the Yellow Wind Grand Array was deployed in the Yin-Yang Remnant Realm!
Unable to seek outward, Luo Chen had no choice but to turn his gaze within.
One look was all it took for his heart to plummet.
Dire!
Utterly dire!
Even worse than when he had departed the Southern Border!
His Nascent Soul was withered to the extreme; the tiny figure could not even open its eyes, appearing as though the slightest movement would shatter its form.
Throughout his entire body, whether in meridians or acupoints, not a trace of magic power could be found.
If that were all, it might still have been bearable, but even the physical power of the flesh he relied upon most was reduced to mere dregs.
His source power was depleted, vast swaths of his meridians were fractured, his extraordinarily hard bones were webbed with fissures, and even the Hundred Poisons King Gu dormant in his stomach had fallen into a deep sleep.
All of this was courtesy of those turbid yellow ocean waves!
Gradually, Luo Chen recalled what had transpired.
After he hurled the slow-moving Black King out of harm's way with all his might, the waves had surged in too swiftly, swallowing him in an instant.
He had thought he could erupt with his full might to break free immediately.
He had never anticipated that beneath those turbid yellow waves, magic power would dissipate without rhyme or reason, as if absorbed by the seawater itself.
Left with no alternative, Luo Chen had repeatedly unleashed other means.
The Nirvana Holy Fire burned everything in its path, yet amid the boundless turbid yellow surges, it was like trying to put out a forest fire with a cup of water.
Sword qi surged as the Yuantu Sword sought to cleave a bloody path out, yet when it slashed forward, it felt as if striking empty air.
He had intended to cross the yellow sea by sheer strength of his physical body, but trapped inside, there was nothing to brace against, and all sense of direction was lost.
Worse still, the turbid yellow waves seemed capable of melting anything, relentlessly corroding Luo Chen's body.
Driven into a corner, Luo Chen had no choice but to continuously stimulate his source power to protect his flesh.
Even that proved insufficient!
Luo Chen had directly brought forth his greatest trump card—the Wither-Bloom Divine Fire!
It had to be said that compared to the relatively weak, incompletely metamorphosed Nirvana Holy Fire, this fifth-rank divine fire—which he had painstakingly nurtured for nearly three hundred years—did not disappoint.
Spurring the Wither-Bloom Divine Fire regardless of magic power consumption, it stubbornly withstood the corrosion of the turbid yellow waves time and time again.
It had kept him alive until the very end.
Yet the price was the complete exhaustion of his magic power.
Moreover, because he had driven the Wither-Bloom Divine Fire far beyond safe limits, his physical body suffered a severe backlash.
And that was not all...
Looking inward to his Purple Mansion, the flame tree that had once been lush and dripping emerald green now drooped withered and limp, devoid of any vitality.
When he tried to communicate with the fire spirit, it barely gave any response.
Luo Chen understood that at the final moment, without collapsing his Nascent Soul, his magic power had no longer been enough to sustain the Wither-Bloom Divine Fire; it was the fire spirit itself that had depleted its own foundation to preserve a sliver of life for him.
It was an instinctual act of protecting its master.
"To think that I, a grand Alchemy Grandmaster who looked down upon peers of the same realm, who slew numerous powerful foes, whom neither Great Cultivators nor Great Demon Emperors could overcome, and under whose blade even a heavily wounded Soul Formation cultivator fell... yet a mere surge of ocean waves nearly drove me to my death."
"Haha..."
A bitter laugh rattled out from Luo Chen's throat.
The raspy sound, like sandpaper grating against his throat, groaned out laboriously into the night.
It sounded wretched, but in truth, it was good news: it indicated Luo Chen was regaining control of his body.
With immediate danger temporarily averted, Luo Chen quickly assessed his condition and began pondering his current plight.
Just what were those turbid yellow waves... Why do they feel so familiar?
Reining in stray thoughts, Luo Chen combed through the labyrinth of his memories, ignoring the throbbing agony in his head to track down where this sense of familiarity originated.
Yet no matter how he searched, there was no trace to be found.
In the end, Luo Chen had to give up for now.
I wonder if Black King managed to escape. I hope he wasn't swept in as well.
Luo Chen sighed inwardly. Ceasing the pointless mental strain, he stilled his mind and began cautiously mobilizing a shred of magic power from his Nascent Soul itself.
At this moment, his Nascent Soul was no different from a porcelain doll.
A single misstep, and it might shatter to pieces.
When that happened, the immense magic power constituting the Nascent Soul would surge forth violently, and with his body in its current frail state, he would likely be blown apart instantly.
Fortunately, Luo Chen required very little magic power.
Just a tiny sliver!
Only just enough to open his storage ring.
A faint gleam flashed at his fingertip, and a medicinal pill appeared. He gently popped it into his mouth.
Gulp.
After swallowing the pill, Luo Chen closed his eyes.
Rather than actively refining it, he allowed the pill's gentle strands of medicinal power to diffuse on their own, nourishing his flesh.
Time trickled by.
The sound of the receding tide seemed to gradually return to his ears.
Luo Chen dared not imagine what fate awaited him if the turbid yellow waves swept back in while he was in such a state.
As dawn approached,
crisp cracking sounds began to emanate from Luo Chen's body.
Large patches of charred skin peeled away from his frame.
Luo Chen abruptly sat up.
"Phew..."
Exhaling a mouthful of foul breath, the stark-naked Luo Chen did not even have time to feel relieved that he hadn't been wearing the Xuanchen Armor before instinctively scooting back several steps.
Crash!
The turbid yellow waves surged in, washing over the soft sand where he had just been lying.
As the tide rose and fell, Luo Chen's heart settled slightly.
After a night of recuperation, his formidable physique had relied on its astonishing vitality to heal, eventually squeezing out a trickle of source power that granted him mobility once more.
He looked in dread at the turbid yellow sea not far away, which looked capable of devouring all creation, and that familiar sensation surfaced in his mind again.
Where on earth have I seen this, or in which ancient record did I read such a description?
No matter for now—leave this place first!
He tapped his ear, and the Huntian Cudgel materialized. Leaning on the cudgel as if it were a walking stick, Luo Chen struggled to his feet.
No longer looking at the turbid yellow sea, he turned around.
With a single glance, the blade-hewn black cliff struck his eyes.
In an instant, everything came rushing back to him.
As if in disbelief, he looked back at the turbid yellow sea once more, his lips trembling as he rasped out two names:
"The Yellow Springs Sea!"
"Broken Soul Cliff!"
Whoosh...
A sea breeze swept across. Clad simply in hemp robes and leaning on a stone cudgel, the solitary man stood alone, appearing utterly diminutive between heaven and earth.
...
Along the rugged mountain path, Luo Chen walked alone with heavy steps.
Information regarding this forbidden land of the Northern Sea flowed through his mind like a gentle stream.
The Northern Sea was vast, home to countless perilous places.
Through humanity's repeated pioneering efforts, many danger zones had been conquered, turning into protective barriers for great sects and factions instead.
Such was the case for the Arctic Yama Heavens, and likewise for Wuzhong Valley.
Even Purple Spirit Island, where living things could barely approach, had once been conquered by Luo Chen and turned into a herb garden for cultivating Purple Monkey Flowers.
Yet there remained many places where cultivators could scarcely set foot, or where exploring required paying an enormous price.
For instance, the Sunken Sea he had once visited, and likewise this Broken Soul Cliff before his eyes!
Rumor had it that Broken Soul Cliff was a forbidden land deep within the Demon Sea. Discovered by a rogue cultivator in early years, the Northern Sea holy land, the Yuan Demon Sect, later organized a group of Nascent Soul and Core Formation experts to venture there, but more than half perished within, earning it the moniker "Broken Soul."
Later, Patriarch Soul Refining of the Yuan Demon Sect set out personally to explore Broken Soul Cliff, reaping a bountiful harvest.
Yet he had explored it only that once; afterward, he never set foot upon it again, right up until the downfall of the Yuan Demon Sect.
Regarding such a forbidden land, Luo Chen naturally held a deep impression.
In fact, he had witnessed it once with his own eyes.
The reason he had failed to recall it last night was that that previous encounter had not been witnessed by his true body, but through the eyes of a puppet when he used a soul-splitting technique to escape Moon Hermit's pursuit.
Later, after forming his Nascent Soul on Longyuan Island, Luo Chen had once retraced his path, attempting to glimpse the sight of the Yellow Springs Sea and Broken Soul Cliff.
Regrettably, on the return journey, he found nothing.
It was also that experience that made Luo Chen realize the Yellow Springs Sea was not fixed in a single location, and Broken Soul Cliff moved along with it.
This was a wandering forbidden land!
Could it be that I ran headlong into the moving Broken Soul Cliff, and was thus swept into the Yellow Springs Sea?
Halfway up the pitch-black cliff, Luo Chen paused to catch his breath, looking down with a bitter smile.
Could he truly be that unlucky?
Yet this was likely the only plausible explanation.
A stationary Yellow Springs Sea might easily be overlooked at worst, but with preparation, one could still steer clear of it.
However, if the Yellow Springs Sea was in motion, no one could fathom its speed.
Especially back then, when Black King obeyed Luo Chen's command and swam at top speed, crashing straight into it.
There was another point of suspicion: to Luo Chen's knowledge, Broken Soul Cliff was exceedingly bizarre—once any living being entered, their divine soul would become muddled and stuporous, rendering them unable to resist as the Yellow Springs Sea devoured them.
Yet while he had been unable to break free at that time, he had certainly been capable of putting up some resistance.
Was it because my divine soul foundation is profound? Or perhaps the Prison Suppressing Soul Technique was functioning all along, preserving this thread of life for me?
Luo Chen did not flatter himself thinking he was peerlessly mighty.
In such a bizarre place, where even Soul Formation almighty figures dared not venture in person, his divine soul foundation alone could never have held out for so long.
He could not figure it out!
Luo Chen glanced once more at the boundless turbid yellow sea in the distance and let out a faint sigh.
Before Divine Lord Youli ascended, he had warned him that a great calamity would arrive unexpected in the future.
Could it be crashing into the Yellow Springs Sea, meeting his end at Broken Soul Cliff?
That would be far too abrupt!
He had not even had the chance to stimulate the lingering aura of the Calamity Gu on the Hunyuan Cauldron.
Better to find a safe spot first and restore my condition!
Treading upon the hard rock, Luo Chen pressed forward, heading away from the Yellow Springs Sea.
...
When night fell once again, the sound of the tide by his ears receded.
Luo Chen halted before a cave hollowed out of a massive boulder.
This place was quite decent. Not only did it shelter him from wind and rain, but it also offered an excellent vantage point overlooking the distant sea.
Its sole drawback was likely the complete lack of spiritual energy.
Yet this hardly counted as a significant flaw, for after walking an entire day, Luo Chen had not found a single place with a spirit vein on this island.
He would just have to make do.
With a thought, an array of bottles and jars appeared before Luo Chen, all filled with pills accumulated over the years.
Furthermore, most were of the supreme grade!
Ordinary pills had long since been depleted during his daily cultivation.
Only these most precious pills were worthy of being kept at hand.
"I wonder if this will be enough to restore my magic power?"
Luo Chen murmured, a look of worry showing in his eyes.
Earlier, while crossing the Southern Ocean, he had already consumed a large portion of his reserves to recover magic power.
Back then, the Southern Ocean at least had sparse stray spiritual energy between heaven and earth; here, however, it was like a barren land devoid of all spirit—there was nothing at all, forcing him to rely entirely on pills.
Moreover, it was not merely a matter of restoring magic power; he also had to nurse his body back to health so he could regenerate source power for emergencies.
Although he had encountered no spirit veins nor any living creature along the way, who knew if some unexpected mishap might occur?
Only by returning to his peak state could Luo Chen's mind truly rest at ease, and only then would he possess the strength to seek a way out.
Only...
"Can I even leave?"
Staring at the pitch-black sea, Luo Chen's heart could not help sinking.
...
Without spirit veins, restoring magic power was an arduous task.
In particular, Luo Chen needed to divert a portion of his magic power to heal his physical body, which slowed progress even further.
Time slipped by quietly, and several months passed before he knew it.
On this day, Luo Chen rose to his feet and emerged from the cavern dwelling.
Standing atop Broken Soul Cliff, he gazed far out toward the turbid yellow sea.
Faint fluctuations of magic power lingered around him, and his essence, qi, and spirit were in fine condition, proving that months of painstaking effort had not been in vain.
Yet Luo Chen still dared not let down his guard in the slightest.
Looking into the distance, Luo Chen pondered carefully.
Over these past months, he had not merely cultivated behind closed doors; he had also conducted experiments from time to time.
Broken Soul Cliff was not exceptionally high, roughly three thousand zhang, and he was situated only halfway up the shaded side of the mountain.
The island itself was not large either, measuring around eight hundred li in length and breadth.
Consequently, within such a modest expanse, Broken Soul Cliff stood as a solitary, towering peak, exceptionally prominent.
Yet the Yellow Springs Sea sprawling outward was immensely vast!
Even with the vision of Luo Chen's Scarlet Eyes Golden Pupils, which could look several thousand li in a single glance, he still could not see its boundary.
Furthermore, through his experiments, he had indeed discovered that the island beneath his feet—and even the sea around it—was constantly on the move.
Though its speed was sometimes fast and sometimes slow, occasionally grinding to a halt, it was indisputably moving.
By Luo Chen's estimate, it was currently lingering near the Southern Border, having remained stationary for quite some time.
In addition, there were several other findings from his exploration.
Namely, this place not only lacked spiritual energy entirely, but even when activating the true intent of laws, he could not draw upon the heaven-and-earth origin qi.
This revelation filled Luo Chen with inexplicable terror!
Heaven-and-earth origin qi was omnipresent unless one departed from this world.
And without departing, what did being unable to draw upon heaven-and-earth origin qi signify?
Luo Chen needed only a moment's thought to arrive at the answer.
An entity possessing power far exceeding his own had severed the resonance between him and heaven and earth, rendering the true intent of laws useless.
What kind of power could surpass him so vastly?
Soul Formation?
Even ordinary Soul Formation almighty figures would likely be incapable of reaching such a degree.
Only a formidable existence infinitely close to the Void Refining stage, like Divine Lord Youli, could achieve this.
Coupled with the constant movement of Broken Soul Cliff, a hypothesis formed in Luo Chen's mind.
"Divine Lord Youli once said that in this world, one cannot break through to the Void Refining stage; only the peak Great Desolation creatures native to the Mountain Sea Realm are exempt from this restriction."
"If this island, this Broken Soul Cliff, and even this Yellow Springs Sea are all transformed from a single Great Desolation creature, then everything makes sense."
"Just like that Mirage Dragon Grotto-Heaven in the Central Plains!"
"The question is, is this Great Desolation creature alive, or is it dead?"
Luo Chen took a deep breath and slowly retracted his gaze, intending to head back to his cave to resume his cultivation.
However, as he drew his gaze back, it paused for an instant at the base of the cliff.
Where the tide had receded, the soft black sand faintly glistened with a peculiar sheen.
Chapter 972