Pathway 42 Deathkeep

Either way, he knew he had by-pa.s.sed a disastrous outcome.

Jufeng stared at his raw and dirty hands. Oh, how fast and hard he had dug in order to escape the many deadly claws. It was good that his body was strong from birth and that he grew up stronger. The energy from the magical pills and beasts that his mother had took when she was pregnant was showing on his body. Moreso, he had fortified his body with chi energy. How else could he have managed to do this?

He looked at the hole he had dug through the base of the tunnel but there was no hole there. It had disappeared.

"Uh?"

No way was that an illusion. He had dug meters long hole. Alright, it was a collapsed hole and that he had the sharpness runic sword. Still, he had spent long time digging the collapsed hole and his hands would testify to this.

He placed his hand on the s...o...b..gat the hole should be and his hand actually pa.s.sed through the s.p.a.ce.

Though, it was only big enough for him to crawl through, the orginal hole wouldn't have only allowed more than a fully grown man to squeeze through.

After cleaning up his hand as much as he could, he decided to check his body for further sustained injuries. He was doing that, when he felt a lump through his robe. He opened his robe and dug out the lump casually. When he saw what the lump was, he sprang up in utter shock and joy.

"The Star-Tide!"

The broad smile on his face could dampen the brightness of the sun. He had thought he had lost it the moment he jumped up from his lotus position. Fate was definitely on his side here.

A luminous treasure! Even if it had no value to him at the moment or in the nearest future, it was still an extremely precious luminous treasure. He wrapped the bead in a parchment before keeping it in his spatial sac.

As he was putting away the bead, suddenly, he remembered the talisman he bought at the market. The Mountain Bark. He should have used this since arriving at the Aculum Divinis. Maybe he would have suffered less than he was recently. He didn't even know if the talisman was working. Nevertheless, he put it on himself. Any little form of diffense was important in this place.

To regain expended strength, he took out some turtle meat and a jar of preserved goat milk as he revelled in the moment. As he relaxed and waited, Jufeng could still hear the banging sound of battle that was still on-going, on the other side of the tunnel.

After waiting for several minutes, he decided to check the tunnel he was in. He kept in mind, not to venture deep but to only check his immediate vicinity. Heavens knows what other dangers were there in the tunnels.

This area was totally different from the area he was in before.

He continued walking slowly forward until, suddenly, a thick stone wall sprang up in the pa.s.sage behind him, cutting him off from the hole.

Heavens' tears! A tunnel trap?

He must have triggered an unseen hatch or.... .

Jufeng was still examining the wall, when large areas of the two sides of the pa.s.sage walls, suddenly sank. Two large pa.s.sages were revealed to Jufeng, from where he heard low screeching sounds approaching from the other end of the three pa.s.sages.

"s.h.i.+fting tunnel."

He had tried his best to check out for tunnel traps, yet, he was caught in a more dangerous one. Jufeng could vaguely see the bodies of the creatures in the darkness of the pa.s.sages as the got nearer.

Critters.

Smaller than nephilia critters. They should be mountain critters. He switched to his spiritual sight and was temporarily relieved when he saw their aura was also not as strong as their giant neighbours. Nevertheless, he was dismayed to discover a large number of them coming from the three pa.s.sages. No matter how it looked, he knew trouble was coming.

From the spot he was standing, he would be at a disadvantage when fighting. He decided to s.h.i.+ft forward, thereby, narrowing it down to two smaller directions.

He tried to test out the White-Flare, the first stage of the sword technique he had learned, the Skylight. But with the sword he was holding, he could only manifest a faint white light. Not that it could do much anyways, it wasn't really an attack move. It might be useful against Nether plane ent.i.ties but it had no use against other ent.i.ties.

Although, the silver-grey sword had no core, it still possessed a sharpness rune. He would have to do with that and tried not to die. He circled vast amount of Chi energy through his meridians and into his body.

Feeling his body stronger and lighter, Jufeng went on the attack before they could totally back him to the wall.

The critters were fast, but with his flashsteps, he was faster than them. And the blade? It was truly a thing of beauty. It was cutting into the critters like threads. This was why soul-forgers were revered in the cultivation world.

Albeit taking some minor injuries, he kept on cutting them down as they kept on coming. It was actually a good way for him to practice and improve his martial arts. He was beginning to enjoy the killing also. The strange sensation. So, this is how a continous killing felt like. No wonder many demons had so much karmic sins since they couldn't stop. Or wouldn't? When their minds were already corrupt.

He remembered the words of his grandfather. To defend one's life and others, killing would be justified if it couldn't be avoided. And would surely be justified if it concerned creatures with no awareness or sentience. Creatures like these critters.

The battle continued until the nephilia critters appeared with fury and the mountain critters withdrew back into the large pasages. The good thing? Only one could occupy the smaller pa.s.sage at a time. One stayed at the front ready to confront Jufeng while the second one stayed at the back, screeching.

The nephilia critter was much more faster than their mountain counterparts and more or less faster than Jufeng. How could it be so fast? It must be a magical beast.

More Chi energy into his body.

With the nephilia critter, he was on equal footing. The longsword was not doing much damage to it due to its strange carapace that was acting like a defensive armor. Its claws are extremely sharp too. it was attacking with so much rage that Jufeng had to be in defensive stances most of the time. Although, he suffered minor cuts, he managed to avoid any mortal injury.

Those cuts should have resulted in serious wounds, yet, he couldn't even feel them much. Maybe, the talisman was really working, and together with his Chi fortified body? Maybe, he actually had a chance.

He continued to block and backtracked until he found the opening he was looking for. The critter was expecting the same routine. It would slash with its claws while Jufeng would block. But when Jufeng saw the opening, he stepped into the beast's left and rolled under its left hand. He swung the longsword in a low blow, slicing the softer under-arm of the critter.

The critter, instinctively, swiped the back of its claws at Jufeng. The force of the impact, sent Jufeng flying further back into the tunnel where he was sprawling on the ground. It was as if he was. .h.i.t by a t.i.tan's hammer. He thought he was fortunate it wasn't the razor ends of the claws. Those would have been fatal to him, talisman or not,.

He quickly staggered upright as he regulated his laboured breathing. He looked at the place his sword had made contact on the critters' body. He had managed to inflict one cut on the critter.

Yes, his sword had drawn blood. How did that felt, critter?

But the trickling of the blood, further infuriated the critter and its claws began to glow in a sizzling hunter green color. The death and rotten aura coming from it was exceedingly overpowering.

Organic poison.

A form of necrosis. There are some creatures that were created with some portions of the elements in their organs. These nephilia critters and spiders, were created with poison glands in their bodies. They could harnessed these various poisons into their claws. This made them extremely dangerous.

Jufeng watched the sizzling green claws. How could this, even, be fair? Before, the fight with the critter was on a less foot, and now, it was on survival. His survival. Since the talisman couldn't prevent cuts, he musn't allow the poisonous claws to mark him. The poison could be deadly.

Despite not knowing the dangers that could be lying further into the tunnel, he agreed with himself that it was time to flee in that direction.

He contemplated using the second stage of the quicksteps, the swiftsteps. But decided to stick to the flashsteps, since he didn't know what sort of trap or creature, he could run into. The less faster flashsteps would allow him to adjust his tranjectory in the shortest notice.

He took off and the two nephilia critters followed. They were as fast as lightning, really fast. He was carefully watching the pa.s.sage as he ran by. The critters were almost on him when the pa.s.sage s.h.i.+fted again which threw them off balance as they came to a halt. They were in a lighted circular area with symbols and signs of various letters and designs.

There was nowhere to go now. The critters sensing blood, went in for the kill. They attacked him together.

Jufeng was preparing to defend himself when the ground of the circular room, opened. The two critters couldn't control their momentum and they were caught in it. As they were falling, the last one of the critters, reached out with his right claw and caught the robe of Jufeng.

Jufeng, who was still struggling at the edge of the opening to retain is footing, was dragged down the through the opening into the chasm beyond.

It was as if he had been falling for a thousand years, though it took seconds. An ancient mystical art. The main effect wasn't even the eerie feeling of forever falling, it was the force of impact. The impact knocked the air out of him making him to loose consciousness for an instant.

When he came through, he discovered he was lying on top of one of the critters. The claws of the one he was on, was inches away from his face. Any closer, they would have entered his head. The two critters had been impaled on the obsidian spikes that were protruding out of the ground. How fortunate he was to land on one of them. If not, he would have been more than dead.

He managed to sit up and looked around. He needed to leave obsidian traps. Using the bodies of the critters as cus.h.i.+ons, he jumped out of the area. Upon landing, he checked himself for any sizzling wound from the poisonous claws but couldn't find any. But, his robe was torn in many places and was quite dirty while his body had the normal cuts .

Relieved, he removed one bloodroot medicinal pill from his sac and put it in his mouth. He found a place close-by and rested for a moment. After regaining most of himself, he carefully checked where he was.

This place was just getting stranger by the pa.s.sing time. The rocks in this place were not Carbonado or topaz but Palladium. He knew right away that he was no longer in the mountain. This was a very different place. The tunnels here were larger and were made of Orbash Palladium. And more noticeably, there were orbs of eternal fire located higher on the tunnels.

He decided to take the one on the left. He had walked a short distance when he saw two kids battling one death-eater and quickly turned back. The kids were like ones of those demiG.o.ds. How could this be? Did it meant he was now inside the deathkeep tunnel? It couldn't and shouldn't be.

All the tunnels he tried were filled with kids battling various creatures. Only one was free from the sound of metals clas.h.i.+ng but was too silent for his comfort. He was contemplating what to do when a death eater suddenly appeared to his far right. Decision made for him. He quickly took the silent one. If only he could find a spot to hide in here. He hadn't gone far when a hand suddenly pulled him into a s.p.a.ce.

"Uh?"

He found himself staring at young kids like himself. He only saw empty s.p.a.ce there just now. Invisibility? Force-field? The kids had a deadpan seriousness on their faces. Though, they've surpressed their auras, but from their looks, he could guess they were Asuras.

Did it meant he was now in deathkeep tunnel? How could that even be possible?

He was looking at them with questions written all over his face when one of them, the same girl he saw at the mountains, held a finger to her lips and pointed in the direction Jufeng was heading.

What could be at the front? He was much more concerned about the death-eater. There was no way he would want to face one. He followed her finger's direction and soon saw what she meant.

"A plane-drifter."

There were powerful ent.i.ties in the Lumence dimensional plane who had transcended ascension but refused to ascend, hence, became a Plane-Drifter.

Now, this was a true walking death.
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Upon getting to the edge of the silent tunnel, the death-eater stopped and made a calling sound. Only for it to be hit with one ma.s.sive and lightning-fast blade light.

Jufeng stared at the corpse of the death-eater who was cut into two. He was turning his attention towards the plane-drifter, when the figure turned and looked straight at them.

"You three are in my force-field, you know. Drop the little cover and step closer. Now."

The plane-drifter looked at the two demiG.o.ds with pure contempt.

"You two should know better than entering this tunnel. You should. I was going to kill you but I will let you live, for now. Don't ever come back here. Leave."

Turning away from the asuras, he pointed at Jufeng.

"You, stay."

After the two asuras had diappeared in a flash, with the death-eater ignoring them, the plane-drifter observed Jufeng keenly.

"You have a message for me, mortal. Speak before I change my mind."

Jufeng ruminated on the words the grey tree had told him, carefully. If the plane-drifter was not in the mood, either he oblitrate him or let him live, for now. Nevertheless, he needed to speak.

"Senior, where should I go if I'm lost in the tunnel?"

"Emberless grove."

"Senior, who am I going to ask for?"

"Regallash. Now speak.

"Senior, he wants me to show you this scroll."

Jufeng produced the scroll of sentience and handed it to the plane-drifter before continuing.

"And to tell you that, "when the sun and the moon sings, eternity dances."

The plane-drifter was quiet for a long time as he was lost in thought. Then, he turned and directed his gaze at Jufeng.

"What do you seek in return, mortal?"

"Senior, this young and humble one seek the Mystic-Order."