Refining the Mountains and Rivers

Chapter 922 – Secret of the Slash Marks

The skies were dark, like the eternal night had arrived.

If it weren’t for Qin Yu standing right beside Lei Xiaoyu, allowing her to clearly hear his breathing, she would have cried out in alarm.

The entire world was swallowed by darkness, making one feel as if they were the only ones left alive. The encroaching fear and unquenchable sense of loneliness were enough to crush the strongest wills.

Luckily, this darkness didn’t continue for too long. A faint blood-colored light sprinkled down from above.

Lei Xiaoyu’s eyes widened. She looked at the blood moon that had appeared. It hadn’t been there a moment before, but now it was in the heavens.

The feeling it gave off was that it had existed for tens of millions of years and would continue to exist like this.

“Big Brother Qin, this is…”

Qin Yu looked at the ground that was bathed in red once more. He slowly said, “I thought it was like this. A great terror is about to arrive.”

He looked at the blood moon quietly resting in the skies and his pupils shrank. Because today’s blood moon was even rounder and fuller than the last time.

This was likely to bring about unknown and even more horrifying changes.

Qin Yu never thought that his guess would be confirmed so quickly. When the tree hole started to shake, the dead heaven-reaching tree was revived once again.

Whoosh –

Whoosh –

Countless dead branches turned into bloody tentacles that shot towards the opening. Lei Xiaoyu shouted out loud, her face instantly paling.

Qin Yu pulled her back. Soon, the slashing marks at the entrance released a silver-colored light and the blood red tentacles stopped once again.

But this time, Qin Yu furrowed his eyebrows. He remembered that when the blood moon appeared before, the tentacles stopped a hundred feet away from the opening. But now they had come in even deeper.

Measuring the distance, the tentacles were at most 70-80 feet away from the opening.

His eyes swept over the silver slash marks at the tree hole’s opening. Then, he looked up at the even fuller and brighter blood moon in the skies. His eyes darkened. Was this the reason?

If the blood moon in this mysterious land followed the waxing and waning rules of the moon in the outside world, then this blood red moon still had a time to go until it became a perfectly full moon.

In other words, if Qin Yu’s guess was correct, then over the next few times the blood moon appeared until it reached perfection, the power possessed by the revived dead tree would become stronger and stronger.

Once the slash marks at the entrance weren’t able to block the tentacles anymore, this place of temporary safety would become a death zone.

After hovering around for a while, the tentacles retracted once again. Just like yesterday, the dead tree pulled out its roots, twining them into thick legs as it rumbled off into the distance.

Lei Xiaoyu had finally regained her composure. Disbelief flooded her eyes. “Big Brother Qin, this tree came back to life, it actually came back to life!”

Qin Yu looked at the direction the tree was going in. He knew that it was heading towards the same mountain valley from yesterday and the same bloody scene of death and slaughter would reappear. He thought for a moment and said, “Xiaoyu, in a while you might see something that leaves you uncomfortable. If you can’t stand it, seal your senses and stand behind me.”

Lei Xiaoyu pursed her lips. “I understand.”

Like yesterday, the withered tree climbed up the steep mountain cliff, rapidly ascending to the summit where the great mountain valley appeared.

The smell of blood from yesterday had completely vanished, as if some unknown existence had sucked it all up.

After yesterday’s battle, the number of cultivators and monster beasts that was reduced by half had basically recovered to the original amount Qin Yu first saw.

It was clear that this place wasn’t sealed up. It connected to the outside world, and this was the only reason it was continuously replenished with new troops.

If there was a passage, then this wasn’t a land of absolute death. There had to be a way to leave…

Taking a step back, even if this was a danger zone, Qin Yu would still use his fists and break open a path to survival!

Before he could think more, a chill coursed through his heart as if something had locked onto him. He could hear loud heaven-shaking rumbling sounds.

He turned his head and saw the massive body of a bone beast. Covered in blood red moonlight, it wildly rushed over.

It roared out loud, its giant hollow eye-sockets fixed onto Qin Yu. The gaze was so intense that it almost condensed into substantive killing intent…as if all the water in the world would be unable to wash it away.

The withered tree instantly reacted. Its legs spread out and countless roots drilled into the rock walls to fix itself there. At the same time, innumerable tentacles formed from dead branches howled out at unimaginable speeds, causing the air to explode.

In an instant, the giant beast collided with the tentacles and a sky-shaking explosion rang out. The tentacles that struck the giant beast instantly collapsed. But, they clearly had an incredible regenerative ability. The broken tentacles regrew in the blink of an eye, restored to how they were at the beginning.

Countless blood red tentacles twined together, forming a massive cage that trapped the bone beast within it.

At the mountain summit, the battle between the withered tree and the bone beast attracted attention from all sides. A quiet eerie light shined in the eyes of the creatures that had been revived by the blood moon.

Hou –

With an enraged roar, the bone beast tore through the cage of tentacles. It didn’t continue throwing itself over. After giving Qin Yu one final glare, it returned to its own position and roared into the skies.

Beneath the blood moon, its damaged bones started to recover at a speed visible to the naked eye. In a few breaths of time it was fully restored.

The attention from the mountain summit shifted away, falling back into the valley.

The withered tree didn’t pull out the roots it had stabbed into the mountain top. It was like a great tree that had grown here for countless years. It had enough confidence and strength to withstand any baptism of wind and rain.

Qin Yu was secretly frightened. Yesterday, he had expected that these terrifying creatures who climbed up the mountain, waiting to eat the blood energy, had to be extremely powerful. But only today did he truly see how much destructive power they possessed.

Beneath the blood moon, they seemed to obtain a horrifying boost of power. So, the strength they could erupt with far surpassed Qin Yu’s imagination.

This world immediately rose several levels on the danger scale in Qin Yu’s mind.

Lei Xiaoyu said with a pallid complexion, “Big Brother Qin, this bone beast seems to be the same one we saw in the underground abyss.” action

Qin Yu nodded. “That’s right, it’s the same one. What you are seeing now, I saw yesterday. It was because I didn’t understand it that I wanted to seek out the nearest bone creature to us in hopes that I could unlock the secret behind its resurrection.”

As he spoke to here he shook his head. It was clear that these terrifying creatures only lived beneath the blood moon. Even if they were in a ‘dead’ state, they weren’t easily destroyed.

Otherwise, the cultivators and monster beasts who were forced to desperately risk their lives in this mountain valley would have used every means at their disposal to help these creatures sleep for eternity.

Lei Xiaoyu looked at the numerous grim-faced cultivators and monster beasts in the mountain valley. “What are they waiting for?”

Qin Yu quietly uttered, “I think they are waiting for the true horror of this world.”

When he finished speaking, there was no need to explain further. Because bulges already began to appear on the cliff walls. Under the blood red moonlight, they were clearly visible.

The bulges burst open and black-armored warriors spewed out, carrying sabers in their hands. Without any hesitation, they flapped the fleshy wings on their backs and howled forward.

There was no emotion or thought in the opened eyes of these black-armored warriors. There was only endless violence, killing, and destruction!

Even though Qin Yu had seen this before, when he saw the tragic and brutal battle taking place in the mountain valley he still felt startled.

If one fell into this sort of fighting, unless one had the absolute power to suppress it, even a fierce tiger would eventually be exhausted of all strength and die on the battlefield.

Lei Xiaoyu subconsciously grabbed onto Qin Yu’s arm. She shivered. If it wasn’t for Qin Yu, she feared she would have slumped to the ground.

Perhaps she had heard that her father had experienced a battlefield that was far more cruel and vicious than this. But the impact of seeing it with her own eyes was a hundred times, a thousand times greater than hearing about it.

Smelling the thick stench of blood in the air, Lei Xiaoyu hugged onto Qin Yu tighter. This wasn’t because she had no courage, but was from the natural fear all living beings had towards death.

Qin Yu lifted a hand and covered her widened eyes. He softly said, “Don’t be afraid. We are safe here. If you cannot forget this sight, just take it as a vivid nightmare.”

He placed his other hand on Lei Xiaoyu’s neck. Her body tensed and she fell into Qin Yu’s arms. He placed her on the floor. Even though she was unconscious, she was still furrowing her eyebrows together. He sighed inwardly.

Since they were both in hell, there were some things she needed to know. He had no idea when they would leave and what sort of situations they would encounter in the future. Lei Xiaoyu would eventually have to face all of this.

He sat down beside Lei Xiaoyu and subconsciously held her hand. He looked at the slash marks at the entrance.

Everything he saw in the mountain valley, including the evasion of the dead tree’s tentacles, proved that the silver light from these slash marks held a great deterring power against the revived creatures. They didn’t dare to take a single step past it.

If he could control this strength then this purgatory would become safe. In fact, these horrifying creatures would become chickens and dogs in Qin Yu’s eyes.

Of course, it wasn’t easy to control this strength. Otherwise, in this world that had existed for an unknown period of time, wouldn’t someone have thought of the same thing?

Qin Yu didn’t believe he was smarter than most people. Since these horrifying creatures were still in control of this blood moon-covered world, it was clear that the strength within the slash marks was still a secret even now.

And what Qin Yu wanted to do was to figure out this secret. If it were any other cultivator, it would simply be wishful thinking.

But after refining the jade embryo egg, Qin Yu’s level had far surpassed those at his boundary.

He looked at the slash marks that emitted steady silver light. A thought appeared in his heart. If he could figure out the secret behind these markings…then there would definitely be a great harvest waiting for him.

He drew in a deep breath and suppressed the restlessness in his heart. This wasn’t the time for that. Who knew what sort of consequences would be waiting for those who tried to unravel this secret?

If an accident occurred and he ruined these slash marks, this peaceful resting zone would become unbelievably tragic.

The brutal battle continued for almost 24 hours. The black-armored warriors dragged away the corpses of their partners as well as those of the cultivators and monster beasts, retreating like a tide.

After eating enough blood energy, the 12 satisfied creatures turned and left.

Without reason, before the bone beast left it swept its rage-filled eyes over. Qin Yu looked up at the skies.

The blood moon was about to disappear and the time for the bushes to illuminate the world was about to arrive. He had a safe period of around 24 hours to crack the secret of the slash marks.

Rumble rumble –

The withered tree wildly rushed back to its original position and took root. The blood moon disappeared as suddenly as it appeared.

The world fell into darkness. Then, a faint light quietly brightened the land…the curtain to the terrifying night had come to a temporary end!