Ze Tian Ji (Way of Choices)

The so-called sky was the edge of the space. It did not have weight, so its fragments were naturally lighter than the lightest leaf. The fragment fell gently towards the grassland, sometimes in the east, and sometimes appearing in the west hundreds of li away. It was impossible to estimate its trajectory at all.

After an unknown amount of time, under the attention of countless terrified gazes of despair, the fragment of the sky finally landed. It may have been on purpose, or it may have been accidental, but it landed perfectly on the mountainous Monster Bull. Immediately, the fragment transformed into extremely dazzling white flames, which gave off an endless amount of light and heat. The Monster Bull gave out a moo of grief and indignation, and disappeared into the white flames. Nothing remained of it, not even ash or smoke.

The grassland shook violently. In a radius of several li, the monsters all fell onto the ground one after another. The monsters that stuck to the ground, like the dragon serpents, were shaken even more, shaken to the point where they vomited blood and died. The shaking spread to the area around the mausoleum, and the cracks between the huge rocks and gray stones spat out a lot of dust.

The two maids, Ning Qiu and Hua Cui, were shaken awake. They could feel the terrifying explosion of energy in the distance. Their terrified faces were pale, and they did not know what was happening. Nanke closed her eyes, and felt the crack in the blue sky. She vaguely understood something, and mumbled, “So it was like that.”

Things that were already happening could not be changed. What had to be done was to find the cause of the matter. Chen Changsheng quickly retracted his gaze, and looked at the origin of the clear light that had shot into the sky. He discovered that the clear light had been emitted by a stone pillar in front of the mausoleum.

In the surroundings of the mausoleum, there were ten stone pillars that were similar in shape. Yesterday, when he and Xu Yourong had arrived in the mausoleum, they noticed the stone pillars—the stone pillars were around several dozen feet in height, and some patterns with unclear meanings were carved on the surface. With the erosion of time, wind and rain, the patterns had become very blurry, making it even more impossible to understand their meanings.

He had noticed the ten unremarkable stone pillars because they made him think of the stone pillars outside the Li Palace. It was also because when the stone pillars were compared to the grand mausoleum, they seemed overly shabby and unpresentable, giving off a very strong feeling of dissonance. They seemed to not be qualified for the mausoleum, and were not an integral whole with it at all. Looking at it now, the ten stone pillars that seemed to be unremarkable were indeed unusual. Such terrifying power was actually hidden within a stone pillar, and the clear light that it had given off was able to shatter and pull off a fragment of the sky.

The fragment of the sky transformed the strong Monster Bull into nothing, and at the same time, it disappeared. The grassland became peaceful again, or in other words, deathly silent. No matter if it was Chen Changsheng, the two maids or the countless monsters, they could only stare at the stone pillar. There was an indescribable sense of nervousness and restlessness.

Suddenly, a layer of rock fell from the surface of the stone pillar. The layer of rock was around several fingers thick and several inches wide. It shattered into many pieces when it landed on the gray stone ground, giving off a soft smash. The sound was very soft, but it seemed very hair-raising in the deathly silent grassland. The monster tide began to surge, and it was unknown how many monsters had been frightened and had fallen into the water plants.

A while later, another Qi pierced through the surface of the stone pillar. It transformed into a clear light, and left the mausoleum without a sound.

At that moment, Chen Changsheng felt it. It was an extremely ancient Qi that was paramount without equal.

The Qi was even older than the continent.

Just what were the stone pillars?

This time, the clear light did not fly towards the blue sky, and instead floated in a tilted and very casual manner towards the edge of the grassland. It was not known where it would fly to before stopping. Countless terrified gazes focused on the clear light, as if they were following it with their eyes. They saw the clear light fly over a thousand li away, and were no longer able to see where it was clearly.

After a very long time, there was a muffled sound of collision and a clear rumble. It had originated from the edge of the grassland over a thousand li away, and spread to the surroundings of the mausoleum. Because of the great distance, the muffled sound was not clear. However, the tremble remained as violent, causing countless water plants to fly up, and the mausoleum to be cloaked in dusk once again.

The powerful tremble caused Chen Changsheng to stumble. However, his gaze was steady, and remained focused on the stone pillar. He noticed that another layer of rock had fallen.

The stone pillar had experienced the effects of wind and rain, so its surface was extremely rough. The color was dark gray, and it seemed like ordinary stone. After the two layers of rock fell off from in front and behind it, the inner part of the stone pillar was revealed. Under the bright sunlight, it could be seen extremely clearly that it was… black.

The Qi from inside the stone pillar continued to pass through the surface and disperse outwards. It turned into rays of clear light, and danced above the grassland. It would sometimes land on the sky high up, sometimes on the faraway edge of the grassland, or sometimes on the ground not far away from the mausoleum. It would rip the sky, flip the earth and bring terrifying explosions.

The rays of clear light contained an extremely terrifying power. It was unblockable, even if Chen Changsheng had ten thousand swords with him. This was because the Qi that came out of the stone pillars had already far exceeded what he could understand. It was a power that was not recorded in the Daoist Canon.

The world shook. The violent energy exploded and enveloped the entire Plains of the Unsetting Sun. Although it could not be seen, it could be imagined that the rest of the Garden of Zhou was also in such a situation.

With the appearance of the rays of clear light, the layers of rock on the stone pillar constantly fell off, shattering under the stone pillar. It revealed more and more of the true appearance of the pillar. It was still stone inside the pillar, but the color was black. It seemed like a patch of mottling, like a book of rubbings that were not done well.

Looking at the mottled surface of the stone pillar and the black stone that was revealed underneath, Chen Changsheng felt that it was rather familiar for some reason.

Thinking of a certain possibility, the knuckles of his hand that held onto the dagger hilt paled slightly. His body trembled gently, and his lips were abnormally dry. Before, when he faced up against the Golden-winged Great Peng, he was daring enough to fight it with the dagger in hand, but now, seeing the stone pillars, he seemed to have even lost the courage to draw his dagger.

Full of shock, he thought in his heart… impossible.

The stone pillar continued to give off clear light. The layers of rock continued to fall off without stopping, revealing more and more of the black that was inside.

The explosions of the violent energies finally met, which turned into countless terrifying whirlwinds. They began to blow violently and wreak havoc in the grassland.

Most of the shaking from the surrounding Garden of Zhou traveled to the mausoleum, and reached his feet.

What was even more terrifying was that the remaining nine stone pillars surrounding the mausoleum also began to tremble slightly. Layers of rock fell off the stone pillars with cracking sounds, and the terrifying Qi was about to appear.

Chen Changsheng held onto the dagger hilt. He knew what he should do, but he did not know how he could do it. He felt slightly absent-minded.

The hilt trembled gently.

As it turned out, the ten thousand broken swords were used to suppress the stone pillars. More correctly, they were used to temporarily seal the Qi in the stone pillars.

Now, the Sword Sea had been taken by him, so the objects hidden in the ten stone pillars were about to appear.

Just what were the stone pillars?

Chen Changsheng already guessed it, but he did not dare to believe it. He did not want to believe it.

However, it had already truly happened.

A large portion of the layer of rock had already fallen off the stone pillars.

A square-shaped black stone slowly appeared before the world.

It stood tall and upright between the heavens and the earth.

Although there were still a lot of leftover layers of rock on the surface of the black stones, complicated lines that were barely comprehensible could already be seen.

Chen Changsheng obviously felt that it was familiar. It was impossible for any person who had stared at it for so many days to not find it familiar.

In a mausoleum in the south of the capital, he had once seen many objects that were similar to the black stones.

There were countless lines on the surface of the black stone. The lines were patterning and texts. With texts carved onto the square stone, it was naturally a monolith.

As it turned out, the black stones were monoliths.

Black stone monoliths.

Heavenly Tome Monoliths.