Tu Kui led the disciples through the air. Before long, a palace spanning a hundred zhang came into view. Li Guanqi was stunned. Was this built just for the secret realm?
Once everyone had gathered, Tu Kui took out a jet-black jade token and tossed it into the air. A rippling portal of light opened before them, its edges distorting like waves in water.
“Fifty Foundation Building Realm disciples will be entering the secret realm today,” Tu Kui announced.
He continued, “I hope all of you return safely. Remember, killing fellow sect members is strictly forbidden! Your identity jade slips will record your every move. If anyone so much as thinks about harming a peer... hmph! The sect will show no mercy. Now, hurry up and enter!”
Li Guanqi, Ye Feng, and Zhong Lin exchanged glances, took deep breaths, and leaped into the portal. Li Guanqi’s eyes snapped open after a brief, disorienting moment, only to see ruins all around him.
The moment his feet touched the ground, he drew his sword and scanned the area. Ye Feng and the others were nowhere to be seen. He quickly deduced that the transporter had scattered the disciples randomly.
He extended his divine consciousness to scan his surroundings. A frown creased his brow—something was forcefully limiting his perception to a mere ten-zhang radius. The harder he pushed, the stronger the resistance he encountered.
Switching to his heart’s eye, he took in his surroundings. He stood on a random street in a ruined city. The sky was gray, and the place was eerily silent.
Beneath his feet stretched dark green stone tiles, their surfaces etched with mysterious patterns that lent them a strange beauty. Tall buildings lined both sides of the street, though time had claimed its toll. The musty, pungent scent of rotten wood hung heavily in the air.
Li Guanqi took out his jade slip, only to discover it had been rendered completely useless. Something in the atmosphere seemed to disturb its function, preventing even the most basic communication with his fellow sect members, let alone allowing him to pinpoint their locations.
A suffocating silence hung in the air, but Li Guanqi was used to it. Years of profound loneliness and feelings of utter isolation had hardened him. With his sword in his right hand, he walked slowly down the deserted street, his footsteps echoing in the stillness.
Rather than heading for the city’s center, he approached a tall building nearby. It stood five stories high, adorned with many beautiful carvings. He could almost picture how extravagant it looked in its prime.
He reached out to push the yellowed door open, but it collapsed with a dull thud. The layout inside resembled that of a brothel, though the interior had once been beautiful. Even a jade serving tray bore golden inlays, and the wine jars shimmered with a bright emerald green. But when he reached out to touch them, the table and the jade items on top of it crumbled to dust.
He soared to the second and third floors, finding each floor more beautiful than the last.
Two spiral staircases led to the fourth floor, guarded by a stone lion at the base of the staircases. As Li Guanqi flew up, the lion’s eyes suddenly flashed red. The supposedly decorative wooden lotus carvings on the stair handles burst open like real blossoms.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
Countless petals—hidden weapons in disguise—shot toward him.
Clang! Clang! Clang! Clang!
Li Guanqi halted midair, his sword weaving through the air as he deflected the incoming storm. Most petals disintegrated in flight, but twenty to thirty percent made it through, forcing him to stay sharp.
When he thought everything was over, he heard a clicking sound.
Thirty candle wicks suddenly fell from the massive chandelier above him. They flashed, and tens of icicles suddenly came out, hurtling toward the ground.
Li Guanqi darted through the air, lightning crackling beneath his feet. He dove into a hallway to dodge the attack. His brows furrowed tightly. What the hell was that?!
Shock coursed through him at having triggered two hidden traps in such quick succession. He hadn’t chosen that particular building for any specific reason—he had merely wandered inside on a whim. This convinced him the attacks weren’t part of an ambush meant for him.
Li Guanqi slowly approached the stair handles and looked at the bloomed lotus flowers, examining the sophisticated mechanisms inside. The hidden weapons used to be the petals of the flowers, fired using a complicated system of cogwheels.
Li Guanqi was stunned. This secret realm was ancient—at least a thousand years old, perhaps even three thousand. Yet its mechanisms still functioned flawlessly, able to react and kill.
An ancient signboard fell from the top of the building and shattered. Li Guanqi stepped outside to read the words written on it.
The ground beneath him trembled violently—the colossal ruins spanning a hundred li in every direction started sinking into the earth. The surrounding landscape fractured with a deafening roar, splitting into more than a hundred massive plates that rapidly rearranged themselves around the ruins, forming an enormous octagonal box.
Countless buildings in the ruins started to sink and collapse until the whole place was underground. The shaking lasted half an hour before gradually stopping.
Darkness swallowed the ruins.
One by one, candles in the surrounding buildings flickered to life. The empty street was now brightly lit. A cold shiver crept down Li Guanqi’s spine.
Looking at the signboard, Li Guanqi recalled that his grandfather once told him about a clan that excelled at building mechanisms.
Could these ruins once belong to the Mo family?
Li Guanqi recalled his grandfather Su Xuan's profound awe for this clan. The words echoed in his memory: “The Mo family possessed such formidable skill that their mechanisms alone could kill even an Illusory Refinement Realm cultivator!”
Li Guanqi gulped, his forehead covered with a sheen of sweat. He gritted his teeth, not daring to stand on any stone tile. He flew directly toward the city at the center of the ruins.