There were corpses scattered across the battleground, consisting of both humans and fiends, and also of species that Tang Jie had never even seen before and about which he had no idea what they could be. They occupied Tang Jie’s entire field of vision, stretching into the horizon, leaving him aghast.
Was this an illusion or real?
If it was an illusion, fine, but if it was real, then this battlefield was far larger than Ten Direction Valley, so was he still in the valley?
Tang Jie was rather at a loss.
He grabbed some soil from the ground and threw it into the air.
Spiritual energy blew the soil away, then it balled up and fell toward a nearby corpse.
This was the corpse of a bull-headed fiend, around thirty feet tall and holding a halberd. It was looking up and howling at the heavens, two trails of blood coming from its eyes. There was no telling who this roar of fury had been aimed at, but the lethal wound was the large hole in its abdomen. From its shape, it appeared to have been inflicted by a fist.
The ball of soil dropped toward the bull man corpse, but as it got close, it was suddenly blown apart.
“A Spirit Essence Barrier…” Tang Jie blurted out, shivering.
Spirit Essence Barriers were an extremely special phenomenon that only occurred with cultivators at the Violet Palace Realm or above. Due to various special circumstances and factors, some cultivators would not turn into Returned Remnants upon death. Their physical bodies would remain, and they would still possess powerful abilities. It was said that this was all in preparation for the body to welcome back the soul. Their bodies would spontaneously protect themselves, rejecting all possible intrusions and external objects until the soul finally returned.
This was precisely why the corpses could last for thousands of years without rotting. Their powerful physical bodies resisted all decomposition and erosion. They existed in the world, but they were isolated in an absolute vacuum, thus resisting the erosion of time.
But most importantly, this meant that it was real!
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An illusion zone would not have had such an effect on the formation in the form of a ball of soil that Tang Jie had tossed out.
An ancient battlefield!
This was an ancient battlefield!
Tang Jie suddenly understood.
He turned around and no longer saw the membrane of light he had come in through. There was only a vast battlefield that was covered in bodies.
“I see…” Tang Jie muttered.
The first two formations could be said to select for a successor, and now, after someone had received the Visceral Manifestation Classic and the Martial Mirror, they would enter the third formation, and only then was the door of inheritance opened to the successor. Most shocking of all was that it was not in Ten Direction Valley.
Ten Direction Valley was simply the outer door of the land of inheritance. Tang Jie was clearly in another space, another world. But he didn’t know exactly what sort of place it was.
All he could see were corpses.
One had to at least be at Violet Palace to exhibit a Spirit Essence Barrier, and he could see that there were tens of thousands of corpses on this battlefield. In other words, tens of thousands of experts at Violet Palace or above had died in this battle. As for those below Violet Palace, who hadn’t left behind any corpses, there was simply no telling how many of them had died.
Tang Jie was somewhat dizzied by this revelation.
What sort of war could create such a scene?
These beings had died ten thousand years ago, but they still exuded a majestic aura that made Tang Jie’s soul tremble. And there were also countless treasures scattered across the vast earth.
Various art relics glimmered, similarly under the protection of Spirit Essence Barriers.
Tang Jie’s eyes brightened.
These art relics alone were enough to make him rich.
Not far from him, a spear was thrust into the ground. It was around four meters long, the pole winding and covered in golden scales, making it appear like a dragon. One could tell at a glance that this was no ordinary item.
Tang Jie went to grab the spear, but a barrier of spiritual light stopped him.
But Tang Jie was no clump of soil, and this Spirit Essence Barrier was incapable of stopping him. With a slight exertion, he broke the barrier and grabbed the spear.
There was a loud clang from the spear.
The spear exploded with golden light, and then a golden dragon phantom emerged from the spear and lunged at Tang Jie.
Alarmed, Tang Jie brought his palms together, activating the Formless Golden Body as he fell back. Boom! The dragon phantom collided into Tang Jie and sent him flying.
The Formless Golden Body had been instantly shattered, and even with his Jewel Body, several of his bones had almost been broken.
Tang Jie was aghast, but rather than pursue, the dragon phantom circled around the spear and let out a furious roar.
As it roared, countless phantoms appeared out of the various Immortal weapons, both of humans and fiends. Their howls, roars, and wails resounded through the world, leaving Tang Jie utterly stunned.
They were all weapon souls!
These weapon souls howled at Tang Jie the moment they appeared. It appeared that they might all be able to communicate with each other.
Even worse was that the more violent ones rushed at Tang Jie.
Firstly, the golden dragon phantom went back into the spear, and then the spear pulled itself out of the ground, its tip flashing with a golden light, and stabbed at Tang Jie.
“Damn!” Tang Jie was given a good fright.
This dragon spear appeared abnormally powerful. He did not think he could handle it, so he turned and ran.
The golden dragon spear doggedly pursued. A golden figure appeared on the horizon, instantly accelerating and aiming straight for Tang Jie’s back.
Tang Jie was aghast at how dangerous the third formation was. He threw an arm back, and an energy sword flew at the tip of the spear. The force of the impact sent Tang Jie flying, but this actually created distance between him and the spear.
It was only his sole art relic, the Azure Light Sword, that was able to stop his blow, and it was also the only treasure he had brought with him into the formation. After all, Xu Muyang had left this art relic to him, and leaving it outside was pointless. All it would do was draw Godhead Palace’s attention.
He hadn’t expected it to save his life.
Only an art relic could fight against an art relic, and while the Azure Light Sword wasn’t on the same level as the dragon spear, at least it had an operator.
Even so, in this clash, Tang Jie had still been sent flying. This showed just how high-tier the dragon spear was. If it wasn’t a divine treasure, it was at least a peak art relic.
And this one use of the sword had drained Tang Jie of a third of his magic power. In other words, at the Spirit Sea Tier, he could only use the Azure Light Sword three times at most.
After being stopped by the Azure Light Sword, the dragon spear continued its pursuit, refusing to let Tang Jie go.
“Truly a pestering ghost!” Tang Jie cursed.
Weapon souls were souls that used magical tools as their vessels, so to call it a ghost wasn’t exactly wrong.
The dragon spear chased Tang Jie down.
A single masterless art relic had Tang Jie at his wits’ end and with nowhere to run. It was only now that Tang Jie realized how vast the gap was between them. Let alone him, even if Godhead Palace’s people had come, they probably wouldn’t have fared much better against these tens of thousands of weapon souls on this ancient battlefield.
And this was only the third formation!
If the third formation was this terrifying, what about the ones that came after it?
Hold on!
Tang Jie’s mind suddenly cleared.
The previous difficulties and dangers of the Nine Executions Immortal Formation had always targeted the non-successors.
The Infinite Illusion Zone and Weakwater Formation were such that even the likes of Godhead Palace had to pay in blood to get through.
But for the person with the right method, it was actually very simple. Only the second formation wall had required someone to cultivate the Visceral Manifestation Classic and Parting Classic to get through.
And the order of the Nine Executions Immortal Formation had been that the first formation gave the key and the second formation required a charge at the Jade Gate and the cultivation of the Parting Classic to get through. Thus, the third formation should be doable for someone at the Spirit Platform Realm!
With the right method, a Spirit Platform cultivator could get through!
Since someone officially at the Spirit Platform Realm could get through, someone of Tang Jie’s strength should be able to do it easily.
If he found it difficult, it meant that he wasn’t going about it the correct way.
The golden dragon spear was still giving chase, so Tang Jie pushed his Violet Lightning Lunge to the limit. His panicked mind began to calm down, and as he regained clarity, his mind began to spin.
Now that he thought about it, to get through the first formation, he had relied on the little ghost, which had been provided by the formation. As for the first formation wall, Godhead Palace had broken through it, so he hadn’t needed to do anything. However, Xu Muyang had said that the Martial Mirror had been the key.
As for the Weakwater Formation, he had easily passed through by relying on the dragonboat created by the illusion zone.
He had gone through the formation by relying on the body tempering of the Parting Classic.
In other words, the method to get through each formation was in some way related to the previous formation.
As there was nothing before the Infinite Illusion Zone, nothing had been needed, but starting from the formation wall, everything had been connected.
If this was the case, to get through the third formation, he would have to start from what he had gained from the previous two formations.
With this thought in mind, Tang Jie looked at the pursuing dragon spear, and then he suddenly had an idea.
The Weapon Mantra!
This idea appeared just when the dragon spear was about to stab into his back.
His mind moving at lightning speed, Tang Jie clenched his teeth. Instead of using the Azure Light Sword to block, he thrust his finger at the golden spear.
This was his first time using the Weapon Mantra on an art relic, and he was using it on a very high-ranking art relic. Tang Jie didn’t know what would happen, whether or not the weapon would actually shatter, or if the enormous burden would suck him dry, but he was past caring.
Finger tip touched spear tip.
Time seemed to stop, with spear and finger frozen in the air.
A moment later, a golden light exploded between the two, blasting both Tang Jie and the dragon spear away.
A powerful storm swept Tang Jie back, and a backlash of power traveled through Tang Jie’s finger to every part of his body, feeling like lava. Blood instantly erupted from every one of his pores, carrying with it a scalding energy that instantly turned the blood into a fog.
“Aaaagh!” Tang Jie cried out as he landed in a rain of blood.
Not even his powerful constitution was able to endure the powerful reverse surge of energy.
Even more astonishing was that his energy wasn’t being sucked out.
It was completely different from when he had first used it. It was more like the backlash from a failed spell cast.
The backlash from a failed spellcast?
This thought briefly lingered in Tang Jie’s mind.
He lay on the ground, raising his head with a great struggle to look into the distance.
As the fog of blood dissipated, there was a golden flash.
The golden dragon spear was still floating in the air, completely unharmed.
The Weapon Mantra had been ineffective!
This was the first time Tang Jie had encountered a situation like this.
He stared blankly at the dragon spear. At this moment, the spear only needed to deliver a finishing blow.
But in these circumstances, the dragon spear started to shiver.
Using the word “shiver” to describe its action was somewhat strange. After all, it was a spear.
But at this moment, Tang Jie could clearly tell that it was shivering.
Shivering in fear.
Rather than stabbing at Tang Jie, it backed away.
Tang Jie felt like he could see that dragon phantom inside the spear stepping back, practically walking on tiptoe, its face stricken with fear and its neck shrunken back, its entire body shaking…
As if it actually had legs, it shifted itself back bit by bit, but not too quickly, as if it felt like somebody was watching it.
Tang Jie laughed.
“Want to try again?” he said.
He propped himself up with one arm and aimed a finger at the spear with the nother.
A moment later, the golden dragon spear seemed to pale, and a noiseless shriek resounded in the depths of Tang Jie’s soul.
The dragon spear swiftly turned around and vanished into the distance, leaving faster than it had come and vanishing without a trace.
Tang Jie was dumbfounded.
Looking at his finger, he shook his head and bitterly chuckled. “It seems like they’re really afraid of you.”