Forbidden Death Abyss, Reborn

A majestic waterfall, like a giant white dragon suspended in the sky, plunged straight down, resembling a stampede of ten thousand horses that had broken free from their reins.

In the face of such natural might, it's easy to feel insignificant. Yet, the more one feels this way, the more some individuals yearn to break free from the control of unseen heavenly power.

To control one's own life and death… one's destiny!

Luo Bei watched the waterfall from afar. He could see the deep pool at its base, churning with earth-shattering spray, like a gaping maw ready to swallow anyone whole. But where he stood was even more perilous than the top of the waterfall!

He was standing on the edge of a cliff not far from the cascading water, with a bottomless abyss before him!

For humans, the most terrifying things are not those that can be seen, but those that cannot be seen, cannot be touched.

This was precisely the case with the abyss before Luo Bei!

The pitch-black night made it impossible for Luo Bei to know the height of the cliff. This abyss, shrouded in darkness in the depths of the desolate mountains, was like a lurking monster. What made it even more chilling was the thick, yellowish-green, viscous mist that filled the abyss before him.

That was the poisonous miasma unique to Luofu!

Therefore, Luo Bei not only didn't know how deep the abyss before him was, but he also had no idea what lay at the bottom.

The mountain wind made Luo Bei's thin clothes flutter noisily, and his entire body trembled uncontrollably.

This was due to an overwhelming fear, and also because Luo Bei's cultivation had been completely crippled by Yuan Tianyi!

The "Golden Liquid Condensing Pill" that Luo Bei had cultivated through trials of life and death was gone without a trace. Even the medicinal power of the "Zhanxikezha Grass" had been nullified. Luo Bei now was practically an ordinary youth, powerless to even lift a chicken. The mountain wind of Luofu alone was already difficult for him to withstand.

But Yuan Tianyi acted as if he saw nothing. Standing at the very edge of the cliff, he asked Luo Bei softly, "Luo Bei, do you know why, among the myriad of cultivators, so few can reach the heights I have attained?"

If anyone else had said this, it would surely have been interpreted as bragging. However, the word "bragging" had no connection whatsoever with Yuan Tianyi. Luo Bei, trembling involuntarily, replied, "Is it because of the cultivation techniques, or opportunities?"

"No," Yuan Tianyi shook his head in the biting night wind. "It's because some people never dare to challenge the boundaries of life and death. The path of cultivation is inherently an act against heaven. If you don't dare to challenge the boundaries of life and death again and again, how can you truly attain enlightenment and grasp truly powerful forces! Those who covet my Luofu's treasures and techniques, how could they understand how Luofu stands above them!"

Yuan Tianyi slowly handed the slender-necked long bottle in his hand to Luo Bei. "Drink this bottle of medicinal liquid, and then jump from here."

Luo Bei met Yuan Tianyi's gaze, nodded, and without the slightest hesitation, tilted his head back and drank the red and green, strongly odorous, viscous liquid. He then leaped towards the unknown abyss!

At this moment, in Luo Bei's eyes, there was natural fear, but more than that, there was resilience and decisiveness, without a trace of doubt.

Only such a person would be worthy of becoming a true successor of Luofu!

"Old Zhao Nan, perhaps he might truly surpass me." Watching Luo Bei plunge into the thick miasma, a proud glint flashed in Yuan Tianyi's eyes. Looking down again at the desolate Luofu shrouded in the night, Yuan Tianyi sighed inwardly, for he knew that from this point on, Luo Bei would have to endure hardships unimaginable to ordinary people, a true fight for survival.

Luo Bei plummeted rapidly through the air. The intense feeling of weightlessness seemed to pull his soul out of his head, and a natural sense of unease permeated his entire being. But before he even hit the ground, simply by coming into contact with the colorful miasma, Luo Bei's body felt a searing pain both inside and out.

The further down he went, the thicker the miasma became!

That was eternal, unmelting death qi!

This was the Forbidden Death Abyss, Luofu's most putrid, yet most spiritually abundant spiritual vein.

Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy nourished all things. The abundant spiritual energy, coupled with the complete lack of human presence, caused spiritual medicine to grow prolifically on the cliffs and precipices surrounding this abyss. For thousands of years, countless herbs that would drive any herb collector mad had grown, withered, and rotted here in solitude. Elsewhere, this place would have been a legendary fairyland brimming with spiritual medicine. However, Luofu itself was located in a hot and humid region, and the abyss was completely sealed off, causing rotting death qi to accumulate within, unable to dissipate. Some of these herbs, like Zhanxikezha Grass, possessed many miraculous properties, while others were ferociously toxic, capable of dissolving flesh and blood on contact. The toxic fumes emanating from their decay alone had rendered the area uninhabitable, making it impossible for even birds to fly through, turning it into a true land of death!

The dense Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy and the foul death qi, these two diametrically opposed forces, were intertwined, inseparable, forming Luofu's unique and most distinctive location.

And the entire bottom of the abyss was a muddy pool formed by the accumulation of these rotting medicinal herbs over thousands of years! This muddy pool, formed from the decay of various medicinal herbs, surrounding trees, or beings who had died tragically within, could be said to be a medicinal cauldron containing the medicinal power of countless spiritual medicines. However, too much of a good thing could be detrimental. Even a Ginseng Vermilion Fruit, if its medicinal power reached a certain level and one lacked the ability to dissolve it, would be highly toxic to the human body. Moreover, this place itself contained the medicinal power of countless poisonous plants and flowers, comparable to those created by the world's top poison masters.

Therefore, this black, viscous muddy pool at the bottom, which resembled a boiling pot, constantly bubbling with reddish-green gas and emitting a strong miasma, was extremely poisonous!

Even Luo Bei, with his exceptionally resilient nature, let out a heaven-shattering scream the moment he fell and his legs came into contact with the black mud in the pool, instantly rotting down to the bare bone. Luo Bei's entire body then sank heavily into this boiling mud. The black liquid, emitting a strong stench and foulness, instantly flooded Luo Bei's mouth and nose.

In an instant, Luo Bei's skin, flesh, and even his internal organs began to rot and decay. But at the same time, the medicinal power of the red and green liquid Luo Bei had consumed began to spread!

The Shangyang Horn, the single leg of an ancient divine beast, a mere speck of powder could detoxify all poisons and regenerate flesh and muscle.

The Sea King Blood Jade, marrow from the spine of a sea-dwelling blood dragon, a mere sliver of which could extend life and grant the physical body terrifying restorative capabilities.

Now, an entire Shangyang Horn and a complete Sea King Blood Jade had been integrated into that small bottle of medicinal liquid.

In addition to these, the bottle contained countless Miao Jiang secret medicines, unknown to the world, passed down for millennia, possessing immense efficacy.

As the potent toxins and death qi of the Forbidden Death Abyss began to rot and decay Luo Bei's bones, these ancient, heaven-defying secret medicines started to furiously expel the potent toxins and foul death qi that had invaded Luo Bei's body, removing the unbeneficial medicinal power, converting the beneficial medicinal power for his own use, and reshaping Luo Bei's bones, blood vessels, and skin at a visible rate!

It was an extremely tragic sight, one that could not be imagined even in the most nightmarish of infernos.

Within the rapidly rotting and decaying skin, muscles and meridians grew like flesh buds. Yet, the muscles and meridians that had just finished growing were often invaded by the medicinal power, leading to pus formation and ulceration.

It was like a person struggling desperately in a vast, turbulent sea of suffering!

This was truly hellish torment!

Why did he choose to endure such pain? And having made this choice, he would likely have to endure even more such pain in the future.

No one knew what this exceptionally resilient youth's heart was thinking.

Perhaps, it was simply to not live like a stray dog, to not beg for others' pity, and to control his own destiny!

No one knew the answer.

After a scream that was instantly swallowed by the thick, foul, viscous black mud, Luo Bei, unable to hold on any longer, finally fainted.

But within the embrace of the dense miasma and the truly dead, silent mud, the two medicinal powers continued to… contend!

Because few people in the world could find materials like the Shangyang Horn and Sea King Blood Jade as Yuan Tianyi had, this ancient Miao witchcraft secret medicine had not appeared in millennia. And according to the unique written records in the Miao Yi dialect, this secret medicine was merely a primer. After preparing this secret medicine, it still needed to be steeped in medicinal herb juices. The more medicinal herbs with potent medicinal power one could find, the stronger the medicinal juice, and the more heaven-defying the transformation of the person's meridians would be!

Even with all human effort, someone of Yuan Tianyi's cultivation level, the medicinal power of the spiritual medicines he could find would never compare to the accumulation of tens of thousands of years of medicinal power in the mud of Luofu's Forbidden Death Abyss!

"Even if his aptitude is mediocre, and time is short, so what!" Standing on the cliff edge, quietly watching the abyss shrouded in thick miasma, Yuan Tianyi's eyes flashed with a rare, intense light.

In ordinary sects, the typical disciples chosen are those with bone structure and meridians suitable for cultivation. They are first taught various techniques to temper their bodies, and this foundational step of strengthening meridians and refining the body alone takes over ten years. However, Yuan Tianyi directly used a secret art to modify Luo Bei's meridians, forcefully aiding Luo Bei's Foundation Establishment with potent external power!

This was an act of defying heaven with the ultimate power of creation! Furthermore, Yuan Tianyi only knew from the Luofu Ancestor's records that the Miao Yi's secret medicine didn't actually make one as strong as Vajra, but rather caused a complete transformation, making human meridians more suitable for cultivation. Therefore, even Yuan Tianyi was unsure of the exact effects this secret medicine would produce, nor what the ultimate appearance of a disciple modified by them would be.

Cycle after cycle, within the Forbidden Death Abyss, Luo Bei remained unconscious, yet his bones, blood, and skin continued to rot and regenerate.

The black medicinal power of countless spiritual medicines gathered in the mud pit formed visible black streams of energy that continuously invaded Luo Bei's body, while a faint green light permeated within him.

Some components within the black energy streams seemed to dissipate as Luo Bei's skin ulcerated, while the remaining milky-white energy streams appeared to continuously merge into the green light.

This was the miraculous aspect of this secret medicine, passed down for a thousand years by the ancient Miao people. If it relied solely on its own medicinal power, it would be utterly incapable of contending with the heaven-defying medicinal power accumulated in the mud pit of the Death Abyss! This secret medicine dispelled the toxic and harmful medicinal energies from the human body, absorbing and integrating the beneficial medicinal power into Luo Bei's body.

The poisonous, decaying aura emanating from Luo Bei grew increasingly potent. This yellow-green poisonous, decaying aura heavily enveloped Luo Bei, resembling a massive cocoon. Soon, the yellow-green poisonous, decaying aura emanating from Luo Bei's body became even more concentrated than the ancient, unmelting, viscous miasma that permeated above the bottom of the pool. As this poisonous, decaying aura spread, the miasma above the pool's bottom also thickened, as if Luo Bei were the source of this miasma!

Within the cocoon formed by the thick, viscous yellow-green gas, the green-red light on Luo Bei's body intensified, and the black medicinal power from the pool bottom surged towards his body at an ever-increasing speed.

Gradually, it seemed as though Luo Bei's body possessed immense suction, like a great whale drawing water, causing the black medicinal power to form a massive vortex centered around him.

Concurrently, Luo Bei's bones and flesh repaired themselves at an accelerating rate, slowly regaining human form from his previously ravaged, ulcerated state.

His skin still emitted a faint green-red glow. After several more cycles of ulceration and repair, the black medicinal power continued to pour into his body at a near-frenzied pace, but his skin stopped ulcerating.

The miasma grew denser, thicker than the night on Luofu, while the black medicinal power of the mud pit gradually faded, eventually disappearing into deathly silence.

The faint green-red light that had been glowing on Luo Bei's skin also dimmed and vanished, like dying embers.

Luo Bei lay half-submerged and half-floating in the filthy, black mud pit, appearing as if dead. His skin had become as pale as if it had never seen sunlight, but between his brows, he seemed to have acquired a trace of Yuan Tianyi's aura, as if imbued with spiritual essence. Anyone who saw him would instinctively think that if he were dressed in fine silk robes, he would undoubtedly be a handsome, dashing youth.

The heavy, dense miasma was cleaved apart. Yuan Tianyi, clad in white, descended like a meteor, scooped up Luo Bei, and then shot out of the thick miasma, soaring towards the heavens. At that moment, a crimson sun was just erupting from behind the highest peak of Luofu, bathing the entire Luofu in a soft, golden light.