Jiang Lan glanced sideways at her, then suddenly reached out and tore the human-skin mask straight from her face. At once, a bewitchingly beautiful face capable of toppling kingdoms was revealed, her eyes still filled with stunned disbelief.
After Song Youwei came back to her senses, she was both ashamed and angry, yet she did not dare move rashly.
"So this is what you really look like..."
Seemingly somewhat satisfied, Jiang Lan withdrew his gaze. Then, with a casual flick, he left behind a jade pendant. "Within Great Xia, take this jade pendant to any Changlong Business Alliance establishment, and someone will naturally bring you to see me."
He did not care whether Song Youwei guessed his identity.
She was a clever woman. Even if she figured it out, she could only bury it deep within her heart and would not dare speak of it.
Now that he had obtained the Blood Immortal Sect's inheritance, once he had strength, many matters and troubles would be resolved as easily as slicing bamboo. There was no need to think too much about them.
Only after Jiang Lan's figure vanished into the depths of the underground palace did Song Youwei come back to herself.
She looked at the jade pendant in her hand, which still seemed to retain his warmth, her expression complicated.
"Changlong Business Alliance?"
"Miss, that is the number-one business alliance in Great Xia today. It is said to control more than sixty percent of the Great Xia Dynasty's economy. Its branches can be seen in nearly every dynasty and kingdom across the Nine Provinces Continent, and even foreign nations overseas seem to have trade routes connected to it..."
"Some say the Changlong Business Alliance was jointly established and controlled by the various top immortal sects, but others say it is actually an industry of the Prime Minister's Manor."
"Who exactly do you think that mysterious man is..."
Behind Song Youwei, the young girl with a maidservant's bun spoke in utter shock and astonishment.
Her other companions were likewise filled with disbelief and shock.
Song Youwei said nothing. Her jade-white hand, fairer than frost and snow, gently held the pendant. On its other side, she could see a single character engraved: "Jiang."
She pressed her red lips together, carefully put away the jade pendant, and only then said, "No one is to speak of what happened today. It would be best if you all forgot it."
"If even the slightest bit leaks out, no one will be able to protect us. By then, even dying without a burial place may become a luxury..."
Countless rumors about the Prime Minister's son flashed through her mind: good-for-nothing, indulged in wine and women, incapable of cultivation...
Especially when she thought of the rumor that he was "incapable of cultivation," Song Youwei could not help but shudder softly.
"How terrifying. He hid himself far too deeply..."
She sighed inwardly, then looked at her companions, who were nodding frantically, and said, "Let's leave. Be careful of an ambush from that Ye fellow on the way. He is deeply scheming. Though he escaped, he may not truly have left."
Meanwhile, at the end of the underground palace, Jiang Lan, who had rested briefly along the way, finally saw what he believed to be the burial grounds amid a collapsed side hall.
It was called a burial ground, but it was actually a shattered ruin, filled everywhere with traces of a great battle, broken pillars and rubble, and heaps of scattered bones.
Blood-colored mist swirled through every inch of the space. Here, it was almost tangible in its density and thickness, with some areas having already turned into pools of blood.
Ordinary cultivators likely could not even reach this place. They would be corroded by the blood-colored mist halfway through, reduced to withered bones and putrid blood.
"The Blood Immortal Old Ancestor really did die here..."
"After fighting a host of powerful enemies and suffering grave injuries, he fled back to his bedchamber to recover. But he encountered betrayal from his disciple. Though he killed the disciple, he himself had reached the end of his oil and the exhaustion of his lamp."
"If I had not intercepted it, judging from today's events, the Blood Immortal Sect's inheritance truly would have fallen into Ye Ming's hands."
Amid his surprise, Jiang Lan could clearly sense quite a bit of Fortune related to Ye Ming and Song Youwei flowing into his Mud Pill Palace.
Though Ye Ming had not been the Protagonist in the original plot, he could still be considered a man of great Fortune.
Song Youwei was even a beauty connected to the Protagonist, Lin Fan.
"This Fortune is better than nothing. Better than having none at all. The Life Dao Fruit's color has deepened considerably, and it is gradually ripening toward the second stage..."
Within this abandoned bedchamber, Jiang Lan saw a collapsed bed of blood jade, emitting a hazy bloody radiance in the darkness.
A skeletal corpse draped in a black robe sat cross-legged atop it, its head lowered, with nothing left but bones.
Not far away were four excavated blood pools, but they had long since dried up. Many skeletons lay scattered within them. Even after countless years, they still retained a jade-like luster, showing that they had not been weak in life.
"The Blood Immortal Old Ancestor was crafty in life. He did not keep the Blood Immortal inheritance on himself, nor did he leave it in the Ancestral Shrine. Instead, he hid it beneath the blood jade bed where he usually cultivated..."
"But there was no way he would not leave behind protective measures such as restrictions."
Recalling the plot in his mind, Jiang Lan manipulated the blood-colored mist here and destroyed the blood jade bed before him.
One restriction after another flashed into view, erupting with terrifying fluctuations of power that shook the entire bedchamber, as though it might collapse and be destroyed completely.
Fortunately, the blood-colored mist here was sufficiently dense. Jiang Lan had rested and recovered along the way; although his head was still hollow and aching, he forced himself to endure it.
"Crimson Forbidden Canon..."
Very soon, as all the restrictions before him vanished, Jiang Lan finally saw the object beneath the blood jade bed.
An ancient scroll, seemingly cast from blood jade, radiated bloody light as it lay silently there, an arcane and mysterious aura surging around it.
The instant he touched it, a warm-yet-cool, jade-like sensation passed into his hand. It was extremely strange, as though it wished to merge with his palm.
"What matters most to me right now is still the Boundless River of Life within it..."
Jiang Lan began flipping through it, and the ancient vine within his Mud Pill Palace trembled gently as well.
An ancient, vast, and mysterious aura seemed to spread across its emerald-green leaves.
At this moment, one vine leaf seemed to have taken on a blood-colored radiance. It truly resembled blood jade, crystalline and translucent, both eerie and magnificent.
Startled, Jiang Lan suddenly felt inspiration descend upon him. The Crimson Forbidden Canon in his hand instantly turned into a wisp of bloody light and vanished.
At the same time, countless insights and understandings concerning the Crimson Forbidden Canon appeared in his mind.
Every forbidden art, divine ability, and heaven-defying cultivation method became utterly clear to him in an instant, as though he had studied and researched them for countless years.
"I had not even started reading it. I only flipped through it, and I had already integrated and mastered everything?" Jiang Lan was genuinely surprised and astonished.
It seemed the ancient vine's function was far more than merely bearing Qi Luck Dao Fruits.
However, he could also clearly sense that the power of Fortune which had just lingered and drifted around the ancient vine seemed to have been completely exhausted.
"So it still needs the nourishment of Fortune power as a prerequisite..."
Jiang Lan noticed that blood-jade-like vine leaf. The Crimson Forbidden Canon had just merged into it.
Having figured it out, he did not concern himself with it further.
Now that he had obtained the cultivation method, this Blood-Colored Plateau was the most suitable "great tonic" place for him to cultivate.
Buzz!!!
Jiang Lan immediately sat down cross-legged on the spot. Bloody light swirled around his body, and every cell seemed to come alive, as though they had begun breathing. They opened their mouths wide and began feasting to their heart's content.
Wisps and strands of blood-colored mist surged toward him from all directions, blotting out the sky and covering the earth like rolling wolf smoke, instantly swallowing him whole.
The void trembled without end. Faintly, a hazy blood-colored river appeared above Jiang Lan's head.
Bloody waves surged and roared. It seemed to be the dwelling of the dead and the final resting place of living souls, with heaps of holy Buddhas and endless Immortal Corpses falling within.
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