Shi Mengying's eyes widened at once, and she hurried over to inspect the situation.
Yet the stone door was not merely intact—it did not even bear the slightest scratch!
Seeing this, Shi Mengying could scarcely believe her eyes.
"No... that's impossible!"
Third Level of Innate Realm.
Let alone a stone door that looked this old and worn.
Even those mechanism doors forged from refined iron that she had encountered in her previous life should not have remained completely unmarked, right?
"Damn it, do I really have to use my full strength?"
Shi Mengying retreated a little, standing a hundred meters away from the stone door with her sword in hand.
She slowly closed her eyes, attempting to gather all the internal energy in her body upon the sharp edge of her sword.
As Shi Mengying gradually circulated her internal energy, even her hair began to drift gently behind her.
At that moment, the Phoenix Spirit Blood within her body was boiling and burning.
A vast power burst forth from her heart before gathering upon the longsword in her hand.
Shi Mengying suddenly opened her eyes, streams of turbulent internal energy spilling from her body.
The broken ancient stone pillars around her were shattered by that force, turning directly into countless fragments and dust.
In an instant, Shi Mengying became a series of afterimages before appearing before the stone door.
Boom!
An even louder sound came from the surface of the stone door.
The energy waves unleashed by the sword's edge even razed all the broken walls and ruins outside the stone door to the ground.
But once the smoke dispersed, Shi Mengying was completely dumbfounded.
Because the stone door was still standing there exactly as it had been!
And it still did not have a single scratch or mark upon it!
"I @#￥%&*!"
At the sight of this, Shi Mengying pointed at the stone door and launched into a torrent of Zu'an-style curses.
She refused to accept it. Why could Gu Chen open this lousy door while she could not?
In terms of Cultivation Level, Gu Chen was nowhere near her equal.
In terms of character, Gu Chen was rotten to the core.
And if they were comparing bloodlines, Gu Chen had been left far behind her beyond the nine heavens!
The more Shi Mengying thought about it, the angrier she became, her eyes overflowing with blazing fury.
She raised her sword and nearly madly kept slashing at the stone door.
"Open for me! Open for me! Open for me!"
Yet while Shi Mengying was still raging like a lunatic.
A vast wave of energy suddenly burst from within the stone door.
Before Shi Mengying could react, the stone door instantly shattered into four pieces and five fragments.
The powerful energy wave even sent her flying dozens of meters away!
Shi Mengying climbed to her feet from the ground in an utterly bedraggled state.
Looking at the ruined stone door before her, her face was filled with confusion.
By all reason, after her repeated attacks just now, the stone door should have shattered from the outside.
How had it exploded from within instead?
At the same time, inside the empty great hall.
Gu Chen stood amid a cloud of dust, casually brushing the ash from his clothes before walking forward on his own.
The twelve stone statues in the hall had long since turned into rubble scattered across the ground.
Anyone unaware of the situation might have thought this place was some abandoned quarry.
Just moments ago, Gu Chen had leaped to the very top of the hall and suddenly discovered the Formation Core controlling those stone men.
Gu Chen had not thought much about it then.
Since he had seen the Formation Core, he might as well destroy it directly.
Thus, Gu Chen descended from the sky and steadily struck the Formation Core with a single palm.
The surrounding air suddenly froze for a second, and then the stone men exploded one after another.
The energy unleashed by the collapse of the Formation Core nearly shook the entire hall down!
Even Gu Chen had not expected destroying the Formation Core to cause such a tremendous impact.
Judging by the damage to the entire hall, it seemed it would never be restored again.
But Gu Chen did not care.
After all, this was also the last time he would come to the Lingxu Secret Realm.
So whether this place was destroyed or not meant nothing to him.
"Not bringing that girl along this time really is much easier."
Gu Chen recalled that, in his previous life, he had come to the Lingxu Secret Realm together with Gu Youwei.
From the moment that girl entered the Lingxu Secret Realm, she had never stopped chattering away.
Back then, Gu Chen and Gu Youwei had spent more than half a day deciphering the totem code upon the stone door.
Later, while passing through the mechanism corridor, Gu Chen had nearly lost his life several times saving the reckless Gu Youwei.
As for this hall guarded by the twelve stone men, Gu Chen had suffered severe injuries just to barely protect Gu Youwei and clear it successfully.
But now, Gu Chen had easily passed through all of it alone.
While his experience clearing it in his previous life had indeed helped.
More importantly, Gu Chen felt that without Gu Youwei, that troublesome deadweight, things were indeed far more convenient.
"By now, you should have been sent to the Cangshan Sword Sect, right?"
"You should enjoy your days over there properly."
Gu Chen spoke in an icy tone, but he had no time to keep dwelling on such matters.
He pushed open the stone door at the end of the hall and walked straight into a corridor, intending to head for the next hall.
The entire Lingxu Secret Realm was divided into three Divine Halls.
The First Divine Hall was guarded by twelve stone men, and there was no reward for passing it.
The Second Divine Hall was guarded by a Primordial Divine Beast, and passing it would grant one Supreme Treasure.
In his previous life, Gu Chen had only passed through the Second Divine Hall with Gu Youwei.
Because Gu Youwei had already been at death's door then, they truly could not continue onward.
Left with no other choice, Gu Chen could only take Gu Youwei and leave first.
As a result, even now, Gu Chen had no idea what monster or treasure was hidden within the Third Divine Hall.
Of course, even the reward from the Second Divine Hall alone.
Had directly allowed Gu Chen of his previous life to break through to the Tenth Level of the Innate Realm.
Gu Chen therefore hardly dared imagine it.
If he passed through the Third Divine Hall this time, would he not directly reach the Profound Gang Realm?
With that thought in mind, Gu Chen swiftly passed through the corridor before him and headed toward its end.
East Desolation Commandery, the Wei family's back mountain.
Wei Qingyu was like a deflated ball, and from the beginning until now.
Those rumbling, indecent noises had never stopped.
She felt as though her stomach were churning like the sea turned upside down.
The sensation was so unbearable that she wished she were dead!
"Damn it, wh... why is this happening?"
"When I cultivated the Sacred Origin Great Yin Scripture in my previous life, this never happened?"
Just then, Wei Qingyu suddenly thought of something.
In her previous life, she had followed behind Gu Chen like an eager little puppy, learning cultivation methods from him.
Later, Wei Qingyu had happened upon the Sacred Origin Great Yin Scripture.
Gu Chen had said delightedly that this cultivation technique suited Wei Qingyu's physique very well and that cultivating it would surely yield twice the result with half the effort.
Thus, when Wei Qingyu later cultivated the Sacred Origin Great Yin Scripture, Gu Chen had basically taught her hand in hand.
Now that she carefully recalled all of it, Wei Qingyu was suddenly seized by a deep terror!
Before you continue