The moon hung directly overhead, and an endless stream of moonlight was drawn into the Azure Stone Great Coffin. At either side of the coffin stood two old men in black, thin and gaunt, their faces withered and bloodless.
Taking advantage of the Azure Stone Great Coffin's absorption of all manner of foul qi and its purification into pure energy, the two old men also reaped no small benefits. It might not grant them any great breakthrough in martial arts, but it was immensely beneficial to their physical vitality.
Just then, a great flock of crows flew across the sky. Amid their cawing racket, they obscured the moon directly above the Azure Stone Great Coffin. A terrifying aura radiated from within the coffin, instantly slicing through the heavens and suppressing the densely packed red-eyed crows—several hundred of them all at once—down to the ground.
Black feathers fell like rain beneath the bright moonlight. Vast swathes of scarlet essence were drawn from the crows' bodies and continuously gathered into the Azure Stone Great Coffin, shrouding its originally silver-and-azure surface in a layer of crimson.
Once the flock of red-eyed crows had all fallen, the Azure Stone Great Coffin rose from the half-buried earth with a thunderous boom. While still in midair, its lid flew open, and from within leaped a gray-robed man eight feet tall, gaunt as a dried hemp stalk.
Seeing this gray-robed man, skinny as a hemp stalk, the two old men who had been quietly waiting beside the Azure Stone Great Coffin and taking their share of benefits slightly changed expression. They lowered their heads, not daring to look at him directly, and addressed him as Holy Son.
The gray-robed man was the one they protected on the Path, as well as a martial arts prodigy ranked extremely