The Eerie Coffin

Squeak~

Faint, sporadic sounds drifted out one after another from deep within the pile of corpses, growing ever denser and noisier.

Lu Feng and Ning Xiang's expressions both tightened as they sensed trouble.

"Master~ Quick~ the Lingering Fragrance Gu Bead~"

Ning Xiang called out urgently. Her experience in the Poisonous Centipede Tomb had made her far more guarded.

Lu Feng understood at once. The moment Ning Xiang finished speaking, the Lingering Fragrance Gu Bead was already in his hand.

This pearl that he had "swindled" from Gu Yuchen contained an extraordinary medicinal fragrance and was quite effective at driving away and warding off snakes, insects, rats, and ants.

Catching that familiar scent, Ning Xiang's expression eased somewhat. Before this, they had relied on this very pearl to pass through the Poisonous Centipede Tomb.

Yet the little black shadows that poked their heads out from the corpse piles one after another were not poisonous centipedes.

They were palm-sized, rat-like creatures, with long incisors and large ears. If not for their thin, lengthy tails, they might almost have resembled rabbits.

But though these creatures looked like rabbits, they were ferocious to the extreme. A few of them began gnawing on the skeletons right in front of Lu Feng and Ning Xiang.

Those hard bones did not even last a single exchange beneath the rodents' sharp teeth before being bitten full of holes.

As he watched strands of phosphorescence spill from the broken skeletons and get swept into the rodents' mouths,

Lu Feng recognized what these creatures were. They should be the Phosphorus Devouring Rats mentioned in the Records of the Strange.

Phosphorus Devouring Rats commonly lived in places littered with corpses. They fed upon Corpse Phosphorous produced through the decay of cadavers. They were relatively weak in attack and held great fear and loathing toward the Yang energy of living people.

While observing them, Lu Feng put away the Lingering Fragrance Gu Bead. Seeing that the rats poking out around them still showed no intention of approaching, he quietly confirmed his guess. They truly were Phosphorus Devouring Rats.

Knowing that they would not launch an attack on their own, Lu Feng secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

Otherwise, with corpse piles stretching as far as the eye could see, who knew how many of these rats were still alive within them? Dealing with them would not have been easy.

After confirming the appearance of the Phosphorus Devouring Rats, Lu Feng also abandoned his thoughts of collecting these bones.

Originally, he had considered whether he could use these skeletons, which had likely accumulated over countless years, to further enhance the Blood-colored War Corpse's strength and bring the Bone Phosphorous Divine Palm to complete mastery.

Clearly, that was no longer possible.

But... the Corpse Phosphorous had been eaten away, while quite a bit of Yin Qi still remained within these skeletons.

If he made an array plate for a Thousand Corpses Gathering Qi Array here, the might it could bear would surely far surpass that of the White Bone Skull Passage above!

But their most urgent task was to find the disciples.

After ruling out the danger, Lu Feng led Ning Xiang in pushing aside the corpse piles and searching for a way out.

"Master~"

Ning Xiang's choked voice sounded. "We're not going to die here, are we?"

Lu Feng understood that Ning Xiang must have long been exhausted after enduring all this way. Only her concern for her companions' safety had kept her from collapsing.

"Don't worry, your master is here!" Lu Feng looked at Ning Xiang with unwavering eyes and solemnly reassured her, "This is only a tiny Earth Grade Tomb Realm. If we truly reach the end of the road, your master will split it open with a single sword!"

Hearing this, Ning Xiang's trembling heart finally settled.

Yet after uttering the words Earth Grade Tomb Realm, Lu Feng himself had a meaningful glint in his eyes.

Judging from the dangers they had encountered so far, this was already far beyond the Earth Grade. Even Heaven Soul Realm Initial Breath Soul Masters would likely struggle to handle it easily.

Had Yun Buran misjudged it? Or had someone entered ahead of them and triggered some restriction within this Tomb Realm, causing its danger level to rise?

With those doubts in mind, Lu Feng continued searching for a way out, scattering more and more piles of bones along the way.

After advancing several dozen meters,

a faint tremor suddenly came from the southwestern corner.

It sounded like a wooden table scraping against the ground. During the trembling, there seemed to be gold, silver, or iron objects atop the table, clanging against one another.

Ning Xiang froze at first, thinking her master had scattered a corpse pile and knocked into something. But when she looked over by the light of the Jade Pearl in her hand, she found nothing unusual. As far as her eyes could see, there were still only dense bone piles stacked like mountains.

"Master~ Did you hear something?"

Ning Xiang thought she might have misheard.

Lu Feng's expression turned grave. As he shielded Ning Xiang behind him, he lightly swung out a palm toward the southwestern pile of bones, clearing a passage.

The instant the white bones flew apart in all directions,

that inexplicable sound came again. It was still coming from the southwestern corner, and from the sound of it, it should not have been far away.

Lu Feng cautiously moved toward the southwest, scattering the obstructing piles of bones as he went.

After hearing the sound time and again, he also confirmed something.

This disturbance should have arisen because he had touched the piles of white bones.

That left him deeply puzzled. There were no array fluctuations here. Logically, merely changing the positions of some bone piles should not have caused such a responsive disturbance.

Ning Xiang followed closely behind Lu Feng, her heart already lodged in her throat.

"We've reached the end."

Lu Feng sent out another palm strike, scattering the final pile of bones blocking their path.

But the sight beyond the white bone piles made him halt, the vigilance on his face turning into solemn gravity.

"That is..."

Ning Xiang was likewise frightened stiff by the scene in the distance.

It was a wide-open space. There were no more skeletons around it, nor any debris or Phosphorus Devouring Rats.

There was only a coffin, black as night.

This pitch-black coffin was not laid flat upon the ground.

It stood upright in the center of the open space.

Four iron chains as thick as arms were bound around it, coiling around the coffin countless times and tying it down tightly.

The other ends of the four chains stretched out toward the four corners and plunged deep beneath the ground.

The scene was exceptionally sinister and chilling.

At the sight, Ning Xiang felt cold sweat soak her back. Worse still, the coffin would occasionally tremble without warning, making the chains bound around it ring out with metallic clangs.

To her, it felt as if an unimaginably terrifying beast had been trapped inside, one that could burst out at any moment and gnaw her until not even bone fragments remained.

Yet the coffin had clearly existed for ages. Whatever was confined within could not possibly be a living creature. Even a long-lived ferocious beast could hardly survive for so many years.

Lu Feng tentatively took two steps forward. Suddenly, the coffin trembled again, and far more violently than before.

As it shook, countless clumps of dirt and dust continually fell down its sides. From afar, they looked like waterfalls pouring down from those thick iron chains.

From this, Lu Feng inferred that the coffin had rarely made any movement over the years, which was why such a thick layer of dust had gathered upon it. Perhaps their rash approach, or their earlier wanton clearing of a passage through the bone piles, had inadvertently triggered some restriction.

As the dust continued to fall, several blurred characters that had previously been covered gradually emerged on the coffin's surface. But because the chains were too thick and much dust still remained, he could only vaguely make out one character: "Slaughter."

Thinking of the passage made of heads earlier, as well as this mass burial pit filled with discarded corpses, Lu Feng instinctively regarded this coffin as another of the tomb owner's "achievements." Perhaps the person inside had died for some special reason, such as from a virulent poison, and others feared being implicated.

That was why the coffin and its occupant had been discarded here rather than granted a place among the displayed remains.

With this concern in mind, Lu Feng gave up on approaching it.

But unexpectedly, the Kirin Ring sent out a peculiar response at that moment.

More precisely, it came from the Ancient Desolation Altar within the Kirin Ring—from the space on its first level where the Blood-colored War Corpse resided!

This thing...

Lu Feng's mouth twitched. It had not reacted in the slightest to all those mountain-like piles of skeletons earlier, yet now, faced with this unknown coffin, it seemed faintly eager to emerge. What was that about?

Could there be something inside the coffin that interested it?

Ning Xiang suddenly spoke timidly. "Master~ Do you think the map leading out of here might be hidden inside that coffin?"

Lu Feng secretly frowned, hesitation appearing on his face.

His instincts told him that a coffin discarded or placed here, bound layer upon layer in chains, was certainly no ordinary thing. There was most likely danger inside.

But Ning Xiang's words were not without reason. If there truly was a passage leading out of this place, then the coffin was undoubtedly the likeliest place to hide it.

The tomb owner would never have placed a coffin here for no reason. Even if it had been discarded, it could have simply been tossed down from above, just like the other skeletons.

After considering it, Lu Feng decided to take the risk and test it.

It would also answer the Blood-colored War Corpse's response.

Lu Feng shielded Ning Xiang as they retreated into the region of bone piles. At the same time, he took out the Ancient Desolation Altar and controlled the Blood-colored War Corpse as it headed straight toward the eerie coffin.

After the events at Demonic Ape Mountain, and after the Blood-colored War Corpse cultivated the Bone Phosphorous Divine Palm, a faint thread of dark-green Corpse Phosphorous had begun to gleam within its skeletal frame. Mixed with its original crimson patterns, the entire corpse looked equally bizarre.

Ning Xiang shrank behind Lu Feng. Seeing such a thing appear from afar, and seeing that it was under her master's control, she instinctively took it to be an array puppet or a puppet-type Treasure Item.

Though startled, she did not pay it too much mind.

After all, her master had already astonished her with far too many methods. She had long grown accustomed to it.

In truth, Lu Feng's control over this Blood-colored War Corpse was nothing like the simple control one had over ordinary Treasure Items or array puppets. Even he himself did not know what kind of existence the Blood-colored War Corpse had become after being forged through the Ancient Desolation Altar and continuously fused and enhanced along the way into its present form.

At first, Lu Feng had thought that as the war corpse's strength and quality rose, it would become increasingly difficult to control. But through continued contact, he discovered that he seemed to have become much more in tune with it. In the past, he had needed to attach a strand of Soul Consciousness around its body and guide it with spiritual energy like an array puppet in order to control it in battle, and even then it could only perform simple attacks.

But now, whether because he had controlled it so often or because the war corpse's quality had improved, a mere shift of his thoughts would make the war corpse respond accordingly. It was as though it had become an extension of his own body.

It was even more responsive than an ordinary Heaven Grade array puppet.

Even Artisan Hero's Nine Puppets Array probably could not compare with this ability to control and sense it.

The Blood-colored War Corpse had now reached the eerie coffin.

Perhaps because it was merely a skeleton without the vitality of a living person, its approach strangely failed to provoke any reaction from the coffin.

Until...

the Blood-colored War Corpse's bony hand reached for the chains wrapped around the coffin.

Only then did the entire coffin erupt with a shocking tremor.