Ning Yao kept glancing back as she skimmed across the ravine, watching Pang Jian's movements for any sign of trouble.
Pang Jian stood as still as a boulder.
Only after Ning Yao had finally climbed the wooden ladder onto the deck of the Indeterminate Ferry, searched around, and descended into the cabin did Pang Jian dismount and walk over to the thick, broad Phoenix Bone.
The withered remains left behind by a Heavenly Phoenix from the Upper Realm towered like an enormous, broad sword, stabbing straight toward the dim sky.
The so-called towering ancient trees nearby were all dwarfed by even a single withered bone of the Heavenly Phoenix. The bone exuded a majestic, sacred aura that left Pang Jian astonished.
He paced around the Remains of the Heavenly Phoenix.
At times, he looked up at the end of the withered bone that pierced the sky. At others, he gazed at the part embedded in the earth. A glimmer of hope gradually appeared in his eyes.
Ning Yao had been right. He was no guileless boy. He found it difficult to trust others and would never share everything with anyone.
Even with Zhou Qingchen, he had kept things to himself. He had not revealed what he had seen through the Eye of Imprint, let alone to Ning Yao.
Only he knew that as the Bloodthirsty Vines withdrew into the cracks in the earth and the rumbling tremors slowly subsided, a mysterious glimmer had drifted through the interior of the enormous withered bone, which had shown no signs of anything unusual.
The mysterious glimmer had wandered for a while before gradually fading away, and everything had eventually returned to normal.
That was what he had kept to himself.
He had been willing to risk returning to this place, of course, not out of kindness, nor to collect the belongings of Luo Meng and the others for Shangguan Qin.
He had come back to find out what that mysterious glimmer drifting inside the Phoenix Bone actually was.
He had suggested exploring the Indeterminate Ferry because he knew Ning Yao did not trust him and had grown wary of him at every turn. She was bound to oppose whatever he proposed.
And he had been right.
When he said he wanted to explore the Indeterminate Ferry, Ning Yao had indeed stopped him and insisted he stay outside.
As for Ning Yao, she had hurried off to explore, hoping to uncover the secrets inside the sailboat on her own.
That was exactly what Pang Jian had wanted.
"Judging by the time, it should appear any moment now."
Pang Jian stared at the tall, thick Phoenix Bone, keeping a certain distance. Unlike Zhou Qingchen, he did not try to touch it. He only waited for the mysterious glimmer to appear.
A while passed.
A hazy, pearly-white glimmer, like liquid amber, really did slowly rise from the spot where the Phoenix Bone plunged deep into the earth.
The mysterious pearly-white glimmer seemed like a living thing as it drifted upward from the bottom of the enormous withered bone.
Pang Jian fixed his eyes on the wondrous glimmer, afraid to miss even the slightest detail.
The image of that white, jade-like divine bone stabbing the divine bird Azure Vulture to death flashed through his mind. Seeing the similar sheen of this glimmer, he felt both nervous and thrilled.
Even the mighty Azure Vulture had died so completely when pierced by the Divine Phoenix Bone. Could this glimmer, with its similar sheen, also contain power capable of reaching the heavens and penetrating the earth?
He was so close to it. Would he be caught in its path and reduced to ashes, like those two guards?
Pang Jian held his breath, tense with unease, and carefully watched and sensed the glimmer. But he detected no terrifying heat from the wavering light, nor did he see countless runes whistling like drills.
"No, this definitely isn't the divine bone. Zhou Qingchen was right."
He gradually understood, and the hope and longing in his eyes slowly turned into deep disappointment.
The withered bone embedded in the earth was not the one he had seen before. It held none of the power to pierce the Sky Canopy. It had retained only a trace of something strange.
"Since it isn't that one..."
After confirming this, Pang Jian finally grew bolder and dared to move very close to the withered bone.
"Ah!"
Suddenly, Ning Yao's delighted cry rang out from deep inside the cabin of the Indeterminate Ferry.
She seemed to have found something too. From inside, she called, "Pang Jian, is everything normal outside? Zhou Qingchen and Shangguan Qin haven't come over, have they?"
"No, everything's normal," Pang Jian called back.
The mysterious glimmer drifting around the pillar-thick Phoenix Bone seemed to be drawn by his voice. It quickly moved to the withered bone in front of Pang Jian, as if silently observing him.
"Thump! Thump-thump!"
The palm-sized pearly-white glimmer suddenly seemed to gain awareness. It repeatedly slammed against the bone wall, trying to break free of the Phoenix Bone and enter Pang Jian's body.
Pang Jian's expression changed abruptly. He immediately backed away, terrified that the glimmer might succeed.
He had no idea what might happen to him if that pearly-white glimmer entered his body.
But he had seen with his own eyes what had happened to the divine bird Azure Vulture and those two guards.
He had risked coming back to see whether there was some secret hidden in the glimmer, and whether he could gain some tangible opportunity from it.
He had absolutely not come to gamble with his life without knowing anything.
"Thump!"
After several more impacts, the pearly-white glimmer smashed through the bone wall as Pang Jian retreated!
Pang Jian's face filled with terror. He tried to grab something to block it, but realized it was already too late.
The liquid-amber glimmer shot straight toward Pang Jian's heart, as if it meant to burrow inside. But the moment it tore through the clothes on his chest, its fierce momentum abruptly halted!
As Pang Jian's mind reeled, the Bronze Gate Pendant on his chest—the copper gate that seemed as though it would never open—cracked open by a hair's breadth.
"Whoosh!"
The liquid-amber glimmer, which should have burrowed into Pang Jian's heart and lain dormant there as it transformed, was sucked into the copper gate instead.
The glimmer flashed and vanished. The crack in the Bronze Gate quickly closed, as though nothing had happened.
At that same moment, deep in the fissures beneath the earth, a buried Ancient Vine Tree suddenly underwent a transformation, unseen by Pang Jian.
The Phoenix Bone had long since impaled the entire Ancient Vine Tree underground. Countless vines had once swayed like monstrous trees, sinister and uncanny.
After the glimmer of amber light was drawn in by the Bronze Gate on Pang Jian's chest, which had opened for the briefest instant, all the wildly thrashing Bloodthirsty Vines—and the Ancient Vine Tree itself—withered and died in the blink of an eye, stripped of every trace of their supernatural power.
Pang Jian, however, knew nothing of it.
He stood there stunned, still holding up both hands to block the glimmer, only to find that he had been fending off empty air.
The mysterious amber glimmer that had burst from the Phoenix Bone, poised to devour anyone in its path, had vanished into thin air before his chest.
The bone wall of the withered bone showed no cracks. It was still just as smooth as before.
But for some reason, when Pang Jian looked at the withered bone again, he felt that all its strange power had disappeared. There was no longer anything wondrous about it.
Looking it over from every angle, Pang Jian noticed only that a barely visible slit had appeared in the front of his clothes.
It was as if someone had taken a thin, sharp blade to his robe while he was distracted.
Pang Jian stared at the inexplicable slit in his clothes, his expression strange as he wondered whether it had something to do with the vanished amber glimmer.
"Pang Jian!"
He was deep in thought, wondering where the glimmer had gone, when Ning Yao burst out of the Indeterminate Ferry, excitement written all over her face.
A large cloth sack now hung from Ning Yao's back. It seemed stuffed full of things, making her look somewhat bulky.
"I knew it! You saw the cultivation materials the Blood Moon cultivators left behind inside the Indeterminate Ferry!"
She patted the sack on her back and said gleefully, "Spirit stones are materials every cultivator needs!"
"Here in the Fourth Realm, almost all spirit stones contain impurities that are as hard to remove as those in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. The spirit stones carried by the Blood Moon experts inside the Indeterminate Ferry aren't especially high-grade, but the rare thing is that they contain no impurities!"
Ning Yao's face lit up with delight. She waved her hand vigorously and declared, "These are things our Fourth Realm doesn't have."
With the enormous sack on her back, she leaped across the fissures splitting the earth. She moved much more slowly than she had on the way there, but her excitement was impossible to hide.
"Congratulations."
Pang Jian offered his congratulations without much warmth. He had not expected Ning Yao to actually find something inside the Indeterminate Ferry.
"Put them in the net under the horse's belly first. It's too conspicuous with me carrying them."
When Ning Yao reached him, she immediately tossed out all the worthless items that had belonged to Liu Qi from the net beneath the horse's belly. Then she put the sack of spirit stones she had picked out inside and sneered coldly, "Still trying to play clever with me?"
Pang Jian was at a loss for words. "I really didn't know there were Blood Moon spirit stones inside."
"Don't give me that! You brought the Bamboo Basket to carry those spirit stones, didn't you?" Ning Yao asked, lips pursed.
Pang Jian shook his head without a word.
"Forget it. I can't be bothered to argue with you. Since you stood guard outside, you've earned your share. I'll give you a few to use for cultivation." After a moment's thought, Ning Yao took several jade-like stones, each resembling a broken brick, from beneath the horse's belly. She lifted open the Bamboo Basket on Pang Jian's back and tossed them inside.
"What's this?"
She suddenly froze.
Inside the Bamboo Basket, the gray-white stone that radiated a faint trace of Profound Yin Power had caught her eye.
After Pang Jian had repeatedly drawn power from it, the strange stone's Profound Yin Power was so faint that its wispy emanations were hard to detect unless one touched it.
Earlier, when Ning Yao had brushed against it, she had only noticed that the Bamboo Basket felt a little cold and hadn't given it much thought.
Only now, after taking a closer look, did she realize something was off. Frowning, she said, "So it's a stone rich in Yin energy. Most people can't use this. Only those with sinister and unorthodox cultivation arts can draw power from it. Pang Jian, where did you get it, and why are you carrying it around?"
"I picked it up in a pile of stones. It was freezing cold when I held it, so I thought I'd see if I could sell it when I got out," Pang Jian replied.
"You're not wrong. This thing does have some value on the market." Ning Yao didn't suspect a thing. "But it's an obscure cultivation material, and very few people need it, so it usually isn't worth much."
Ning Yao paid it little mind. She tossed a few of the spirit stones she considered "extremely valuable" into the Bamboo Basket on Pang Jian's back, then urged him to get on the horse and head back.
"Remember this: don't breathe a word about finding these spirit stones," she warned coldly.
"Okay."
Pang Jian answered indifferently, then mounted the horse again and rode toward Zhou Qingchen and the others.
Before you continue