Hollow Skull

On Lake Heart Island, the White Tower gave off a faint glow, steeped in gloom and wickedness.

As they concentrated on sensing it, they could still hear the anguished cries of the dead. One by one, they felt their scalps prickle.

But when Pang Jian looked at the White Tower again, he found it had become entirely harmless, no longer making him feel the slightest discomfort.

This sinister White Tower, which came from the mysterious Yin Spirit Temple and possessed the power to seek out souls and ghosts, seemed to deliberately ignore him. It alone would not search his soul.

"I'm glad you came to save me."

Luo Hongyan gently pressed her lips together. A hint of unmistakable delight and smugness shone in her clear eyes.

Pang Jian frowned and said coldly, "When we first entered the Cenji Mountains, if you'd treated me the way you do now, I wouldn't have stood by and watched you die at the bottom of Blackwater Pool."

Luo Hongyan stared at him in astonishment.

Then,

in that void, she turned toward the faint soul shadow huddled in the darkness and said smugly, "See? When you fell to the bottom of the pool, he didn't save you. This time, though, he rescued me."

The real Ning Yao gazed at her stunningly beautiful apparition and lowered her head in dejection. "If I'd known he was so extraordinary, I would've treated him well too."

"You couldn't have."

Luo Hongyan's face was full of mockery. She shook her head with a faint smile and said, "You both come from great families, but Zhou Qingchen saw what made him different and reached out to him first. What about you? You met him before Zhou Qingchen did, yet you couldn't recognize his worth. You treated him like an ordinary hunter."

Ning Yao fell silent.

Luo Hongyan was telling the truth. She and Pang Jian had entered the Cenji Mountains together, but it was Zhou Qingchen who had taken the initiative and won Pang Jian's trust first.

When Ning Yao realized this, she hadn't thought about how to draw Pang Jian back to her side. Instead, she had used threats.

In the end, Pang Jian had thrown the pouch of silver onto the ground, declaring their agreement over.

"Little brother..."

He Rong had watched for a while from the side, but he couldn't bring himself to speak to Luo Hongyan. So he said to Pang Jian, "Since you're unaffected, I'll have to trouble you to go to the top floor of the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda and destroy the special formation there."

Su Yuntian nodded along with an awkward chuckle.

When Luo Hongyan had been in danger, fear of the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda had kept them from daring to rush over and save her. Now they found it hard to face her.

Luo Hongyan, however, didn't mind. She cared only about Pang Jian's attitude and what he thought. Smiling, she said, "Whether or not you can break the formation, I believe you'll come out unharmed. This Heavenly Spirit Pagoda from the Yin Spirit Temple definitely can't hurt you."

"I saw it with my own eyes: the moment you stepped onto Lake Heart Island, it fell from the sky. I even feel... it's afraid of you."

Her words brought the others back to the strange sight of the White Tower crashing down and the island shaking violently.

They looked at Pang Jian, their gazes suddenly clouded with doubt.

Could it be that none of that had been a coincidence?

"I'll take a look,"

Pang Jian said in a low voice.

He, too, felt the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda couldn't hurt him. The feeling was uncanny, and he couldn't explain why, but it was there all the same.

Once he decided to investigate, he didn't hesitate. Carrying the Dragon-Patterned Spear, he strode toward the White Tower.

He suddenly moved very quickly, barely pausing at all. He no longer proceeded cautiously, sensing and observing as he went.

In an instant, he was at the White Tower, standing at the entrance to the stairs.

At that moment, everyone's gaze naturally converged on him. They seemed even more anxious than he was.

Luo Hongyan remained calm and composed, pinching her waist with a tender white hand. No one knew what she was thinking.

"My body belongs to me!"

Sensing her movements, the faint soul shadow imprisoned inside her body spoke through gritted teeth, holding back her anger. "The places he's touched are part of my body too!"

Luo Hongyan didn't care about her fury at all. In that desolate, empty world, she danced with graceful, swaying steps.

"If I want, this body can belong to me too."

"I was just thinking that perhaps taking you over and becoming you completely wouldn't be such a bad idea. Your cultivation aptitude is indeed a little poor, but there are ways to make up for it. It'd just take some effort and a few tricks."

At those words, Ning Yao didn't dare show even a hint of anger. Frightened, she quickly suppressed every trace of resentment.

Just then, Pang Jian stepped inside the White Tower and immediately felt the dense spiritual energy filling the space.

It was countless times richer and purer than the spiritual energy of Lake Heart Island. It filled the bottom floor of the White Tower like drifting white mist.

On the tower floor, clear, translucent crystals were arranged in a square spiral, forming a complex, mysterious formation.

The square spirals connected to one another. Within the crystals that formed them, light flowed ceaselessly like water.

Standing above the crystals, Pang Jian tried cultivating with the Pot-Heaven Qi Cultivation Art. At once, an incredibly rich power surged out of the crystals!

A waterfall of mighty spiritual power poured into his dantian in an instant, flowing straight into his Spirit Sea!

It was pristine spiritual power, not spiritual energy from heaven and earth. It needed no purification or further refining.

And its sheer quantity was astonishing!

In that one moment, Pang Jian felt a pool's worth of spiritual power gather in his Spirit Sea.

"Thump, thump!"

His heart raced. He stared at the wondrous formation beneath his feet in disbelief, feeling that this was the finest cultivation sanctuary in the world!

Cultivating atop these crystals would let him fill his Spirit Sea with spiritual power in no time.

His Qi Refining Realm cultivation would surely reach its bottleneck quickly, gathering an immense force with which to break through to the next realm!

Enjoying the wonders of the place, Pang Jian drew a deep breath and forced himself to calm down.

He knew this wasn't the time.

He quickly found the stairs leading upward. Daring not glance at the crystals again, he hurried up, floor by floor.

The second, third, and fourth floors were all completely empty. The floors were made of the same material as the tower itself, like the bones of some colossal creature.

Without a moment's hesitation, he headed straight for the top floor of the Heavenly Spirit Pagoda.

On the fifth floor, a gigantic, hollow skull of bone-white color suddenly appeared before his eyes.

The top of the skull was hollow, as were its eye sockets and cheekbones. Inside its hollow cranium, countless ghostly beings, tiny as mosquitoes, circled and shrieked around a living creature.

The moment Pang Jian stopped, he heard an endless clamor: despairing cries, frenzied roars, pleas for help, and curses of boundless hatred for the world.

The space on this floor seemed filled with wandering ghosts, concealing countless evil spirits.

He hurriedly steadied himself, neither trying to make out the meaning of those strange voices nor searching for their source. Instead, he looked at the thing in the hollow center of the skull, surrounded by all those ghosts and spirits.

It was a dark green turtle. It was clearly a spirit, but far larger than any of the souls and ghosts around it.

It was in the center of the skull, surrounded by a multitude of ghosts and spirits, as though its intelligence and awareness were slowly being worn away.

As he watched closely, Pang Jian suddenly realized that the ceaseless clamor came from the ghosts and spirits circling it.

Countless ghosts, each tiny compared with it, surrounded it, muddling its thoughts and will.

It was so dazed that it was nearly forgetting who it was.

"The skull is the special formation."

Pang Jian understood.

He moved a little closer and immediately felt the pure Profound Yin Power rushing toward him.

He understood at once. The hollow skull was built from pieces of jade that contained Profound Yin Power.

The jade was no longer grayish white, but pure white. The Profound Yin Power hidden within it was purer than the piece he had found in the pile of stones.

Those pieces of jade contained nothing but abundant Profound Yin Power, without any spiritual power or other auras.

Pang Jian tried to move closer and closer, focusing on the gloom and chill released by the skull. The Bronze Gate Pendant against his chest began to grow warm as well.

As soon as the warmth appeared, the dark green Spirit Turtle surrounded by countless ghosts and spirits sensed something.

The Spirit Turtle struggled to gather its thoughts, laboriously adjusting its angle as it slowly turned toward Pang Jian.

At last, it saw the spear-wielding youth standing as if facing a great enemy. Confusion filled its eyes at first.

Then, suddenly, wild joy welled up from the depths of its gaze!

However,

when it finally saw Pang Jian clearly and realized he wasn't the person it had been hoping for, deep disappointment showed in its eyes.

It had no flesh, blood, or bones; it was merely a soul. Yet the complex, shifting look it gave Pang Jian revealed its thoughts.

Without a word between them, Pang Jian only had to look into its eyes to guess what it was thinking.

"I'll destroy this skull and get you out."

Pang Jian made the promise for no apparent reason. He had come to destroy the formation anyway, so he tightened his grip on the Dragon-Patterned Spear and thrust.

"Clang!"

The jade struck by the spearhead rang like metal hitting metal. The seemingly insignificant piece of jade didn't even throw off a spark.

Pang Jian was startled. Gripping the Dragon-Patterned Spear in both hands, he felt the savage strength rising through his arms and body, then thrust at the same piece of jade again.

"Clang!"

Just like before, the jade rang like metal, but didn't budge.

"Is this one particularly tough?"

Knowing just how strong he was, Pang Jian refused to believe it. With the same force, he clenched the Dragon-Patterned Spear and began attacking other pieces of jade.

"Clang! Clang-clang! Clang-clang-clang!"

He tried more than ten times, striking different pieces of jade each time, but not a single piece making up the skull formation cracked.

Not even one showed any sign of shifting.

The Spirit Turtle surrounded by countless ghosts and spirits quietly closed its eyes in disappointment, no longer holding out hope for him.

Pang Jian didn't lose heart. He tried again and again, then set down the Dragon-Patterned Spear and pushed and pulled at the pieces of jade with both hands. Still, he couldn't pry even one loose.

"I'll go out and think of another way. I'll smash this damned thing, no matter what."

After a long moment, Pang Jian left it at that, not knowing whether the Spirit Turtle could understand him.

He didn't even pick up the Dragon-Patterned Spear. Rather than going back the way he'd come, floor by floor, he jumped straight out through an open window.

"Boom!"

He crashed from the five-story White Tower onto the ground, which was covered in tender green weeds, then quickly made his way to Luo Hongyan.

Everyone stared at him, their faces filled with uncertainty.