Blind Girl Caresses the Broken Stele; Jade Bones Hum Softly, Knowing Heaven's Might

Deep within Immortal-Breaking Mountain lay a hidden miasma-filled valley.

The thirty-thousand-jin City-Guarding Stele was wedged fast across the mouth of a cave halfway up the mountain. This massive black stone sealed off most of the passage without the slightest gap, completely shutting out the blood-soaked stench and carnage beyond. Only a half-foot-wide crack remained overhead, letting in the occasional thread of chilly mountain wind.

The cave interior was utterly secure, forming a fortress no one could disturb.

Upon the dry surface of a massive boulder, the thick Netherwind Wolf pelt stirred.

A-Nan opened her eyes, clouded over with white film, and sat upright from within the beast pelt.

It was especially quiet around her.

The heavy breathing that usually sounded beside her ears was gone, and so was the scraping of the Black-Iron Chain dragging across the ground. Yet the air still carried a warm scent. It was the pure yang scent of blood and vitality radiating from Lu Chen's twelve-layer physique, lingering in the cave without dissipating.

A-Nan wrinkled her tiny nose and sniffed.

She stretched out her little hand, groped around the stone a few times, and caught hold of the rag doll with the missing ear.

A-Nan hugged the rag doll tightly against her chest. She neither called out nor shed any tears. She merely quietly lifted the wolf pelt and slid down from the towering boulder. Her bare little feet landed directly on the uneven ground covered in broken stones.

In the past, stepping on gravel would surely rub several blood blisters into her soles. But today was different. Her reconstructed flesh was exceptionally tough; even sharp stone chips pressing into the bottoms of her feet caused no pain at all.

Following the warmth left in the air, she walked step by step toward the cave entrance.

A huge, rough stone surface blocked her path.

A-Nan stopped and pressed both little hands flat against the back of the City-Guarding Stele.

The stone surface exuded a chill and was covered in uneven, coarse rock patterns. The night wind leaking through the half-foot-wide crack above blew directly across her thin shoulders. She raised her little face in the direction of the wind and listened carefully to the sounds outside.

At that moment, an unusual sensation came from beneath her palms.

Something was hidden inside the black stone. When Lu Chen had fiercely uprooted this broken stele during the day, that violent pure yang blood and vitality had surged down his arm and forced its way into the deepest part of the stele. That brute force had yet to fully disperse and still lay dormant beneath the heavy layers of rock.

A-Nan's chest gave a sudden thump.

The drop of pure blood from a strange beast, repeatedly refined by Lu Chen and forcibly fed into her mouth, reacted at this moment. Two currents of blood and vitality from the same source met directly through the thick black rock.

A low hum came from the rough stele surface.

A-Nan frowned.

A strange itch rose in her palms. It traveled along her fingertips, burrowed straight into her wrists, and seeped all the way into the depths of her freshly reconstructed marrow. Her entire arm turned sore and numb.

She only wanted to find something hard and give it a good rub.

Her ten slender little fingers, gleaming with a lustrous jade-white hue, pressed tightly against the rough stele surface and rubbed back and forth with force. The movement was utterly casual. It was exactly how she used to knead yellow mud beside the filthy puddles of Mud Alley in Black Mud City's outer district.

This was a thirty-thousand-jin City-Guarding Stele. During the day, that Foundation Establishment Realm steward had struck it with a magic artifact and failed to chip off even a layer of rock.

And now, beneath this little girl's tender fingers—

At the very edge of the stele, the weathered rock ridges, hard beyond measure, silently began to crumble.

There was no crisp sound of hard objects striking each other.

Those indestructible black rocks were directly ground into extremely fine stone powder by that primal, monstrous brute force in its purest form. It was even finer than the refined white flour sold at noodle shops.

The itch gradually faded.

A-Nan released her hands.

Fine stone powder caught between her fingers trickled down in a soft patter, scattering all over the tops of her bare feet.

She groped her way back with her little hands. A large section of the rough, sharply defined edge had been forcibly rubbed away, leaving behind a smooth, flat, pale-white indentation.

The little girl's mind held no concept of destructive power at all.

She shook both arms, felt the soreness and numbness in her hand bones vanish completely, and found herself much more comfortable. Bending down, she casually brushed the stone powder from the tops of her feet.

Then A-Nan straightened up again and pressed half her cheek tightly against the cool City-Guarding Stele.

Her stomach chose that moment to rumble loudly.

"Where did the big one go?"

She murmured softly. Her little mind was full of thoughts of when she might get a bite of hot beast meat. The body that had just ground apart an extremely hard stele displayed a strange state of utter sluggishness and ethereal detachment.

After drinking the pure blood, her senses had changed completely.

Those grayish eyes clouded with white film still could not see the light. But beyond the blind spot of mortal fleshly eyes, another, keener sense had awakened.

Centered on A-Nan's slender body, rings of invisible ripples of vital aura spread outward.

The special perception brought by bloodline resonance pierced directly through the cave's thick stone walls and rapidly extended toward the dark forest outside.

She saw many flickering specks of light.

In the forest outside, dozens of weak life-flames lay scattered about, all low-level demonic beasts hiding in the darkness to forage.

Every one of those flames was trembling violently.

They circled far and wide through the forest, refusing to come anywhere near this cave halfway up the mountain.

That was because a vast remnant aura of exceptionally savage, ferocious blood and vitality still coiled around the cave. It was the territorial scent Lu Chen had left behind after killing. This Sha Qi had scared those feathered beasts without intelligence out of their wits, leaving them to cower in the distance and stare helplessly.

Leaning against the stone, A-Nan watched those furtive little flames with great interest.

Suddenly, her brows knitted tightly together.

The faint relaxation on her face vanished in an instant. She raised her chin, and her hollow, clouded eyes stared straight through the half-foot-wide crack overhead toward the high sky above Black Mud City.

In her world of perception, a massive cluster of aura that pierced to the bone came crashing down from an immeasurable height.

It was too cold.

It was utterly unlike the warm blood and vitality emitted by birds and beasts. This was an immense source of spiritual energy without the slightest trace of human warmth.

That was Song Que.

To shorten his travel time, this elite sent by the Azure Firmament Sword Sect had directly loaded a full ten mid-grade spirit stones into the formation hub and burned them furiously. The spirit boat's formation was severely overloaded, letting out a shrill explosive roar as it forcibly tore apart the heavy clouds high overhead.

The Foundation Establishment Realm pressure, completely unrestrained, bore down from all directions.

This ice-cold spiritual pressure crashed brutally into the ripples of vital aura A-Nan had sent outward, stabbing her cheeks with pain. The upper limit of power capable of crushing a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator had directly triggered the blind girl's long-range perception at that moment.

It was not only the sky that felt cold. Something was wrong beneath the ground as well.

Standing barefoot on the earth, A-Nan clearly sensed the terrestrial spiritual veins around the outskirts of Immortal-Breaking Mountain undergoing an exceptionally violent upheaval.

The spiritual energy originally scattered throughout the underground was being forcibly drawn out by some overbearing force.

These currents of energy darted back and forth through the air, gathering together.

The spiritual energy of heaven and earth for hundreds of li around was intertwining in midair. The prelude to a grand formation sealing the heavens had already begun to brew. It was an attempt to lock the entirety of Immortal-Breaking Mountain tightly within it.

A-Nan shuddered all over.

The chaotic cold aura roaming outside made her feel extremely uncomfortable.

She turned around and quickly walked barefoot back to the deepest part of the cave. Hugging the rag doll with the missing ear tightly in both hands, she climbed up the dry, hard boulder and curled herself back into a tiny ball.

She pulled the wide Netherwind Wolf pelt over herself, wrapping her head, hands, and feet tightly within it, leaving only a pair of grayish eyes exposed as they gazed toward the City-Guarding Stele.

"The sky has turned cold."

The little blind girl murmured softly.

She obediently curled up in the corner, quietly waiting for that tall figure to return.