Ancient Desolate Runes Boil the Blood; a 30,000-Jin Dao Stele Shakes the Earth!

Lu Chen's rough palm pressed tightly against the massive black stele.

There was none of the bone-piercing chill he had imagined.

Stirred by the Ancient Desolate blood and qi surging madly through his body, the stone's originally cold, hard surface slowly began to seep with a trace of warmth.

That warmth burrowed up from his palm, shooting straight into his head.

Lu Chen's pupils contracted violently.

A series of immensely fragmented yet shocking images suddenly flashed through his mind.

A blood-red moon hung in the sky.

The earth was cracked, scorched soil everywhere.

Countless ancient forefathers stood bare-chested, their muscles knotted and their bodies smeared with blood.

They carried enormous black stone steles one after another, braving the immortal arts raining down from the sky as they marched forward head-on.

Their roars shook heaven and earth.

With every step they took, the earth veins trembled madly.

That savage aura—humanity's most primal and unyielding aura—crossed countless ages and struck Lu Chen's nerves without reservation.

Just as this bloodline resonance was about to reach its peak—

A blinding azure light suddenly burst from the towering city wall of the inner city.

The shriek of something cutting through the air was sharp and piercing.

A middle-aged man in black robes rode a flying sword out from the inner city. He sped toward them, then came to a steady halt in midair above the square.

His face was frosty, and his aura unfathomably deep. He was certainly no half-baked outer sect disciple.

He was a steward sent from the inner city.

A genuine Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator.

Standing on his flying sword, the steward looked down at Lu Chen below.

He looked at him as though he were already a dead thing.

Lofty and disdainful.

"The Saintess severing mortal ties is an opportunity ordained by heaven."

With his hands clasped behind his back, the steward's voice, wrapped in immense true essence, echoed over the entirety of Black Mud City.

"You, an ant, not only refuse to obediently face your tribulation."

"You even dared to defile our sect's spirit beast and destroy the City-Guarding Stele."

"Do you know that you have committed a monstrous sin deserving the annihilation of body and soul?"

Before his words had fully faded—

The steward had no intention of giving Lu Chen any chance to defend himself. His hands rapidly formed seals before his chest.

A cultivator's arrogance was displayed in full at this moment.

To kill a mortal required no reason—only a verdict.

The spiritual qi around the square was instantly drained dry, gathering frantically into the air.

In the blink of an eye, a massive azure hand of true essence, several zhang long, condensed in midair.

The lines on its palm were clearly visible, radiating a terrifying pressure that could crush everything.

The steward turned his right hand downward.

The massive azure hand of true essence came crashing down at Lu Chen's crown with the terrifying force of Mount Tai bearing down.

A wild wind howled, shaking the wooden doors on both sides of the street violently.

The mortals peeking through door cracks and from behind broken walls in the distance covered their mouths tightly in terror.

It was over.

A Foundation Establishment Realm immortal master had descended in person.

That youth who had stood up for his blind little sister, no matter how strong he was, could never withstand true immortal arts.

If that blow landed squarely, he would surely be crushed into a puddle of mangled flesh.

Lu Chen stood before the Dao Stele without retreating half a step.

He had no intention of dodging at all.

He swept his arms backward and pulled A-Nan tighter against his back, making sure the little girl would not take the blow head-on.

Then Lu Chen suddenly drew in a deep breath.

His chest expanded violently.

The Ultimate Dao Furnace within him let out a heaven-shaking roar.

All his blood and qi were forcibly wrung out, blasting wildly from his pores.

Crimson blood and qi shot into the sky, forming a straight plume of smoke that rammed hard against the descending hand of true essence.

"Bang!"

A deafening explosion erupted in the center of the square.

The massive azure hand of true essence struck Lu Chen's shoulders and back without any flourish.

Terrifying true essence pressure poured down in a torrent.

The bluestone slabs beneath Lu Chen's feet did not even last the span of a breath before shattering inch by inch into fine stone powder.

The immense downward force traveled down Lu Chen's spine.

His legs were forced into the ground up past his knees, sinking nearly half a foot deep.

Under the crushing pressure, his bones let out crisp cracks that made one's scalp tingle.

But he did not fall!

His back remained ramrod straight.

Every muscle in his body spasmed violently beneath the Foundation Establishment Realm pressure. Yet the iron-gray skin granted by the eleventh layer of the Iron Shirt instead underwent an incomparably brutal tempering.

Black metallic patterns coursed wildly beneath his flesh, their color growing deeper and deeper.

A hue like black iron completely covered his body.

With nothing but a mortal body, Lu Chen had forcibly endured a Foundation Establishment Realm spell capable of smashing down city walls.

Having exhausted its spiritual qi, the massive hand of true essence dissolved into motes of light.

The black-robed steward's pupils suddenly shrank.

For the first time, undisguised horror appeared on the face that had remained so arrogant.

He unconsciously stepped back half a pace, making the flying sword beneath his feet sway.

"Impossible!"

The steward cried out, his voice rising so sharply it cracked.

"There is not a trace of spiritual qi in your body!"

"How can a mere mortal body withstand the crushing weight of true essence without mana protecting it?"

This completely overturned more than a century of his understanding of cultivation.

Mortal flesh was supposed to be like paper; upon encountering true essence, it should have been reduced to ashes. How could it possibly withstand such force without breaking apart?

Lu Chen slowly raised his head.

He lifted the back of his rough hand and casually wiped away the blood at the corner of his mouth.

His crimson eyes remained fixed on the Dao Stele ahead.

He completely ignored the Foundation Establishment Realm steward shouting in midair.

Those lofty cultivators were nothing in his eyes.

Lu Chen spread his thick arms and, one to either side, tightly embraced the very base of the enormous black Dao Stele.

His ten fingers, covered in the sheen of black iron, dug deep into the cracks of the stele's rocky patterns.

"Rise... for me!"

Lu Chen opened his mouth, and from deep in his throat erupted a terrifying roar like a beast driven into a corner.

His heart pumped blood madly, thudding like war drums.

Blood surged through his thick veins, washing through every limb and bone.

At this moment, the Ancient Desolate Forbidden Physique's savage, violent strength burst forth without restraint.

The muscles in his arms bulged grotesquely, while his tendons stretched taut to the brink of snapping.

"Creeeak—"

An incredibly piercing sound of stone grinding came from deep underground.

The sound traveled along the earth veins, spreading throughout Black Mud City and beyond.

The steward in midair stared with his eyes wide, even his breathing halted.

Under everyone's gaze—

The City-Guarding Stele, weighing 30,000 jin, rooted in Black Mud City for over a century, and regarded by the immortal sect as an absolute symbol of authority—

Actually began to shake violently.

This was not some lifeless object for comprehending the Dao created by the immortal sect.

It was a relic left behind by ancient Ultimate Dao body cultivators.

An ancient war stele used to suppress the spiritual qi of heaven and earth and restore the glory of the Ultimate Dao.

The instant the Dao Stele was shaken by Lu Chen's pure blood and qi—

An ancient, savage, heavy force field, specifically meant to suppress the spiritual qi of heaven and earth, instantly spread outward from the stele and enveloped the surrounding space for hundreds of zhang.

All spiritual qi within that space immediately became stagnant as dead water, while gravity increased severalfold.

The steward in midair bore the brunt of it.

Deprived of spiritual qi to sustain it, the flying sword beneath his feet let out a mournful cry, its light completely dimming.

The steward's body tilted. With a scream, he fell stiffly from the air and crashed heavily into a distant pile of rubble, leaving him battered and disoriented.

Accompanied by the tremendous roar caused by the shaking Dao Stele—

The houses along the entire main street trembled violently, and vast swathes of roof tiles and mud bricks came crashing to the ground.

"Rumble!"

The soil beneath the stele finally could not withstand the heaven-upending force and exploded apart.

At the very instant the 30,000-jin stele was forcibly pulled from the ground—

An incomparably dazzling blood-colored desolate rune suddenly lit up from the ancient markings at the base of the Dao Stele.

Carrying the majestic vitality of the ancient era, the desolate rune climbed upward along Lu Chen's arms gripping the stele's base with terrifying speed.

In the blink of an eye, the blood-colored desolate rune had spread across Lu Chen's entire body!