Innate Dragon Marrow

"This... this... this is impossible!!!"

Master Gu He's entire body shook violently. His aged eyes stared fixedly at the floating mass of liquid, his voice turning shrill and distorted from overwhelming excitement and disbelief.

"'Innate Dragon Marrow'!! It's the legendary Innate Dragon Marrow!!!"

That roar was like a meteor crashing into a still lake.

The entire second floor of the Myriad Treasures Pavilion exploded like water thrown into a boiling cauldron of oil!

"What?! Innate Dragon Marrow?!"

"Heavens! Ancient records say that only where a true dragon has fallen, nurtured by the earth veins for ten thousand years, is there the slightest chance for dragon marrow to form!"

"A single drop of Innate Spiritual Milk extending one's life by ten years is already a supreme treasure, yet a drop of this Innate Dragon Marrow can equal a hundred years of bitter cultivation! It can even cleanse the marrow and refine the body, reshape one's Dao foundation, and transform a person from the inside out!"

Gasps, shrieks, and greedy panting rose one after another, converging into a mad tidal wave of sound that nearly blew the roof off the Myriad Treasures Pavilion.

This fist-sized mass of dragon marrow had long surpassed the scope of what Spirit Stones could measure. It was an unparalleled divine treasure capable of sparking wars between sacred lands, one that even Nascent Soul Realm old monsters would smash their heads open fighting over!

The smile on Shen Wanshan's face froze completely.

In that instant, his face turned pale as paper, then flushed the color of pig liver.

He clutched his chest, feeling as though an invisible hand had seized his heart in a savage grip, crushing the breath from him.

Forty million...

Only forty million!

That heaven-sent fortune could have been his!

He had personally shoved this peerless treasure into the Left Clan's hands! He had even smugly believed he had gotten the better deal!

"Puh—"

Overwhelmed by massive regret and fury, Shen Wanshan spat out a mouthful of blood, his entire body swaying as though he might collapse at any moment.

On the other side, Zuo Tianhe rose straight from hell into the ninth heavens.

Overwhelming ecstasy crashed through his mind, making his entire body tremble as old tears streamed down his face.

"There's hope... the ancestor can be saved..."

He stared at that mass of dragon marrow, his legs going weak. If the occasion had not been inappropriate, he would nearly have knelt on the spot and kowtowed to Ye Xingchen. This was no mere life-saving medicine—it was practically a colossal stroke of fortune delivered to the Left Clan!

Brilliant light flashed repeatedly in Zuo Xiaoqing's beautiful eyes, and all her worries turned into deep shock and worship. Looking at the young man upon the stone-cutting platform, dressed in white whiter than snow beneath the glow of the dragon marrow, seeming as if he held everything in his grasp, her heart pounded like a war drum and a bewitching blush colored her cheeks.

Ye Xingchen remained calm, as though all this had been within his expectations.

He casually beckoned with one hand.

The Innate Dragon Marrow containing the shadow of a dragon within a river of stars obediently fell into the jade bottle he had prepared long ago.

After sealing the bottle, Ye Xingchen turned around, his teasing gaze sweeping over Shen Wanshan's ash-gray face.

"Patriarch Shen, thank you for yielding it to me."

Ye Xingchen shook the jade bottle in his hand, his voice clear and bright. "Just now, you said this stone was leaking qi? It was indeed leaking qi. But what it leaked was not wasted qi—it was the purest dragon qi between heaven and earth!"

Those words were like the sharpest blade, stabbing viciously into Shen Wanshan's heart before twisting twice.

Shen Wanshan's vision went dark, and he nearly fainted on the spot.

Just as everyone was still immersed in the utter shock and greed brought by the Innate Dragon Marrow—

Suddenly.

An icy, deathly aura, as though it had come from the Nine Nether Hells, erupted without warning!

The brightly lit hall of the Myriad Treasures Pavilion seemed to darken in that instant, while the temperature plunged as though everyone had fallen into an ice cellar.

The figure wrapped head to toe in a black robe, who had stood silently like a shadow behind Shen Wanshan all this time, suddenly took a step forward.

It was an evil cultivator from the Netherworld.

Within the shadows beneath his hood, two points of ghostly green fire beat violently as they locked onto the jade bottle in Ye Xingchen's hand.

Greed, desire, killing intent.

The three emotions intertwined, turning into tangible pressure that instantly blanketed the entire hall.

"This item..."

"Was formed from the lost 'Yellow Springs Dragon Eye' of my Netherworld, and is fated with our sect."

The evil cultivator slowly raised a withered hand like a ghost claw, pointing at Ye Xingchen. His voice was hoarse and domineering.

"Junior, hand over the dragon marrow, and I will leave you an intact corpse."

"Otherwise, your soul will enter the Nine Nether Hells and sink for all eternity!"

The withered ghost claw closed in on the jade bottle. Before its fingertips even arrived, a nauseating stench of corpses had already burrowed into everyone's nostrils.

"Get lost!"

Zuo Tianhe's roar was like thunder.

His Golden Core spiritual power surged, forcibly shattering the table before him as he moved to place himself in front of Ye Xingchen.

"Patriarch Zuo, you've chosen the narrow road."

A chilling voice slithered along the ground.

Shen Wanshan's spirits lifted. His figure flashed, and he blocked Zuo Tianhe's path.

Zuo Tianhe's body abruptly stalled.

In that instant of opening, the ghost claw wreathed in black mist had already reached Ye Xingchen's face.

The young man stood where he was, his fingers still lightly stroking the warm, smooth bottle, his gaze tranquil.

"Insolence!"

A red figure flashed, and a delicate shout exploded like thunder.

Nangong Yan raised her slender hand, and a crimson wall of fire rose from thin air, stretching between the ghost claw and the young man.

Sizzle—

The black mist met fire and let out a scorching hiss like raw flesh pressed against a branding iron. The evil cultivator was forced back several yards, hanging upside down from the second-floor railing like a giant bat.

"Nangong Yan." The evil cultivator's voice was cold and piercing. "The Myriad Treasures Pavilion is open for business. Since when did it begin interfering in its customers' private grudges?"

"Murdering for treasure is also called a private grudge?" Nangong Yan's red dress fluttered fiercely as the pressure of her Late Golden Core cultivation spread without restraint. "Daring to make a move inside my Myriad Treasures Pavilion—do you take my pavilion for a place with no one in it?"

The evil cultivator gave a strange laugh, his black robe billowing behind him. Countless phantom shades of wronged souls rose and sank at his back, their shrill wails instantly filling the hall.

"The Myriad Treasures Pavilion? What an impressive signboard." The evil cultivator licked away the scab of blood at the corner of his mouth, the green flames in his eyes surging violently. "But this Innate Dragon Marrow is a sacred relic of my sect. Whoever blocks me today dies! This old man does not mind refining the Myriad Treasures Pavilion into the Hundred Ghosts Night Parade Painting!"

As his words fell, darkness swallowed the light on the second floor.

Black corpse water began seeping from the walls and floor. The once resplendent stone-gambling hall transformed in the blink of an eye into a grim domain of ghosts.

"The Netherworld conducts its business. All irrelevant people, die!"

The evil cultivator formed strange hand seals, and the sky full of ghostly shadows gathered into an enormous skull. It opened its huge jaws, ready to swallow Nangong Yan and Ye Xingchen whole.

Shen Wanshan had long since retreated into a corner, a malicious, gloating grin hanging on his face. Fight. The more thoroughly they wrecked the place, the better. Only chaos would let him fish in troubled waters.

The skull's massive jaws were about to close.

"Hmph."

A cold snort.

It was soft, as soft as a teacup being set on a table.

Yet the instant that sound rang out, the wailing of ghosts and howling of spirits filling the sky came to an abrupt halt.

The roiling black mist, the seeping corpse water, the savage skull, even the violent aura around the evil cultivator—all of it was frozen in place as though someone had pressed pause.

At the top floor of the Myriad Treasures Pavilion, the void faintly caved in.

One finger.

A thin, withered finger covered in age spots.

It pierced through the floor, through the darkness, through that invincible-looking skull phantom.

Like a finger popping a soap bubble.

Pop.

After that faint sound, every strange phenomenon vanished like smoke.

That finger continued onward without slowing. It looked slow, yet ignored the distance of space, lightly touching the evil cultivator's brow.

The green flames in the evil cultivator's eyes trembled violently. He wanted to flee, but discovered in horror that even the right to move a single little finger had been stripped away.

"You think you're worthy?"