Chance Encounter with the Gourd Vine, the Shard of Destruction

That day, the three of them reached a cliff halfway up Mount Buzhou.

Houtu, who had been sensing her surroundings with her eyes closed, suddenly stopped. A flash of wonder crossed her beautiful eyes. "Big Brother, the earth essence here is exceptionally dense. It seems... something is calling to me."

Upon hearing this, Dijiang narrowed his eyes as silver spatial laws churned wildly in their depths.

A moment later, a smile curled across his lips. "A natural innate concealment array. No wonder it escaped divine-sense detection. Step back half a pace."

As soon as he spoke, Dijiang formed a sword gesture with two fingers. A heart-pounding force of spatial severance coiled around his fingertips as he lightly swiped at the empty air before him.

"Riiip—"

A sound like tearing silk rang out, and the tranquil void was forcibly ripped open, revealing a fissure several yards long.

A dense surge of innate spiritual energy, nearly liquid in concentration, mixed with creation energy and poured out from the crack.

The three stepped through the fissure, and the sight before them suddenly opened up.

This was a hidden innate grotto-heaven. At its center lay a small pool formed from Three Lights Divine Water.

Beside the pool was a pile of incomparably heavy soil that glowed with Mystic Yellow light.

"Nine Heavens Resting Soil!" Houtu cried out, her eyes filled with delight. It was an earth-element supreme treasure, perfectly suited to her earth laws.

Yet Dijiang's gaze passed over the Nine Heavens Resting Soil and fixed firmly upon a vine growing from it.

It was a vine that had only just sprouted tender shoots. Faint divine light in seven colors—red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, and violet—flowed across it. Though it was still extremely fragile, its innate spiritual-root Dao rhythm could not be mistaken.

"Primordial Gourd Vine..." Dijiang's heart churned with stormy waves.

He knew perfectly well that this vine would one day bear seven innate gourds renowned throughout the Primordial World. They would fall into the hands of the Three Pure Ones, Nuwa, Eastern Emperor Taiyi, Hong Yun, and others. The vine itself would become the crucial sacred artifact Nuwa used to mold earth and create humanity!

"Big Brother, this vine seems extraordinary. Should we move it?" Xuanming's cool voice sounded from nearby.

Dijiang drew a deep breath, suppressing the stirrings in his heart, and shook his head. "No. It has not yet matured. If we forcibly transplant it, we may damage its origin and ruin this tremendous opportunity."

A calculating gleam flashed in his eyes.

The three clans were currently contending for supremacy, and Hongjun had yet to emerge. Since he had discovered this gourd vine first, its future ownership would no longer be for the Heavenly Dao to decide!

With that thought, Dijiang moved his mind and secretly activated the Creation Jade Disk within his sea of consciousness.

Wisps of exceptionally pure creation energy flowed from his fingertips and silently sank into the Primordial Gourd Vine's roots.

Afterward, he had Houtu take only half of the Nine Heavens Resting Soil and Three Lights Divine Water, leaving the other half behind to continue nourishing the gourd vine.

With this wisp of creation energy, it would be enough to support the gourd vine until it bore fruit.

Next, Dijiang formed seals with both hands and tightly layered a Triple Spatial Maze Array outside the innate array.

Just as they were preparing to leave the grotto-heaven, Xuanming, who had remained silent all along, suddenly walked toward a dark corner in its deepest reaches.

There was no spiritual energy there. Instead, an exceptionally pure aura of slaughter and bone-chilling cold permeated the area, making one's scalp tingle.

Xuanming extended her slender, pale fingers, brushed aside the rubble, and pulled a pitch-black broken blade from the soil. It was neither metal nor stone.

The instant the broken blade emerged, the temperature in the grotto-heaven plummeted. A terrifying murderous aura, as though it sought to massacre all living beings, shot toward the heavens, but Dijiang reacted swiftly and suppressed it with a spatial barrier.

"This is..." Dijiang's eyelids twitched as he stared at the broken blade.

There was not the slightest trace of creation energy on it, only destruction and slaughter in their purest forms.

Considering the current era of the Primordial World, this was the remnant of a killing artifact that had yet to appear in the world!

"Big Brother, I... really like this."

Xuanming held the broken blade, and an unusual hint of obsession appeared in her cool eyes.

She already controlled the laws of ice and rain, with ultimate killing intent contained within her. This broken blade's aura was simply a match made in heaven for her.

"Keep it safe. Nurture it close to your body with your Primordial Spirit, but before your cultivation advances further, do not casually use the killing origin within it." Dijiang warned her gravely.

Xuanming nodded obediently and stored the broken blade within her Primordial Spirit.

Only after carefully inspecting the Triple Spatial Maze Array he had set did Dijiang quietly leave this innate grotto-heaven with his two younger sisters.

The farther they climbed, the more oppressive the pressure became. They were only Zenith Heaven Golden Immortals, and this was already their limit, so the three began following the slopes of Mount Buzhou downward.

As they gradually moved away from Mount Buzhou's core region, the heavy pressure began to weaken.

Yet at the same time, the originally clear innate spiritual energy in the air gradually became mixed with a sickeningly sweet, violent trace.

"What heavy killing intent. It is even more frenzied than that within Pangu Hall." Houtu frowned slightly and instinctively circulated her Primordial Spirit. Strands of earthen-yellow law light flowed across her body, blocking the murky aura that tried to invade her.

Xuanming merely snorted coldly. Frosty energy radiated around her, and before the killing intent could approach, it froze into ash-gray ice crystals that fell with soft rustles.

"This is the tribulation aura of the great calamity."

Dijiang stopped and looked through layers of cloud seas toward the vast, boundless land of the Primordial World beyond Mount Buzhou.

Faint dark-red tribulation clouds churned above the heavens, while an oppressive aura of slaughter filled heaven and earth.

"Now, the Dragon Clan, Phoenix Clan, and Qilin Clan have already killed until their eyes are red in their struggle for heaven and earth's providence.

"This tribulation aura will not only obscure heavenly secrets, but also erode cultivators' minds.

"Once one sinks deeply into it, even a Zenith Heaven Golden Immortal will become a crazed demon who knows only slaughter, ultimately perishing in body and Dao."

Dijiang took the opportunity to instruct his two younger sisters.

As he spoke, the distant sea of clouds suddenly began to churn violently.

"Rumble!"

Accompanied by deafening thunder, three enormous figures smashed through the clouds and fought as they plummeted from the sky toward the foot of Mount Buzhou.

They were three colossal beasts, each tens of thousands of feet in size.

One was a horned true dragon covered in azure scales, one was a pure-blooded Scarlet Phoenix wreathed in Southern Bright Flame, and the last was an Ink Jade Qilin that strode upon Mystic Yellow Aura.

All three pure-blooded divine beasts radiated the formidable aura of Peak Primordial Unity Golden Immortals. Yet none displayed the bearing of the strong. Their eyes were bloodshot, their bodies drenched in blood, and every attack was a ruthless move aimed at mutual destruction.

"Roar! My Dragon Clan discovered this Nine-Leaf Swordgrass first! You are courting death!" Azure Dragon roared, opening his mouth to unleash a sky full of Gui Water Divine Thunder.

"Bullshit! All birds, beasts, and creatures belong under the jurisdiction of my Phoenix Clan and the Qilin Clan! How dare a damp-born, egg-hatched creature like you lay claim to it?"

Scarlet Phoenix screeched, beating his wings as a boundless sea of fire poured down from above.

Ink Jade Qilin said nothing. He directly unleashed his innate divine ability, drawing upon the power of the earth and transforming it into countless earthen spikes that tore toward the other two divine beasts.

The violent aftershocks of their power swept across the land like a hurricane, instantly leveling several nearby mountaintops.