North Sea Anomaly, Chaos Pearl Fragment

After leaving Qiuniu and Yinglong, Qing Xuan and Qing Yi continued north.

More than ten thousand years later.

The North Sea, whose waves had roared without cease all year round, suddenly fell silent.

Across hundreds of millions of miles, every wave froze in midair at the same instant.

Waves tens of thousands of feet high remained poised to crash down, yet not a single drop of seawater fell. Even the workings of the Great Dao between heaven and earth seemed to have come to a brief standstill.

Qing Xuan and Qing Yi stood atop the sea.

The Twelve-Petal Creation Azure Lotus hovered behind Qing Xuan, trailing streams of clear creation light.

The Eastern Green Lotus Treasure-Colored Banner gently unfurled beside Qing Yi, isolating their auras from the North Sea.

Qing Yi looked beneath the surface. "Here?"

"Yes." Qing Xuan's gaze fell upon the bottomless darkness.

Several thousand years ago, the source within his body had stirred for the first time.

That sensation had been exceedingly faint. It had appeared for only an instant before vanishing completely. Only after they entered the North Sea did the intermittent pull gradually become clear.

It was not because he had previously been too far away to sense it. Rather, whatever lay hidden beneath the North Sea had only recently revealed a trace of its aura after a long seal.

Qing Xuan raised a hand.

A world slowly unfolded in his palm, with mountains and rivers, the Four Seas, sun, and moon appearing in turn.

The Twelve-Petal Creation Azure Lotus took root at the center of the world, and boundless vitality flowed in every direction with the cycle of heaven and earth.

Yet in the deepest part of this world, which had nearly become complete, lingered an extremely faint gray aura.

It was a source even Qing Xuan himself rarely touched.

At this moment, that gray aura, dormant for untold ages, trembled faintly in response to the fluctuations coming from the depths of the North Sea.

They came from the same source. There could be no mistake.

"Let's go."

Qing Xuan took a step forward, and the sea beneath his feet parted to either side.

Qing Yi followed at his side.

In the blink of an eye, the two vanished beneath the North Sea. Behind them, the countless waves frozen between heaven and earth began crashing down once more.

Boom!!!

The seawater, held back for so long, crashed together with a roar that resounded across the entire North Sea.

Yet beneath the surface lay an entirely different scene.

The deeper they went, the dimmer the light became.

Ordinary seawater could no longer withstand the lingering aura of the Great Dao here. No living creatures existed at the bottom of the North Sea; there was only an ancient battlefield stretching on for countless miles.

Broken dragon bones lay scattered across the seafloor.

Farther away were several grotesque Fierce Beast carcasses, wrapped in layers of gray-black baleful aura. Even after the passage of endless years, they had not fully decayed.

Qing Xuan and Qing Yi did not linger over those remains.

What truly made them stop was a pitch-black fissure that ran across the entire seafloor.

That fissure did not appear to have formed naturally.

It stretched from the Earth Veins of the North Sea all the way into the depths of the void, piercing through everything in its path.

No Great Dao flowed around the fissure. There was only a killing aura condensed to near solidity, which had not dispersed in the slightest even after more than ten thousand years since the end of the Fierce Beast Tribulation.

Qing Yi watched for a while. "This is not a spatial rift. It is a spear mark."

The Twelve-Petal Creation Azure Lotus behind Qing Xuan slowly rose, keeping the killing aura that tried to approach outside its clear light.

There was only one spear capable of leaving such a mark in the Primordial World, a wound that still could not heal on its own after the Fierce Beast Tribulation.

Qing Xuan frowned slightly. "Godslayer Spear left this behind."

When Hongjun had spoken of Shen Ni, he had personally said that the Godslayer Spear in the Beast Emperor's hand was the foremost killing weapon of the Primordial World.

Qing Xuan had never truly seen the Godslayer Spear in action before.

Now that Shen Ni had fallen, merely a spear mark left behind from the tribulation made him understand for the first time what a supreme killing treasure truly was.

The Twelve-Petal Creation Azure Lotus and the Eastern Green Lotus Treasure-Colored Banner cast down clear light at the same time.

No matter how fiercely the spear intent struck, it could not truly draw near them.

Yet Qing Xuan did not continue forward.

Being able to withstand it was one matter. Being able to tear apart the spear mark before them was another.

Though both the Twelve-Petal Creation Azure Lotus and the Eastern Green Lotus Treasure-Colored Banner were among the finest defensive spiritual treasures in the Primordial World, neither excelled in killing.

If he relied solely on his own magic power to wear it away bit by bit, even ten thousand years might not be enough to break through the mark left by the Godslayer Spear.

In a true clash between Great Luo, defensive treasures alone were not enough.

That thought passed through Qing Xuan's mind, but his gaze remained fixed on the depths of the spear mark.

The sensation from his source lay within.

Just then, a thread-thin strand of black spear intent pierced through the clear creation light and shot toward Qing Yi's brow.

Qing Yi did not retreat.

The girl merely raised her hand and lightly tapped that strand of spear intent with her fingertip.

A tiny azure lotus bloomed amid the killing intent.

At first, it was only a phantom.

Then, as though some force had stripped the black spear intent of its original form, it flowed into the lotus along its stem.

By the time all twelve petals had fully bloomed, the killing aura that could have pierced an ordinary Taiyi Dao body had turned into an azure lotus floating quietly above her fingertip.

Qing Yi curled her fingers, and the lotus vanished.

Qing Xuan walked forward, and the world behind him fully unfolded.

Vast mountains and rivers swept toward the black spear mark.

However, the instant the two came into contact, the mountains and rivers at the forefront of the world suddenly lost their color.

The Five Elements dispersed, and Yin-Yang fell silent.

The order of heaven and earth that had already taken shape reverted into an indistinguishable expanse of gray upon nearing the depths of the fissure.

Qing Xuan did not continue testing it. With a thought, he immediately withdrew his world.

In that brief instant, the mountains and rivers spanning ten thousand miles at the forefront had already returned to nothingness.

Yet there was no anger or shock in his eyes. Instead, for the first time, they showed an unmistakable stir.

Because that portion of heaven and earth had not truly been destroyed.

All the forces that formed the mountains, rivers, sun, and moon still remained. It was merely that the Five Elements were no longer the Five Elements, Yin-Yang was no longer Yin-Yang, and every differentiated Great Dao had been kneaded back together.

"What was that?"

Qing Yi had seen it as well and turned to Qing Xuan.

Qing Xuan smiled faintly. "The opportunity has appeared. The true answer lies ahead."

With that, Qing Xuan raised his hand and took Qing Yi's hand.

Just as the two were about to enter the fissure, dark golden dragon patterns suddenly appeared around them.

Those dragon patterns had been concealed around the spear mark and were only awakened together when the aura of Chaos emerged.

Within every dragon pattern seemed to be frozen an entirely different age.

In some, armies of the Dragon Race fought Fierce Beasts. In others, dragon bodies tens of thousands of feet long fell from the North Sea.

There was also a dragon claw that covered heaven and earth, sealing this ruined world completely at the final moment.

Qing Xuan paused. Aside from the traces left by the Godslayer Spear, this place was actually sealed by a Great Luo of the Dragon Race.

The next moment, time inside and outside the Ruined Realm froze at once.

The clear creation light still lingering around Qing Yi's fingertips stopped in midair, and the clear light cast down by the Twelve-Petal Creation Azure Lotus was likewise fixed in the void.

Only Qing Xuan and Qing Yi could still move.

Outside the ruined world, a crimson-gold dragon eye slowly opened.

A single eye nearly occupied half the sky above the North Sea.

A deep voice followed it into the Ruined Realm.

"The North Sea Ancient Battlefield has been sealed by my Dragon Race since the end of the Fierce Beast Tribulation."

"You two entered without notice."

"Should you not give me an explanation?"

Qing Xuan raised his eyes and looked toward the crimson-gold dragon eye reflected beyond the Ruined Realm.