After defeating the guardian beast, Mu Chen slowly approached the crystal ball that radiated a mysterious power, taking every step with exceptional care. He knew full well that here in the Spirit Road Secret Land, the danger might only just be beginning. In the crystal ball's soft glow, his figure cast a long, dark shadow across the cavern wall, like a fearless adventurer stepping into an unknown abyss. The instant his hand touched the crystal ball, a powerful surge of spiritual energy poured into his body like a raging tide. This spiritual energy was utterly unlike anything he had encountered before. It seemed to possess a consciousness of its own, darting freely through Mu Chen's meridians and bringing a strange sensation of tingling numbness mingled with swelling pain. Mu Chen hurriedly steadied his mind and guided the power slowly along the spiritual energy circulation pathways he knew, lest it throw his own spiritual foundation into disarray. Just then, the surrounding cavern walls began to shake violently. The crystals embedded in them, which had been illuminating the cavern, flickered erratically between light and darkness. With a deep rumble, a gloomy passage slowly opened on one side of the cavern. A bone-chilling wind blew out of it, seemingly carrying faint, mournful wails that made his hair stand on end. Mu Chen drew a deep breath and headed into the passage. Its walls were covered in ancient murals, their colors still so vivid that they seemed freshly painted. Yet their contents made Mu Chen's heart tighten. They depicted all manner of horrifying scenes: cultivators dragged into a dark abyss by countless black tentacles, souls struggling in agony amid flames, and demonlike creatures gnawing on human corpses. The images were so lifelike that they seemed to possess a sinister magic, drawing anyone who looked at them unwittingly into fear. He forced his gaze away from the murals and concentrated on moving forward. Before he had gone far, however, the ground beneath his feet suddenly softened, as though it had turned to quicksand. Mu Chen's feet sank rapidly. He tried to unleash his spiritual energy to break free, only to discover that some restriction seemed to bind it here, preventing him from exerting his full strength. Alarm shot through him, but he quickly calmed down, recalling a similar situation he had read about in his family's ancient texts. He swiftly adjusted his breathing and relaxed his body as much as possible to slow his descent. At the same time, he took a tough spirit vine from his Storage Ring and hurled it toward a protruding rock in the passage ceiling. The vine's tip coiled around the rock like a nimble snake. Mu Chen gripped it tightly, then used the strength of his arms to pull himself out of the quicksand inch by inch. No sooner had he escaped the quicksand trap than a series of transparent spiritual energy barriers appeared ahead. Multicolored light shimmered across them, weaving into intricate patterns that looked both beautiful and deadly. As Mu Chen approached a barrier, he sensed the powerful spiritual energy fluctuations emanating from it and knew that forcing his way through would only injure him. Instead, he began carefully examining its patterns, trying to discern their underlying order. After studying them for a while, he discovered that the patterns were actually ancient Spiritual Power Puzzles. Each pattern represented a spiritual energy node, and the barrier would vanish only if those nodes were activated in a specific sequence. Drawing on his extensive knowledge of spiritual energy and his keen perception, Mu Chen began solving the puzzles one by one. He cautiously extended a finger and injected a thread of spiritual energy into the first node, which flickered faintly. Then he activated the remaining nodes in the sequence he had worked out. When the final node was activated, the light on the barrier blossomed like fireworks before gradually fading away. Mu Chen breathed a sigh of relief and continued forward. Yet the deeper he ventured, the heavier the air around him grew. It felt as though a pair of invisible eyes were watching him, leaving him uneasy from head to toe. Suddenly, countless streams of black mist surged toward him from every direction in the passage, rapidly condensing into ghosts of various shapes. The ghosts let out piercing shrieks and lunged at Mu Chen. Their bodies were insubstantial, but every time they passed through him, they stole a little of his body heat, making him feel as though he were trapped in an ice cellar. Mu Chen circulated his spiritual energy, forming a faint shield over his body in an attempt to fend off their assault. But there were too many ghosts, and they seemed able to penetrate the shield's defenses. His brows knitted tightly as he realized that conventional methods were useless against them. He closed his eyes, quieted his mind, and tried to sense their presence with his soul. With his mind focused, Mu Chen discovered that although the ghosts had no physical bodies, their cores consisted of strands of black soul power. He recalled an ancient secret soul art that could disperse or control soul creatures through the resonance of soul power. He began performing the art, releasing his own soul power and bringing it into resonance with that of the ghosts. Under the secret art's influence, the ghosts gradually slowed. Mu Chen seized the opportunity to increase his output of soul power, dispersing theirs one by one. As the last ghost dissolved, peace returned to the passage, but the immense expenditure of soul power left Mu Chen feeling weak. After a brief rest, he continued onward. Eventually, a vast circular hall appeared ahead. Huge runes covered its floor, flickering with an eerie light that made the entire hall look like a realm of ghosts. At its center stood a stone platform, upon which rested an ancient treasure chest. The chest gave off an alluring sheen, as though tempting Mu Chen. Yet Mu Chen was not deceived by its appearance. He knew that in this uncanny secret land, the more enticing something was, the greater the danger that often accompanied it. He slowly circled the hall, studying the runes on the floor. They formed an enormous Spiritual Power Array, whose energy fluctuations were exceedingly complex. The slightest carelessness could trigger its mechanisms. Mu Chen carefully analyzed the arrangement of the runes, trying to find a safe way through. After a long period of observation and thought, he discovered tiny gaps between them that seemed to hold the key to unraveling the formation. He cautiously followed those gaps, taking every step with extreme care for fear of touching a rune and triggering danger. As he approached the stone platform at the center of the hall, he suddenly heard the sound of a mechanism activating. His heart tightened as countless sharp spikes sprang up around the treasure chest, gleaming with deadly poison. At the same time, holes appeared in the hall's walls, shooting out beams of spiritual energy. The beams wove into a dense net that swept toward Mu Chen. He hurriedly unleashed his spiritual energy and darted backward like lightning. Even as he retreated, his eyes remained fixed on the formation and the treasure chest as he searched for a way to counter the attack. He discovered that the paths of the spiritual energy beams seemed to have some connection to the runes on the floor, while the spikes around the chest were not without openings either. Timing his move precisely, he charged toward the stone platform again during a gap between the beams' attacks. He deftly avoided the spikes while using his spiritual energy to disrupt the beams' trajectories. After a series of perilous maneuvers, he finally reached the treasure chest. But just as he was about to open it, he discovered a complex spiritual energy lock that seemed to require a specific key or code. Mu Chen's brows drew tightly together. He knew this was yet another challenge, and that he would have to continue exploring this secret land filled with uncanny dangers to find a way to open the treasure chest.
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