Ominous golden hair, the curse of the great accomplishment sacred body, and another Half-Step Great Power slain (double-length chapter)

Every clone carried a Profound Jade Platform inscribed by Qin Tian, allowing it to flee far through space at a critical moment and confuse its pursuers.

Things had been different back at the Yaoguang Mine, where Qin Tian could only rely on luck to gather materials, piecing together what he needed for a Mystic Light Platform bit by bit.

But sometimes, luck could not solve everything.

If the materials were not there, they were not there. Even good fortune could not conjure them out of thin air for Qin Tian.

Of course, doing things like Archmage Liu Xiu would work too.

The problem was that, although this could bring the materials in by air...

There was no guarantee they would land in Qin Tian's hands.

So Qin Tian had been extremely frugal at first, inscribing only three or four Profound Jade Platforms. Unless absolutely necessary, he avoided using them and saved wherever he could.

Once he reached the outside world, things changed. With several million jin of source in hand, Qin Tian transformed into a man whose surname was Filthy and given name was Rich.

He purchased vast quantities of raw materials for Profound Jade Platforms and inscribed teleportation arrays whenever he had time. Every paper effigy carried plenty of Profound Jade Platforms.

After all, to fool an opponent, the act had to be convincing enough. If it neither dodged nor fled, even an idiot would know something was wrong.

Only by struggling desperately and doing everything possible to survive could he convince the pursuers that the paper effigy was his real body.

Meanwhile, Qin Tian himself was racing toward the Jade Pool's Immortal Pool without pause. He intended to use the curse within it against his enemies.

Soon, Qin Tian arrived before the Immortal Pool.

Hazy vapors rushed toward his face. The spiritual energy here was astonishingly dense. Cultivators would not even need to circulate their mystical arts-the world's primal essence practically burrowed into their bodies of its own accord.

If someone could cultivate here for a long time and bathe in the Immortal Pool's waters, even the Mortal Body could be tempered until it rivaled a king physique.

"Open!" Qin Tian closed his eyes and opened them again as a profound Dao resonance rose around him. His eyes were terrifying, azure and silver-white interweaving as the two ultimate mysteries of time and space manifested.

Every blink made heaven and earth resonate together, as though scriptures of the Great Dao were sounding.

As his eyes opened and closed, they seemed to contain an entire starfield, unfathomably deep, vanishing and being reborn. The passing of a single instant felt like millions of years beneath an eternal blue sky.

He saw through the Immortal Pool, and his expression instantly changed. The lakebed was densely packed with the corpses of young women.

This was no immortal lake. It was clearly a burial pit. Hundreds of corpses filled its center, piled atop one another.

Their lotus-root arms and long, jade-smooth legs still gleamed, but their bodies were stiff, without the slightest sign of life.

The young women's corpses had pale faces and wore white robes bearing the Jade Pool's emblem. Their loose black hair writhed chaotically like snakes as they drifted along the dim lakebed, making his scalp prickle.

None of this was what had changed Qin Tian's expression.

Qin Tian knew perfectly well what lay within the Jade Pool Ruins. He had long since prepared himself for these corpses.

The true reason for his alarm lay elsewhere.

His unusual eyes had pierced through appearances and glimpsed the true nature of this place.

After more than a hundred thousand years, the bodies of the Jade Pool Fairies could not possibly have remained undecayed.

Apart from the true bodies of Great Emperors, Emperor Weapons, and immortal artifacts, everything in the world had to endure the washing of time and ultimately rot away.

Unless buried in a specially prepared corpse-nurturing ground, they would one day become bones, then finally crumble into dust.

Though the Jade Pool was sacred and ranked among the world's greatest blessed grounds...

It was not a suitable corpse-nurturing ground. In fact, to some degree, it suppressed the formation of Reincarnation Seals within corpses.

The bodies of the great accomplishment sacred body and the Western Emperor had been placed deep within the Jade Pool precisely to ensure that they would not undergo corpse transformation after death and be exploited by the Underworld.

Naturally, the Immortal Pool could not preserve the Jade Pool Fairies' bodies for all eternity.

The true reason was the curse originating from that great accomplishment sacred body-the power of a curse that came from an immortal artifact.

After tens of thousands of years, the Jade Pool Fairies' bodies had long since been infected by the curse and become part of it.

Once transformed into part of the curse, they naturally became imperishable, for they were no longer corpses but vessels housing the curse.

Sure enough, a pulse of Qin Tian's divine power shattered them. Once the waxy layer covering their bodies broke, the female corpses dissolved straight into puddles of liquid that dispersed through the lake.

Through his divine eyes, he saw wisps of curse power appear alongside the liquid.

Having glimpsed the truth, Qin Tian felt his scalp crawl.

All ten layers of the Immortal Pool had long since been infected by the great accomplishment sacred body's curse.

The bodies of these Jade Pool Fairies had been contaminated along with them.

But Qin Tian could only steel himself and keep going. His enemies were already close.

"This is going to be trouble."

Gritting his teeth, Qin Tian stamped his foot. Dao patterns flickered and flowed in wave after wave as he seized the curse power revealed by the dissolved bodies of the Jade Pool Fairies.

He could faintly glimpse strands of golden hair dancing within some unknown boundary.

Qin Tian formed seals with both hands, and nine ancient characters leaped from his fingertips one after another.

The nine emperor characters recorded at the beginning of the Void Scripture could suppress boundless space and illuminate eternity. Their mysteries were profound beyond comprehension.

Ancient characters emerged one after another, forming a cage in the air. The nine characters sealed heaven, fixed space, and froze time. Traces of the Great Dao erupted into blazing Dao light, accompanied by all manner of wondrous sounds.

It was as though the secrets of creation were unfolding, as though the universe's primal essence were surging. Time and space froze, imprisoning the drifting curse mist.

"Suppress!"

Qin Tian shattered the female corpses in the Immortal Pool, turning them into curse mist and feeding it into the seal.

"Not enough!" Qin Tian's gaze burned. The female corpses in the first layer had been too weak, and the curse power they carried was too faint to curse his pursuers to death immediately.

He needed curse power from deeper layers.

Qin Tian swept his hands through the air, continuing to draw upon the world's essence and drive it into the Immortal Pool.

The tranquility of the Immortal Pool, undisturbed for ten thousand years, was broken.

Great banks of mist were extracted from the Immortal Pool, one after another.

Qin Tian's eyes widened as he gradually increased his force. Immortal light swirled within his pupils, and he proceeded with extreme caution.

The next instant, the Immortal Pool churned. An endless, ominous aura surged out, gray and heavy as leaden clouds. Golden light faintly flowed within it, but there was nothing sacred about it. Instead, it carried a sinister eeriness.

"It worked!"

"This Daoist has done it!"

While Qin Tian was preparing the array formation, his pursuers arrived.

A gigantic Divine Vessel refined from divine jade tore through the sky, its imposing rumble like a thunder god of the nine heavens beating a drum as it rapidly approached.

A Half-Step Great Power stood aboard the Divine Vessel, radiating terrifying pressure. His entire body blazed like a torch as waves of blood energy rose around him.

"Junior, you cannot escape!"

"Hand over everything you obtained from the Yaoguang Holy Land."

"In my boundless mercy, I may leave your corpse intact."

The paper-effigy Qin Tian seemed pleasantly surprised. "Really?"

"You'll really leave my corpse intact?"

The Half-Step Great Power choked. Qin Tian's question left him momentarily at a loss for words.

Leaving an intact corpse was just something people said.

You would already be dead! What good would an intact corpse do?

It was basically a provocation before battle-a tradition, the sort of threat one threw out before a fight.

Who actually cared whether their corpse remained intact after death?

But he quickly recovered and nodded solemnly. "Indeed. I will leave your corpse intact, provided you hand over everything you obtained from the Yaoguang Holy Land."

The paper-effigy Qin Tian could not help laughing. "Pfft! Seriously, you actually thought I cared about having an intact corpse?"

The paper-effigy Qin Tian shook his head, wearing an expression of concern for the man's intelligence.

"You... how dare you!" Humiliation turned the Half-Step Great Power's face furious.

"A mere Other Shore Realm cultivator, something I could slap to death with one hand! If not for my mercy, how could you have survived until now?"

"And you dare mock me!"

The paper-effigy Qin Tian waved a hand and apologized. "Sorry, I didn't mean to mock you."

Qin Tian had always been very forgiving toward dead men.

Well... how often "always" applied depended on his mood.

The paper-effigy Qin Tian said solemnly, "I was only buying time!"

The Half-Step Great Power's expression changed. He recalled Qin Tian's outrageous evasive maneuvers along the way. Even he, a Half-Step Great Power, had struggled to catch him. Whenever he was about to attack, the brat seemed able to foresee the future, using a Profound Jade Platform to perform a Void Shift and flee without a trace.

He had finally cornered the brat. He could not let him escape again.

The Half-Step Great Power hastily shouted, "Seal off space! Don't let him escape!"

"Escape? I'm not running anymore!" The paper-effigy Qin Tian calmly shook his head.

"I was waiting for my skill cooldown. What were you waiting for?" The paper-effigy Qin Tian grinned and pointed one hand toward the sky.

Moonlight spilled down, shrouding the land in a haze. The crimson earth and stones looked desolate, devoid of life.

Suddenly, wisps of red light appeared at the edge of the vast landscape. Immortal light that should have shot straight into the heavens had been deliberately redirected toward Qin Tian's pursuers.

Bone-piercing killing intent made them tremble as an eerie presence spread through the air.

The Half-Step Great Power felt his hair stand on end, as though a supreme sovereign had opened their eyes and unleashed killing intent. His skin cracked, and he hastily retreated a hundred li.

But that eerie red light still swept over him.

In a daze, he glimpsed the truth. Golden hairs filled the sky, appearing from nowhere and drifting through the mortal world, eerie and ominous, radiating a sinister aura.

The attendants aboard the ancient vessel were struck directly by the red light and instantly robbed of their lives. Their bodies collapsed, leaving only sheets of human skin, as though everything beneath had been sucked dry.

Yet they did not remain dead. Long golden hairs sprouted from them, making them look like vicious ghosts, a painfully jarring sight. A chill pressed deep into the bones as they all stared fixedly at the Half-Step Great Power in perfect unison. Against their now-gloomy surroundings, the scene was bone-chilling in every sense.

"What is this?"

The Half-Step Great Power was horrified. In an instant, both Four Extremes cultivators and Dragon Transformation Cultivators had become eerie Golden-Haired Monsters.

The sight made fear rise unbidden in his heart.

Suddenly, he felt an itch on his body. Looking down, his eyes widened as long golden hairs sprouted from within him.

Recalling what had happened to his attendants, fear welled up inside him, and he could not help scratching the places where the golden hair grew.

But the moment he plucked the golden hairs from his skin, they grew back even thicker, rooted in his flesh and blood, impossible to remove completely.

"Wh-what in the world is this damned thing?"

The Half-Step Great Power wailed. Waves of bluish-purple energy kept spreading across his body, especially around his forehead, while strand after strand of golden hair pierced through his skin.

The sound of ritual worship rang out, as though every living creature from several epochs were weeping and praying. It shook the soul.

In an instant, a dense layer of hair covered his entire body, terrifying to behold.

A curse was itself a kind of law and secret art. Rooted within the great accomplishment sacred body, it was extraordinarily contagious. Even these few filtered wisps of curse mist, which could hardly count as the true curse, were enough to turn a Half-Step Great Power cultivator into a golden ape-man on the spot.

"Something to send you on your way!"

Qin Tian smiled brilliantly.

"Aaah!"

The Half-Step Great Power wailed madly in excruciating pain. Golden hairs grew from his skin one after another, drawing away his divine power, his blood energy, and his spirit. Everything he possessed became nourishment for the curse.

"I want you dead!"

The Half-Step Great Power still retained a sliver of strength. He raised his hand, intending to take Qin Tian down with him.

"No need to trouble yourself. I'll do it myself!" The paper-effigy Qin Tian shrugged and, right before his eyes, turned into a paper figure that fluttered to the ground.

The Half-Step Great Power stood frozen, staring stupidly at the scene.

A killing blow straight to the heart!

After all that, he had gambled his life, only to discover that his opponent had been nothing but a clone!

"Aaah!"

"You little thief, you deserve to die!"

The Half-Step Great Power roared, but he could endure no longer. Golden hair engulfed his entire body, and his life was extinguished.

Even an insignificant trace of that aura was beyond the ability of someone who had yet to attain the path of a saint to withstand.

Ultimately, the ominous affliction in the Jade Pool was the Underworld's curse power.

It was a curse designed to target a great accomplishment sacred body. Even someone as powerful as the Western Emperor could do nothing. She could only end the great accomplishment sacred body's life with her own hands to lessen her partner's suffering.

With a curse this terrifying, even a trace of its aura was more than enough to destroy an ant that had only just entered the immortal platform realm.

"All done. Time to wrap up!"

Inside the Jade Pool Ruins, Qin Tian let out a long breath and wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.

Drawing out this curse was no easy task. It could even be called extremely dangerous.

He had been terrified of contracting the eerie curse himself.

Mostly because golden hair looked ugly and was inauspicious. Had it been red hair, Qin Tian might have agreed.

After all, the Red-Haired Ancestor possessed boundless magical power. At worst, he would worship one more Red-Haired Ancestor.

If he captured a trace of that Dao resonance, he might even become a Dao scion of the eerie forces and one day stand shoulder to shoulder with the Highland Ancestor.

As for his future prospects...

He might know nothing about being an undercover agent, but he could learn!

He would pay tribute to the God Emperor and become one of the agents infiltrating the eerie forces on behalf of the heavens.

As for his codename, it would be-Pangolin!!!

Great waterfalls cascaded down picturesque mountain cliffs, their silver ribbons stretching a thousand zhang, magnificent expanses of white.

Palaces stood in ranks like a painted landscape. Nearby lay an open area surrounded by endless exotic flowers and plants, with more palaces scattered around it. In the central region...

Spiritual energy rose in mist, and auspicious colors flowed. Qin Tian sat cross-legged beside the lake, where water vapor billowed and immortal light shone endlessly through the haze.

Spiritual energy poured ceaselessly into his body. His cultivation, which had reached the point where it could advance no further, strengthened once again. His bitter sea expanded, his life spring sublimated, his divine bridge reached toward heaven, and his other shore grew ever more profound.

The Dao palace above the heavens became increasingly clear, as though he could enter it with a single light step.

I'm adjusting the update time. Future updates will probably be around nine.

Please send monthly votes, recommendation votes, and add this to your favorites.