Deep within the Sun Sacred Clan's ruins, firelight flickered inside a cave dwelling, illuminating Li Qingshan's grave face.
He was using pure Sun True Fire to temper the Dao Bell embryo suspended in the air. Divine markings flowed around his fingertips as he guided the earth-vein fire and the true fire into one.
Just as his fingertip was about to finish tracing a rune, a searing pain suddenly stabbed through it!
"Hmm?"
Li Qingshan jerked his hand back, his gaze sharp as lightning as he scrutinized the bell embryo.
The normally docile Lightning-Attracting Dao Marks had grown unusually hot, releasing wisps of purple lightning.
The once orderly and profound runes were twisting out of shape, with chaotic silver lines appearing among them.
They faintly shared the same origin as the presence of the magnificent formation deep within the ruins.
A pained hiss came from Xiaobai at his wrist.
Its crystalline scales glowed white in resistance. The strange presence the bell embryo had suddenly released caused it intense discomfort.
Li Qingshan's divine sense surged into the bell embryo like a tide, and he sensed the Lightning-Attracting Dao Marks trembling wildly.
It was as though countless tiny lightning runes were racing and crashing into one another within it, resonating intensely with something outside.
"For three days in a row, something strange has happened on the seventh tempering."
He picked up the bell embryo and examined it closely by the firelight, his brows tightly knitted.
At the same time, he keenly noticed that the flow of heaven and earth's essence Qi outside the cave dwelling was fluctuating at a peculiar frequency.
The tides of essence Qi naturally released as his Five Deities of the Dao Palace circulated had, without his noticing,
reached a core node of this ancient forbidden land.
Boom!!!
A tremendous crash suddenly came from outside the cave, as though the heavens had split apart!
Li Qingshan's expression changed slightly. Grabbing the bell embryo, he turned into a streak of golden light and shot out of the cave dwelling.
In the distance, the void was twisting violently, and the clear sky was covered in a web of cracks like colored glass.
Black mist, thick as ink, poured from the fissures, turning into fumes that corroded everything they touched the moment they reached the ground.
Wherever they passed, plants withered and died in an instant, all life extinguished.
Li Qingshan circulated the Sun True Scripture, and dazzling crimson-gold divine radiance blossomed around him, like a miniature sun descending.
It drove back the encroaching chill.
He stared at the black mist churning within the fissures and thought grimly:
This wasn't torn open by an outside force. The ancient formation here is collapsing on its own!
Before the words had faded, the surging black mist abruptly condensed into more than ten phantoms clad in battered armor, wielding bronze halberds and dark iron shields!
Their forms were indistinct, yet they exuded the brutal killing aura of an ancient battlefield.
Every one of them had a presence no weaker than that of a Dao Palace Secret Realm cultivator!
Are they formed from the baleful Qi left behind by the heroic spirits of an ancient battlefield?
Li Qingshan's pupils contracted. He swept them with his divine sense and discovered that the phantoms had no physical bodies.
They had instead manifested from pure baleful Qi combined with some kind of ancient formation markings.
Hiss!
A phantom wielding a bronze halberd moved. Its blade tore through the air, thrusting straight at Li Qingshan's face with speed and sharpness enough to pierce metal and stone!
He twisted slightly to one side, narrowly dodging. The chilling baleful Qi trailing the blade grazed his shoulder, corroding a scorched black mark into the edge of his robe.
Li Qingshan's gaze turned cold, and the Heart Fire Divine Treasury in his Dao Palace Secret Realm roared into motion.
Blazing Sun True Fire erupted from his palm, its scorching light crashing toward the halberd-wielding phantom like a wave!
Boom!
The true fire burned, and the phantom let out an ear-piercing scream from its soul, its outline twisting violently.
Taking advantage of its damaged spirit core, Li Qingshan joined two fingers like a sword. The power of the Lung Metal Divine Treasury condensed into a streak of indestructible Geng Metal Sword Qi, which he slashed down through the air!
Pfft!
Where the Sword Qi passed, the bronze-halberd phantom broke apart, turning back into black mist that dispersed.
Three more shield-bearing phantoms had already closed in from the flank.
Li Qingshan advanced instead of retreating, darting through them like a ghost. The instant he evaded a shield strike,
his body, forged through countless trials, erupted with terrifying strength. His fist strikes fell like mountains, blasting the phantoms apart!
There's no end to these phantoms. I need to find their source!
He destroyed several more phantoms in succession, spreading his divine sense like a net, and quickly found the key.
Hidden at the core of every phantom was a fine but extraordinarily ancient formation marking.
The rhythm of these markings faintly echoed the remnant markings from the sundial he had obtained!
These formation markings are what sustain them!
Thoughts flashing through his mind, Li Qingshan grabbed the bell embryo, which was still behaving strangely.
Sensing a presence of the same origin, the Lightning-Attracting Dao Marks suddenly burst with brilliant light.
The bell body rang of its own accord, its clear peal spreading in invisible ripples and causing the phantoms lunging toward him to all falter at once!
An opening!
Li Qingshan leaped up, circulating the Five Elements Divine Abilities at will and unleashing them in turn.
Heart Fire refined their spiritual origins,
Lung Metal severed their baleful Qi forms,
Kidney Water extinguished their chilling flames,
Spleen Earth suppressed their formation foundations,
and Liver Wood entangled the momentum of their attacks.
Under this exquisitely executed cycle of the five elements, the more than ten powerful phantoms collapsed one after another.
Before the black mist had completely dispersed, Li Qingshan finally saw the whole of the formation markings at their cores.
They were an extremely ancient type of forbidden rune used to summon and command battle souls, sharing the same origin as the Sun Sacred Clan's protective formation here.
"Something has gone wrong with the formation eye supporting this area."
He put away the bell embryo and extended his divine sense northwest along the traces left by the formation markings.
Before long, he found a cyan boulder half a person's height in a clearing deep within the ruins.
The surface of the stone was covered in densely packed ancient runes, their light now extremely dim.
Cracks covered it as well, and the entire boulder was trembling violently, as though it might shatter completely at any moment.
"The formation eye stone is on the verge of collapse."
Li Qingshan crouched down and brushed his fingertips over the stone, feeling the chaotic, fading energy within.
It was very likely that the vast tide of essence Qi he had unwittingly released when he reached perfection in the Dao Palace Secret Realm
had become the last straw that broke this formation eye node, already heavily worn by the passage of time.
That, in turn, had caused the spatial fissures and the backlash of the battle souls just now.
He pondered briefly, then took out the ancient fragment he had obtained from the sundial.
He pressed it gently against the core of the formation eye stone while using his divine sense to commune with the earth's dragon veins.
A wisp of the purest Solar True Force flowed out of his Dao Palace Secret Realm and slowly entered the stone, which was on the verge of breaking apart.
"Lightning-Attracting Dao Marks!"
He brought the bell embryo close to the formation eye stone again, and the Lightning-Attracting Marks on the bell resonated strongly with the runes on the stone.
As though coming to life, the golden Dao Marks flowed down from the bell embryo.
Like a divine craftsman's carving knife, they precisely repaired and sealed the cracks in the stone.
The formation eye stone gradually stopped trembling. The terrifying spatial fissures in the surrounding void also stopped expanding, the black mist ceased to pour out, and the lingering baleful Qi slowly dissipated.
Just as the last spatial fissure was about to close completely, another unforeseen change occurred!
A fragment of intent, ancient, cold, and imbued with supreme majesty, was like a ferocious beast abruptly awakening from an eons-long slumber.
It burst from the depths of the fissure as it was about to close, becoming an invisible spiritual blade that stabbed straight at Li Qingshan's sea of consciousness!
"One who lacks my sacred clan's bloodline and dares tamper with the Heavenly Pivot Formation Eye shall suffer divine punishment!"
The ancient divine sense, full of disdain and the will to destroy, boomed through Li Qingshan's sea of consciousness.
It bore a terrifying pressure that seemed to come from the primordial era.
"A mere remnant thought dares flaunt its power?!"
Li Qingshan's gaze turned icy. Deep within his sea of consciousness, the Divine Seed that symbolized his origin suddenly erupted with ten thousand beams of golden light.
It was as though a true sun had risen within his soul, vast and majestic.
The utterly yang, utterly forceful power of his divine sense swept forth like a tsunami, instantly enveloping, crushing, and utterly obliterating the invading ancient intent!
But the last trace of pressure left by that intent before it dispersed still swept through the cave dwelling like a storm.
Struck by that terrifying oppression at the level of its bloodline, Xiaobai fell straight from Li Qingshan's shoulder.
It curled up on the ground, its scales dim and the light of its jade horn nearly extinguished, sinking into a deep sleep and a state of self-protection.
"Xiaobai!"
Li Qingshan immediately scooped it up and sent a continuous stream of pure Solar True Force into its body.
Warm golden light formed a protective barrier, driving away the ancient pressure that clung to it like a shadow.
His face dark, he glanced at the formation eye stone, which had regained its calm. Then he picked up Xiaobai, and with a flash, returned to the cave dwelling.
After carefully settling Xiaobai in a corner lined with soft spirit herbs, Li Qingshan sat cross-legged beside it and carefully examined its condition with his divine sense.
The pressure of the sacred clan's remnant intent was exceedingly overbearing. It had penetrated deep into Xiaobai's bloodline and considerably suppressed it.
"I can only rely on slow, painstaking work to nourish it back to health."
He sighed softly and took out a spirit-nourishing pill he had refined earlier, dissolving it with divine power.
He guided the pure medicinal power like a gentle stream, carefully nourishing Xiaobai's origin and protecting it through this crisis.
Within the cave dwelling, only the crackle of the burning earth fire and steady breathing remained.