Master of the Secret Realm

A drop of cold water fell on Sang Ying's face. She immediately raised her hand to wipe it away before she had a chance to look around.

The empty stone chamber barely revealed half of its true form in the dim light, while the other half was shrouded in thick fog.

Although she didn't know what might be inside the mist, Sang Ying instinctively gripped the spirit sword in her hand, and Gu Shu within the sword seemed to sense the danger and fell silent.

Sang Ying never expected that there was a spatial array hidden in that mural.

Fang Chi merely touched them, and he teleported the three of them to different stone chambers.

Fortunately, their communication talismans were still working, so Sang Ying contacted them immediately after realizing she was separated from the other two.

Fang Chi was unlucky; the stone chamber she was teleported to was filled with lava, with nowhere to even step. She had to dodging blades that seemed to fly out of nowhere while struggling to reply to Sang Ying and the other person.

Compared to her, Hai Tingzhou was much luckier. In the stone chamber he was in, there was a Divine Sense left behind by an unknown powerful being. The owner of the Divine Sense was probably a formation cultivator, so he kept urging Hai Tingzhou to practice the formation in the room before fighting him.

It is said that only by defeating that Divine Sense can Hai Tingzhou safely leave the stone chamber.

After hearing their stories, Sang Ying guessed that the world inside the murals was probably a reward prepared by the master of the Shimmering Gold Island Secret Realm for those who passed the test.

Perhaps by the time they successfully leave the stone chamber, their cultivation will have made considerable progress.

So what will be her reward?

"Look ahead!" Gu Shu suddenly spoke from within the spirit sword, waking Sang Ying from her reverie.

She looked up at the place that had been shrouded in mist. The thick fog slowly receded, and a figure appeared and disappeared in the mist.

Sang Ying drew her sword and approached the figure step by step.

Finally, as Sang Ying drew closer, the mysterious figure revealed its true form.

She was a girl in a white dress, which seemed to be stained with blood. But what attracted Sang Ying's attention even more than the bloodstains were the two crystalline horns on her head.

Even though the girl had her back to Sang Ying, her jade-like horns could not be hidden.

Sang Ying's heart tightened, and she tentatively asked, "Bai Qinglong?"

Upon hearing this, the girl in the white dress slowly turned around, and her beautiful and elegant face immediately came into Sang Ying's view.

This was a face she had seen countless times, but the brows of this face used to carry a heroic air, which slightly diminished her charm, making her look more like a general than a young lady.

The heroic spirit on his face has been replaced by a sense of fragility.

Sang Ying's shock was beyond words, and even Gu Shu within the sword screamed wildly, "A dragon! It's a dragon! A dragon that has been extinct in the Cultivation World for so many years! Look at her, she's so beautiful! Waaah~"

That last sound was probably its choking sob.

"Does this seem familiar?" The woman in the white dress smiled gently at Sang Ying, her tone familiar, as if she had known Sang Ying for a long time.

Sang Ying nodded in agreement. "It is familiar, after all, I've lived with your face for over five hundred years in the illusion."

Upon hearing this, the woman in the white dress, Bai Qinglong, smiled even more broadly, "That's not an illusion, that's my memory. I've placed my memory into an array, and anyone who enters the underground palace will be dragged into that memory, becoming a part of it, and experiencing the events I went through."

Seeing that Sang Ying didn't respond, Bai Qinglong had no choice but to continue, "You should have seen my background from your memories, but I wasn't as lucky as you. My grandfather wasn't close to me when I was little, and my mother only cared about protecting me. She made Bai Shou my best protector, taking care of me meticulously until I grew up. I originally thought that Bai Shou and I could be together for a lifetime..."

Sang Ying's pupils contracted slightly. So Bai Qinglong liked Bai Shou?

"However, before I could express my feelings to my mother, the marriage between the White Dragon Tribe and the Black Dragon Clan became a done deal."

As someone who experienced it firsthand, Sang Ying naturally understood the situation at the time. The Black Dragon Clan was powerful and had even rallied other clans to plead for them. Even if Old Patriarch Bai wanted to refuse, he probably wouldn't be able to.

"So, when I was three hundred years old, Xuan Jingshan and I officially became husband and wife." She suddenly smiled sadly, "But you also know why they allied with the White Dragon Tribe. Through this marriage, the Black Dragon Clan gradually swallowed up the White Dragon Tribe, and as the young master, I was imprisoned in the inner courtyard, unable to do anything. If it weren't for that Devil Creature named Heaven Swallower escaping in the end, I'm afraid the White Dragon Tribe would truly have ceased to exist in this world."

"The Devil Creature army attacked, and the Patriarch Xuan had long since become a puppet of the Heaven Swallower. At the critical moment Xuan Jingshan chose his father, leading the entire Black Dragon Clan to stand against us. It was at this time that I was rescued by Bai Shou, who had secretly broken into the Black Dragon Clan Chief's mansion."

"But not long after, the chieftain of the Azure Dragon Clan found me and begged me to sacrifice myself for the clan."

The last four words seemed to carry immense weight, sounding heavy in Sang Ying's ears.

The emotional Gu Shu even started crying out loud, taking advantage of the fact that no one else could hear him, and howled desperately in Sang Ying's ear, making Sang Ying frown involuntarily.

"Of course, my mother and father were unwilling. They knew how I had spent the past two hundred years in the Black Dragon Clan, and naturally couldn't bear to let me lose my life again. So, my mother secretly arranged for Bai Shou to take me away and escape."

"Perhaps everyone knew about Mother's plan, because on that day, Patriarch Qing transferred all the Dragon Race stationed near my house, allowing Bai Shou and me to leave without hindrance. But by then, this land had already become food for Devil Creature, so where could we escape to?"

Upon hearing this, Sang Ying suddenly had a bad feeling. "Bai Shou...?"

"Yes." Bai Qinglong closed her eyes briefly, as if unable to bear facing her most tragic memory. "During our escape, we encountered a large number of Devil Creature. He died protecting me."

"From then on, I had nowhere else to go but back to my mother and the others, and I had no choice but to accept my fate and sacrifice myself to the formation."

The scene of being sucked into the formation along with Heaven Swallower flashed through Sang Ying's mind again. At this moment, she finally completely separated Bai Qinglong from herself.

Sang Ying can never become Bai Qinglong, and Bai Qinglong will never be Sang Ying.

"I originally thought that after sacrificing myself to the formation, my soul would surely dissipate, but I didn't expect that after being swallowed by the formation, I would not die. I just dragged my broken body to the Twin Orchid Realm."

She led Sang Ying forward, and the thick fog gradually dissipated, gathering all around the low pillar in the middle of the stone chamber.

"Back then, there weren't many powerful figures in the Twin Orchid Realm, and Haizhou City was just a small fishing village. I received help from a fisherman surnamed Hai, who sent me back to the sea, thus extending my lifespan. To repay him, I taught him cultivation and together we founded Haizhou City."

"But the damage inflicted by the great formation was too profound, affecting my lifespan. I can no longer return to the Dragon Race Clan's territory, which has become a lifelong regret. I am unwilling to die in obscurity, so I transformed into this Gleaming Gold Island, created this secret realm, and await the arrival of a destined person to entrust something to them..."

Sang Ying followed Bai Qinglong's gaze and saw that the thick fog on the low pillar had long since dissipated. She could clearly see that what was placed on the pillar was the Dragon Abyss Sword, which existed in Bai Qinglong's memory!