Shrouded Sky

Chapter 191 - A Woman In The Source

The creature was covered in shimmering silver scales, lying motionless. It was over two meters long, its muscles bulging with strength.

“It’s dead,” Ye Fan sighed in relief.

Using the stone knife, he turned it over to face upward. Its features resembled a human’s. Without the fine scales, it could have been a handsome man. In Purple Mountain, this wasn’t the only such creature. The invisible malevolent intent gathered around him matched this form, meaning at least one more was alive.

Ye Fan noticed a broken stone tablet beneath the creature. Piecing together the fragments, he could only make out four characters: “Those who tamper, die.”

The rest was illegible. A warning stirred in his heart. These were human characters. Had this ancient creature died because it tampered with something? The source before him?

Upon closer inspection, it was clear the six-armed creature had struggled back from the source before dying. “The source can be deadly…” Ye Fan murmured.

The source energy flowed, the area serene. Ye Fan stood, examining the massive two-meter-tall source, likely weighing thousands of pounds. Though radiant with colorful light, it wasn’t a Godsource, just an exceptionally pure treasure source, rare in its size.

“Wait, my stone clothing is glowing…” As he neared the source, his armor, knife, and star disk shimmered.

Circling the source, he noticed cracks with specks of light inside, like tiny stars.

“There are Godsource fragments inside…” The stone knife glowed brilliantly when brought close, like a rare treasure.

“Someone sealed Godsource fragments in this giant source,” Ye Fan realized, astonished, as he studied the woman inside. She was serene, as if in eternal sleep.

Ye Fan sighed. She was likely a corpse, devoid of life despite her lifelike appearance. Her beauty was unparalleled, yet time had taken everything. Suddenly, he spotted a jade pendant sealed in the source, half-hidden in her skirt, easily missed.

“An ancient creature… fond of jade ornaments?” He frowned, suspecting she might be human.

Then, his heart skipped a beat. Among the Godsource fragments were several red hairs.

“Red fur…”

A chill ran through him. On the night the Zhang Clan’s founding ancestor vanished, a red-furred whirlwind swept the blood-red land, with an unknown creature howling all night. The child with the ancestor, terrified into a stupor, saw his hand covered in red fur.

Recalling this, Ye Fan shivered. Among the inscriptions left by the powerful figures in Purple Mountain, few belonged to women. “Could this be… the Jade Pool Sacred Ground’s Saintess Yang Yi from ten thousand years ago?”

He didn’t act rashly, stepping back to search the mine for clues. Soon, he found writing on the wall:

“Zhang Jiye pays respects.”

“A thousand years ago, the Zhang ancestor was here!”

Ye Fan’s heart leaped. The Celestial Source Tome seemed close. With the ancient creature dead here, he avoided touching the source, his mind racing. “The fate of a Celestial Source Master…” The thought chilled him. “If I become one, will ominous events haunt my later years?”

He walked far, the shadow lingering. The demonic summoning waxed and waned. After advancing over ten miles, he made a major discovery, a broken stone pendant, identical to his own. Simultaneously, his stone clothing, knife, and star disk glowed brightly.

Silently, a group of figures emerged from an abandoned mine, moving in perfect order. Ye Fan’s scalp tingled. These were yin ghosts and spectral horses, cold and ghostly, like they’d stepped from the netherworld.

“So many of these things formed…”

They surrounded him silently, their faces pale, bloodless, and lifeless, animated by a strange energy. Since learning cultivation, Ye Fan had studied “ghosts,” believing they were residual energy fields from the dead, dissipating over time.

“With so many deaths here a hundred thousand years ago, these things must be common…” He wasn’t worried, unafraid of such entities unless they were ancient creatures.

Puff.

He swung the stone knife, dispersing the yin beings. The Godsource skin was indeed their natural bane.

Suddenly, a piercing scream echoed, chilling in the silent Purple Mountain. A disheveled woman in white rushed toward him like a specter.

Clang.

She knocked the stone knife aside with immense force, as if made of molten iron.

“She’s…” Ye Fan was shocked. Her yin form was nearly solid, nourished by the mountain’s yin energy.

Swish.

He drew a five-colored flame from his cauldron, incinerating her instantly.

Striding into the abandoned mine, a bone-chilling cold hit him. It was an ice cellar, covered in frost. “Senior Zhang Jiye, you didn’t die here, did you?”

Soon, his scalp tingled again. The mine connected to a yin vein, and in its depths, countless yin beings writhed. No bones, Zhang Jiye hadn’t died here. Ye Fan unleashed his cauldron, burning the yin beings with five-colored true flames.

These entities were newly formed, but he grew uneasy. With so many deaths eons ago, older, more formed yin beings likely lurked deeper. This realization spelled trouble, beyond ancient creatures, other ghostly entities might exist. Another ten miles in, he found a shattered stone knife and star disk.

“Senior Zhang Jiye, with your low cultivation, how did you get this far…” Ye Fan groaned.

Suddenly, the green lotus in his sea of bitterness trembled, projecting a cyan light curtain around him.

“What’s here?” He sensed something behind him and spun around. In a mine dozens of meters away, a massive creature stared coldly.

Its lower body was a snake, thick as a water tank, stretching dozens of meters. Its upper body was humanoid, covered in half-foot-long black fur, with long arms and hairy palms.

“Can you… understand me?” Ye Fan asked, on guard.

Boom.

The creature lunged, its arms like pincers aiming for his throat with incredible force, like a mountain crushing down. Ye Fan dodged, slashing with the stone knife, sparking as if striking iron. From afar, a foul wind surged, accompanied by a shrill howl.

A strange bird charged, featherless, covered in scales, too large to fly, running on the ground. Its dozen-meter-long body thundered through the cave.

“Damn, ancient creatures!” Ye Fan recognized its fossil from the mine. It didn’t attack the snake-furred creature; both pursued him together. “I’ve stirred them up!”

A tidal wave of killing intent surged, relentless and ferocious, shocking him. “Good thing… they’re not pure humanoid creatures.”

Through their killing intent, Ye Fan gleaned a truth: awakened ancient creatures couldn’t survive long outside their sources, decaying quickly even if they returned. “Only those sealed in sources during their formation can endure,” he realized.

The two creatures, like evil gods, brimmed with murderous intent, eager to kill him. However, the cave’s narrow passages slowed them.

Boom.

A mountain-shattering force struck, outrageously powerful. Ye Fan’s face paled as he saw a six-armed humanoid creature, silver-scaled, burning like a flame, the source of the malevolent intent.

With no choice, he summoned his cauldron, diving inside and speeding forward.

Bang.

The immense force sent the cauldron flying, crashing through a dozen mines like cutting through tofu.

Roar…

The terrifying howl raised goosebumps, even within the cauldron.

This creature was overwhelmingly powerful; without the Godrune Cauldron, Ye Fan would have been shattered.

“Now I’ve seen the terror of ancient creatures…” he muttered, steering the cauldron. He was nearing Purple Mountain’s center, where the demonic summoning intensified.

Bang.

The silver creature pursued, striking from afar, sending the cauldron crashing through more mines. Purple Mountain grew restless, with several more chilling cries, even more terrifying than the six-armed creature, threatening to shatter his soul. “How can they be this strong…”

The demonic summoning surged tenfold, urging Ye Fan toward it despite being in the cauldron.

“What’s happening?!”

The oppressive aura grew stronger, the summoning irresistible, pulling his body uncontrollably.

Clang.

Suddenly, a melodious bell rang, like divine music, calming the restless mountain.

“A hundred thousand years ago, the Grand Emperor used a Paragon Artifact, the High Heaven Bell, to suppress the Godsource creature…” Ye Fan recalled.

Following the bell, he rushed forward like lightning. The ancient creatures behind him halted.

Swish.

He entered a vast cavern, like a grand hall, where the bell’s echo faded.

The expansive hall resembled a plaza. Ye Fan spotted a human skeleton, beside which lay a silver book, glinting coldly.