Chapter 364 – Atop Great Wilderness Tower, Mysterious Immortal Statue and Coffin

The Summit of the Great Wilderness Pagoda

Boom!

“What’s happening?”

Hearing the commotion around him, Xiao, the Dean of the Barren Wilderness Academy, opened his eyes in confusion.

Outside the cave residence on the same top floor, four Immortal Statues began to shake violently.

It seemed as if they had discovered something exciting and were growing impatient.

Even Xiao, as the Dean of the Barren Wilderness Academy, had never witnessed such a phenomenon.

It is important to note that the Great Wilderness Pagoda serves as a training ground for students due to three critical factors.

First is the former Demon Suppression Division’s underground prison beneath the pagoda.

Second are the twelve Immortal Statues at the summit of the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

The last is the permanently stationed Pagoda Master of the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

Although the underground prison of the Great Wilderness Pagoda holds many demons and heretical cultivators,

these are merely a facade.

The truly vicious and powerful demons and heretical cultivators are actually imprisoned within the pagoda’s structure above ground.

Moreover, the Great Wilderness Pagoda is publicly known to have only ten floors,

but in reality, it has a full one hundred floors.

The first ten floors are merely what outsiders believe to be the entirety.

The true core area lies in the prison sections above the tenth floor.

This arrangement was a smokescreen released by the Immortal Alliance to prevent anyone from attempting to free those imprisoned within the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

Only core members of the Immortal Alliance are privy to this information.

Thus, if anyone truly intends to cause trouble at the Great Wilderness Pagoda,

they would invariably charge toward the underground prison.

This not only avoids threatening the important demons confined in the Sumeru Space above

but also leads them directly into the traps prepared for them in the underground prison.

Under extreme circumstances, the Immortal Alliance can even seal off the space of the underground prison entirely,

leaving those who enter with no means of escape.

Over the years, there have indeed been some arrogant individuals who attempted to break into the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

Without exception, they all ended up becoming ‘honored guests’ within the pagoda,

earning themselves a hundred-square-meter cell with all meals and accommodation provided.

Releasing false information externally is just one layer of insurance.

As a prison for demons and heretical cultivators,

the defensive capabilities of the Great Wilderness Pagoda are by no means weak.

Not to mention the permanent guards consisting of graduates from the Barren Wilderness Academy,

the mere presence of Xiao is enough to deter most individuals or factions from even considering laying a finger on the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

If the false information fails to mislead the enemy, and Xiao and the other guards are unable to fend off the invaders,

the Great Wilderness Pagoda has one final safeguard:

the twelve Immortal Statues surrounding Xiao.

It is worth noting that the origins of these four Immortal Statues are highly unusual.

Their existence even predates the Great Wilderness Pagoda itself.

In the early days, the Immortal Alliance’s Demon Suppression Division relied heavily on these four Immortal Statues to keep the most vicious demons in check.

Similar Immortal Statues are actually quite numerous within the Immortal Alliance.

However, these statues are exceptionally unique, often appearing no different from ordinary statues.

They only react under specific circumstances,

typically when they encounter a being that piques their interest,

such as a suitable inheritor for their Dao Legacy.Or perhaps a crisis had emerged that could threaten the Immortal Statues themselves.

Only under such circumstances would these Immortal Statues show signs of activity.

The reason Barren Wilderness Academy forced students to undergo trials in the Great Wilderness Pagoda during their studies was partly to observe whether any students might be recognized as inheritors by the Immortal Statues.

In a sense, these Immortal Statues served as an alternative form of immortal trial.

They represented power passed down from ancient times.

Regarding this matter, Xiao possessed considerable authority to speak.

Because she had originally been an ordinary student at Barren Wilderness Academy.

After entering the Great Wilderness Pagoda, she unexpectedly gained recognition from one of the immortals.

Thus was born the current Pagoda Master of Great Wilderness Pagoda, Guardian of Shanhai Bureau, Transformation Soul Stage Cultivator – Xiao.

Sensing the movements from the four Immortal Statues, Xiao immediately left her Cave Residence and emerged to the outer area.

In the topmost space, four Immortal Statues surrounded a coffin.

Countless massive chains extended from around the coffin.

The four largest chains connected to the four Immortal Statues respectively.

The remaining chains stretched throughout other parts of the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

Even as the Pagoda Master of Great Wilderness Pagoda, Xiao knew little about this coffin.

She only knew that, like the four Immortal Statues before her, the coffin had existed before the Great Wilderness Pagoda itself.

Their true origin traced back to Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital, the Holy Land behind Barren Wilderness Academy within the Immortal Alliance.

As one of the Four Great Sacred Grounds alongside Supreme Purity Dao Palace, Myriad Enterprises Immortal Sect, and Vast Sea Profound Sect, Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital was naturally shrouded in mystery.

Even Xiao couldn’t claim complete understanding of Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital.

She only knew that its greatest distinction from the other three sacred grounds lay in how much of their power derived from the ‘Ever-Bright Immortal Lamp’ within the Heavenly Capital.

Relying on the Ever-Bright Immortal Lamp, cultivators within Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital could achieve a state where their Divine Souls remained indestructible and their Physical Bodies deathless for certain periods.

Consequently, the Ever-Bright Immortal Lamp was renowned as one of the Immortal Alliance’s Five Great Celestial Artifacts.

It served as a crucial trump card for the Immortal Alliance.

Calling it one of the foundations of the Immortal Alliance wouldn’t be an exaggeration.

Now, the mysterious coffin that had never shown activity before began to shake.

The four Immortal Statues surrounding it also displayed unusual movements.

Golden light erupted from the chains connected to the four statues, spreading along them toward the central coffin.

To Xiao’s astonishment, a sword hilt gradually emerged from the Formation at the coffin lid’s center before finally stopping.

Just as Xiao’s mind went blank, unable to comprehend the reason for these events, a clear, cold voice sounded in her ear.

“Go, invite… to come.”

The voice appeared abruptly, bypassing the Dao protection inherent to the Transformation Soul Stage and reaching the deepest part of Xiao’s Sea of Consciousness.

Had this occurred in any other circumstance, Xiao would have felt profound alarm.

Because if the other party could so easily transmit their voice into her mind, they could just as easily attack her.

An existence capable of so effortlessly influencing a Transformation Soul Stage cultivator was undoubtedly extraordinary.

At minimum, they would be a Great Vehicle Stage Mortal Realm Immortal walking the earth.

Yet since this was happening within the Great Wilderness Pagoda, Xiao didn’t overthink the matter.Not only was she not the least bit frightened at the moment, she was actually quite delighted.

Because ever since she obtained the Immortal’s Legacy, she had known exactly what she was truly guarding within the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

Although Xiao was unclear about the identity of the voice’s owner.

Based on the information she possessed,

the one who had transmitted the message to her might very well be the legendary Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital Lord, who had survived to this day.

The reason this remained merely a rumor was that no one in the entire Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital had ever truly seen Him.

Not even His gender was known.

Yet despite this, the existence of the Ever-Bright Immortal Lamp still earned the Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital Lord the profound reverence of countless cultivators in the Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital.

For in a sense, the Ever-Bright Immortal Lamp had saved the lives of innumerable cultivators from the Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital.

If not for this mysterious Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital Lord,

the Nine Luminaries Celestial Capital might have long vanished into the river of history during the multiple great calamities.

Having reasoned this through, Xiao immediately nodded and soon vanished from the spot.

Meanwhile, on the fifth floor of the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

“Seriously, is this Great Wilderness Pagoda trial supposed to be challenging? How could something like this hold back the students of the Barren Wilderness Academy?”

After punching a Golden Core Stage guardian of the Great Wilderness Pagoda to death, Mu Xiaoye’s face was filled with disappointment.

She had initially thought, given the wild rumors about the Great Wilderness Pagoda,

that starting from the fourth floor, it should have posed significant pressure on her.

After all, according to legends, the fourth floor of the Great Wilderness Pagoda was a trial that could only be unlocked at the Golden Core Stage.

But in her actual experience, Mu Xiaoye found that neither the fourth nor the fifth floor of the Great Wilderness Pagoda had anything particularly remarkable.

Although the guardians were fairly strong,

they were only fairly so.

They couldn’t exert the slightest influence on her, a Phoenix Calamity Cultivator.

Due to the unique nature of the Great Wilderness Pagoda trial,

once the trial began, Mu Xiaoye was separated from Lu Chen and Shen Feiyang.

At the moment, she simply assumed they were also undergoing their trials.

Unbeknownst to her, the two had already arrived in an area completely unknown to Mu Xiaoye.

At the summit of the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

“You’re awake?”

Lu Chen opened his eyes to find a valiant woman dressed in black training attire, her hair tied high, standing calmly before him.

Though she was a woman, Lu Chen sensed a Killing Aura from her that many men lacked.

Thanks to his good memory, Lu Chen quickly recognized her identity from her somewhat familiar features.

This was none other than the legendary Dean of the Barren Wilderness Academy, the Pagoda Master of the Great Wilderness Pagoda—Xiao.

In response to Xiao’s question, Lu Chen nodded.

He then turned to Shen Feiyang beside him and abruptly asked, “Now, can you tell me the purpose of bringing me here?”

Shen Feiyang was taken aback, his eyes filled with confusion.

He then asked, puzzled, “How did you know I deliberately tricked you into coming to the Great Wilderness Pagoda?”

Lu Chen replied calmly, “Because when you were saying all that, the one inside you kept watching me, as if worried I might refuse.”

“Uh…”

Shen Feiyang looked speechlessly at his right hand, seemingly surprised that it was this one who had given them away.

After all, over the past year, this one had repeatedly demonstrated his power to Shen Feiyang.

In Shen Feiyang’s own words…As long as this one was willing, there was nothing in this world that could trouble him.

Though it felt somewhat shameful to admit, Shen Feiyang genuinely enjoyed this feeling of being protected by a female ghost.

At the very least, it greatly eased his tension as a spy within the Black Lotus Sect.

After all, he had previously asked the presence within him: if the Leader of the Black Lotus Sect were to personally take action, could she help him escape with his life?

To this, her response was utterly domineering:

‘If such a day ever comes, then conditions permitting… the one who should run… would be him.’

It was precisely because of these words that Shen Feiyang completely set his mind at ease.

He began to focus wholeheartedly on investigating the Black Lotus Sect’s lair.

However, after experiencing a special Opportunity, the female ghost within him seemed to have Awakened some memories.

She instructed him to find a chance to bring Lu Chen to the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

Though Shen Feiyang didn’t understand why this was necessary, their long time together had taught him that the mysterious female ghost wouldn’t harm him.

Still, out of his inherently kind nature, Shen Feiyang asked whether this action would bring danger to Lu Chen.

After all, his relationship with Lu Chen was quite good, and if possible, he didn’t want to betray a friend.

The response he received put Shen Feiyang’s mind at ease:

Not only would this pose no danger to Lu Chen, but it would also bring him a significant Opportunity.

It was for these reasons that Shen Feiyang’s first action upon encountering Lu Chen was to bring them together to the Great Wilderness Pagoda.

“I know you have many questions in your hearts,” Xiao’s words were directed not only at Lu Chen but also at Shen Feiyang. “And these questions will be answered once you follow me deep into the Great Wilderness Pagoda.”

Lu Chen didn’t show much resistance to this.

Ever since entering the Great Wilderness Pagoda, he had been sensing a familiar aura.

Under Xiao’s guidance, Lu Chen and Shen Feiyang eventually reached the special space at the pagoda’s summit, where the Immortal Statue and mysterious coffin were kept.

Seeing the familiar coffin and the chains surrounding it, Lu Chen’s mind was struck as if by lightning.

This scene was exactly the same as what he had witnessed in the special Instance – the Great Yan Imperial Mausoleum.

And this coffin before him, without doubt, was the Undying Longevity Coffin he had seen back then in the Imperial Mausoleum.

This was the first time he had seen something in reality that was completely identical to what existed in the game.

The shock this brought him was difficult to put into words.

Shen Feiyang was equally astonished, though what shocked him wasn’t the Longevity Coffin itself.

Rather, it was one particular Immortal Statue beside the coffin – that of a female Immortal.

This female Immortal wore armor and held a Spear, resembling a female military officer.

What made Shen Feiyang’s blood run cold was the face of this female officer.

It was identical to that of the female ghost within him.

Though Shen Feiyang had considered that the female ghost within him must have an extraordinary origin, he never imagined it would be this extraordinary.

The other statues surrounding this female Immortal were equally remarkable.

The remaining three Immortal Statues each possessed their own distinctive features:

One statue was draped in owl feathers, tall and imposing. Even as a mere statue, it exuded an indescribable ferocity, like a humanoid feathered owl.

Another statue had Double Pupils in its eyes. Though made of stone, these eyes gave off a vivid, lifelike feeling, as if they could see through everything in the world.The final Immortal Statue appeared ordinary at first glance, but upon closer inspection, one would notice mysterious patterns covering all the exposed skin beneath its clothing.

These patterns spread across the entire statue, seemingly containing some special power.

Four Immortal Statues, plus a mysterious coffin.

No matter how one looked at it, this scene was extraordinary.

(End of Chapter)