The end of the long street.
An old man carrying a lantern walked towards Chen Jiuyang and the others.
Chen Jiuyang, Bai Riyue, Luo Xingchen, and Qi Wushuang all wore solemn expressions.
They subconsciously wanted to turn and leave.
The old man before them, with his eyes gouged out, clearly emanated an aura of an alternative path to enlightenment, terrifying beyond measure.
Qi Wushuang said, "Into the house!"
As the words fell, he unleashed a sword from his hand, shooting it into a house, then used his spiritual power to pull everyone inside.
Seeing that Chen Jiuyang and the other two were safe, they followed suit, hiding in the wooden house.
Once inside the wooden house, it felt like entering another safe world. Chen Jiuyang couldn't help but glance at Qi Wushuang. How did he know that entering the small wooden house would be safe?
Bai Riyue said in a deep voice, "It's here! Close the door!"
They watched as the old man carrying the lantern, with his sightless eyes, drew nearer and nearer.
And those two seemingly light and ordinary wooden doors felt as if they were bearing the weight of Mount Buzhou. No matter how hard Qi Wushuang pushed, he couldn't move them an inch.
Chen Jiuyang's expression changed slightly.
All four present were at the Quasi-Emperor cultivation level. Even Luo Xingchen could move them with great spiritual power.
Yet, these two doors, which even a Quasi-Emperor could not close, were truly bizarre.
Qi Wushuang quickly said, "Let's all push together! We must close the door, otherwise, if that old man gets in, we will all die!"
The others immediately stepped forward to help. Chen Jiuyang also went to close the door. As soon as he touched the doorknob, he found the wooden door to be bone-chillingly cold. It was also devouring their divine power, as if freezing his vast martial arts furnace.
Fortunately, Chen Jiuyang was at the peak of the Quasi-Emperor realm and possessed a trace of Dao power. With this trace of Dao power, he slowly closed one of the doors.
At this moment, the old man carrying the lantern was getting closer and closer, three meters, two meters, one meter...
Half a meter...
The old man carrying the lantern had extended a terrifyingly dark, withered skeletal hand, reaching towards them.
"Bang!"
With Chen Jiuyang's help, the door was finally closed by a hair's breadth.
The four of them breathed a collective sigh of relief.
This place was truly bizarre. With their Quasi-Emperor cultivation, they were beings who could challenge immortals, sweep across the universe, and suppress an era. Yet here, they struggled to even close a wooden door.
They didn't know what kind of ghastly thing the old man carrying the lantern was, but he made their hearts pound and a sense of mortal peril surge.
Chen Jiuyang looked at Qi Wushuang and asked, "Brother Qi, how did you know that entering the small wooden house in this place would be safe?"
Qi Wushuang replied, "I have been here for three thousand years, and after much exploration, I gradually figured out the rules of this place."
Three thousand years? Chen Jiuyang's heart sank.
Suddenly, the old man's hoarse voice echoed in their ears:
"My eyes are gone. Could you lend me your eyes for a moment?"
Chen Jiuyang and the other three's faces changed drastically. They stiffly twisted their eyeballs and saw that the lantern-carrying old man, who had been shut out, had somehow penetrated the wall and appeared on the other side of the wooden house!
"Ah!" Bai Riyue let out a scream. One of his eyes flew out of its socket uncontrollably and drifted slowly towards the lantern-carrying old man. The lantern in his hand emitted a cold and terrifying aura.
Qi Wushuang quickly shouted, "Stop him! If the eyeball falls into his grasp and he looks at it, we will all die!"
"Unleash your strongest Dao martial techniques!"
Chen Jiuyang glanced at Bai Riyue. The latter's limbs began to twitch, his aura plummeted, as if he were transforming into a ghostly entity.
It seemed Qi Wushuang's words were not false.
Chen Jiuyang immediately drew his saber.
"Hum hum hum!"
The saber's hum surged, and a golden thread erupted, a strike imbued with a trace of Dao power!
Dao power was Chen Jiuyang's strongest force at the moment.
This strike arrived in an instant!
"Pfft!!"
However, this strike did not destroy the lantern-carrying old man. After landing on him, the golden character 'Yuan' released a powerful and domineering aura. The lantern-carrying old man shook violently and then, in a struggling posture, could no longer move freely.
"Hehehehehe!!!"
A chilling, sinister laugh echoed.
The dim, cold, dark lantern light weakened, and then the eerie creaking sound, like a swarm of ten thousand insects on a night march, stiffened and stopped.
After being suppressed by Chen Jiuyang's strike, Bai Riyue's eyeball flew back into his eye socket.
"Dao power!"
"Thank you, Brother Chen!"
Chen Jiuyang maintained his saber-wielding posture, slowly shaking his head, and asked with a solemn expression, "What is this ghastly thing, and where did it come from?"
"With my strength, I can only suppress it for a while, not for long."
Qi Wushuang replied simply, "Dao ghost."
"It strips away the Dao fruits that already exist within us."
"Hmm?" Chen Jiuyang's brows furrowed. "Existing Dao fruits? What does that mean?"
Qi Wushuang explained, "When we descended into this world, our Dao fruits had already descended into our bodies."
"What we need to do is activate the Dao fruits step by step, refine the Dao power, and then complete the path of the Dao fruit."
"And if attacked by these Dao ghosts, the Dao fruits within us will be stripped away."
"If they are completely stripped away, we will perish here immediately..."
"I lost my original Dao fruit here, spent a long time, and only then found another Dao fruit to refine, and returned here."
Chen Jiuyang's expression changed, and he then said gravely, "You returned here, does it mean you have to pass some trials to refine the Dao fruit step by step?"
"That's right." Qi Wushuang nodded slowly.
"If you all wish to successfully refine your Dao fruits and survive here, then you must all follow my command."
Chen Jiuyang, Luo Xingchen, and Bai Riyue nodded solemnly.
Qi Wushuang continued, "After leaving here, we will proceed to the next stage, which is the 'Night March of Ten Thousand Ghosts.' They will transform into our likenesses, so we need to agree on a password beforehand."
"Remember, that is the first step to refining the Dao fruit opportunity."
"And to refine our Dao fruits, we need to help each other."
"Ghosts can deceive people, and once you are deceived by a ghost, even if you miraculously survive, you will become neither human nor ghost, a member of the ten thousand ghosts, forever lost and fallen here, unable to transcend."
"Unless someone speaks the password, and when you need help, only then can you trust them." m..oΓg
The three's expressions changed again. This ghostly place was so perilous?
Qi Wushuang said, "To activate the power of the Dao fruit, someone must help. As for why, you will understand when the time comes."
"For now, let's set a password. I'll go first: Heaven gives birth to all things, Wushuang is most precious."
Bai Riyue said, "Great calamity fills the heavens, nameless faces the sky."
Luo Xingchen said, "Washed clean but not demonic."
Chen Jiuyang's heart stirred. These seemed to be the names of divine abilities: "Past and future, now there are no immortals!"
"Good, since we have all set the passwords, let us depart."