Chapter 1771: A Turn in the Path, Another Peak Appears
Without waiting for the grey-robed elder to speak further, Nether Qi began to recount her origins; she was placing a desperate bet.
The stranger could learn everything about her through a soul-search, likely with even greater precision and detail.
At this moment, regardless of whether the grey-robed elder allowing her to leave was a snare or a genuine gesture, the reality remained that they were no match for him.
Being in such a disadvantaged position, she felt compelled to act—to see if they could secure a place here or use dialogue to pry into the elder’s true intent.
Nether Qi decided to disclose certain truths to observe his reaction; so long as he did not strike, she could not abandon hope.
However, as long as she could clarify the sequence of events, that would suffice; it would test his stance, allowing them to act according to the unfolding situation.
Li Yan listened in silence. Yet, in his heart, his confidence did not stem from the sisters’ assumption that he had obtained an inheritance here.
Rather, Li Yan simply wanted to know what ulterior motives this pair of sisters harbored. It was highly probable that Yan Qingchen shared the same goal.
This information had become vital to Li Yan, for it concerned the hidden intent of the Yin-Yang Primordial Chaos Sect. Simultaneously, he had other uses for these two sisters.
Knowing the riverbed held a strange anomaly, they would certainly be unwilling to leave; under his intimidation, they would exhaust every means to stay.
Unexpectedly, the details revealed next diverged sharply from his initial theories, catching him somewhat off guard.
In Li Yan’s estimations, the sisters and Yan Qingchen had come seeking a specific treasure or, perhaps like him, a rare heavenly material.
The latter was the most likely probability. Li Yan had even wondered if they were also searching for the Moon-Gazing Pure Immortal Grass.
In Huangqi Valley, the items worth such a perilous infiltration were almost always medicinal pills, but having reached the Inheritance Ancient Hall, raw materials were the more plausible objective.
Yet, the chance of the sisters and Yan Qingchen seeking the exact same herb as him was statistically slim.
Li Yan did not believe the world was governed by such convenient coincidences.
The Ming sisters were more accurately named Nether Qi and Nether Yu. They were indeed of the Undead Nether Phoenix clan, yet they were not of the pure-blooded lineage.
Their ancestral line began with the union of an Undead Nether Phoenix and a Green Phoenix. Races such as Dragons and Phoenixes were peak existences among demonic beasts, possessing incredibly high bloodline grades.
To produce offspring was no easy feat. The origins of that ancestral Undead Nether Phoenix were lost to time; it was only known that he had no kin left and eventually took a Green Phoenix as his wife.
Consequently, the bloodline of Nether Qi’s clan was infused with the essence of the Green Phoenix. To ensure the survival of their race, this had been a necessary compromise.
In some respects, this had actually bolstered the Undead Nether Phoenix bloodline—for instance, in their affinity for Spatial Laws. Originally, this divine ability was weaker in the Undead Nether Phoenix than in the other two phoenix clans.
This afforded them a unique, inherent advantage when dismantling formations!
However, because of this, through generations of continuity, they never encountered another pure Undead Nether Phoenix and were forced to intermarry with other phoenix kindred.
This caused their bloodline to grow increasingly diluted and muddled. Eventually, many of the innate divine abilities of the Undead Nether Phoenix either waned in power or vanished entirely in certain descendants.
Conversely, the innate abilities of other phoenix kindred began to manifest and strengthen, while the speed of their Phoenix Soars movement technique declined with each passing generation.
To an outsider, this might seem inconsequential. Since ancient times, the phoenix clans were considered of one house, and unions between Dragons and Phoenixes were well-recorded.
Regardless, they were all high-grade bloodlines. The decline of old innate abilities in favor of new evolutions was a natural phenomenon, which typically meant little.
Yet, to Nether Qi’s branch, this was their profound sorrow!
Their progenitor was the Undead Nether Phoenix, the most formidable of the phoenix kindred and the one most feared by other races.
But later, because their bodies were too powerful, they were constrained by the Laws of Heaven and Earth, making reproduction increasingly difficult.
In contrast to the other phoenix clans, they were the first to fall into decline.
Thus, they began to scour the world for their kin, hoping to restore the true bloodline inheritance, but they never found another pure Undead Nether Phoenix.
At most, they found clans in similar straits—Undead Nether Phoenixes whose bloodlines were even more diluted than theirs, such that they could no longer truly claim the name.
It seemed as if the pure race had truly vanished from the world.
The process was long and grueling. Through generation after generation, every clan leader and elder exhausted their efforts to reclaim the true inheritance.
They sought to restore the glory of the Undead Nether Phoenix, but they always met with failure.
During this search, Nether Qi’s branch gathered various clues. Some were true and some were false, though eighty to ninety percent were judged to be fabrications.
Even when a lead proved genuine, the arduous journey to reach it often revealed that the world had changed, leaving behind only faint, lingering traces.
By Nether Qi’s generation, though their clan had grown relatively large, their muddled bloodline made them neither here nor there.
This left her branch at the absolute bottom of the hierarchy among the phoenix clans.
The strongest among them, the Supreme Elder, was only at the Mid-stage Body Integration Realm, a level achieved only after enduring countless years of slow accumulation.
The cultivation of the clan leader and the elders had stalled at the Void Refining Realm, unable to progress further.
Because their innate abilities were varied but their bloodline lacked purity on either side, their cultivation frequently encountered bottlenecks. This was the tragedy of this branch.
This only hardened their resolve to find their true bloodline or other kin.
They gathered every scrap of evidence they had ever collected for study. Eventually, the sole Supreme Elder risked his remaining longevity to perform a perilous divination.
He deduced three locations where an Undead Nether Phoenix colony or inheritance might still exist.
In two of those places, the concealment of heavenly secrets was so dense that even after the Supreme Elder coughed up blood and fainted, he could not find the exact coordinates.
Only Huangqi Valley yielded a relatively clear location and information.
However, it was obvious that the best-case scenario here would be some form of inheritance, not a living colony.
Huangqi Valley was far too powerful; how could they allow another race to sleep soundly beside their bed? If a powerful clan existed nearby, the valley experts would have sensed them long ago.
Furthermore, a colony could not survive without ever venturing out, especially if they had to emerge from the Inheritance Ancient Hall. They would have certainly alerted the powerhouses of Huangqi Valley.
Nether Qi and Nether Yu were the disciples with the highest alchemical attainments in the younger generation. Combined with their proficiency in joint-strike techniques, they were the ideal candidates for this mission.
Nether Qi did not explicitly state their true alchemical rank, but Li Yan could guess they likely reached the Grandmaster level.
However, they did not wish to use Yan Qingchen’s method of acquiring Sect Contribution Points. They hoped to slip into the Inheritance Ancient Hall as discreetly as possible.
This was somewhat similar to Li Yan’s own plan. The difference was that Li Yan truly lacked alchemical skill and was forced to find alternative ways to earn points.
After the brief summary, Li Yan finally understood one point: they were not true Undead Nether Phoenixes.
No wonder that, despite both being Spirit Transformation cultivators, though Nether Qi was a minor realm lower than him, her speed as a phoenix had lagged so far behind his.
This had been a lingering question for Li Yan. While hidden, he had watched the sisters fight to the death with Yan Qingchen; in that situation, they should have had no reason to hold back their speed.
“You already understand that I have no intention of killing you. Why reveal so much? I am a human; you should know very well what that implication entails,” Li Yan said, his voice flat as he looked at them.
“That is because we came here to obtain the inheritance. If Senior wishes to take the essence blood from my body, then take it!
I imagine that after learning the situation, Senior might have felt our low cultivation rendered our essence blood useless to you.
And now, seeing our muddled bloodlines, Senior likely looks down on it even more. Senior should have already noticed the issues after seeing the divine abilities I manifested earlier…”
One had to admit that Nether Qi was exceptionally intelligent. Even while at a disadvantage against Li Yan, she had accurately guessed some of his thoughts.
She paused briefly, glancing at the grey-robed elder who was watching her in silence, and then continued.
“…In that case, I would like to boldly ask: did Senior obtain his fortune here?
If so, could you allow us to enter and take a look? If you permit it, no matter what conditions Senior proposes, I… I will do my best to fulfill them…”
As she reached this point, Nether Qi suddenly thought of something. Her fair face flushed with a crimson glow, making her look extraordinarily beautiful for a moment, and she could not go on.
Nether Yu also understood her sister’s thought; her face turned completely red, and she lowered her head, not daring to look at Li Yan.
“Oh? You never thought of killing me to avenge your kin and then refining my essence blood? It seems your strength is simply insufficient to support such a thought,” Li Yan said, a trace of mockery appearing on his face.
“Senior, under normal circumstances, we truly would have the thought of refining your essence blood. But you did not kill us.
The immortal fortune you obtained is your own luck; we only wish to obtain some inheritance. We are not people who cannot distinguish good from evil.
Although the Undead Nether Phoenix is rare, those are ultimately outsiders, not our kin.
It is like you being human—if we killed some unrelated humans, would you seek revenge for them?
In the end, do cultivators not just live for resources? It is just that the resources we seek are somewhat special.”
This time, without waiting for Nether Qi to speak, Nether Yu spoke up with a hint of dissatisfaction. They only wanted the inheritance for the survival of their own branch.
Li Yan was momentarily stunned. Thinking it over, he found her reasoning quite logical.
No matter how many humans they killed, as long as it did not involve him, he could not be bothered to interfere.
But he was also certain that if the sisters were stronger than him, they would almost certainly refine his essence blood to solve their own bloodline issues.
“Then do you know what the inheritance here is?” Li Yan did not bother answering her; he immediately switched to another question.
“That… that is unclear. Based on the clues from the divination, we only know that one of our kin once appeared here.
That kinsman was very powerful and likely had some connection to this temple. Later, he disappeared along with this sect!” Nether Yu replied softly.
Li Yan nodded.
“Can you open the passage here?”
Li Yan’s aged face remained expressionless, and his voice betrayed no emotion.
“It is not certain. But if it truly was set by a powerhouse of our race, our clan has provided some methods used by our elders to break such restrictions.”
Nether Qi was currently considering more matters: how to persuade the grey-robed elder, and what to do if the inheritance inside was taken by him.
Would they truly have to offer themselves to him? That was the most desperate, final method suggested by the Supreme Elder.
The reason for such a plan was the fear that the Undead Nether Phoenix here might still be alive but unwilling to show itself, or perhaps was severely wounded and trapped…
“Very well. Then follow me to the riverbed. That place might not be the location you are looking for.”
Li Yan was unaware of the unpredictable and unacceptable thoughts in her mind. He naturally had his own plans.
The grey-robed elder’s voice came again, but the content of his words took the sisters by surprise.
After their explanation, he was actually willing to take them there. This sudden change felt too fast.
Though they did not understand why he had suddenly agreed, the sisters knew they could not defeat him, and their goal was likely right before them. Naturally, they steeled their hearts.
“Oh… oh… thank you for your generosity, Senior!”
“Mn. Wait here for a moment.”
After Li Yan finished speaking, he ignored the confused looks from the sisters. Not knowing what else he intended to do, they watched as his figure vanished. Nether Qi and Nether Yu could only exchange looks.
“Sister, this person acts very strangely.”
“Do not move recklessly. Let’s see if we can get close to our destination first,” Nether Qi replied via voice transmission.
Why had he suddenly agreed? They had begun to suspect his realm was truly only the Spirit Transformation stage; otherwise, why had he failed to capture Yan Qingchen?
But in their speech, they continued to call him “Senior” with every breath, wanting him to know they remained in a weak position.
After waiting for fifteen minutes, Li Yan’s figure reappeared before them, hovering above a certain point in the river.
“It is done. Come here!”
During his absence, Li Yan had gone to retrieve the four warning formations left by Yan Qingchen. He found those formations quite useful.
This array was not for attack or defense; having watched Yan Qingchen set them up from the shadows, he had memorized the positions of the flags and eyes, so breaking them was not difficult.
After saying this, Li Yan dropped directly into the river water below and vanished once again.
Seeing this, Nether Qi and Nether Yu took a deep breath and immediately flew forward, plunging into the water.
Sinking rapidly, they soon saw the grey-robed elder standing before a section of the riverbed wall. He used his magical power to push back the surrounding water. On the riverbed wall before him sat a tiny purple cowry.
Without careful observation, one would never notice anything special about it; there were far too many colorful shells here.
The color of that purple cowry had faded significantly, but it bore traces of having been cleaned.
The elder stood there, staring at the purple cowry. Nether Qi and Nether Yu, assuming he was waiting for them, quickly landed behind him.
“As you can see, try to break it and see if you can open a path. I have already sensed it; there are indeed faint ripples of a formation here!”
Just as the sisters landed and prepared to follow him in, they heard the elder suddenly speak these words.
The revelation left them momentarily dazed.
After several breaths, Li Yan’s aged voice came again, now tinged with dissatisfaction.
“What? Did you not say you had a way to break it? Do you expect this old man to do it? If so, why are you still here? You might as well leave!”
“Se… Senior, were you not taking us to have a look?” Nether Yu asked, somewhat uncertain.
Although Li Yan had previously asked if they could break any restrictions here, they had assumed he was merely inquiring about the methods they had prepared before coming.
“I said I would take you to the riverbed to see where a formation might exist. Is this not a formation?” Li Yan replied.
“But… but you have already obtained the immortal fortune. Why do you still need us to break it?” Nether Yu pressed.
Events were shifting too quickly. A moment ago, they were wondering why he had agreed to their request without conditions and allowed them to see the situation.
Now, his actions had once again defied their expectations.
For a moment, they were utterly bewildered!