Chapter 230
“It was thanks to the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.”
Baek Cheong slightly lifted the black jade plate cradled in her arms.
If she said she had personally repaired the damaged teleportation formation, there would be far too much to explain.
Nothing about it was ordinary, from recognizing the law glyphs to fitting the jade plate together and restoring the teleportation formation.
She could explain her ability to recognize glyphs as an insight gained from the True-Text Diagram, but the realm of laws was different.
It was far more natural to say that the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc had activated the ruins’ formations and opened the way for her.
“I obtained it in what was called the Tortoise Dragon’s dwelling.”
Profound Void Perfected Person gazed at the black jade plate with interest.
His gaze slowly swept over the golden lines dividing the Nine Palaces and the Eight Trigrams along its edge.
Unlike someone who had been stomping his feet in frustration because he could not open the door moments ago, his face was now filled with delight.
“Oh... So it was a formation disc connected to these ruins.”
Profound Void Perfected Person neither touched nor approached the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.
He merely lowered his sleeves, smoothed his disheveled beard, and smiled in satisfaction.
“I came to in this place from the very beginning. After we were separated, I worried something might have happened to you, but you found your own way here. What a relief.”
Baek Cheong flinched inwardly.
While Profound Void Perfected Person had been worrying before the door, she had been busy harvesting spirit herbs in the spirit-herb field and fighting the Earth Dragon.
But since they had reunited safely, there was no need to lay out every detail of what had happened.
“I was looking for you too, Grandpa Profound Void.”
At least she had not added to the lie.
Before heading to the Earth Dragon’s dwelling, she had confirmed that Profound Void Perfected Person was on the Flood Dragon’s side, and after leaving the spirit-herb field, she had come straight here.
The only thing that had happened in between was acquiring more than twenty jade boxes of spirit herbs and a third-tier demonic core.
Profound Void Perfected Person nodded deeply at Baek Cheong’s answer.
“Fortuitous opportunities choose their masters before coming to them. If you obtained the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc in the Tortoise Dragon’s dwelling, then you were probably destined to make it yours.”
Instead of asking its value or probing its origins, he simply offered his sincere congratulations.
Baek Cheong tightened her arms slightly around the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc.
She had never worried that it would be taken from her, but it was reassuring that a Nascent Soul grand cultivator could stand before such a treasure without revealing any greed.
“But if you have that, couldn’t you open the door in front of us?”
Profound Void Perfected Person gestured toward the enormous door with his chin.
Baek Cheong also tore her eyes from the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc and looked up at the dozens-of-zhang-tall door.
“Did you figure out where this place is, Grandpa Profound Void?”
“I can’t say I’ve figured out everything, but I did find several clues from which we can make a guess.”
Profound Void Perfected Person approached the door and pointed with his fingertip at a glyph engraved in the blue jade.
The glyph conveyed the meaning of building a lofty seat beneath the clouds, where countless beings bowed their heads.
Beside it, strokes representing a monarch, nobility, and a dwelling continued at length.
“It seems to be someone’s audience hall. Most of the inscriptions on the door praise its owner.”
“Doesn’t it say whom they praise?”
“The part bearing the name is made of something I cannot even read. But judging by the images carved into the doors, it isn’t hard to guess.”
A Flood Dragon winding through the clouds filled both doors.
The horns and claws were overlaid with Heavenly Dao glyphs, while every scale concealed tiny formation glyphs that summoned water and wind.
It seemed clear that the owner of the audience hall was a Flood Dragon or someone deeply connected to Flood Dragons.
This time, Profound Void Perfected Person pointed not at the door but at the floor around them.
“Moreover, this place is different from the secret realms we commonly speak of. If it were a separately created minor world, there should be a boundary dividing inside and outside, but no matter how I search, I see no such flow.”
He then added an explanation of how he had come to be here.
Profound Void Perfected Person had awakened in the outer corridor leading to the Flood Dragon’s audience hall.
Every path leading back had been blocked, and he had not found any formation that could shift space.
The power enveloping the entire ruin separated the inside from the outside and severed every flow leading outward.
“It seems someone sealed and concealed this ancient ruin by some means. To escape, we’ll have no choice but to go inside and find the center of the ruins.”
Baek Cheong nodded as she listened.
The teleportation formation connecting the guest quarters and the five dwellings had only shown the way forward; it had not sent them outside the ruins.
Unless something like the turtle’s belly shell existed, there was no guarantee that returning to the entrance would let them leave Yeonha.
In the end, they had no choice but to open the door.
‘Let’s examine it first.’
Supporting the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc on her left arm, she brought her right hand close to the enormous door.
Her divine sense rapidly extended dozens of zhang along the door’s surface.
From a distance, the carvings of the Flood Dragon had caught her eye first, but when she examined it up close, the entire door was densely packed with countless glyphs.
The Heaven-and-Earth glyphs constantly summoned water, wind, and clouds.
The Heavenly Dao glyphs formed flows representing obedience, praise, and authority.
Between the layers of the Heaven-and-Earth and Heavenly Dao glyphs were countless empty sections where the strokes seemed to have been severed.
‘They must be law glyphs.’
They appeared, almost without a doubt, to be traces concealing law glyphs.
Yet unlike the glyphs she had seen in the depths of Yeonha and in the teleportation formations, she could not even recognize their outlines.
Thanks to having been directly swept up in silver light, she could grasp even the blurred forms of the law glyphs related to teleportation.
But the empty spaces before her offered no clue as to what laws they contained.
No matter how many times she swept over them with her divine sense, they left no impression, like water slipping through her fingers.
At least, by connecting the surrounding glyphs and reading their context, she could tell that Profound Void Perfected Person was right.
Inscribed words expressing praise filled most of the doors, and the strokes signifying an audience hall where a lofty being resided were repeated several times.
‘The lofty being here must be the Flood Dragon.’
Baek Cheong slightly furrowed her brow as she scanned the inscriptions.
Although countless glyphs covered the door, only one formation actually moved power.
Even the tiny formation glyphs embedded in the Flood Dragon’s scales were closer to decoration.
The only active formation encompassed both doors and the doorframe at once, repelling any force entering from outside.
‘A barrier blocking entry and exit.’
It was a sealing formation erected to prevent anyone from intruding.
No flow led outward; it merely rejected any force trying to open the door.
She could not tell whether it had been created to imprison the owner of the audience hall inside or to keep intruders outside.
Either way, it was not a sign that she could enter without concern.
She looked up at the Flood Dragon’s eye carved into the enormous door.
The pupils made of jade gave off no light, and her divine sense detected no trace of life.
‘There’s no way an ancient being is still alive, right?’
The ruins had remained buried for so long that the Tortoise Dragon’s dwelling had become a wasteland, and the vegetation in the spirit-herb field had flourished and withered countless times.
Even if a Flood Dragon had once been the owner of this audience hall, it was unlikely to have survived until now.
Moreover, Profound Void Perfected Person, a quasi-fifth-tier formation master, was by her side.
A sword fragment containing a sword strike sealed by Sword Venerable Pacheon also rested inside her spatial dharma treasure.
No matter what happened, she could deal with it once.
‘Even so, I have to open it.’
Having made up her mind, Baek Cheong infused the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc with spiritual energy.
Golden lines rose beneath the round black jade as the Nine Palaces and Eight Trigrams began to move.
The barrier surrounding the door also appeared on the formation disc in miniature, as if it had been waiting for this moment.
In the Kun Palace, she placed the flow of the seal that burrowed beneath the doorframe.
In the Qian Palace, she moved the force pressing down from above, and in the center she displayed the formation glyph binding the two doors together.
As she slowly rotated the Eight Trigrams, the golden lines that had been connected to one another fell apart one by one.
“Oh.”
Profound Void Perfected Person let out a low exclamation as he watched the changes unfolding beside him.
Baek Cheong did not respond, alternating her gaze between the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc and the door.
If she forcibly broke the barrier, she had no way of knowing how even the law glyphs might react.
Instead, she followed the flows reflected on the Heavenly Armor Formation Disc and gradually shifted the center of the formation glyphs.
The force binding the doors flowed into the doorframe, while the force pressing down on the doorframe escaped into the empty space.
Finally, she rotated the glyph in the Central Palace half a turn.
Click.
The golden barrier blocking the door rapidly faded from the top downward.
At the same time, the dozens-of-zhang-tall door trembled inward.
Grrrrr!
The golden metal and blue jade that had remained interlocked for countless years pushed against each other.
A gap as thin as a strand of hair appeared between the two doors, then slowly widened.
‘It opened.’
Before she had time to rejoice, an immense amount of spiritual energy poured through the gap.
It was as though an invisible current had engulfed her entire body, forcing spiritual energy all at once into her dantian.
When she activated the Five-Element Technique, the five attributes interlocked through generation and restriction, circulating the overflowing spiritual energy back into her core essence.
Even so, the amount rushing in was far greater than the amount she could absorb.
The inside of her dantian swelled taut, and her feet slid backward.
“Don’t be greedy and take in too much.”
Profound Void Perfected Person lightly waved his sleeve.
The spiritual energy pouring toward Baek Cheong split to either side and dispersed into the wide corridor.
As the pressure bearing down on her dantian diminished, the Five-Element Technique also returned to its normal flow.
“Thank you.”
Baek Cheong offered a brief thanks and looked beyond the open door.
Inside the door that had finally opened, a magnificent audience hall came into view.
The floor was fitted together from blue jade, and golden Flood Dragons coiled around each thick pillar.
Countless night-luminous pearls modeled after clouds and stars were embedded in the ceiling.
The water qi flowing along the walls alternately formed images of waterfalls, mist, and small rivers.
Even after tens of thousands of years, the ancient audience hall remained as radiant as if it had just been built.
But beneath the splendid decorations, there was neither a person nor a demonic beast.
Not even a table or a piece of furniture remained, leaving the vast space completely empty.
Only the enormous throne at the very back seemed to be waiting for the owner of the audience hall.
A stone statue of a Flood Dragon sat coiled atop the throne.
Branches of horn rose from its head, and claws that seemed to grasp the clouds sprouted from both its forelimbs.
Even its scales and whiskers had been carved with such delicacy that it looked alive.
“Amazing.”
Profound Void Perfected Person gazed at the statue and did not hold back his admiration for quite some time.
“If it commanded an audience hall this grand, the being modeled by the statue must surely have been a demon sovereign.”
A fifth-tier demon sovereign was a demonic beast at the same realm as a Soul Transformation cultivator.
The Flood Dragon carried thick blood from a true dragon, so it must have possessed extraordinary powers even among fifth-tier beings.
But he did not approach the throne right away.
Profound Void Perfected Person first swept through the entire audience hall with his divine sense, excluding the throne.
The glyphs hidden in the floor and pillars were dormant as well, and he saw no formation meant for attacks.
Only after examining the area for quite some time did he take the first step forward.
“There doesn’t appear to be any immediate danger.”
Baek Cheong followed him as they walked around the expansive audience hall together.
Then the inscriptions carved into the walls and pillars gradually came into view.
At first, she had thought the entire audience hall contained countless formations.
Heaven-and-Earth glyphs and Heavenly Dao glyphs continued line after line, while the unrecognizable empty sections seemed to contain law glyphs.
But when she examined the direction in which spiritual energy flowed, none of the inscriptions were moving as formations.
Instead of generating power, the glyphs connected meaning to meaning and formed sentences.
‘They used glyphs like a language.’
Glyphs carrying individual meanings gathered to form sentences, continued along the walls, and recorded the history of the audience hall.
Profound Void Perfected Person passed a pillar, then stopped.
He traced several strokes with his fingertip, slowly drawing his brows together.
“Upper Realm... fall...?”
The fragmented words spread through the spacious audience hall.
The content was so extraordinary that Profound Void Perfected Person seemed to have read it aloud without realizing it.
Baek Cheong looked up at the same inscription and read the surrounding glyphs one by one.
Far more meaning than the portion Profound Void Perfected Person had read connected in her mind.
‘After part of the Upper Realm fell, the path of ascension was blocked.’
The Upper Realm in the inscription did not mean some distant immortal realm.
It referred to the world above the one they were currently in—the Spirit Realm that cultivators reached by ascending.
Even if she had merely guessed that a fragment of the Spirit Realm might have fallen away...
Confirming a record that part of the Upper Realm had fallen below was difficult to believe.
But the inscription that followed immediately afterward was even more ominous than the preceding content.
Without realizing it, Baek Cheong opened her eyes wide as she read the final inscription.
‘A true dragon sleeps in the fallen Upper Realm.’