Chapter 125: The Tumultuous Heavenly Gate

The Burning Sky Cauldron in Lu Qingyang’s arms let out a beast-like shriek, its bronze body flickering with a blood-red glow. The taotie patterns, dormant for a thousand years, seemed to be infused with Nine Nether Devilish Qi. The embossed scales curled one after another, and the tusk-like protrusions gnawed at his tiger’s mouth as if alive. Blood flowed along the ancient Vicious Beast’s lips and teeth, outlining a bizarre star map on the cauldron’s belly. Every drop of blood that fell into the sea exploded into a crimson vortex.

The small Dragon in his arms suddenly raised its head, seven purple lightning bolts erupting from the Big Dipper pattern on its forehead, tearing a Milky Way-like crack in the dim sky. Primordial star trails flickered in its glazed vertical pupils, and its tender Dragon roar, imbued with ancient prestige, stirred up massive waves. The seawater, like a giant Dragon flayed alive, thrashed in agony. Tens of thousands of acres of waves solidified in mid-air into the form of a nine-headed Qionglong. Each Dragon scale was an inverted iceberg, and its Dragon whiskers transformed into hurricanes that ripped through heaven and earth, carrying broken coral and shipwreck debris, crashing towards the bronze gate with an earth-shattering roar.

“Young Master Lu, wait!” Fairy Leng Yuehan emerged, treading on an ice Phoenix that broke through the waves. Where her profound ice wings swept, a thousand miles of frost instantly congealed. The Guanghan Mirror in her hand reflected the essence of the moon’s soul. When the mirror light pierced through the Xuanji mark on the small Dragon’s forehead, it projected a phantom image of the celestial stars’ rotation onto the clouds. Before her words finished, nine chains carved from thousand-year-old profound ice had wrapped around Lu Qingyang’s feet like cold pythons. At the clasps, three hundred frozen Jiaolong carcasses simultaneously opened their eyes, and the extreme cold Qi gushing from their empty eye sockets congealed into barbed ice lotuses on the sea surface.

A blood river vortex suddenly exploded at the bottom of the sea. Yin Jiuyou’s burial sky coffin, carrying Yellow Springs foul Qi, shot into the sky. The hundred ghosts night parade patterns on the coffin’s surface peeled off, transforming into thousands of decaying zombie arms that grabbed and tore at the ice chains. From the gaps between the corpse-spotted fingers, ink-jade corpse beetles crawled out. The incantations on their carapaces flickered like phosphorescent flames, gnawing at the Ice Soul cold Qi, creating spiderweb-like cracks. Two chains snapped with a crash. What gushed from the broken ends was not seawater, but viscous, mercury-like starlight fragments, as if someone had crushed the Milky Way and poured it into the Mortal world.

The sea breeze, carrying the scent of sulfur, blew into his face. Dark red blood beads seeped from Lu Qingyang’s fingertips as he crushed a Talisman, drawing a twisted trajectory in the Void Realm. Before the blood beads could fall into the sea, they were crushed into powder by some invisible force, scattering into millions of crimson stardust particles. He looked down at the young Dragon in his arms—its small body, less than a foot long, was expanding at a visible rate. Its Dragon scales, in the Chaos fire, gleamed with a cold metallic luster, each one like an ancient bronze mirror, reflecting a fragmented star map. The young Dragon’s milk teeth gnawed at his tiger’s mouth with increasing urgency, and the mingling of Dragon blood and flames emitted a “hissing” sound of bone erosion.

“The sea space has been refined into a Dragon-locking Formation.” Su Meiniang walked gracefully, treading on solidified waves, her nine fox tails weaving a flowing galaxy behind her. With each step she took, ice crystal-like patterns congealed on the sea surface, from which seeped faint blue soul flames, boiling the seawater into a churning emerald color. Old Demon Yin Jiuyou’s burial sky coffin flickered in and out of view in the steam. The soul-suppressing nails on the coffin lid suddenly let out a painful hum, and several of them even shattered amidst the violent tremors.

The young Dragon suddenly broke free from Lu Qingyang’s embrace, sending up a shower of star sand as its inverted scales rubbed against the air. These star sands, upon touching the sea, transformed into vortices, tearing the solidified waves into spiral ice pillars. The giant Dragon roared to the sky, its sound waves forming a tangible shockwave that pressed the sea surface into a thousand-zhang abyss. At the bottom of the deep pit, the bronze gate suddenly appeared. The chains wrapped around its door rings were forged from three hundred Dragon soul skeletons, and at this moment, they dripped viscous soul liquid, corroding charred runes into the ground.

“Guixu Heavenly Gate… Open!” Su Meiniang’s fox tails suddenly plunged into the sea, and the towering waves abruptly parted, revealing the phantom image of the Burning Sky Cauldron coiled at the bottom of the sea. The taotie patterns on the cauldron’s body awakened in the starlight, greedily gnawing at the spatial rift, and the bronze chains suppressed beneath the cauldron’s feet let out an unwilling roar. The golden light bursting from Lu Qingyang’s tiger Talisman resonated with the cauldron’s patterns. The bronze gate let out a painful groan, and seven rays of starlight suddenly surged from its crack. The blood tears dropped by the ancient Magic Treasure congealed into amber ice crystals, suspended at the center of the vortex.

The inverted scale giant Dragon swooped down, its Dragon claws tearing through the Void Realm, creating silver wrinkles. The Guanghan Mirror thrown by Leng Yuehan shattered in the Dragon’s breath, yet its mirror light reflected a scene of a green-robed Daoist throwing a young Dragon into the cauldron—that child-sized Dragon body was covered with constellation totems, exactly matching the inverted scales of the current Dragon. The wails of three hundred Dragon souls suddenly came from all directions. Only then did Lu Qingyang realize that the seawater had long turned dark red, every drop enveloping a Dragon soul afterimage, congealing into translucent Dragon forms in the steam, piously kowtowing towards the bronze gate.

“The Burning Sky Cauldron isn’t refining Dragon souls…” A hoarse whisper came from within the small Dragon, overlapping with Su Meiniang’s laughter. Lu Qingyang suddenly felt a burning sting from the tiger Talisman in his arms. Looking down, he saw dense star patterns appearing on the Talisman, perfectly matching the spatial wrinkles beneath the inverted scale giant Dragon’s claws. The bronze gate finally opened completely. Within the Chaos behind the gate, countless floating bronze coffins appeared, each coffin lid engraved with a surname familiar to Lu Qingyang—those were the Cultivation Families annihilated by the Xuanji Sect.

Yin Jiuyou’s burial sky coffin suddenly shook violently. The coffin lid “bang”ed open, and hundreds of blood-colored zombies streamed out from within, only to turn into ice sculptures the moment they touched the inverted scale Dragon’s breath. Leng Yuehan seized the opportunity to unleash her Lifebound Treasure, the Profound Ice Sword, but its blade was repelled by an invisible barrier three inches from the Dragon scales. Su Meiniang suddenly chuckled, her fox tails wrapping around the Profound Ice Sword and throwing it to Lu Qingyang: “Don’t you understand? The Burning Sky Cauldron is both the key and the cage—and your Bee Cloud Sword is the key to opening the true cage!”

Before her words finished, Lu Qingyang’s seventy-two Bee Cloud Swords suddenly lost control. Star patterns identical to those on the tiger Talisman appeared on their blades. The sword Formation shot into the sky, weaving the trajectory of the Big Dipper into the firmament, forming a mirror image with the wrinkles beneath the inverted scale giant Dragon’s claws. The bronze gate let out a deafening roar. The starlight gushing from the crack suddenly poured back, sweeping Yin Jiuyou’s blood-colored zombies, Su Meiniang’s fox tail galaxy, and Leng Yuehan’s Profound Ice Sword all into the vortex. Lu Qingyang only felt the tiger Talisman burning his heart, and the Xuanji Old Ancestor’s sigh came from his ear: “Countless years, finally I have waited for someone who can truly sever Karma…”

“Taiyi Split Light Sword!” Leng Yuehan’s Ice Soul Sword suddenly flew out of her hand towards the starlight. The phantom image of Guanghan Palace’s first Ancestral Master appeared on the sword’s body. Su Meiniang’s fox tails wrapped around one of the starlight rays, but the scales at her tail tips were scorched black: “This is… the Upper Realm’s envoy’s weapon?”

The inverted scale giant Dragon suddenly let out a painful roar. The Big Dipper pattern on its chest began to crack, and purple flames surged from the cracks. Lu Qingyang seized the opportunity to invert the Burning Sky Cauldron onto the Dragon’s head: “Senior Xuanji, you reborn through a Dragon fetus, but did you ever ask about the Zhenhai Great Sage’s backup plan?” The Chaos fire within the cauldron drilled into the Dragon’s body along the cracks, actually burning three hundred and sixty Acupoints patterns onto the Dragon bones.

A muffled thunder-like roar came from the bottom of the sea. Nine bronze Dragon-confining pillars broke through the water. The chains wrapped around the pillars automatically bound the giant Dragon’s limbs. Yin Jiuyou suddenly laughed wildly, tearing open his chest to reveal a beating Corpse King’s heart: “This Old Man has waited countless years, and today I finally await the opening of the Heavenly Gate!” The moment the heart exploded, countless corpse beetles transformed into a black tide, surging towards the gate’s crack.

“Elder Yin, wait!” Ao Lie’s broken Dragon body suddenly rushed out from the bottom of the sea. His remaining Dragon horn shot out a bloody beam of light, “Behind that gate is not the Upper Realm at all, it is…” Just as the light beam was about to touch the bronze gate, a hand covered with green scales suddenly reached out from the gate’s crack and gently crushed the Dragon horn with a single grip.

The owner of the hand slowly stepped out of the doorway, revealing a monster with a Dragon head and a human body. With each step it took, ice crystal lotuses congealed on the sea surface, yet purple flames burned at the center of each lotus: “How can a Lower Realm ant touch this Guixu?” When its vertical pupils swept over everyone, Lu Qingyang’s protective Sword Qi shattered like thin ice, and a line of blood instantly burst from his throat.

Leng Yuehan’s Guanghan Mirror suddenly protected its master on its own, its surface reflecting the monster’s true form—billions of souls surged within the gaps of its scales, each soul marked with the Big Dipper on its forehead. “You are… Ancestral Master Xuanji?” Her voice trembled uncharacteristically, and her Ice Soul Sword Qi, under the pressure, shrunk to an inch of cold light.

The monster raised its hand to seize the Burning Sky Cauldron. The Chaos fire within the cauldron transformed into a docile pet in its palm: “The backup plan I left back then has been well-nurtured by you ants.” With a flick of its finger, the inverted scale giant Dragon let out a tragic wail, and bloody starlight erupted from all its Acupoints. The starlight intertwined in the air, forming a Big Dipper Grand Formation covering a thousand miles.

Lu Qingyang suddenly crushed the jade tablet fragment hidden in his sleeve. The fragment transformed into a stream of light and pierced into his glabella: “Since Senior wishes to Possess, why not try this Junior’s ‘Heaven Severing Sword Intent’?” His pupils instantly turned dark gold, and the Sword Qi around him actually cut fine cracks in the space. The monster showed a solemn expression for the first time, its green-scaled hand grabbing towards Lu Qingyang’s crown.

“Quick, now!” Su Meiniang’s nine fox tails suddenly wrapped around the monster’s arm, their poisonous needles piercing into the gaps between its scales. Yin Jiuyou’s burial sky coffin shot up from the bottom of the sea, spewing out a thousand years’ worth of accumulated corpse poison: “No matter if you’re human or Dragon, it’s not your turn to be arrogant in this Lower Realm. Come and taste this Old Man’s Nine Nether Yellow Springs Qi!”

Leng Yuehan gritted her teeth, using all her strength to bite her fingertip. A fountain-like stream of vital blood drew a blood Talisman on the Guanghan Mirror. An ice Phoenix phantom, like a bird, shot out from the mirror: “Seventh-generation Disciple of Guanghan Palace, respectfully invite the moon’s essence to descend!” The moon’s essence, drawn by the blood Talisman, pierced through the Big Dipper Grand Formation like a sharp arrow, instantly congealing into a rock-solid ice crystal cage above the monster’s head.

The monster was enraged, its scales bristling like a hedgehog, shooting out dazzling green light: “How dare a firefly’s light contend with the bright moon? Today, I shall let you Lower Realm ants witness the power of an Immortal!” Where the green light passed, fox tails snapped inch by inch like harvested straw, corpse poison rolled back into the burial sky coffin like a receding tide, and the moon essence cage vaporized directly like melting ice and snow. However, in this flash of lightning, Lu Qingyang’s Sword Qi had already pierced three inches into the monster’s glabella like lightning! “Ah~ Heaven Severing… Sword…” The monster suddenly let out a deafening roar, as if to tear the sky. The dark blood gushing from beneath its green scales dripped onto the sea like ink, actually transforming into three-headed, six-armed demonic creatures, all with the Big Dipper brand flickering on their foreheads.

“Quick, destroy the bronze gate!” Ao Lie’s broken body, like an arrow leaving the bowstring, embraced a Dragon-confining pillar and crashed into the giant gate like a meteor. “This gate is greedily devouring the Spiritual Qi of this realm!” Lu Qingyang’s Sword Qi suddenly surged like a volcanic eruption. Blood flowed from his seven orifices, yet he smiled like a blossoming spring flower: “So Upper Realm Cultivators bleed too!” All of his Bee Cloud Swords shattered like broken meteors, but the fragments, like a rain of arrows, pierced into the monster’s vital Acupoints. The monster was forced to retreat, but the bronze gate tilted like a dangerous building ravaged by a storm, and a terrifying sound of spatial tearing came from its crack.

“You are seeking death!” The monster formed hand seals, and the Big Dipper Grand Formation suddenly unleashed blood-colored lightning. Su Meiniang was struck in the left shoulder, her fox fur turning to ashes, revealing bare bones. Half of Yin Jiuyou’s body was incinerated by the lightning, yet he still commanded the corpse beetles to gnaw at the Formation’s Foundation. Leng Yuehan’s ice Phoenix was shattered three times, and the Guanghan Mirror was already covered in cracks.

Lu Qingyang suddenly threw the Burning Sky Cauldron like a meteor towards the center of the lightning, shouting: “Senior, do you know why I can refine Chaos fire?” The moment the cauldron was struck by lightning, the phantom image of the Zhenhai Great Sage appeared within it as if in an illusion.

The Great Sage’s phantom raised its hand like a heaven-supporting pillar, grasping the blood-colored lightning as if it were a fragile rope, easily tearing it apart: “Because my Bloodline has never been a pawn to be manipulated!” The monster, seeing this, finally turned pale with shock: “Old man Zhenhai, how dare you… ” However, before its words finished, the bronze gate suddenly, like a tree uprooted, was completely lifted. A deafening, earth-shattering suction came from behind the gate, like a greedy giant beast, devouring the blood-colored lightning along with the Big Dipper Grand Formation.

Lu Qingyang, quick-witted, grabbed a backward-flying Dragon-confining pillar. Looking closely, behind the gate was an endless swirling nebula vortex, like the most mysterious black hole in the Universe. And within the vortex, an eye the size of a city slowly opened. “Close your eyes!” Zhenhai’s voice boomed like thunder. The Great Sage’s phantom suddenly roared, its sound waves sending everyone flying a hundred miles. Lu Qingyang caught a final glimpse of the scene reflected in that eye—tens of thousands of chains piercing through the realm barrier, each chain tethering a burning Cultivation planet.

When he opened his eyes again, only a swirling Void Realm vortex remained on the sea surface. The Burning Sky Cauldron floated quietly at the center of the vortex, golden Dragon blood seeping from the cracks in its body. Yin Jiuyou, dragging his broken body, tried to snatch it, but a Dragon claw suddenly extended from within the cauldron, piercing through his chest. “Be careful!” Leng Yuehan’s Ice Soul Sword Qi froze the Dragon claw for an instant, and Lu Qingyang seized the opportunity to put the cauldron into his storage ring.

A blood rain suddenly fell from the clear sky. Amidst the blood rain, Su Meiniang’s voice transmission came: “Young Master Lu, do you know that the demonic creatures in that monster’s blood are devouring the coastal Mortals…” Before she finished speaking, three blood-colored light pillars had already risen from the southeast, each faintly appearing in the shape of the Big Dipper. Lu Qingyang wiped the blood from the corner of his eye. The fragments of the Bee Cloud Sword automatically flew back into the sword scabbard on his back. He said in a deep voice: “Fairy Leng, are you willing to go with me to slay the demons?” The sword scabbard let out a low hum, as if a hungry shark pack had smelled blood.

Leng Yuehan pressed the broken Guanghan Mirror to her heart, a cold moonlight glowing around her. She said indifferently: “We Cultivators of Guanghan Palace have never feared death.” The two transformed into streams of light, instantly disappearing into the sky. At this moment, in the shadows beneath the sea, Su Meiniang’s pale face slowly emerged. The blood dripping from her severed tail actually wrote a line of small characters in the Void Realm: “The Big Dipper Seven Fiends have formed, Guixu is coming.”