Chapter 151 - The Root Chamber and the Whispering Flesh
Chapter 151: Chapter 151 - The Root Chamber and the Whispering Flesh
Inside the underground chamber, the dense Ashen-Blood Miasma gradually thinned.
The Petrified Calamity-Magnet rested in his palm like a cold stone heart.
For the first time since he entered the Golden Core Realm, he felt full.
Full like every inch of his body had been packed with cold, heavy power.
Even the strange balance of his Void State and Sun State had grown deeper.
A faint change occurred inside him.
It was not loud.
The tenth tribulation mark suppressed everything perfectly.
But Su Bai knew.
He had entered the second stage of Golden Core.
For ordinary Golden Core cultivators, advancement meant the golden core in the dantian became denser, purer, and more complete.
For Su Bai, the matter was more complicated.
His entire body was his Golden Core.
So when he advanced, there was no single golden bead becoming brighter.
Instead, his whole body became heavier, more unified, and more difficult to shake.
Su Bai lowered his gaze and sensed himself carefully.
"If other Golden Core cultivators polish one core," he muttered, "then I am polishing an entire person."
He paused.
Then added softly, "No wonder it costs so much."
Fortunately, the Ashen-Blood Miasma had paid the cost for him this time.
His body cultivation had improved as well.
But that was even harder to measure.
Normal body cultivators advanced stage by stage. One layer strengthened after another.
Su Bai’s progress did not follow that path.
Every part improved together.
It was not one stage rising. It was the entire body being forced forward as a single unreasonable thing.
Su Bai thought for a moment.
Then gave up naming it.
Naming abnormal progress did not make it less abnormal.
Still, he was happy.
He opened his eyes and looked at the Petrified Calamity-Magnet in his hand.
Then, after a moment of sincere gratitude, he lowered his head and kissed it.
The cold stone touched the edge of his mask.
Su Bai froze.
Right.
Mask.
He felt a little awkward. But the intention had arrived.
That was what mattered.
If this stone had a spirit, it should understand.
Su Bai slowly stood.
The chamber around him had finally become clear enough to see.
It was circular. Formation channels were carved into the floor and walls, overlapping like veins in an ancient body.
Thick seal-lines extended upward from the chamber.
They passed through the ceiling and vanished into stone.
Su Bai looked up.
Those lines should lead to the cracked altar outside.
They had guessed correctly.
This was the Root Formation Chamber beneath the altar.
The altar above was only the exposed surface.
This was the place that fed it, controlled it, or restrained it.
Perhaps all three.
Along the chamber walls hung several cocoon frames.
Su Bai’s eyes narrowed.
They were not like the pale cocoons that had held real cultivators outside.
These sacs were red-black and half-dried. Their membranes clung to the frames like shed skin.
Su Bai understood at once.
The real cocoons had been above.
The false shells had been grown below.
When the real bodies were taken away, these unfinished things had lost the fragments that gave them shape.
He was about to inspect them more closely when his gaze moved to the center of the chamber.
Then his eyes changed.
At the center stood a stone pillar split open from within.
Inside the crack was something dark red and shriveled.
Pale formation chains wrapped around it layer after layer.
It looked like flesh. It also looked like stone.
It was no larger than a clenched fist, yet the pressure it gave off was far greater than its size should allow.
It looked like a piece of flesh that had forgotten how to die.
Every few breaths, it pulsed.
Thump.
A thread of red-black miasma entered the formation lines.
Thump.
Another thread spread through the cracked channels.
Thump.
The chamber breathed with it.
Su Bai stared at the thing.
For the first time in a while, the joy from his advancement faded completely.
Ashen-Blood Miasma.
It came from this.
Or at least, the dense miasma in this chamber did.
His eyes narrowed.
The thought that followed made his scalp turn cold.
Was Ashen-Blood Miasma real blood?
From something that had once lived.
Or worse, something that still refused to die.
Su Bai swallowed.
The Fallen-Star Sanctuary was vast.
Its red mist covered far more than this single chamber.
If this small piece of flesh could produce so much miasma beneath an outer-area altar, then what kind of being could produce enough to stain the entire mystic realm?
The flesh fragment pulsed again.
This time, the miasma did not simply flow into the formation lines.
It gathered around the pillar.
Then a voice came from it.
"Come..."
Su Bai’s body stilled.
The voice was faint.
"Come..."
It was the same voice that had whispered his name near the altar.
Su Bai’s expression became cold.
Then the thing spoke again.
"Su... Bai..."
It knew his name.
Perhaps it had heard the others call him.
Perhaps the altar had learned it.
Whatever the reason, Su Bai did not like it.
Names were already dangerous in this place.
A piece of undying flesh knowing his name was even worse.
The voice carried temptation, like an invitation placed gently beside the mind.
But Su Bai was not affected.
At least, not by the voice.
What tempted him was the flesh fragment itself.
His body could reverse Ashen-Blood Miasma.
The Petrified Calamity-Magnet could gather it.
If this thing could continuously produce dense miasma, then for Su Bai, it was almost a cultivation treasure.
A terrible, horrifying, whispering cultivation treasure.
He stared at it.
The thought was dangerous.
If he took it away, could he keep it sealed?
Could he use it to cultivate later?
Then his gaze moved to the failed cocoon sacs on the walls.
He remembered the real Luo Shenshui lying unconscious above.
He remembered the pale mouths beneath the borrowed face.
The temptation cooled.
A treasure that learned names, stole soul fragments, grew false people, and leaked miasma was not a treasure.
It was a problem pretending to be useful.
That kind of thing was familiar.
In his previous life, many tasks had looked simple until one accepted them.
Then they became endless.
Su Bai’s eyes became flat.
No.
He was not keeping this.
He did not even know how it had arrived here.
Maybe it had been brought here by some past cultivator who thought he could control it.
Maybe it had manipulated people from previous openings and made them carry pieces, names, or fragments into the hall.
Whatever the truth, Su Bai suddenly did not want it anymore.
A thing that could produce benefit forever could also produce disaster forever.
So he walked toward it.
The flesh fragment seemed to grow excited.
Its pulsing quickened.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
Red-black miasma streamed from it more rapidly.
The pale formation chains trembled.
The failed cocoon sacs along the walls twitched as if responding to its rhythm.
"Come..."
The voice grew clearer.
Su Bai stopped in front of the cracked pillar.
The Petrified Calamity-Magnet trembled in his hand.
The flesh fragment pulsed again.
It seemed to be waiting.
Su Bai raised his hand and touched it.
The moment his fingers made contact, it felt as if lightning struck his soul.
A cold, bloody will rushed into him.
It did not enter through his skin alone.
It tried to enter through his spirit.
Images flashed on Su Bai’s mind.
Red sky.
Broken earth.
Countless figures falling.
Then the invading will tried to dig deeper.
It wanted to mark him, to learn him, and to wear him.
Su Bai’s face changed.
His guess had been right.
This thing was not only producing miasma.
It was trying to invade.
But the moment the invasion touched the deeper part of Su Bai’s body, his Reversal Body reacted.
The force twisted.
The invading will lost its direction.
The mark that tried to carve itself into him bent backward.
A strange coldness spread through Su Bai’s spirit.
Instead of being branded, his spirit felt as if it had just been sharpened by a knife that regretted its own decision.
Su Bai did not wait.
His eyes turned cold.
All the Qi gateway reservoirs in his body responded at once.
Black, think needles formed.
They appeared in layers around him like a sudden night sky filled with falling rain.
The flesh fragment pulsed faster.
For the first time, its voice changed.
"Do not—"
Su Bai moved his fingers.
The needles fell.
Every needle followed the lines he had seen. The cracks where miasma leaked and the points where the flesh fragment touched the pillar.
The entire chamber filled with black streaks.
It spread along the exact pathways that fed the miasma outward.
The flesh fragment shrieked.
The sound did not enter the ears.
It entered the bones.
...
Outside the chamber, the group’s expressions changed.
Chen Feng’s sword rang in its sheath.
Mu Qing staggered half a step.
Qiao Wen clutched his chest.
Zhao Heng raised both arms, shielding the others by instinct.
"What was that?"
No one answered.
...
Inside the chamber, Su Bai did not stop.
More black streaks fell.
The flesh fragment thrashed inside the formation chains.
Miasma surged.
The Petrified Calamity-Magnet dragged it toward Su Bai.
His Reversal Body twisted it.
His Macro-Taiji circulation crushed and refined it.
The flesh fragment shrieked again.
This time, its voice weakened.
It pulsed once.
Twice.
A third time.
Then it stopped.
The chamber became silent.
The red-black miasma stopped pumping through the formation channels.
The whisper vanished.
Su Bai stood before the pillar, breathing slowly.
His fingers were still touching the dead fragment.
No more invasion came.
No more name was spoken.
Only a faint, cold heaviness remained.
He withdrew his hand.
The flesh fragment had changed.
It looked darker now, like a piece of ancient meat that had finally remembered it was dead.
Su Bai exhaled.
"Good."
Then he stared at it a moment longer.
His stomach growled.
Su Bai froze.
He looked at the dead fragment.
For some reason, it now looked...
Appetizing.
It’s not even edible in any proper sense. But his body reacted to it like a rare material.
His eyes slowly narrowed.
"Ridiculous," he muttered.