Chapter Eighty-Seven: The Abyssal Guardian

Chapter Eighty-Seven: Abyss Guard

The party of nine paused to rest several times along the way, then reached the place indicated by the peerless fiend at the highest possible speed.

“The entrance is nearby. Look carefully,” Chu Jie ordered.

“Yes, Boss!” Wu Long and the others dispersed at once.

The image left by the peerless fiend differed somewhat from what they now saw, as if someone had tampered with the area.

“Could someone have been here already? The peerless fiend didn’t summon only us. Maybe there are others,” Duan Kun said with a frown.

In the end, using the clues from the image, they found a tiny fissure in the cliff face beneath a precipice. It had traces of being sealed shut.

The surrounding terrain had clearly been altered on purpose, making the true entrance difficult to locate.

Chu Jie stood before the fissure and sent out a torrent of radiant power from his fist. The Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel crashed into the crack with overwhelming force. The stones blocking the entrance crumbled into powder. Before long, an opening wide enough for two people to walk through side by side appeared.

Once the dust had settled, Chu Jie led the others inside.

This was Chu Jie’s second time entering the passage. The last time he came through here, he had gained more than ten thousand high-grade mystic crystals.

But this time, he felt a faint unease. The peerless fiend’s tone had carried a hint of coercion, clearly implying that nothing good awaited them here.

Still, it did not seem as though they had been summoned here merely to be killed.

In any case, they would go in and see.

Chu Jie led his group in single file. The passage was dim and gloomy, and the Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel floated ahead of him, casting light to illuminate the road before them.

At first the passage sloped downward, but after a while it began to rise again. Fortunately, there were no forks; otherwise, it would have been far too easy to get lost in a place like this.

An hour later, Chu Jie brought the others to a spacious chamber. It was a stone hall, with more than ten thick pillars standing inside. Some of the pillars had even been knocked down, though it was impossible to tell whether they had been broken by force or had simply decayed over time.

At the far end of the hall stood a stone throne, empty of any occupant.

In front of Chu Jie and the others stood several people, and among them was one Chu Jie recognized at a glance.

“Zhou Jie!” Chu Jie’s eyes turned icy.

He had never expected to run into Zhou Jie here. Thinking back to what had happened earlier, it seemed possible that Zhou Jie had been chosen by the peerless fiend because he had killed so many cultivators.

“It’s you?” Zhou Jie turned around and looked at Chu Jie and Duan Kun with open contempt.

Chu Jie said angrily, “I saw you kill Du Xuan and the others. I never thought you’d become so insane that you’d even slaughter your own people.”

Zhou Jie replied coldly, “Oh, so you saw it. No wonder I felt something was off back then. It doesn’t matter. I wasn’t that close to them anyway. If they made me unhappy, of course I’d kill them. And the two of you—I’ll kill you as well. Just wait.”

Perhaps because they were inside this stone hall and he feared the peerless fiend, Zhou Jie did not make a move.

As for Chu Jie, the moment he saw Zhou Jie, the killing intent in his heart surged uncontrollably. The Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel spun wildly beside him.

And then Zhou Jie spoke again.

“Heh. The few people I killed don’t amount to much. You’re the ones who’ve truly killed a lot, aren’t you? I know it. You should have another name too—the peerless fiend. Maybe you don’t possess the true strength of the real peerless fiend, but you’ve still slaughtered plenty of people. Don’t deny it. Everyone who comes here has blood from countless cultivators on their hands.”

Zhou Jie looked at Chu Jie triumphantly and continued, “I’ve killed about thirty-something people. Not much. Compared with you, it’s nothing.”

Chu Jie said coldly, “The people I killed deserved it. Unlike you, who even slaughtered your own men. Besides, I’ve wanted to kill you for a long time. You deserve to die.”

Zhou Jie curled his lip, but still did not move or say another word.

Duan Kun said icily, “So you still dare speak to us? Today is the day you die!”

No sooner had he finished speaking than Chu Jie’s Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel doubled in size and roared through the air toward Zhou Jie.

At the same time, Duan Kun’s shuttle-shaped magic treasure gave a sharp hum and turned into a streak of light, striking at Zhou Jie as well.

Zhou Jie had not expected the two of them to act so decisively, and to gang up on him besides. There was no way he could beat them, so he did his best to dodge, retreating repeatedly. But how could his speed possibly match the speed of their treasures?

Just as the Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel was about a fist’s distance from Zhou Jie’s chest, it suddenly stopped.

“What is going on?” Chu Jie was startled. It was as if the wheel had slammed into an invisible wall, unable to advance even a fraction farther.

The Reincarnation Scroll inside Chu Jie’s body turned rapidly, yet it had no effect. The wheel remained frozen in place.

Duan Kun encountered the same problem. His shuttle-shaped treasure flew to within a fist’s distance of Zhou Jie, then abruptly stopped as well, as if blocked by something that could not be seen at all.

Even more terrifying was that Chu Jie and Duan Kun had both exerted their full strength, yet the two high-grade treasures had been halted so casually.

A streak of red light appeared before Zhou Jie, wrapping around both treasures. With a sudden tremor, it sent them flying backward.

Chu Jie gave a long shout and forcefully controlled the Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel, barely preventing himself from being injured by the rebound. The wheel turned into flowing light and returned to his fist.

Duan Kun’s shuttle-shaped treasure also returned. Neither of them was hurt, but both felt an overwhelming terror. They knew with certainty that this was not Zhou Jie’s power.

Zhou Jie’s strength could never have been this horrifying. Only one person could possess such terrifying might.

The peerless fiend. Only the peerless fiend could wield such strength.

A distant, ethereal voice echoed through the stone hall.

“No fighting. Offenders die.”

Chu Jie knew at once that the voice belonged to the peerless fiend. Though he could not tell whether it was male or female, he could feel the utter indifference in it.

It was as though they were nothing more than ants in the other party’s eyes.

“Hahaha, hahaha...” Zhou Jie laughed wildly, mocking Chu Jie and the others. “Come kill me. I’m standing right here, waiting for you. Go on, if you’ve got the guts!”

He laughed until tears came to his eyes.

Chu Jie drew a deep breath. The Heaven-Earth Treasure Wheel reappeared before him, as though it might charge at Zhou Jie and annihilate him at any moment.

“Boss, don’t,” Wu Long urged from the side. “If we act now, we definitely can’t kill him. Better to wait until later.”

Seeing the smug look on Zhou Jie’s face, Chu Jie almost could not stop himself from striking. But after Wu Long’s warning, he finally suppressed his anger and withdrew his hand.

At that moment, several more people entered the stone hall.

All of them carried a fierce murderous aura. They must have killed many people outside as well, and had now been summoned here by the peerless fiend.

A thought flashed through Chu Jie’s mind.

Could it be...

Was the peerless fiend trying to cultivate a successor, or perhaps forge a force of his own, then use them to kill on his behalf?

Before long, including Chu Jie’s group, there were already thirty people in the hall.

Then the stone hall’s great door suddenly shut on its own. One martial artist went to check the exit, only to discover that no matter what he did, he could not budge the stone door at all.

In other words, they were all trapped here now, with no way out.

No one spoke. Instead, everyone remained on guard against the others around them. These were all people who had killed many others—truly vicious and ruthless in every sense—and they were highly sensitive to the killing intent on one another.

The strongest killing aura in the hall belonged to Chu Jie, or rather to Duan Kun. As a result, aside from Wu Long and the others, no one wanted to come near this side, fearing they might be secretly slain by Chu Jie.

Chu Jie did not care about that. What troubled him was the growing sense that something terrible was about to happen. He still had no idea what the peerless fiend had brought them here to do, but his ominous premonition was becoming stronger and stronger.

Suddenly, the entire hall began to tremble, as if it were moving toward some unknown destination.

Chu Jie’s heart jolted. Could it be that there was some enormous ancient ruin buried within the Gods-and-Demons Abyss? This stone hall was clearly not a treasure artifact, yet it was now moving along some predetermined path.

At that moment, a golden-armored warrior suddenly appeared in the center of the hall, his entire body covered in golden armor.

But everyone could tell at once that this was only an apparition, not a real person.

Even so, the imposing aura radiating from the golden-armored warrior was astonishing. He did not feel like a master of the Spirit Gathering Realm at all, but rather like a martial artist of the Star Core Realm.

Everyone shook with shock. Reaching the Star Core Realm required not only extraordinary talent, but also overwhelming fortune. As a result, Star Core Realm experts were exceedingly rare. None of the people who had come to the Gods-and-Demons Abyss had seen a single one. In Bloodslaughter City, Spirit Gathering Realm martial artists were the most numerous and formed the main force.

The golden-armored warrior carried a saber. With a savage sweep, he unleashed a blinding blade aura whose shadow seemed to pierce the entire hall. Everyone shrouded by that blade shadow felt as though an immense pressure had descended upon them, making it almost impossible to breathe.

Then the peerless fiend’s ethereal voice sounded once more.

“Power. Do you want it?”

Everyone trembled.

The temptation was simply too great. Yet how could such a tremendous gift be offered without any conditions? It was obvious that there had to be restrictions, though the peerless fiend had not spoken of them yet.

Several streaks of red light entered everyone’s sea of consciousness. Those red lights were messages.

After the red light entered Chu Jie’s divine sense, he immediately read the information contained within.

The golden-armored warrior before them was called the Abyss Guard, a powerful warrior charged with guarding the Gods-and-Demons Abyss. As for them, they were all candidates. One among them would become the next Abyss Guard, and in doing so would unleash a monstrous slaughter throughout the entire Gods-and-Demons Abyss.

Chu Jie took a deep breath. At last, he understood what had gone wrong.

The Abyss Guard.

Once someone became an Abyss Guard, they would probably never be able to leave the Gods-and-Demons Abyss again. Worse still, they might well become neither human nor ghost—just like the peerless fiend himself. Chu Jie had never seen the peerless fiend’s true appearance, but he could sense that the peerless fiend was definitely unlike an ordinary person.

Under the temptation of reaching the Star Core Realm, everyone was ecstatic.

Especially Zhou Jie.

The moment he saw the golden-armored warrior, he knew his day had come. This time, he was determined to become a Star Core Realm expert.