That invisible pressure did not come from the sky, but from the depths of the earth, like the collective sigh of countless wronged spirits, condensed into substance, intending to drag this wilderness into eternal silence.
Gu Xuan leaned against a broken half-wall, his chest rising and falling violently as he tried to calm his disordered breath caused by excessive depletion.
After continuous fierce battles last night, the Yin Energy inside him was almost completely drained. It was now the deepest darkness before dawn, a time when Yin Energy was strongest and Yang Energy had not yet emerged, so he had to seize every breath to recover.
However, just as he closed his eyes to concentrate, the Copper Token engraved with the character "Xu" inside his chest suddenly became scorching hot without any warning.
It was not the burning of fire, but a scorching heat originating from the depths of his soul, as if a heart existed outside his chest, beginning to resonate with his own heartbeat at a bizarre frequency.
“Buzz…”
A low hum exploded directly in his mind. Gu Xuan grunted, feeling an irresistible, immense force violently tearing at his consciousness, trying to drag him into some unknown Shen Yuan.
He suddenly reached out and pressed against his chest, trying to suppress the anomaly of the Copper Token, but it was all in vain.
His vision instantly blurred, and the surrounding withered forest and Black Water Pool resembled a faded ink painting, rapidly being swallowed by a sweeping snowstorm.
The wind and snow were like knives, stinging his face.
Beneath a solitary beacon tower, the bonfire flickered uncertainly in the wind, almost extinguished.
An old soldier, clad in tattered armor with his beard frosted over, held a boy of about five or six tightly in his arms, using his own broken body to resist the biting cold wind.
“Xuan Wazi, are you cold?” The old soldier’s voice was hoarse, like two pieces of gravel grinding together.
The young Gu Xuan shook his head, but his small hand gripped tighter.
The old soldier’s cloudy
“Xuan Wazi, remember this…” The Lao Shao Chang’s voice suddenly lowered, heavy with blood and tears, “Our Xu Zi Ying, three hundred and seventy-two men, not one less, not one more, all died outside the South Gate. That day… damn it, that day, a huge opening appeared in the sky!”
His body began to tremble uncontrollably, not from the cold, but from the fear deep within his soul.
“A pitch-black rift, right above the South Gate. From inside… from inside stretched out many Black Shadows, like long tentacles, and with one sweep, they sucked people in… living people, who didn't even have time to let out a scream before they were gone… gone…”
“The General… he was the last to charge forward, trying to seal that opening, but he was sucked in too…”
The Lao Shao Chang choked up at this point, tears mixing with ice shards rolling down his eyes, his voice so choked he could barely speak: “Everyone is gone… only I was left, kicked off the beacon tower by the General, and managed to keep my life…”
He tightly clenched the Copper Token in his hand, the force almost crushing it.
He buried his face in the child’s hair and roared with all his might, word by word: “Xuan Wazi, remember my words! Never, never go south! South of the South Gate, a hundred miles away, is the Gate of Hell! Whoever goes dies!”
The torrent of memory abruptly stopped here, as if cleanly severed by an invisible pair of scissors.
“Hoo!”
Gu Xuan suddenly opened his eyes; his forehead and back were completely soaked with cold sweat.
He gasped for air, his heart pounding wildly, as if he had just personally experienced that snowstorm and despair.
With a trembling hand, he took out the now ice-cold "Xu" Copper Token from his chest.
Only now did he finally realize the truth.
This was not some ordinary military merit token, but the identity imprint of the three hundred and seventy-two fallen soldiers of the Xu Zi Ying!
It was not just a piece of metal, but a "beacon" carrying the collective Resolve of three hundred and seventy-two instances of unwillingness, resentment, and fear!
No wonder he was relentlessly hunted by those Spook Ghosts, no wonder every step forward seemed guided by invisible threads.
He thought he had stumbled into this place of death, but now it seemed that from the moment he stepped into this wilderness, or perhaps even earlier, from the moment his bloodline was born, he had already been part of this massive tide of resentment spanning the river of time!
The "Xuan Wazi" the Lao Shao Chang spoke of was him!
This memory was the ultimate warning, branded into his bloodline and the token by the last survivor of the Xu Zi Ying with his dying breath!
“South… is the Gate of Hell…” Gu Xuan muttered to himself.
But now, in this entire wilderness, where was *not* the Gate of Hell?
He took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the turbulent waves in his heart.
Fear solved nothing; only strength was the sole pass to this desolate land.
He took out the last two blank Copper Tokens from his satchel, which he had stripped from the Spook Ghosts he had suppressed.
Without hesitation, he walked to the edge of the Black Water Pool, which was still emitting wisps of cold vapor, and immersed all three Copper Tokens into it.
“Zzzzz—”
Pure Yin Energy seemed to find an outlet, pouring madly into the Copper Tokens. The surfaces turned black as ink at a visible rate, and a thin layer of frost even condensed on them.
Gu Xuan’s gaze sharpened, and with his fingers held like a blade, he fiercely slashed his own chest!
A drop of Heart's Blood, crimson with a faint golden sheen, was forced out.
This drop of blood did not fall immediately but hovered and rolled on his fingertip, emitting a pure and domineering life force.
“With my blood, awaken your spirits, show me the way forward!”
He flicked his finger, and the blood drop split precisely into three, landing on the three pitch-black Copper Tokens, respectively.
A bizarre scene unfolded!
When the Heart's Blood landed on the surface, it was not annihilated by the Yin Energy. Instead, it sounded like a scorching branding iron hitting ice, emitting a "hissing" sound.
The blood drops rapidly traveled across the token surfaces, and wherever they passed, fine, dense cracks were automatically etched.
These cracks were not random; they connected and spread, and finally, when the three Copper Tokens were placed side by side, the cracks formed an incomplete map!
The destination on the map was an area heavily marked with blood-red cracks, next to which were two distorted ancient characters—Trap City!
And the direction indicated by the map was clearly… South!
The moment the map took shape, the cold system prompt sounded quietly in Gu Xuan’s mind:
【Detected high-concentration, high-cohesion Resolve source Coordinates……】
【Coordinates are highly correlated with the initial upgrade sequence of the Demon Suppression Hall, suspected to be a ruin associated with the Demon Suppression Hall’s initial Coordinates.】
【Designation: Trap City Ruins.】
Gu Xuan’s pupils suddenly contracted.
Trap City Ruins!
The ruined capital a hundred miles to the south!
The Lao Shao Chang’s dying instruction echoed in his ears: heading south meant stepping into the Gate of Hell, violating the final protection within his bloodline.
But the system prompt was so clear: if the Demon Suppression Hall wanted to upgrade, wanted to gain greater power, it had to head toward the source of stronger Resolve.
If the Trap City Ruins truly held the core of the ancient battlefield where the Xu Zi Ying was annihilated, unimaginable horrors must lie there.
But equally, there must be demonic remnants that were not swallowed by the Black Shadows during the "Sky Split," perhaps even… witnesses to the truth of that catastrophe!
Go, or not go?
This thought only circled in Gu Xuan’s mind for three seconds.
The last trace of hesitation in his eyes was replaced by determination.
In this man-eating wilderness, standing still meant waiting for death.
The Lao Shao Chang’s warning was out of care, but he didn't understand that in the current world, there was no safe place left.
To survive, and even to uncover the mystery of his own origins and the truth behind the Xu Zi Ying’s demise, he could only live toward death and constantly grow stronger!
He made his decision: head south!
But he would not venture alone as he had before.
Gu Xuan stood up, his gaze sweeping over the Yin Guis soaking in the Black Water Pool.
He walked to the edge of the pool, stirred the murky water with his hand, and finally selected five Yin Guis whose forms were the most complete and whose Yin Energy was the most stable.
He took out the two Copper Tokens that had just been engraved with the map, used his own mental power as a guide, and forcibly drove them into the bodies of the two strongest Yin Guis, serving as the array cores.
As for the "Xu" Copper Token that carried the Lao Shao Chang’s memory, he carefully put it back close to his body.
Subsequently, he mobilized the sliver of Yin Energy he had just recovered, imitated the structure of the Hun Lian inside the Demon Suppression Hall, and forcibly linked the residual souls of the five Yin Guis together, forming a Hun Lian network that he could control remotely.
“From now on, you are my eyes, my hands.”
Gu Xuan’s will sank deep into his Spirit Sea, firmly grasping the main control of this “Yin Soldier Squad.”
As long as he did not die and his spirit remained intact, even if these five Yin Guis were smashed to pieces, they could be infinitely resurrected and reformed through the Hun Lian, using his own power and the surrounding Yin Energy.
This was the nascent form of the "Demon God" legion he forged for himself!
All preparations were complete.
A faint, pale light was already appearing on the horizon.
Morning mist began to spread among the withered trees, making the depression appear even more ghostly.
Gu Xuan took one last look back at this dangerous place where he had stayed for only one night.
The simple residual array he had set up last night had long since been blown away by the Yin wind; everything seemed as if it had never happened.
However, his gaze fixed on the broken wall where he had rested last night.
A palm-sized piece of charred Terracotta Plate had been stuck into the damp soil at some point, facing the direction he was leaving.
On the Terracotta Plate, a line of crooked markings had been scratched with a sharp object. The handwriting was childish, yet it carried a bone-chilling malice:
“You will become one of us too.”
Gu Xuan’s face showed no expression. He walked over slowly, raised his foot, and stomped heavily on the inscription.
“Crack.”
The Terracotta Plate shattered instantly, turning to dust.
He withdrew his foot and walked toward the south without looking back, leaving behind only a cold, firm whisper that dissipated in the thick fog.
“I will not become one of you…”
“I will suppress you.”
The moment the words fell, unnoticed by anyone, the solid frozen earth beneath Gu Xuan’s feet trembled ever so slightly.
It was as if some ancient entity, slumbering for a thousand years, had slowly opened its dusty eyes because of those words.