Chapter 396: The Cross

Shi Mu, mindful of the traps on the floor, continued his quiet, uninvited journey up the rocky stairs. Now guided by his previous experience, he no longer gave other floors as much as a passing glance. When it appeared that nothing was out of the ordinary, he would proceed to the next level until the twenty-first floor.

After spending precious time on the sixteenth floor, Shi Mu had reason to fear that the Azure Ape King may be returning soon.

He was just about to move on to his next destination when something made him stop his tracks and quickly hide under the shadows of the stairs.

Corpses of a dozen fully transformed demon guards lay sprawled on the stairs, all of them bearing the same lethal chest wound as if stabbed right through. Blood was still gushing out of their wounds—a sure sign that the deed was done only very recently.

A glint crossed Shi Mu’s eyes as he stared at the corpses for a few moments before immediately looking up.

Every fully transformed guard within Heaven Ascension Peak possessed at least Xian Tian level prowess. Only someone of Earth-rank or higher could kill them with one fell swoop.

Has someone else also taken this opportunity to infiltrate Heaven Ascension Peak?

A thought arose in his mind. With a tap of his foot, he restarted his journey upward with silent leaps.

A few moments later, Shi Mu finally returned to the twenty-first layer.

The entrance of the floor was also adorned with a few corpses. Judging by their uniforms and appearance, this passel of guards was even more tenacious than the ones before—perhaps they were at the level of Later Xian Tian-rank. Unfortunately, their power levels did not seem to mean anything before their mysterious assailant as they were all murdered without a sound.

The twenty-first floor was structurally similar to the sixteenth except that there were even more limestones on its karst cave, enough to obscure much of the view. The limestones’ distribution was uneven too, with some areas being more densely packed than others. Overall, they formed an undulating passageway through the middle.

Shi Mu’s eyes flashed gold again as he scanned the limestones, bemused that there were none of the same transparent light cobwebs he had seen before. He wasn’t sure if someone destroyed them or if the floor never had them in the first place.

As Shi Mu pondered on the possibilities, he proceeded forward quietly.

It didn’t matter who else was there—he himself was already here. He can’t go back now.

He continued his journey in the passage for a while until he reached a sharp corner. A soft humming sound echoed ahead. Shi Mu’s face tightened a little and pressed his body to the corner before looking forward, his pupils constricting.

Lying before him was a stone door a few yards tall, covered in a layer of white light.

Three humanoid figures in grey robes were standing before the door. The left and the right were both towering figures carrying some sort of grey light in their arms as they tried to blast through the door’s white luminescence. At the same time, the shorter smaller figure in the middle muttered something under their breath with arms crossed.

All three of them emanated the aura of an Earth-rank powerhouse.

With a flash of light, an octagonal roulette surfaced before the grey figure.

The grey figure waved their hands and the roulette responded with the appearance of three lights of red, white, and blue before each of the orbs began shining brighter and brighter to form a beam of tricolored light that shot right at the door.

The white glow from the door was starting to thin out.

A few moments later, only a thin layer of the glow remained.

The shorter grey figure gave a low growl and the tri-colored beam grew thicker, so much so that three singular runes surfaced on the light beam. The grey light that the two towering men carried in their arms had shifted into green.

The white glow on the door flickered before it cracked and dissipated.

The door itself gave a low rumble as it opened slowly.

Shi Mu’s expression shifted once more.

The man in the middle retracted his roulette and waved, signaling the other two to enter with him. Shi Mu waited for a while before tailing them.

Behind the door was a dark passage. To where it lead he didn’t know. As he was afraid that his Spirit Sense may alert the three figures before him, he was limited to observing the path with only his naked eyes while making sure to keep a large distance between himself and the gang.

His normal vision may not be on par with Cai, but it certainly surpassed most others of the same rank. In addition, the green cloak he donned had the ability to shroud its wearer from others’ Spirit Sense, so there was no fear of him being discovered.

The passage was short, only ten or twenty yards. Soon the gang of three exited the passage and reached another clearing about ten yards wide, surrounded by limestones. Opposite where they stood was another large door, with two life-like reliefs of an ape on its left and right.

Shi Mu’s mind was struck with jubilance. This door looked exactly the same as the one on the sixteenth floor!

This stone door was also protected by that strange white barrier, and this time its magic seemed even stronger than the last.

The three grey figures stood before the door, preparing to strike it down using the same method.

At that moment, a loud rumble was heard from one side of the limestones. Rocks flew everywhere until a large opening was created. A jet-black silhouette shot out of the opening at dizzying speed. In the blink of an eye, the black blur collided with one of the tall grey figures.

The tall one’s reflexes were just as lightning-fast, as an aura of grey emanated from their body before coming into contact with the black attacker.

Clank! Clank!

The sounds of a violent melee rang out until the two pugilists leaped backward.

Shi Mu finally had a chance to observe this strange assailant more closely. The black figure was, in fact, a jet-black wolf-shaped puppet about two or three yards long with features that were exquisitely crafted. On each of its feet were sharp claws shining with a cold white gleam, as if each were a dagger. Lining its jaws were rows of teeth as sharp as knives.

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On the back of the wolf was a big thick hook about a few feet long, giving the puppet a frightening finish.

Shi Mu examined it more closely as shock crossed his visage.

This wolf puppet may look hideous and terrifying, but its aura betrayed the fact that it had reached Earth-rank.

Shi Mu had seen such battle puppets being sold before, but all of them were very weak. He did not expect to see an Earth-rank puppet in a place like Heaven Ascension Peak at all.

Intrigued, his gaze lingered on the wolf puppet a little longer before turning his attention to the grey figure.

Once again, the grey fighter engaged the wolf puppet at close range. In a matter of minutes, the grey robe was ripped away, exposing its wearer…

Shi Mu’s was aghast, for beneath the grey robe was a large barbarian with a square jaw, his exposed limbs covered with thick green fur while long, green nails protruded out of his fingers. Most importantly, the barbarian’s eyes were dim and unlively.

That grey robe he was wearing seemed to have protective properties. The moment it was destroyed and ripped away from the jaw-faced barbarian, an aura of undead perforated the scene immediately.

In his shock, Shi Mu knew what it was.

“Zombie Art!”

The wolf puppet regained its footing before hurling at the barbarian in a blur of black, its powerful jaw attempting a neck-severing bite on the barbarian’s throat. At the same time, one of the puppet’s forelimbs aimed at the barbarian’s chest while its other reached out to the barbarian’s abdomen in a merciless assault.

The barbarian did not even attempt to move out of the way.

Clank! Clank! The wolf puppet’s claws struck right at the barbarian’s body, but it couldn’t seem to go all the way into his skin as they stopped at a few inches deep. The wolf’s teeth had the same result.

A green flash of light shone in the square-jawed barbarian’s eyes. He clapped his hands together and clasped the wolf puppet’s body like a gigantic plier, locking the machine in a tight embrace.

At the same time, another towering shadow appeared like a ghost behind the wolf puppet. With the grey robe blown away from the force of the fight, this second figure revealed himself to be yet another large barbarian with green fur covering every inch of his body—a deadpanned, middle-aged man, to be exact—who also emanated an aura of death.

Two unsettling green lights shone out of the middle-aged barbarian man’s eyes. He crossed his arms, and a dazzling green orb of light rose on his right hand. He uttered a low growl and turned his right hand into a blurry trail of green as he jabbed his hand into the puppet’s back until his hand came out from the other side, clutching an egg-sized black crystal.

The lights on the wolf puppet were instantly snuffed out as it fell to the floor, limp and motionless.. The aura that it had previously exuded faded completely the very moment the black crystal was pulled out.

Throughout the entire ordeal, the short grey figure never once made a move—or even snuck a glance. Their eyes were fixed solely on the door before him.

He studied it for a little while longer before waving his hand and summoning the octagonal roulette again, shooting out the same tri-colored light beam at the door.

The glow on the door’s surface shimmered as white light gathered from everywhere to form a concrete shield, blocking the light beam from breaching the door.

“Uh, there are two of them? What a drag,” the shorter grey figure mumbled, summoning the octagonal roulette back towards himself.

His voice barely left the air when he suddenly moved his arms wildly, shooting out ray after ray of grey light from his hand before striking the earth before him. Each ray of grey was, in fact, a single grey flag stuck into the earth, which ultimately completed a formation.

Shi Mu’s eyebrows furrowed the moment he heard the man speak. The voice sounded very familiar—as if it belonged to someone he knew, yet he could not recall just who exactly could it be.

A few moments later, the grey-robed man spread out the last flag of the oval-shaped formation. He muttered some incantation below his breath and the flags were immediately lit up before shooting out a grey beam that converged into a pillar of light as thick as a water bucket.

With a point, the grey beam blasted the stone door.

The white glow reacted similarly as before; they once again converged at the center into a shield and blocked the attack.

The grey-robed man chuckled softly and struck a handsign.

Immediately, the grey light beam broke into a few rays of light entangling the white glowing shield.

With another flash, the octagonal roulette appeared in midair again, shooting its tri-colored beam at the door.

The white shield shook violently as if trying to escape the grey light, but it seemed that no matter how hard it tried, the shield was completely bound to its spot.

The tricolored light beam easily broke through the defensive glow on the door. At the same time, the two barbarians—with their hands encased in grey light—hurled a barrage of punches at the stone door.

This went on for fifteen minutes until the last glow on the door flickered and died.

The grey-robed man was exhilarated. He waved his hand.

The middle-aged barbarian approached the stone door and shoved it open with a great heave of his hands.

Shi Mu bent his body slightly forward, his eyes looking right at the room behind the door, and his visage completely changed.

The room behind the door was structurally similar to the one on the sixteenth floor, with the floor covered by some turquoise material while the ceiling and the walls were completely black, giving the room an odd look.

But this was all nothing compared to what was in the middle of the room. On the green floor, gigantic golden runes were carved like a dense web throughout the entire room in a gigantic formation.

Sitting in the middle of the formation was an altar with a black cross about two or three yards tall..

Nailed onto the cross was a gory pile of something. It looked like a human body, but it was so battered and tortured that not a single part of its anatomy looked normal.