Chapter 1403: A thing of romance

The tunnel was silent without an end in sight.

While the pursuing troops were approaching him, Gu Qing Shan was in no hurry to escape.

He took a deep breath to calm himself down.

Watching the dim Life Talismans, Gu Qing Shan felt like there was some sort of secret that was hidden here.

—-for some reason, he suddenly recalled something in the past.

After going through so many worlds, running into close contact with both [Order] and [Chaos], as well as travelling to the Age of Old, I’ve never actually seen such a gigantic and huge talisman tunnel before.

“Xiao Seng, do you know what this tunnel is?” Gu Qing Shan asked.

Zhao Xiao Seng clasped his hands and said: “Amitabha, this Xiao Seng has yet to know benefactor’s name”

“I’m Gu Qing Shan’

“Benefactor Gu, I’ve been trapped inside Kunlun all this time without knowing anything about the outside world. Both the matter of the tunnel and fleeing will have to rely on you”

“I see”

Gu Qing Shan flew closer to the wall of the tunnel and carefully examined these Life Talismans.

At this point, the Life Talismans had all become ashen like burnt paper, extremely fragile, but haven’t completely crumbled away.

“They’ve all lost their functions…”

Gu Qing Shan muttered.

Near the Wraith realm, those Life Talismans were extremely powerful, anyone who attempted to touch them would be eliminated by the combined power of countless talismans.

——-but this place was too far away from where the wraiths were, so the talismans no longer contained any power.

But Gu Qing Shan didn’t try to risk it, he simply stood at a distance while his gaze scanned through the surrounding talismans.

Invisible Mind Swords were unleashed, cutting through large patches of Life Talismans and destroying them all.

Rash rash!

As the talismans scattered, a near-transparent wall that gave off faint light appeared in front of Gu Qing Shan.

The ocean?

Watching the shadows of fishes that were swimming outside, Gu Qing Shan was extremely doubtful.

The wraiths use Life Talismans to fully encase the walls of this tunnel, just to hide this ocean?

He remained cautious, slowly moved forward, and touched the walls with his hand.

A line of glowing text appeared on the War God UI:

[Discovered the Reality Wall]

Reading this, Gu Qing Shan fell into thought.

“Benefactor Gu, that ocean is truly very strange, but we need to hurry” Zhao Xiao Seng urged him.

“Hm”

Gu Qing Shan answered, but was still a bit unwilling to leave.

This tunnel was actually made from the Reality Wall.

——I know that I was being transported to the Wraith realm, so I used Life Talismans to escape and entered Kunlun; then I reappeared in the tunnel again, only to discover that the walls of the tunnel were made from the Reality Wall, with an ocean on the outside.

What exactly is this?

“Zhao Xiao Seng, can you stop the wraiths for another 15 minutes?” Gu Qing Shan asked.

Zhao Xiao Seng shook his head: “It was thanks to the power of the formation that I was able to do it the previous time, now that the formation has completely crumbled, I cannot stop so many enemies by myself”

Gu Qing Shan appeared regretful.

Since the wraiths are after me, I can’t remain to study this tunnel wall any further.

He looked at the thread on his hand, then said: “Alright, let’s go ahead and follow the tunnel”

“But there seems to be some sort of power within the tunnel that’s restraining us here” Zhao Xiao Seng said.

“No need to worry”

Gu Qing Shan raised his hand and quickly drew talismans in the void of space.

A total of five talismans were drawn at once, circling around their bodies.

——the wraiths’ teleportation talismans!

Under the power of these talismans, their figures flashed forward and started flying towards the other end of the tunnel.

Gu Qing Shan was still a bit unwilling to let it go, so his gaze occasionally passed through the walls of the tunnel, slashing the Life Talismans that covered the walls.

Initially, after the Life Talismans crumbled away, it was still an ocean that appeared.

But as Gu Qing Shan and Zhao Xiao Seng continued moving forward, the ocean abruptly disappeared, replaced by the scene of a destroyed world.

The entire world was in ruins, only occasionally could some small animals be seen among the ruins, scavenging for food.

As they continued further, the scenes of ruin being shown outside the Reality Wall continued to change.

Sometimes, it was a sea of never-ending flames; sometimes, a world of poisonous fog; sometimes, the only thing outside the Reality Wall was the void.

Since they were flying at high speed, the foreign apocalyptic scenes only flashed briefly through their visions.

Finally, when Gu Qing Shan used Mind Sword to slash away another portion of Life Talismans, he saw something completely different.

A giant whose height reached even the sky above was slowly trekking across a barren land.

It was the only remaining living being in this world.

Where did it come from? Why is it here?

Gu Qing Shan couldn’t stop, otherwise, he would have tried to communicate with this giant.

In his spirit sense, the pursuing troops were approaching closer and closer.

Right at this point, a fork appeared ahead of them.

The tunnel split off into three paths, one leading downwards, one leading forward, and one leading to the left.

“Benefactor Gu, which way should we go?” Zhao Xiao Seng asked.

Gu Qing Shan looked down and saw that the black thread on his hand was reaching into the path on the left.

“This way”

Gu Qing Shan flew into the left path.

Zhao Xiao Seng swiftly followed.

After moving forward a bit more, Gu Qing Shan once again couldn’t help himself using his gaze to cut open the wall.

The abandoned Life Talismans crumbled into ash to reveal the transparent Reality Wall.

The other side of the wall was a series of structures covered in wild grass.

Grass and vines have become overgrown, a series of train cars have fallen to one side, completely broken.

There wasn’t a single person on the train platform, only a few pieces of bones.

Gu Qing Shan was confused, but could only continue to fly forward.

They were flying as fast as possible to avoid the wraiths’ pursuit.

Suddenly, the five Life Talismans faded.

The two of them hovered in mid-air, no longer moving forward.

Gu Qing Shan drew five more Life Talismans in the void of space.

They began to burn and circle around the two of them——

But they continued to remain in place, not moving forward at all.

Gu Qing Shan looked around.

Only to see that the walls here no longer had any Life Talismans on them.

The Reality Wall had been completely exposed to the two of them.

—–on the other side of the wall, Gu Qing Shan was able to see endless darkness, only occasionally would there be some glowing insects that flew through the darkness, continuing forward after going past their gazes.

Gu Qing Shan tried and found that at this point, the spatial restraints within the tunnel had disappeared here, so they would be able to fly freely even without Life Talismans.

“It seems this place is no longer under the wraiths’ control” Gu Qing Shan commented.

“Indeed. But benefactor Gu, look ahead” Zhao Xiao Seng pointed at the gloomy end of the tunnel and spoke in a whisper.

“I can see it” Gu Qing Shan also replied in a whisper.

There was an unimaginably wide platform at the very end of the tunnel.

This platform was made out of nothing but white bones, perfectly laid out at the end of the path.

From the looks of it, the platform was purposely constructed at the end of the tunnel specifically to receive any entities that arrived here.

Gu Qing Shan and Zhao Xiao Seng flew forward, landed on the platform, then carefully observed it.

There was nothing but endless darkness ahead of them, there was nothing to be seen both above and below, only a pile of bones that were stacked so high that it became this platform.

At the very top of the platform, a single transparent glowing bone stood straight up, almost like a staff or scepter.

“Benefactor Gu, what do we do now?” Zhao Xiao Seng asked.

Gu Qing Shan looked down and saw that the thread that represented their pursuers had abruptly disappeared, while the thread that represented what he was looking forward was still reaching deep into the darkness.

Strange.

Why would the wraiths stop pursuing us here?

Gu Qing Shan carefully contemplated the implications of this.

He walked up to the highest point of the platform, then placed his hand on the transparently glowing bone.

A line of glowing text appeared on the War God UI:

[Staff of Secret Summoning]

[The summoning incantation: By my body, thrown towards the end of destruction, witness the return of the Samsara]

[Attention: This is a ceremonial staff purely for the sake of summoning a certain entity, its only use is summoning]

Gu Qing Shan held the white bone staff in his hand and made his considerations.

“Benefactor Gu, what do we do now?” Zhao Xiao Seng asked.

Gu Qing Shan regained his senses and sighed.

He suddenly laughed and explained: “Ever since we entered the tunnel, we’ve only seen strange and unusual things, but we don’t actually know anything at all—— to escape this clueless state, I will now discard all my worries to attempt something that I don’t know the results of”

“Amitabha, that is a thing of romance” Zhao Xiao Seng clapped his hand.

“Aren’t you afraid to die?”

“I am, but Buddha had said that life is a journey, and in the end, men have to attempt something risky once in their lives”

Gu Qing Shan was surprised: “Did Buddha really say such a thing?”

Zhao Xiao Seng clasped his hands together: “Not yet, but after I become the Buddha, I’ll be the one to say it”

“Good” Gu Qing Shan was a bit impressed by his determination and praised.

Since Zhao Xiao Seng didn’t object, he raised the bone scepter and chanted in a whisper: “By my body, thrown towards the end of destruction, witness the return of the Samsara!”

Fwoom———

From the faraway darkness, two green giant glowing spheres suddenly appeared.

While these two green glowing spheres were still far away, they were as large as windmills, emitting intense green light that illuminated Gu Qing Shan and Zhao Xiao Seng’s body from afar.

Following that, a ghostly visage slowly appeared.

——–the two green glowing spheres were actually its eyes.

Just its eyes were already so large, it truly is a wonder just how large this ghostly being’s body would be.

It uttered a resounding angry howl: 「 WHO WAS IT? WHO SUMMONED ME HERE AT THIS CRUCIAL POINT IN TIME!? 」

Rumble!

Rumble!

Rumble!

The platform and the tunnel both trembled intensely.

——while Gu Qing Shan and Zhao Xiao Seng were stunned, the ghostly being approached the platform step by step.

“Sounds like it’s in a really bad mood” Zhao Xiao Seng shrank and slowly retreated behind Gu Qing Shan.

“Indeed, it sounds like we found some trouble” Gu Qing Shan drew his sword and commented.

He then thought of something and asked in a low voice: “Do you still think this is romance?”

Zhao Xiao Seng took a deep breath, then clasped his hands: “Amitabha, this kind of romance is a bit too much for me”