Chapter 287 - The Blue Orb

"What's going on? How did they just pass through like that?"

"What happened to the poison mist?"

The confused poison masters broke out into a commotion.

It was not just those who had been left behind either. Even those who had already cleared the green mist obstacle could not help but stare wide-eyed as Lu Tianzi's group joined them effortlessly.

Of course, this was apart from Elder Xiquan's group, who were already nowhere to be seen. With how easily they cleared the green mist, there was simply no reason for them to stop and rest.

Because of Lu Tianzi, the rest of the poison masters immediately decided to shelve their original plans for the time being.

Rather than challenging the green mist by force and risk losing their lives, an alternative method that would allow them to pass through unscathed was a thousand times more attractive!

All of them started focusing their attention on the green mist once more, and it was at this time that they noticed the dim emblem of light on the ground.

"That's a detection formation!"

"A detection formation? Did those guys manage to set it up this quickly?"

"He is only at the First Cycle Origin Core realm, do you think that's even possible? The formation must have been there from the start, and they just happened to be the first to find some patterns to activate it."

"You think so? Rather than that, I am sure they were probably just lucky enough to notice it activating, especially since they had nothing better to do anyway."

"They really lucked out then!"

"No matter what, now that it is activated, wouldn't it be safe for us to pass through as well?"

When that topic came up, the poison masters could not help but look at each other with both anticipation and uncertainty.

Passing through the green mist without protection?

Without an extremely high level of confidence, who would dare do such a thing?

It was not as though they could ask Lu Tianzi for an explanation either. With how they had treated Lu Tianzi earlier, there was a high possibility that Lu Tianzi might just lie to them as payback!

In the end, they never had the chance to test out their hypothesis.

While they were still contemplating their next step, the emblem of light on the ground suddenly dimmed down, until it completely vanished.

To reduce the chances of having his Spiritual Essence system discovered by the others, Lu Tianzi had only directed a relatively small amount of Essence energy into the formation. And now, that bit of Essence energy had finally run out.

"Damn it, we just missed our chance!"

"It's fine, I'm sure it will activate again soon enough. Let's just be patient and wait!"

Now that they knew of its existence, some of those who were more knowledgeable about formations started examining the detection formation as well.

But just like Lu Tianzi at first, no matter how they tried to direct their Essence energy within, it was all in vain. The formation simply refused to accept even a single bit of their Essence energy.

Because of that, the poison masters grew even more certain that the formation was the kind that would automatically activate from time to time.

Now was the time to be patient and wait.

They just had to be careful not to miss out on the next opportunity when it came!

Those who had already cleared the green mist could only smile wryly when they overheard the discovery of the others, and some of them even shot Lu Tianzi's group with looks of disdain.

"Lucky bastards," one of them unreservedly voiced out everyone's thoughts.

Most of them were injured, and even the best of them had to expend the bulk of their energy just to get past the green mist. Realising that Lu Tianzi's group managed to join them by a stroke of luck, they could not help but feel bitter in their hearts.

Lu Tianzi simply ignored the death stares coming from all directions, leaving these people behind to proceed deeper into the cave.

The way forward was dimly illuminated by what looked like green pearls of light, embedded into the stone walls at regular intervals.

These green pearls of light were all connected to the huge formation array under the cave, which explained how they were still able to give off light after such a long time had passed.

The group of three walked a long way before they were confronted by a fork in the road.

In front of them, the tunnel suddenly split into ten different paths. After choosing a random one, It split into another ten, and then another…

The tunnels did not simply split apart horizontally.

Some led downwards, then turned upwards later.

Some led upwards, then turned downwards later.

Before long, they had become completely disoriented by the winding tunnels.

The elders of the Healers' Circle were not joking when they said that the inside of the tomb was like a maze!

Thankfully, they quickly arrived at another landmark.

The tunnel ahead was blocked by a red mist, similar to the green mist that they had come across near the entrance.

Lu Tianzi went straight for the previous solution. And as expected, he found the same detection formation underneath the red mist.

Just like before, the formation would only accept Spiritual Essence energy before it activated.

This time, without the Origin Core realm poison masters releasing their energy to mask his attempt, Nanlan Qianxue managed to pick up on the Spiritual Essence energy coming from Lu Tianzi.

"This…" Nanlan Qianxue hurriedly looked behind. It was only when she saw that nobody was following did she finally let out a sigh of relief.

Seeing her actions, Lu Tianzi could only smile inwardly.

He had obviously already checked before acting, but seeing the look of worry on Nanlan Qianxue's face was still quite a refreshing sight.

As for Beiwei Jinguo, his cultivation was still far too low to identify any form of energy undulations above the Essence Building realm.

With that, they cleared the red mist obstacle just as easily.

Once again, they got to experience the feeling of coming into direct contact with lethal poison, and their bodies were slowly getting used to this surreal sensation.

This experience of going through winding fork roads and going through poison mist obstacles repeated itself multiple times over.

After a few hours, the group finally arrived at a wide chamber.

This chamber looked entire different from the tunnels before.

In the earlier tunnels, the walls, ground, and ceiling were all of the same rough stone.

But in this chamber, the floors were lined with wide tiles, the stone walls were replaced with neatly arranged bricks, and the high ceiling was cut into the shape of a smooth dome.

Still, none of this was important.

What drew their attention was a bronze statue of a bird's talon, stretching out from the centre of the tiled floor up to the height of a man's chest.

Its claws held tightly onto a glowing orb that cast beautiful blue rays of light onto the surroundings, as though creating a true work of art.

"It's beautiful," Beiwei Jinguo remarked as he followed behind Lu Tianzi.

"It really is," Lu Tianzi nodded in agreement.

The blue orb possessed a mysterious allure, an unexplainable attractiveness that beckoned them over.

With Nanlan Qianxue and Beiwei Jinguo following closely behind him, Lu Tianzi approached the blue orb without hesitation.

It was as though he had fallen into a trance.

When he arrived before the blue orb, Lu Tianzi reached out towards it without thinking twice.

And the moment his finger came into contact with the blue orb, a surge of information immediately flooded into his mind.

Shocked by the abruptness of it all, Lu Tianzi broke out of his daze. He quickly tried to cut off the connection, but it was already too late.

No matter how hard he tried, he simply could not severe his mental connection to the blue orb.

Not just that, but he even lost total control over his body. Even by driving his origin core to the limit, he could not budge a single inch.

His body remained locked in place, standing upright with a hand on the blue orb.

Lu Tianzi cursed inwardly as he continued to struggle.

This was especially since he could see Nanlan Qianxue and Beiwei Jinguo stepping up beside him and reaching out towards the blue orb as well.

Shit!

I need to quickly break out of this to help them!

However, everything he did was meaningless.

Lu Tianzi stopped trying soon enough, but this was not because he had given up on himself.

By then, his initial panic had been replaced by a sense of bewilderment.

Just a few moments after the connection had been established, Lu Tianzi sensed that the intrusion of information was benign in nature and meant him absolutely no harm. Since that was the case, there was no reason to continue wasting his efforts.

Rather than that, he might as well just wait and see what happened next.

Even if things were to turn south after this, there was nothing he could do now to prevent it anyway.

Soon enough, an image appeared in his head, and his surroundings began to morph and change.

The walls closed in, transforming from bricks into wood.

The tiled floor similarly transformed into wooden planks, and the ceiling disappeared, letting in the warm rays of the sun.

It was a strange room without doors, windows, or even a roof.

A young man lay in bed before Lu Tianzi, his forehead sweaty and his breath weak. His face pale and his lips blue, the young man groaned every other moment, as though he was in truly agonising pain.

Lu Tianzi did not rush into anything.

From his current condition, Lu Tianzi could tell that the young man was not about to die anytime soon, and thus there was no need to rush to save him even if there was a need to.

Instead, Lu Tianzi chose to turn around and take a good look at the room.

Behind him was a long row of shelves, with a myriad of items displayed clearly on top of each counter.

Most of these were precious materials and spiritual plants, both poisonous or not.

But aside from that, there were also whole carcasses of various animals, some too big to fit on the shelves and were thus left lying on the ground.

There was also a table with a full set of equipment.

From mortar and pestle to knife and board, whatever he could think of would be present in all sorts of different shapes and sizes.

With that, Lu Tianzi immediately realised what was going on.

Somehow, he had entered a test of his knowledge in the healing arts.

No, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that this was a test of his knowledge in the neutralisation aspect of the poison arts.

Finally satisfied after exploring the rest of the room, Lu Tianzi turned back to the young man and started examining his condition closer.

Since this was a test of his knowledge, then he would take it seriously as well.

After learning so much over the past week or so, Lu Tianzi had inevitably grown curious about his current level of understanding in the poison arts.

If anything, this could be a good chance to find out exactly how good he was!

But it was at this moment that Lu Tianzi realised something very amiss about the young man before him.

This young man lying in bed who Lu Tianzi was supposed to cure… he was actually human!