Chapter 524: Crimson Mother Arrives (part 1)
The canopy of heaven in Forbidden by the Immortal was lit with crimson light, making it seem like a world of blood. What was more, it was full of rifts. Thanks to the bright red sky, it was possible to see that the rifts were very deep. And they didn’t look like they’d formed naturally. They looked constructed, such that they resembled a massive magical symbol! A mere glance at that symbol would cause feelings of uncontrollable terror to rise up in a person, something instinctual and from the depths of one’s life force.
It wasn’t just Xu Qing and the Captain who were shaken. All of the cultivators in the safety zone were also affected. Everyone felt deeply moved, and sensed as if a great catastrophe was looming. The army of cultivators was made mostly of people from the second and third wave. Most of those who’d made up the first wave had already left.
The source of the dramatic scene in the canopy of heaven was the central region of Forbidden by the Immortal. At that location was the main imperial palace hall of Ancient Emperor Dark Serenity for this particular operations palace.
What had once been a magnificent and incomparable palace hall was now very different. It was now covered in a gigantic, cancerous growth of flesh. From a distance, it looked like a massive ball of flesh some tens of thousands of meters in size, covered with thick blood veins that stretched all over it. What was more, it pulsed, almost like a heart.
Thump thump. Thump thump.
Every time it moved, it sent a thunderous noise rippling out in all directions.
That noise distorted the air, turning it blurry. Mutagen levels soared, becoming like a mist. It also created gruish figures who hovered in the air and bowed to the ball of flesh. The blood vessels stretched out from the flesh and across the ground in the area.
About 500 kilometers away, there was another strange sight. It wasn’t a ball of flesh, but rather, something like a spike rising into the sky. It was pitch black, incredibly sharp, and pulsed with a cold aura. It looked like some sort of consummate, deadly weapon. It was a godly weapon, and there wasn’t just one of them. Another 500 kilometers away was another spike that looked exactly the same. Yet another 500 kilometers away was a third spike! If you could look down on Forbidden by the Immortal from a very high vantage point, you would see that there were a total of twenty-seven spikes. Starting from the imperial palace, they stretched out toward the west. It was almost as if there were some huge beast buried underneath the operations palace, and the thorns were spikes coming off of its back.
The ‘heart’ covering the imperial palace was directly above that beast, and hovering above it in the sky was an octagonal spell formation that looked like it was set into the sky itself. It pulsed with red light. There was a natural cadence to the way it flickered and turned the sky red. It was impossible to tell what the spell formation was made from. It was only 3,000 meters across, so compared to the beast below, it was insignificant other than the red light it cast.
That said, it was clearly the source of the rifts, as they spread out from the formation to fill the dome of heaven.
Inside the octagonal spell formation were 361 black-robed figures. 360 of them sat cross-legged and were chanting some sort of complicated and indecipherable enchantment. It wasn’t a human language. It sounded gruish and bizarre. What was more, every so often as they chanted, they would lift a hand, plunge it into their bodies, and pull out one of their organs. Then they would hold the organ high overhead, dripping blood, as if it were an offering. The organs would rapidly wither, turning into black energy that converged in the middle of the spell formation.
That was the location of the 361st person. Though he also wore a voluminous black cloak, he was trembling so hard that the hood had fallen back to reveal a face criss-crossed with red blood vessels.
Xu Qing’s pupils constricted.
“I put a few eyes in place outside, all for the purpose of being able to witness this battle between gods. That said, I know it brings a certain element of risk. So let’s wait until the red moon is awakened and in the middle of devouring the local god. Things will be a lot safer then.”
Looking very pleased with himself, the Captain closed his hand, covering the eye.
Xu Qing nodded. “Yeah, let’s wait. It shouldn’t be very long now.”
With that, he put on the skin mask with its concealment powers. He settled the power of his taboo poison over his violet moon heavenly palace. He also added in the power of his heavenly dao, the Ghost Emperor mountain, and the daybreak light. With all that, he was confident the violet moon wouldn’t be revealed. Having accomplished these things, he closed his eyes and settled down to wait, all while mentally reviewing everything that happened with the phoenix-like temple complex.
In that matter, time slipped by slowly but surely.
About six hours later, intense rumbling sounds once again echoed out in the sky outside. They were so intense that Xu Qing and the Captain could hear them even in their hiding spot in the flesh.
Shaken, and still a bit fearful, they continued to wait. They didn’t try to look at what was happening. Xu Qing knew for sure that the red moon... was about to wake up.
The red color in the sky was even more intense than before, casting all of the buildings and flesh in a deep crimson light. There was some violet in it, but it was overwhelmed by the blood-red color.
The twenty-seven spikes trembled, and the racing heart seemed to pulse with an aura of awakening.
Meanwhile, in the canopy of heaven, all of the black-robed individuals in the octagonal spell formation, who had already sacrificed their five yin organs and their left eyes, dug out their right eyes. As they held them aloft, Zhang Siyun’s right eye withered into nothing, and a host of blood vessels exploded out of his eye socket.
More rifts opened up in the sky.
Then Zhang Siyun’s hands slowly covered both of his eyes. His facial expression didn’t reveal any hint of pain. The corners of his lips twitched upward slightly. A terrifying and paramount will suddenly erupted from Zhang Siyun. Both heaven and earth were all stained red by that will.
Then a red moon rose in the sky of Forbidden by the Immortal, right above Zhang Siyun!
1. Xu Qing saw the figure atop the moon, covering its eyes with its hands, in chapter 361. ?