Chapter 459 Open Sesame

I dashed forward using my hoverboard, there was a Marble hovering in the middle of an area where more than a dozen cultivators were fighting each other for.

Just as I was about to grab it, some random shmuck managed to land his hand on it first.

"I got it!" he said exclaimed as if he had won the lottery.

Bad move kid.

Because once you try and steal from several predators, you become their main prey.

The guy who took the piece didn't even live to rejoice as two different spears from different cultivators pierced through him while a sword cut his head clean off from his body.

His hand relaxed as the marble fell off and another cultivator went for it.

It kept on going like that, whoever went for the grab would get immediately killed off by the others.

I pulled a pill from my inventory and flicked it with two fingers.

The pill flew like a bullet and came in contact with one of the cultivators.

"Who dares?!" shouted the cultivator as he turned to face me.

But before he could lock eyes with me, he realized that the pill that made contact with him had begun turning to smoke.

He waved the smoke away hastily increasing it's spread and this began spreading to other cultivators.

The rest of the cultivators didn't realize the danger of the green smoke until the first cultivator's hand began rotting.

"POISON!" shouted the first cultivator as he backed away and gobbled up several healing pills.

The other cultivators, realizing the danger of a poison capable of making an Ascendant Cultivator's arm to rot in an instant all backed away. As for me, I didn't hesitate to go into the smoke and grabbed the floating marble.

"KILL HIM!" shouted the first cultivator as he desperately tried to suppress the poison's spread.

The others as if they were not enemies before and became allies followed his order to come to hunt me down. Yet they didn't dare proceed further.

The smoke was spreading more and more.

"He's a fool, even if he has a powerful poison he'll die from it, let's just wait it out!" one of the cultivators who weren't too keen on being inflicted with the same poison as the first one said.

Yet, this only worked in my favor, as I was never affected by this poison. After all, I made it.

Several breaths of time passed without me moving from my spot before the idea of me being immune to this poison began circling their minds.

"He probably has an antidote! Use long-distance attacks!" the smartest of the bunch said.

And the rest followed suit, throwing away spears of Qi or swords of it toward me.

Though the firework looked pretty, the damage was abysmal, since I already deployed the Hoverboard's barrier.

Not only that, I even threw several other pills outward.

The cultivators saw the pills had their faces pale. And the smartest of the bunch immediately dipped away from the pills before they exploded too and covered the area in poison.

As for the unlucky or the slowest of the cultivators they were inflicted with a poison so potent that no amount of pills can save them from.

For several moments, I had a giant region around me that was full of poisonous smog that no cultivator thought it would be wise to fight me inside it. This poison serves as both a sword and a shield and no one in their right mind will dare come inside.

"Shit, forget about him," one of the cultivators said as he turned his head to another direction, he saw another marble a few miles away and decided to head toward it. And when the other cultivators saw the same they also went to that direction.

Soon I was at peace inside a cloud of poison.

I didn't need to do anything but wait.

Time passed and a few cultivators who were clearly not strong enough to compete with other stronger and more vicious cultivators thought that it was a good idea to attack the guy sitting in a cloud of poison.

But their thinking soon proved to be wrong, as they approached the cloud and realized that it contained not jut poison, but the carcasses and melted bodies of several dozen other cultivators that had come before them.

I had constantly supplied the poison cloud with more and more poison, just to keep it functional and in a working form. I didn't increase its size since I would just draw unwanted attention to myself.

Soon though something came up. A man began walking inside the Poison Cloud, without a care in the world, he took a step after step as he got closer and closer to me.

While I was sitting in the lotus position on my hoverboard, he had already arrived to face me.

'Shit... this guy... is strong, absurdly so...'

"You, you're an Heir," he said.

'Shit...'

"Ah you don't need to be so wary of me,' he said.

'No fucking shot I shouldn't...'

"What do you want?" I asked him.

"To test you, this trial is a bit boring he said, and you look a bit strong, well not as strong as me, but I want to see if you qualify to even take this trial," he said.

The man's face was hidden thanks to the poison but when he took another step and was right in front of the hoverboard barrier, I could fully see him.

He had a gentle-looking and handsome face. Almost too beautiful to be called a man, but he was clearly not as gentle as his face.

He raised his index finger up and that got me on guard, and with one motion he cut through the protective Saint Qi barrier as if it was made of paper.

"I told you, this trial is too easy, now, entertain me!" he said.

"Do I look like a circus monkey to you?" I questioned.

"Oh, we have one with some spit here, good, then, here is the deal. You must block one of my hits, if you do I'll allow you to enter the trial, if you can't, then you were never cut out for this." He said.

"And why should I approve of such an unfair trial, aren't we all here to take the Poison God's trial, you're a book owner yourself, you should know." I said.

"Because you're the only one with four books here, everyone else has only one. They're boring, you look interesting and I want to see how you managed to get all four books, if it was chance or true ability," he said.

I stood up, looked the man in the eyes, and said, "Dao Shen."

The man smiled, his grin reaching all the way to his ears, "Ah to have other people know of this humble person, I guess my reputation of leaving no one alive is now flawed," he said.

"Nah, it's not about that," I replied, "It's because you said that everyone else has only one book, you already hinted the fact that you have more than one, and with that alone, I deduced your name. Not to mention that," I said as I pointed to his shoulder.

Dao Shen looked to his shoulder and then smiled some more if that was even possible.

"You're very bright," he said.

"The Book of Devouring, otherwise you shouldn't have been able to walk through this poison mist without taking damage. So you said you wanted to test me, and I feel it would be a little too unfair, how about this since you're clearly the strongest of the both of us. How about if I land a blow on you, you'll forget this manner." I said.

"That's an interesting thought, but you clearly know the difference between us, how can you ever hope even to touch my robes with such weak cultivation?" he asked.

"You'll be surprised," I said.

"Then go ahead, try, but if you fail to impress me, you'll die," he said nonchalantly.

"Right, when do we begin?" I asked.

"Whenever you like," he said.

"Right...aaaand done, I won," I said.

Dao Shen frowned "You think this is a joke?" he said, his Divine Sense began seeping out exposing his true power. And for a second I almost took a step back. His pressure was undeniably comparable to the serpent head at the poison god's gate.

"No," I replied, "Not a joke," I said.

"I find it interesting that you managed to survive my pressure without sweating, with that alone I could have considered that you have passed my test, but I don't like being joked around with, what do you mean you won, you didn't move an inch, nor did your Qi change, how did you think that you won this fight?" he asked.

"Because you lost the moment you took a step in, look at your shoulder again," I said.

Dao Shen looked to his shoulder and his eyes widened.

"Since when?" he asked.

"Since the moment you took your first step here, the poison around me isn't so simple that the Book of Devouring will consume it, while you were eating away at the poison, the poison was also eating away at your Qi, and that's why your robe is now damaged and you have a small blemish on your shoulder. Though I might die in a frontal clash, If I have time to prepare I'm not someone that'll easily go down," I said.

The young man began laughing hysterically. And it went on for hours, his bursts of laughter without even him fully realizing were destroying my poison cloud. And soon only the two of us were visible to everyone around us.

"Very good, what is your name?" he asked.

"Well, I guess you already know it," I said trying to dodge the question.

"Shen Bao," he said.

'Fuck...'

The moment my name was spoken everyone far and near turned to me.

"The youngest Heir, you're considered a genius in many regions, and a lot of Poison God inheritors want your book. Let's see, how are you going to get away from this, you proved your ability with your special poison, but now you have to survive being discovered. Good luck," he said.

He then took a step forward and began flying away.

The cultivators a few miles from me all realized who I was, and they knew for sure that if they were to kill me, they'll have my book and have better odds at the trial.

"Damn... well, I guess I'm gonna have to do this then," I said as I turned to the gate's direction.

"Encircle him, he's trying to get to the gate," someone said.

And they were right. Because the gate was opening up.

A giant swath of cultivators moved toward the giant gate that seemed like a portal to the netherworld. And many who didn't have the marble on them perished as they clashed with the gate trying to break into it.

Only those who had the pearls managed to get in safely.

Seeing this, other cultivators began swarming the gate not to enter, but to stop other pearl owners from entering and stealing their pearls away. It was a massacre at the gate.

"Unfortunately for you, you're a thousand years too slow to stop me," I said and took one step forward.

With that step, I folded space and teleported forward right in the middle of all of those cultivators.

They didn't understand what happened nor did they realize I was among them. Simply because, I was using the Traceless Steps where not only is my Qi, presence, and body is hidden, my whole being is concealed from the world.

And I continued walking and walking.

Only for one person to smirk in my direction... he sent me a divine sense message, "It's been a while, Shen Bao."

Looking in the direction of that person, I saw a young man with ember-like eyes and tanned skin, his body exuded youth and power and his infernal and fiery spirit seemed to rage when he noticed me.

Fighting spirit and competitiveness was ignited in this young man's eyes.

"Meng Hao..." I muttered back.