Chapter 1259: Hidden Last Words

Oddly enough, Qu Yu's flesh had long since decayed, leaving only bones. Yet, the skeleton hadn't fallen apart; even when moved aside, it maintained its original sitting posture.

He Lingchuan jumped onto the stone bed and reached out to Dong Rui.

Dong Rui quickly handed over the stone slab.

He Lingchuan gently pressed twice on the spot where Qu Yu had been sitting, then placed the stone slab there and made slight adjustments.

Lingguang, who had been craning his neck and watching intently, blurted out:

"It's aligned!"

It fit seamlessly.

Indeed, this stone slab had been carved directly from the stone bed!

Everyone's spirits immediately lifted.

He Lingchuan moved the slab aside and illuminated the area with fluorescent spores. The three people, two monkeys, and ten eyes all immediately leaned closer to the stone bed. Even the Eyeball Spiders jumped down, eager to see what secrets were written there.

However, their eyes grew tired from looking, yet the stone bed remained blank.

Unwilling to give up, Dong Rui reached out and ran his hand back and forth over Qu Yu's seat but couldn't feel any writing.

"Fooled by a dead man!" he fumed, wanting to curse.

What a profound sense of frustration!

When Myozanten burst in and saw the playful inscription Qu Yu left on the wall back then, did he feel the same way?

"What exactly is wrong?" As clever as He Lingchuan was, racking his brain now was fruitless.

Fu Liushan, meanwhile, said, "If the secret were written on the stone bed, it would be exposed as soon as the Sky Demon moved his remains. Not to mention, the opponent was that divine being, Myozanten."

Dong Rui nodded repeatedly, "That makes sense, that makes sense."

Upon seeing the inscription on the wall, Myozanten, if even slightly ill-tempered, would have torn Qu Yu's remains apart in anger. Qu Yu couldn't risk that if he wanted to keep his little secret.

The Divine Bone Necklace remained silent. Clearly, there was nothing here it wanted to consume. This fellow might know every moment of history, yet it offered He Lingchuan no hints at all.

Perhaps some facts were destined to remain buried under the dust of history, never to be revealed to the world.

He sighed regretfully and decisively gave up: "Never mind. There are too many ancient secrets; knowing one less won't matter. The dying message on the stone couplet is already a great find!"

The others also straightened up, ready to leave.

Dong Rui quickly adjusted his mindset, rubbing his hands together: "Who cares about this? Crystal Mountain is waiting for me!"

He had never seen such well-preserved remains of a divine being! The thought of conducting numerous experiments and replenishing his stock of divine bones and blood, which He Lingchuan had nearly depleted, made him grin from ear to ear.

It wasn't that the immortal's dying message wasn't interesting enough, but it couldn't compare to the tangible remains of a divine being.

He Lingchuan was about to jump off the stone bed, but looking back and seeing Qu Yu's remains somewhat awkwardly tucked into the corner, he involuntarily paused.

Regardless of his character or conduct during his life, at the crucial moment, he chose to face death with a smile to protect the human world's most vital secret.

For this alone, he deserved the respect of later generations.

So, He Lingchuan carefully and nimbly moved his remains back to their original position. He then bowed, saying, "Forgive my intrusion."

Let Immortal Minghui continue to rest in peace here.

It was unclear if He Lingchuan had inadvertently touched something while moving him, but Qu Yu's left hand, which had been resting on his knee, suddenly slipped, and his index and middle fingers extended forward, tapping the stone bed.

With a click, like jade striking jade, a crisp, echoing sound rang out.

Right before He Lingchuan's eyes, tiny characters suddenly appeared one after another on the blank surface of the stone bed, like shallow grass floating up from the bottom of a pond.

"Whoa! There it is, there it is!" Fu Liushan exclaimed. "Words!"

The three people and two monkeys immediately crowded closer. Dong Rui also exclaimed, "This sly old ghost!"

Just looking at the dying inscription on the wall, one might assume True Immortal Minghui was naturally unrestrained and carefree, but who would have thought he was incredibly shrewd? For later visitors, merely putting the stone slab back onto the stone bed, no matter how perfectly it fit, was useless. They had to move True Immortal Minghui's remains back into place for the next step of his trap to be triggered.

Only someone who treated True Immortal Minghui's remains with such care would at least bear him good intentions.

The Sky Demon, having been fooled by him, would not have acted this way.

As for whether the Sky Demon would destroy or take his remains in a fit of rage, that was beyond True Immortal Minghui's control. At that time, with the Sky Demon's sudden attack and the hasty events, it was already remarkable that he could return to the hidden chamber after being gravely wounded and set up these intricate arrangements.

The rest was left to luck.

This final trick by True Immortal Minghui was a game from his youth, played with fellow disciples in the Grand Reversion Sect, called "Settled Zen." It involved using an illusion to hide an object beneath a statue, and the object couldn't be found unless the statue was returned to its original place twice.

Qu Yu had originally believed that most likely his fellow disciples would find this underground palace. His dying message would then have a good chance of reaching his sect.

But he didn't know that after his death, the world would undergo drastic changes, and the Grand Reversion Sect would focus on managing their oasis, no longer having the energy to search for him. This secret remained hidden until three thousand years later, when He Lingchuan uncovered it.

This later visitor didn't know the immortal's old trick. He moved Qu Yu's remains back to their original position purely out of respect.

From this perspective, it's hard to say whether it was He Lingchuan's luck or Qu Yu's.

The Soul-Capturing Mirror in He Lingchuan's embrace chuckled, "Treat good with good, and evil with evil! Master, your immediate reward came quickly."

"Immediate reward" might not be the best phrase, but He Lingchuan had no time to quibble with it now. His attention was entirely on the stone slab.

This was the second hidden dying message. Was this the secret Qu Yu had risked his life to protect?

The stone slab read: The Sky Demon's essence blood was like a potent poison to the plants, ordinary humans, and lesser demons of the world, causing strange mutations. Qu Yu had discovered that Sky Demons frequently abducted humans and demons, triggering various deformities.

What did these Sky Demons want?

Qu Yu initially thought the Sky Demons wanted to activate some puppet weapons to fight against the immortal descendants, since the number of Sky Demons was far less than the immortal clans in this realm, putting them at a numerical disadvantage.

Since the Sky Demons experimented on demons, he would experiment on Sky Demons—a tit for tat.

However, he later learned from a captive that some Sky Demons were very interested in what they called "Divine Descent Art." This was why they captured a large number of humans, demons, and even some immortals for experimentation.

What was the purpose of such experiments?

Qu Yu already knew that Sky Demons, like immortals, had many organizations. The goals, methods, and means of each organization varied. Some organizations did one thing, others did another, and they weren't necessarily cooperative.

Even if other immortals knew, they might not take it seriously. But Qu Yu, out of his own interest, dissected 998 Sky Demons in total—a small portion he killed himself, the rest sent by other immortals—and he truly uncovered something significant.

First, puppets activated by divine blood could maintain long-term physical vitality even after death, unlike ordinary corpses that quickly decayed—as long as their heads weren't severed.

If conditions allowed, preserving them for thousands of years was not an issue.