Chapter 1827: Dark Undercover

Looking into the mirror again, Panlong City appeared surrounded by the sea on all sides. At first glance, it seemed to be in imminent danger, yet the seawater never reached its South Gate.

He Lingchuan also noticed that the South Gate was tightly closed, whereas when he first saw the ruins of Panlong, it had been wide open with a damaged main gate.

This scene, too, was different from historical accounts.

What exactly was going on? The answer was practically revealing itself.

Just then, the image in the Haoyuan Golden Mirror flickered, then zoomed in, focusing on the Fortune Pool in front of the Mitian Temple.

A gentle breeze blew, and the pool was full, gleaming golden from an unknown light source.

The pool water was dark red, as if stained with blood.

Just now, Qianhuan and the two Great Sky Devils had emerged from here. So, this must be a transition point between different scenes within the Sea of Consciousness?

As He Lingchuan was pondering, he suddenly saw shadows and light shifting in the pool, and something swam by.

A fish?

At least its shape resembled a fish.

It seemed natural for there to be fish in a pond. The dozen or so colorful koi in the Fortune Pool of the Panlong world were so round they could barely swim, having been fattened by devout worshippers.

But here, something felt inherently strange.

The figure swam back, this time more slowly.

He Lingchuan looked closely, then suddenly let out a soft gasp.

He recognized it; it was an even more significant old acquaintance—

Chaos from the Grand Square Pot!

He was all too familiar with its massive, round, and blunt-headed shape. And the hundreds of chains trailing behind Chaos, which from a distance looked like a long, fanning fish tail, possessed a beauty that seemed ethereal but was actually harsh.

But this creature always roamed the chaotic expanse of the Grand Square Pot; how did it suddenly swim into Qianhuan's Sea of Consciousness?

He Lingchuan scratched his head, making a rough guess that the Haoyuan Golden Mirror had probably connected to Qianhuan's network of laws, allowing this creature to quietly follow along.

The presence of Chaos meant that the Grand Square Pot had also quietly infiltrated.

What had it come to do?

He Lingchuan watched Chaos's idling form; it looked sinister no matter how he viewed it.

He murmured, "How long have you been lurking here?"

The Grand Square Pot never gave him advance notice of its actions.

Of course, Chaos didn't answer, but it swam closer to the surface, then turned, and dozens of chains suddenly lashed out, crossing each other to form a large net of chains beneath the water!

The mesh was very small and dense, and black shadows emerged one after another from the chains, completely blocking all the gaps.

The Three Corpse Worms—they were old actors too.

At this, the color of the pool water darkened considerably.

He Lingchuan mused.

What did this mean? What was Chaos trying to trap?

The surface of the water?

Dong Rui, standing nearby, asked him, "Why did the Haoyuan Golden Mirror specifically show us this pool?"

With such intense and fierce battles happening in the city, why was it live-streaming a close-up of a mere pool?

He Lingchuan countered, "What did you see?"

Everyone exchanged glances, then quickly peered into the pool with wide eyes, but all they saw was a pool of blood-red water.

Nothing else.

"Nothing at all," Dong Rui said curiously. "What about you?"

As the owner of the Haoyuan Golden Mirror, did He Lingchuan always see something different from what ordinary people saw?

He Lingchuan shook his head.

Indeed, living people couldn't see Chaos; he was the only exception.

Mother Zhu suddenly said, "The pool water has darkened."

Although she couldn't see the red shadow in the pool or the net of chains underwater, she could feel that the pool water had changed.

Just as He Lingchuan was about to speak, he saw the net of chains in the pool retract, and Chaos disappeared.

The pool was empty once more.

What was going on?

Before that thought finished, he saw the two Great Sky Devils sweep past the Mitian Temple, coincidentally passing in front of the Fortune Pool.

It seemed Chaos was hiding from them, not wanting to be discovered.

So, did Qianhuan, as the host, know about its invasion of an ancient True Immortal's Sea of Consciousness?

He Lingchuan deduced that, most likely, she didn't know, or at least didn't know Chaos's exact location.

Chaos appearing in a small, inconspicuous pool instead of freely swimming in the vast ocean outside Panlong City was very telling in itself.

This pool was very likely a channel or a fault line. Chaos might have transformed itself from a giant whale into a speck and squeezed itself in here.

Then, the next question arose: What was it doing, hiding here?

Typically, channels were for people to pass through. But earlier, when Qianhuan and the two Great Sky Devils came through the pool, Chaos made no move.

What was it waiting for?

He Lingchuan's eyes flickered.

The pool was empty now, but he knew Chaos was lurking nearby.

As the two Great Sky Devils moved through the streets and alleys, Miaozhantian grew increasingly alarmed.

Yes, this was indeed the ancient Panlong City, exactly as it looked after the city was breached over 150 years ago!

Ahead was a tower; she leaped to its top, intending to search for Qianhuan's whereabouts, but to her surprise, when she looked out, she saw a boundless ocean stretching in all directions!

Miaozhantian naturally knew what the Panlong Wilderness looked like, so why would Qianhuan place "Panlong City" in her Sea of Consciousness within a vast ocean?

Wait, the sea?

Before she could think further, Miaoyuntian suddenly pointed forward.

A gray shadow flickered through the ruins.

Miaozhantian gestured to her sister, signaling to split up and flank it.

This ruined city had too many streets and alleys; if Qianhuan decided to hide, it would be difficult to find her quickly. Miaozhantian also couldn't just conjure a Divine Fire Heavenly Meteor to flatten the place.

But since she was here, she was calm and unhurried.

If Qianhuan continued to hide in her Sea of Consciousness, control of the Upside-Down Sea in reality would gradually be seized by Miaozhantian.

Qianhuan could stall outside, but Miaozhantian had already broken in. Could she continue to cower in her own Sea of Consciousness, her own crucial territory?

Along the chase, Miaozhantian saw two Black Dragon marks on crumbling walls.

Had they not dissipated yet? And why would such marks appear in Qianhuan's Sea of Consciousness?

These things hadn't been seen for a long time since the fall of Panlong City.

Their latest sighting was where Emperor Jiuyou made his appearance. Hmm, hadn't Bai Ziqi already confirmed that Emperor Jiuyou was He Xiao from the outside world?

Speaking of which, it seemed all figures connected to Panlong City were now gathered in the Upside-Down Sea?

As Miaozhantian pondered this, she passed another broken white wall, where another dragon head mark was visible.

Having seen so many, she had become accustomed to them. She glanced past it and continued walking without looking back, but after two steps, she suddenly felt something was wrong:

The previous dragon head carvings had all been black; why was this one gray? Was it because it was on a white wall?

The mouth was shorter, the nose larger, and the dragon horns looked different.

Damn it! She immediately turned back, only for her vision to be filled by a gaping maw.

Jiaotu!

It had buried its head in a hole in the wall, eyes open and unmoving, so the two Sky Devils hadn't noticed anything unusual at first glance.

The creature was too fast. Miaozhantian raised her arm to shield her head, but her left arm was clamped in its large mouth.

Both tumbled in the ruins, and Jiaotu violently shook its head, snapping Miaozhantian's forearm with a crunch.

But it didn't linger after striking, abruptly leaping away. Miaozhantian's long blade in her left hand had lunged towards its belly, and another figure was also charging in.

Miaoyuntian arrived.

The Miaozhantian sisters attacked together, determined not to let it escape again.

Golden light also shimmered around Miaozhantian's severed arm, and the wound rapidly healed.

In the Sea of Consciousness, her 'body' was a manifestation of soul power; injuries could be repaired by expending soul power.

Jiaotu dodged a few times, then swiftly leaped onto a high wall and climbed upwards along it, moving more nimbly than a lizard.

It's worth noting that on the previous Pulao Island, Miaozhantian was over ten feet tall; but in the Panlong ruins, she had reverted to a normal human height.

Jiaotu had also shrunk proportionally.

Thus, the high walls of Panlong City still seemed towering to them.

Miaoyuntian leaped high towards it, firing two hand-forks, one after the other, which accurately landed directly in front of Jiaotu's two changes in direction.

Her prediction was incredibly precise, missing Jiaotu's snout by mere inches.

The sharp prongs pierced over half a foot into the wall, their ends still quivering.

Jiaotu turned its head and ran along the wall with great speed.

The wall was thick and straight, and Miaoyuntian ran vertically along it, seemingly unaffected by gravity.

As Miaozhantian chased on the ground, Jiaotu even had time to turn its head and spray several sharp spikes at her.

The spikes glowed with a bluish light, indicating potent poison.

Miaozhantian picked up a broken stone tablet from the ground and hurled it fiercely at Jiaotu.

Although Jiaotu dodged, that brief pause allowed Miaoyuntian, coming from behind, to lift her hand-fork and almost stab its tail.

The reason it was 'almost' was because just before the hand-fork struck its target, a gigantic head suddenly emerged from within the city wall, its gaping maw large enough to swallow Miaoyuntian whole with room to spare.

And that was indeed its intention.

Most terrifyingly, there was no warning whatsoever before it appeared.

When a crocodile lunges for prey, it makes a splash as it breaks the water; yet this thing emerged silently, without even cracking the wall!

Before it surfaced, Miaoyuntian, running on the wall, hadn't felt anything unusual in the wall structure at all. Yet her reaction was extremely swift; she forcibly shifted her body outwards, avoiding vital points, but her left leg was caught by the gigantic head.

The monster bit her and slammed her violently against the wall.

With a loud thud, Miaoyuntian wasn't flattened, but the mottled city wall remained intact, only losing a few patches of its surface—it was incredibly hard; even a Great Sky Devil couldn't damage it.

However, this was Qianhuan's Sea of Consciousness; Panlong City's appearance here was already bizarre, so a few more strange occurrences wouldn't be fussed over.

The monster rammed her several more times. Miaoyuntian tried to pry its jaws open with force, but they didn't budge an inch!

She was like a fierce tiger caught in an iron-toothed animal trap, possessing great strength but unable to use it.

It was broad daylight now, and the unknown light source from above illuminated the monster emerging from the city wall, revealing it clearly.

Miaozhantian's steps faltered. "How is this possible!"

This was another dragon!

And its size was much, much larger than Jiaotu's.

Its enormous head emerged from the wall; its body diameter alone was nearly fifteen feet, and its full length was not immediately discernible. It supported itself on the wall with one of its front paws, which had four claws.

Seeing these four claws, Miaozhantian almost uttered "Black Dragon Divine Venerable" but swallowed the words back.