Lin Jin wasn’t actually helping much as he followed Shu Xiaolou. He merely watched her search around for the Divine Cloud Passage every time they went a layer deeper. But he could tell that their environment had gotten quite creepy by the time they entered the fortieth layer and beyond.
One layer had been filled with huge rocks of strange shapes that seemed to be everywhere.
One had been a vast ocean without even a place for them to stand on.
Lin Jin felt as if he had traveled to so many locations on vacation in this short span of time. He liked layer forty-six the best because the place had been filled with greenery, mountains after mountains, and rivers after rivers. It was impossible to find such a scenic place in the outside world.
“The difference between each layer is so great that it doesn’t feel like this was created by the same person,” Lin Jin voiced his opinion.
Shu Xiaolou nodded. “You’re right. There is a signature in every layer and so far I’ve seen three different signatures. Which means we’ve been seeing artwork from three different people.”
Lin Jin was shocked to hear this.
Whoever painted these realms surely weren’t average people. They had to be at least profound immortals, maybe even unfettered immortals.
Which meant many secrets must be hidden in the crafting of this Unending Nature Landscape.
Perhaps even the remnant soul of the immortal Du Li that Lin Jin had found here didn’t know about the painting’s secrets. And this piqued his interest.
Maybe he would find interesting information inside this Unending Nature Landscape.
Lin Jin asked Shu Xiaolou for the three names she had seen. She answered him, saying they were ‘Huang Longgong, Li Jian, and Xuan Xuanzi’.
Lin Jin was dumbstruck after hearing the names.
He never heard of Huang Longgong and Xuan Xuanzi before, but he found the name ‘Li Jian’ to be familiar. And yet, he couldn’t put his finger on it right now.
“Found it!” Shu Xiaolou found this layer’s Divine Cloud Passage so she pulled Lin Jin down to the next layer.
They were now at the forty-eighth layer of the painting realm.
Only, the sight that greeted them startled them both.
Ominous clouds covered the sky without a ray of sunlight shining through. Dark mountains were everywhere shrouded in the aura of death. They saw the Acheron river that extended into the far distance and countless dead people were treading on the river like zombies.
Wails, roars, and other strange sounds entered their ears. Despite knowing this was a painting realm and not the real world, Lin Jin and Shu Xiaolou still felt their scalps prickle.
“It’s an ‘Acheron River’ painting!” Lin Jin suddenly said.
Shu Xiaolou nodded. When it came to knowledge of the ‘Acheron River’, Shu Xiaolou knew more than Lin Jin as the latter had actually learned of this painting from one of Shu Xiaolou’s personal book collections.
On the fourth floor of Heavenly Spiral Academy’s Beast Appraisal Pavilion, there was a collection of books Shu Xiaolou had slowly accumulated over centuries. Some were the only ones left in existence while many came from ancient graves. After all, one could only find the best treasures buried with the dead sometimes.
As a painting spirit, Shu Xiaolou was interested in all paintings passed down over time. One of her collected books had records of a painting that was available during the peak of the immortal era.
The ‘Acheron River’ painting.
It was said that a great immortal had ventured to the netherworld, and using the balance of Yin and Yang energy as his canvas, he painted this picture.
The Acheron River was a malicious item and gave no cultivation effects, but it could oppress all other malicious beings. More importantly, legend had it that the Acheron River painting was linked to the actual netherworld.
Lin Jin and Shu Xiaolou exchanged a glance. To be honest, the Acheron River may be precious, but it had no value for Lin Jin. Instead, Shu Xiaolou may see it as a treasure.
“Let’s move on. This place is making me uncomfortable,” Lin Jin said honestly. Being a living breathing human, it would be odd if he felt comfortable staying in a place that belonged to the dead. The ominous energy was everywhere and a living person would be slowly corroded if he stayed here long enough, no matter his cultivation level.
Shu Xiaolou was doing better than Lin Jin. She definitely wanted to investigate this Acheron River, but now wasn’t the time.
Then, she began searching for the entrance to the next layer with Lin Jin following closely behind her. For a moment there, he was a little scared with all the dead people around that looked so real to him.
He couldn’t help it. He may be a bold man but this place was too harrowing. People who had died of various methods were walking around him so his courage was useless here.
Shu Xiaolou became flustered too. She was now walking on the same path as the dead and found a large eerie hall up ahead.
The hall was structured by skulls and skeletons, and it looked unsettling no matter which angle they saw it from.
“The entrance to the next layer is in here.” Shu Xiaolou breathed a sigh of relief after locating their target. She then turned to look at Lin Jin.
Only, her eyebrows ended up jerking upward and her body froze at the sight.
Shu Xiaolou had never shown such an expression before so she truly frightened Lin Jin. Because he was very familiar with her, he knew Shu Xiaolou must have seen something incredulous to show such a reaction.
Shu Xiaolou wasn’t an ignorant spirit. Her experiences far exceeded Lin Jin’s so he couldn’t believe there was anything that could make her look like this.
That meant that it wasn’t a being that was scary or something of the sort that shocked her, but rather a situation that did—like maybe something had latched onto him, for instance.
Perhaps only that could cause Shu Xiaolou to show this expression.
Lin Jin immediately turned around but found nothing behind him. He breathed a sigh of relief at this but also felt confused. Was Shu Xiaolou toying with him?
Then, Shu Xiaolou lowered her voice to say, “Lin Jin, look at your shadow.”
As if she was afraid to startle something.
His shadow?
Lin Jin hadn’t actually looked at his shadow just now so he quickly looked down. Then, his scalp prickled.
The shadow at his feet clearly didn’t belong to him because his robes weren’t that long. He didn’t have hair as long as a woman’s either.
Lin Jin’s scalp went numb. Fortunately, he had seen enough of the world to be able to maintain his composure. He took another look to make sure his eyes weren’t deceiving him.
“Maybe this is an illusion invoked by a certain spell!” Lin Jin mumbled to himself and then summoned Xiao Huo. He also activated the blood ghost to protect himself.
However, he didn’t actually have faith in his assumption. If someone had gotten close or invoked a spell, he would have realized it. The perpetrator wouldn’t be able to deceive the blood ghost and Clear Wind either.
