Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Murong Long was in a tight corner. His freely flowing hair smelled burnt, the spiritual suit he wore a mess.
Doing nothing but staring down after flying into the air, he was waiting for Jiang Chen to appear. Once he saw the latter, he would kill him directly.
Everything had been burned on the hill, and the fire was gradually extinguishing, but still, Jiang Chen hadn’t appeared.
“It was a tactical formation of an indiscriminate attack. He must be dead.”
“Probably. He intended to die along with Murong Long.”
“Anyhow, Murong Long is one of the top three of the Dragon Rise List. How would he have been killed so easily?”
Ying Wushuang’s skin was as smooth as jade. In the ruddy firelight, she looked as if she was wearing clothes made of sunlight.
Standing closest to the hill, she was staring at it intently.
What would he do?
Ying Wushuang was sure that Jiang Chen wouldn’t choose to die with his rival.
Maybe in the others’ opinions, it would be an acceptable result as long as Murong Long also died, but as well as she knew Jiang Chen, he wouldn’t want to die even if Li Nanxing, Su Xing, and Murong Long died with him.
However, there could have been an accident. The temperature on the hill had been high enough to melt darksteel. It wouldn’t be easy to survive it.
After the fire had been extinguished, the ground on the hill was burned black. Even the corpses had been burned into ashes.
She didn’t see Jiang Chen. He might have been turned into ash, too.
Nobody was sure, even Murong Long.
“Did you see him leave?” Murong Long asked his team, who had surrounded the hill.
“No. We’re sure no one left the area.” The team was affirmative.
So there was only one possibility—Jiang Chen was still on the hill.
Murong Long descended a little and searched every corner with his holy awareness, but since he found nothing, he started to gaze at the ashes that had once been corpses.
Under the terribly high temperature, they had turned into small piles of ashes. It was impossible to tell the original outlines and less impossible still to tell whether they had been humans or beasts.
“Did he really burn himself to death?” Murong Long doubted.
He thought Jiang Chen was foolish, but he had never imagined the latter was that foolish.
Just then, a great disturbance was created in the temporary imperial palace. Radiances of treasure surged from there.
Ten-odd radiances of treasure connected the sky with the ground, which was more impressing than what had happened in the Martial Imperial City.
Undoubtedly, this scene could be observed from every corner of the secret treasure.
“I assume it’s because the fierce beasts left and the treasure is free of their evil spirits!”
“Let’s not waste anymore time. Otherwise, others will take advantage of our hard work, and we’ll get nothing!”
People didn’t care about what had happened to Jiang Chen anymore. They hurried to find the treasure in the mountains, as did Murong Long. He landed in the center area with his team again.
Ying Wushuang was still over the hill, waiting for Jiang Chen to show up, but several minutes had passed and there was still no trace of him. She assumed Jiang Chen didn’t want the other members of the Holy Sword Society to suffer with him, so she led the team to fly to the edges of the mountains.
There must have been extremely valuable treasure in the temporary imperial palace, but how could she compete with those strong people? She had to settle for something less valuable.
As for Jiang Chen, while the others were busy locating him, he had started treasure seeking.
With the genuine phoenix blood, he was fearless of flames. He had managed to leave with the aid of the tactical formation.
By that time, he was in a spacious hall. He put everything that looked like treasure into the jade bracelet, but there were few things in this grand palace that could be called treasure.
How?
Most importantly, he didn’t see any crystals of fire dragon or holy dragon balls, which were the two most popular valuables in the secret treasure. Wherever there was treasure, these two things would be found.
Since he hadn’t seen them, it meant he hadn’t reached the part with treasure.
Something isn’t right!
Jiang Chen released his holy awareness and walked along the walls.
He soon found something, standing behind a big screen used to separate spaces.
Before him was a round table and four chairs, all made of first-class wood.
Although many years had passed, they still smelled fragrant.
Jiang Chen frowned. He grabbed the edge of the table and tried to lift it, but the wooden table didn’t move, as if it had taken root.
As I expected.
Smiling complacently, Jiang Chen started to work on the table.
Soon, he pushed the table clockwise, and with great effort, the table started to turn. He heard gears moving under his feet.
Then a door opened in the ground and a staircase leading down appeared.
Jiang Chen was surprised. He had walked back and forth over there a few times without discovering the staircase.
He released his holy awareness down, but the same as before, it was absorbed by the walls.
According to his experience, the Dragon Dynasty hadn’t left anything damaging in the treasure.
Still, he wouldn’t let his guard down. He walked down carefully.
Leading underground, the staircase had 100 steps. When Jiang Chen stepped off the last stair, before him was only darkness, which he had expected.
And he could hear wind blowing, which meant it was spacious here.
He created a ball of fire to float five yards in front of him, helping him explore the way.
He was situated in a long passage. There were excellent frescoes on the walls whose ornamental value hadn’t been damaged by the muted colors.
Jiang Chen was appreciating these frescoes as he advanced.
He soon had a shocking finding.
It turned out that the whole small world hadn’t been built for the elimination of the dynasty.
It had already existed in the prime of the Dragon Dynasty and been used as a secondary palace.
At the time of its elimination, the dynasty had moved all kinds of treasure here and hid it everywhere.
“What did I say? It’s so weird to build so many houses just to hide treasure. And this place doesn’t look like an imperial mausoleum at all,” said Jiang Chen.
“What did I say? It’s so weird to build so many houses just to hide treasure. And this place doesn’t look like an imperial mausoleum at all.”
Jiang Chen’s hair stood on end as a miserable voice repeated his words.
Most importantly, it had come from behind him, the voice less than a yard away from him. He could even feel its chilling breath.
Jiang Chen drew his sword out as quickly as possible and struck behind him.
But he hit nothing. Nothing was there.
“What’s wrong? Was it an illusion?” Jiang Chen didn’t understand. He moved the fire ball back in front of him, but still, he didn’t see anything.
“What’s wrong? Was it an illusion?”
However, the voice came again, and closer, as if it was right behind his back.
Jiang Chen switched on the armor of thunder. Covered in electricity, he looked brighter than a fireball.
Tss! Tss!
Almost at the same time, Jiang Chen heard something being shocked by electricity right behind him.
When he looked back, he saw a figure jump onto the wall, fleeing rapidly.
A spiritual monkey?
Pleasantly surprised, Jiang Chen relaxed.
This kind of spiritual animals wasn’t very dangerous. They were common in places with buried treasure.
Wherever there were spiritual monkeys, there was valuable treasure. Mimicking human voices was one of the characteristics of spiritual monkeys.
Almost without hesitation, Jiang Chen followed it as quickly as he could, but the spiritual monkey ran faster. Moving here and there, its body didn’t look real at all.
It disappeared at the end of the passage, and Jiang Chen found himself located in a wider space.
He was petrified when he confirmed what he was seeing.
