“Activate!”
Someone ordered with a silent shout.
In this split second, three things occurred simultaneously.
Firstly, a black snake and a white snake abruptly manifested out of nowhere, coiled around Gu Qing Shan from his left side and quickly restrained his entire body.
Secondly, Gu Qing Shan raised his sword and thrusted it from below, towards his shoulder.
Thirdly, a small worm on his shoulder disappeared.
——–this was [Shadow Shift]!
A split second later.
An old man abruptly appeared on Gu Qing Shan’s shoulder.
The sword went into the old man’s body, twisted, then slashed again, slicing the old man in half.
“Ah— hel——-”
Only after he had died did the old man’s cry for help was heard.
From his voice, it was clear that he was the one who had ordered the attack.
Unfortunately, he could no longer utter another sound.
It was simply that fast of an attack!
Gu Qing Shan looked around only to see that there were cultivators all around him.
Gu Qing Shan raised his hand to act once again.
But he had already been fully restrained by the black and white snakes.
The two snakes then turned into a white-robed girl and a black-robed girl that both slowly entered his body.
This caused Gu Qing Shan an intense sense of discomfort that caused him to completely stop.
One other person stepped out from the crowd of cultivators and laughed: “[Twin Snakes of Impermanence], this is the 5th rank Divine Skill in reality, we will use his death to revive Elder Chang!”
Being restrained by the two girls, Gu Qing Shan stood completely still.
It was impossible for anyone to escape after being struck by [Twin Snakes of Impermanence].
The cultivators around him paused for a bit, slowly calmed down, and carefully observed his appearance.
A round of discussion sounded out.
“Take a look at this person, doesn’t he look a lot like Gu Qing Shan?”
“Hm, his eyes seemed to have been damaged”
“A bit older”
“But his overall appearance is very similar”
Everyone quickly realized this.
They shifted their eyes towards one of their comrades.
—–the younger Gu Qing Shan.
At this point, the Gu Qing Shan who was struck by [Twin Snakes of Impermanence] suddenly vanished.
He turned into a sword.
The blade of the sword was clear and cold like the waters of autumn.
The hilt of the sword was just enough to fit in the hand.
The sword’s length was a few inches longer than a normal sword, but it didn’t exude any elegance, instead filled with an unknown sense of sharpness.
The black and white girls tried to circle swiftly around the sword, only to utter a pained scream before returning to their snake forms and disappearing into the sky.
——–the Six Paths Great Mountain sword.
Thaumaturgy, [Invincible]!
Thaumaturgy, [Law Breaker]!
“That’s impossible!” someone exclaimed in shock.
Immediately after that, a certain person wielded that sword.
Gu Qing Shan.
This time, it was the real Gu Qing Shan—— with a black piece of cloth in front of his eyes.
“Gongzi, I’m a sword of Huang Quan, their Causality Divine Skill didn’t fulfill the Cause for its Effect”
“Hm, you’ve worked hard”
Gu Qing Shan replied while he put the sword behind his back and looked at a certain person.
Before he appeared, the wind had already started to pick up around the mountain.
Sensing the wind around him, the younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ looked around and understood.
——–beside himself, the others completely froze in place.
These people were simply staring at Gu Qing Shan like silent statues that didn’t make a single sound.
Gu Qing Shan looked to his younger self and said: “Thank you”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ took a step back, pointed at himself with a finger, and said: “I can’t say”
He then made a throat-slitting gesture.
The meaning of this was clear——-
I have a lock seal placed on me, can’t communicate or I’ll die.
Gu Qing Shan naturally understood this.
If this wasn’t the case, there wouldn’t be a need for him to have the parallel world Gu Qing Shan summon me, is there?
In reality, the other side only informed him a single thing through inner sight.
—–that he had to respond to the summon.
This matter was unrelated to his reality being the parallel world that had fallen into the Eternal Abyss, but a completely different parallel world entirely.
Most likely, this was the reason why he was able to talk to me without issues.
Gu Qing Shan mused for a bit: “So, it’s so strict that you can’t even reveal any information at all?”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ simply looked at him and said nothing.
Gu Qing Shan pondered a bit, then asked: “Just now you said ‘I can’t say’, so you can only say these words?”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ opened his mouth and said again, emphasizing: “I can’t say”
Although he claimed that he couldn’t say, he still said it.
This form of response and tone represented a different layer of meaning.
——affirmation.
Gu Qing Shan felt a bit glad, then asked again:
“Other than ‘I can’t say’, I guess that you definitely can’t utter the words ‘I don’t know’ either”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ froze briefly, then seemed joyful.
“Your words, I don’t know how to answer”
He said that in order to express that Gu Qing Shan guessed incorrectly.
Gu Qing Shan clapped his hands and said: “Very well, we’ll talk like this”
‘I can’t say’ expressed that he couldn’t answer, but it had an affirmative tone, which can be used to express confirmation.
‘I don’t know’ usually expressed unclearness and lack of knowledge, but during their conversation, it had gained a new layer of meaning.
—–denial.
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ didn’t trigger the seals on his body by answering ‘I can’t say’ and ‘I don’t know’.
But these two phrases could now represent affirmation and denial.
With affirmation and denial, communication could be established.
Gu Qing Shan put up one finger: “First question, you can exchange information with people from our world, correct?”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ replied: “I can’t say”
——this was affirmation.
“Is that so, then the rules should be: You can talk to us normally, but can’t expose your identity and matters regarding your world, correct?”
“I can’t say”
“Is the fighting power in your reality at the same level as these people?”
“I don’t know”
——this was denial.
In other words, they also have those with very high levels of fighting power.
“If there are stronger people, why aren’t any of them here? Is it because they’re busy fighting against the Apocalypse, or because they’ve surrendered to it?”
“I can’t say, I don’t know”
“…Understood, half of them have surrendered to the Apocalypse, the other half are still fighting against it, is that right?”
“I can’t say”
“Does your reality hold nothing but hostility towards us?”
“I can’t say, I don’t know, I can’t say, I don’t know”
“…It’s very complicated and can’t be explained in a few words, correct?”
“I can’t say”
“Got it. Now I want to know, other than killing me who was sent by the Abyss, you have other orders as well, correct?”
“I can’t say”
“This place is the site of inheritance, there are only three things that could be done here. Firstly, to obtain the God of Death’s inheritance; secondly, to destroy the God of Death’s inheritance; and thirdly, to destroy the portion of the Abyss that’s here—– did you come here to destroy the portion of the Abyss?”
“I don’t know”
“Did you come to destroy the God of Death’s inheritance?”
“I don’t know”
“So, you wanted to obtain the God of Death’s inheritance in this place. In other words, your side had also sent people up that mountain, correct?”
“I can’t say”
“The people that were sent out have to be stronger than the two who were originally here to receive the inheritance, correct?”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ pondered for a bit, then replied: “I can’t say”
“What’s the battle situation? Have they already engaged in combat?”
“I can’t say”
Gu Qing Shan’s heart turned heavy.
They’ve already engaged in combat.
Lin is heavily injured while Anna is exhausted, if they had to fight enemies from a parallel world, wouldn’t that be sure-death?
Gu Qing Shan didn’t ask anything else and just said: “Go—— run for your life, leave the rest to me”
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ looked at him, then took out a formation plate and activated it.
The two of them clasped their fists towards each other.
The younger ‘Gu Qing Shan’ was enveloped by the light of the formation and vanished from Gu Qing Shan’s sight.
Right after he disappeared, Gu Qing Shan’s killing intent boiled.
The slow breeze around the mountain suddenly turned into an intense sword-infused wind that swept across the ground.
Every cultivator within the sword-infused wind, exploded into masses of blood then were slowly erased by the rampaging storm.
—–it turns out that right after he used [Shadow Shift], Gu Qing Shan had turned back into human form and silently activated a Taiyi sword array.
These cultivators weren’t very strong at all, the only notable person was the leading Elder, at Paragon realm like he was.
That was why Gu Qing Shan had asked his younger self where their reality’s truly strong people had gone.
Gu Qing Shan turned around and scanned the black mountain with his inner sight.
——–that place was the God of Death’s mountain of inheritance. It was towering, faraway, and vast.
Scaling the mountain would surely require him to spend a lot of effort, face a lot of danger, and cost a lot of time in order to reach Anna and Lin.
But there was no time for that.
Anna and Lin were already engaged in battle with enemies that were stronger than they were.
Gu Qing Shan didn’t waste time to hesitate and drew the Earth sword from the void of space.
The Earth sword’s heavy mountainous voice resounded, asking him: 「 There isn’t enough time to slowly search for them, what do you want to do? 」
“[Sanctuary]” Gu Qing Shan replied.
「 How many times? 」the Earth sword asked.
[Sanctuary] was the Earth sword’s Thaumaturgy that allowed the Earth sword to adjust the weight of its strike when attacking an enemy, the weight can be adjusted to be anywhere from 2-fold to 1001-fold the enemy’s weight.
“1001 times” Gu Qing Shan triggered his sword seal and muttered: “If the mountain doesn’t come to me, I’ll just level the mountain”
