"I know him. He is Duan Lang, who has been ranked thirteenth on the Life and Death Realm King Warrior-to-be list. Amongst everyone else, he enjoys the kind of plays that cause other people inconvenience the most. Last time when the gate opened to the life and death secret realm, many people had to pay a big price because of his tricks."The speaker was a young man in his thirties, but his real age would probably be in the fifties. Speaking of which, he was in that last secret realm as well. Perhaps he had personally been a victim of Duan Lang"s tricks or witnessed some.
"This Duan Lang is so evil! His power has reached second level of Life and Death Challenge, so why would he still try to trick us? How despicable!"
"Let"s join forces and break this qi wall then. The bridge would stop people from pa.s.sing by, but would it stop qi power? I hope not." Someone suggested.
"Yeah! Let"s use qi power to attack from afar. We have so many people on our side. Let"s just spend some time and break this wall first."
Hearing him, everyone"s eyes brightened.
"It won"t work." Ye Chen shook his head.
"No? Have you even tried?" These people turned around and looked at him.
"The life and death bridge will not allow anything no matter if it were people or energy. The stone statues on both sides will also attack energy and attacks. All the attacks will not land on the wall." As he spoke, Ye Chen waved his hand in the air and a beam of qi flow shot out.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Just as this qi flow reached the bridge, both stone statues opened their big mouths and shot out beams of light to destroy the power.
"What? Not even qi flow can make it through?"
"d.a.m.n it! This Duan Lang is so evil!"
"It seems like we will have to go search for other Life and Death Bridges unless a powerful half step king warrior comes to help us, since only they would have the power to destroy what Duan Lang has done."
"Let"s go! Don"t waste your time here."
Some of the people were planning to leave.
"No need to search for another bridge. This qi wall…I can break it."
It was indeed Ye Chen who said those words. He started walking toward the bridge, and as he walked onto the bridge, the two stone statues started to attack him. But, these light beams did not manage to get close to him before being shattered completely.
"Such a fast sword speed!"
Who in the present was not a martial genius? They were all half step king warriors. Although they could not discern Ye Chen"s sword speed, they could at least tell his style as he destroyed the first wave of attacks.
Soon, he arrived at the qi wall and threw out a sword attack directly without any effort.
Shoo!
On the qi wall, a s.h.i.+ny sword mark flashed through and it was destroyed in the next second.
"What a scary sword artist! His cultivation is only at high level half step king warrior stage, so how could he have this monstrous an attacking power?"
Everyone was shocked. Duan Lang himself was at second level Life and Death challenge second level. The qi wall would at least be super powerful and hard to break through even through it might not be the same as his actual power.
The qi wall"s position was very interesting, perfectly away from the stone statue"s attacks. Waiting until he had shattered the qi wall, Ye Chen took a step forward. At that moment, the stone statues suddenly reactivated and started to attack him. If it were someone else, they would be capable of breaking through the qi wall but would not have the time to do so, because just as they would be attacking the qi wall, the stone statues on the other side would be attacking them as well.
In other words, on reaching the center of the life and death bridge, the warrior would be attacked from both sides. If the warrior decided to back out, he or she would be attacked once again.
After getting through the bridge easily, Ye Chen did not even look back before entering the inner areas. As for the people after him, they would have to use their own power to get through.
…
In the inner areas, the life and death evil spirits seemed to increase in number drastically. It would be lucky to run into one of them after a couple of days in the outer area, but Ye Chen was able to run into one each day in the inner areas.
Pop!
After killing a wild cow evil spirit, Ye Chen shook his head because there was still no life and death stone inside.
"No matter what, each time the secret realm is opened, half of the people would not be able to get any life and death stones. People here would need to have more than just power, and also some luck. Without luck, even if they managed to kill fifty different evil spirits, it would not be as good as one for the lucky warriors."
"Luckily, I will be able to stay for three months" worth of time in this realm, and it has only been a couple of days. I am not in a hurry."
Ye Chen was not in a hurry. Even if he did not find any life and death stones inside the inner areas, there would still be the core area. The chances of getting life and death stones would increase drastically there.
While Ye Chen was killing evil spirits, the others were not resting either. There were more than one hundred and fifty people here, approaching two hundred in number. More than half of them would be able to get into the inner areas, which would be around eighty of them. If it were not for the fact that the inner area was big enough, Ye Chen perhaps would be able to run into these people.
…
Swoos.h.!.+
The pale white blade light sliced through the sky. It only took one blade attack to slice the tiger evil spirit in half. The spirit was extremely powerful. Even after being attacked by the blade, it did not disappear at all. Instead, it twisted its body and started to attack Dugu Jue.
"Die!"
Dugu Jue with white hair had a cold look on his face while the long blade of his brushed through the head of that spirit.
Boom!
The spirit was shattered immediately, its body disappearing into the air. And as it disappeared, one stone wrapped in a bicolored qi flow appeared and floated in the air.
"Life and Death Stone!" Dugu Jue"s cold eyes suddenly brightened.
Even as the No.1 martial genius of the Dugu Family, Dugu Jue did not have as many Zhen yuan crystals as Ye Chen, but there were indeed life and death king warriors inside his family. If he wanted some for training, it would be a small thing for him to ask. And with the Zhen yuan crystals and his natural talent, he was now at top rank half step king warrior realm. As long as he was not too unlucky, he would be able to reach the first level of life and death challenge with one life and death stone for sure.
"Even then, my cultivation would not be as far as theirs."
In his mind, "they" were the top warriors that were about to become a true life and death realm warriors.
On the other side…
"Haha! My luck is not bad! After killing twelve life and death evil spirits, I have managed to get one stone! With the evil spirit body, once I reach the first chamber, who would have the ability to oppress me?" Chu Zhongtian was able to fuse the life and death stone with his body and feel clearly that the stone was helping him clear his mind. It was a very slow but stable effect.
"No. Those older generation of martial geniuses are not enough for me to worry yet. I will beat them one day for sure, but Dugu Jue, Dantai Mingyue, Liu Wujian, and Jiang Tian, they would not be hard to mess with. If they manage to get a higher cultivation than me, then the chance of me winning would be extremely small."
Chu Zhongtian did not have enough comprehensive ability himself, and he might even be at the bottom amongst the people who entered life and death secret realm. Therefore, he thought that only one life and death stone would not be enough. It would be safer for him to reach level three before slowing down.
Within a blink of an eye, twenty years had gone by.
During this period of time, half of the people who had entered the inner areas managed to get a life and death stone. All of them were trying to increase their mental power, and some of them had even managed to improve their level.
What about Ye Chen"s luck then?
It was very bad to be fair!
After entering the inner areas, he had killed twenty-five evil spirits and still had not gotten one life and death stone yet.
"Two life and death evil spirits! I hope luck is in my favor this time."
On this day, he ran into two of them together, which was not something that had happened before. After all, life and death evil spirits normally traveled alone.
"Go!"
His broken blood sword shot out of its scabbard and formed into thirty-three sword shadows before shooting out again.
Shoo! Shoo! Shoo! Shoo!
With Ye Chen"s Defensive sword spell, the two spirits did not manage to do anything before being shattered completely.
"There it is!" Ye Chen squinted his eyes.
A life and death stone floated up after one of them disappeared, wrapped around with two types of qi.
Holding onto the stone, Ye Chen examined it carefully. He could sense that once soul power got close to it, there was an interesting wave of feeling that came rus.h.i.+ng back in return. It was as if he had been experiencing life and death over and over again, his mental state elevating a little each time.
He pushed his Zhen yuan and the stone naturally infused into his body. He quickly realized that a hint of life and death qi leaked out of his body. But if one did not look carefully, it would be hard to notice.
"This qi is coming from the stone, and it would be hard to hide away from people. I just wish there would not be people stupid enough to look for trouble."
Ye Chen understood almost within the second that even though the stone had been fused into his body, it would be possible to get stolen. As long as one killed the warrior, then the stone would be exposed.
After half a month, some people had already managed to get a second one.
Although Ye Chen did not get a second one, the stone inside his body had been burnt out completely. As a consequence, his mental power level had increased to the first level of life and death challenge.
The first level had doubled his Zhen yuan. When he was at top rank half step king warrior level, his Zhen yuan allowed him to use his Evil Shattering sword ten times. But right now, he could use it twenty times. Even the quality of the Zhen yuan had ameliorated drastically, seeming way purer than before.
Besides that, he sensed that his understanding of life and death had improved as well, and the usage of his Zhen yuan seemed to be smoother.
The mysterious life and death challenge would not be an easy thing to go through, since one would have to try and understand the meaning of life and death.
"The gap between high rank and top rank half step king warriors is not a small one. In the condition where both warriors have similar comprehensive ability, the latter would be able to beat the former without any effort. With my power now, I wonder how much of a confidence would I have in beating them."
Last time when he was fighting the demi demon king, Ye Chen used all of his top attacks but still could not do anything to his opponent. None of his attacks hurt the other even slightly, and the gap was almost impossible to be described with words.