Chapter 1270: Weird!
To most cultivators, the Ancient Realm was just another level. By walking the ancient path, one could follow in the footsteps of their ancestors, they would search the techniques they possessed to find... the most original strand of Essence that was hidden within them.
By extinguis.h.i.+ng one Soul Lamp after another, one could sink further and further into one’s own self, into the depths of one"s cultivation base....
In the end, in the great circle of the Ancient Realm, when Essence began to stir and life force thrived, Dao Tribulation would occur. One could tread the Dao path and enter... the Dao Realm, to become a truly almighty figure in the Mountain and Sea Realm.
During that process, each lamp that was extinguished was a deadly crisis, which made the Ancient Realm very difficult.
Meng Hao had originally a.s.sumed that his journey through the Ancient Realm would be the same. He would rely on his cultivation base to reduce the level of difficulty and make things much easier. But now he understood what the Ancient Realm meant to an Allheaven Dao Immortal... it was a truly deadly situation.
The difficulty level involved was many times greater than that of the ordinary Ancient Realm. Generally speaking, when it came to the deadly act of extinguis.h.i.+ng Soul Lamps, the success rate was about fifty percent. When it came to Allheaven Dao Immortals though, it could be considered more like ten percent!
Allheaven Dao Immortals were vastly more powerful, and their tribulation was far more deadly.
Meng Hao took all these things which he had been thinking about and buried them in his heart as he sped forward. In the blink of an eye, he was closing in on the seething clouds.
Even as he neared, the clouds churned as a figure emerged from within them. It was a person who wore ancient clothing, and yet... completely lacked any facial features!
It was... a faceless man!
He moved with incredible speed as he closed in on Meng Hao, performing an incantation gesture at the same time. Rumbling could be heard from the clouds, transforming the energy of Heaven and Earth into numerous stone fragments which spun toward Meng Hao. The faceless man brimmed with towering killing intent, as if Meng Hao were an archenemy he could not live under the same sky with, as if he would not rest until one of them was dead.
Meng Hao’s eyes flickered with killing intent as the faceless man bore down on him. He didn’t slow down at all, but instead barrelled forward. When the stone fragments. .h.i.t him, they shattered, and Meng Hao shot like a meteor into the faceless man.
“DIE!” he growled, grabbing the faceless man’s throat and crus.h.i.+ng it. A bang could be heard as the faceless man exploded into pieces. However, there was no flesh and blood; instead, he faded away into streams of mist that then surged back into the cloud ma.s.s.
Next, three more faceless men flew out. When their cultivation base power emanated out, astonis.h.i.+ngly, it was in the great circle of the Ancient Realm. Their attacks caused the starry sky to tremble, and the clouds to churn. However, Meng Hao’s only response was a cold snort as he advanced, waving his sleeve, his cultivation base surging.
The three faceless men collapsed into pieces, completely incapable of resisting Meng Hao at all. However, an unsightly expression could be seen on Meng Hao’s face. He didn"t look happy at all, and the reason was... he had just begun the tribulation, and was already facing a humanoid tribulation of the great circle of the Ancient Realm. As for what would be coming later... he could only imagine.
What caused his heart to sink even further was that there was an incredible pressure pus.h.i.+ng at him from behind. Apparently, even if he didn"t want to try to transcend the tribulation, and attempted to flee, that pressure would prevent him from doing so.
“I’m... being forced to face the tribulation....” he murmured. He rotated his cultivation base again, and rumbling sounds could be heard as he shot toward the clouds. Next, six faceless men appeared, and this time, they weren’t in the great circle of the Ancient Realm, but rather, appeared to be closer to the Quasi-Dao Realm.
They moved so fast they looked like lightning bolts as they closed in on Meng Hao.
“Scram!” Meng Hao barked. The sound of his voice exploded out, causing the six lightning-like figures to explode, and causing even the clouds to churn.
These opponents didn"t count for much to Meng Hao, and his eyes burned like fire as he continued to press on.
“You don’t have to force me to try to transcend this tribulation.... I"ve been looking forward to it for a long time!” He took another step forward, causing the starry sky to shudder, and the roaring in the clouds to grow more intense.
At the moment, countless members of the Meng Clan were down in the ancestral mansion, eyes glued to the scene which was playing out, looks of shock written on their faces.
That was especially true of the five Patriarchs, whose eyes were wide as they watched.
“Ordinary Ancient Tribulation sends lightning out of the clouds, or perhaps five elements magic. It isn’t until the very end that the humanoid tribulation comes....”
“If your cultivation base is high enough, and you seize the moment, you might not even have to wait for those terrifying humanoid creatures to appear before opening the Door of the Ancient Realm....”
“But in this Ancient Tribulation, the humanoid figures appeared at the very beginning. How could you possibly transcend this...?” The five Patriarchs couldn’t help but share a shocked glance with each other.
Meng Hao’s grandmother was trembling from extreme anxiety. Unfortunately, there was no way for her to help Meng Hao; she could only look on as he tried to transcend the tribulation, her heart stinging as if from the stabs of a knife.
Behind her were Meng Hao’s granduncles, uncles and aunts, and all of them looked incredibly nervous.
Although not everyone in the Meng Clan felt worried for Meng Hao like his direct relatives, they were all shocked. Meng Hao had now closed about twenty percent of the distance to the clouds, and as he was speeding along, more roaring could be heard as, shockingly, twelve figures shot out at top speed.
Those twelves figures... were in the Quasi-Dao Realm!!
Meng Hao’s heart sank further.
“Twelve Quasi-Dao. Will the next group have twenty-four 1-Essence Dao Realm enemies? Then forty-eight 2-Essences? Ninety-six... Dao Lords.... One hundred and ninety-two 4-Essences? Then four hundred 5-Essences. Eight hundred Dao Sovereigns....?” As Meng Hao followed this train of thought, his scalp began to go numb.
“Impossible. This tribulation comes from the Mountain and Sea Realm, and the will of the Mountain and Sea Realm cannot be interfered with. Even I, the future Lord of the Mountain and Sea Realm, must face this tribulation and experience this life-or-death struggle. But there’s no way that eight hundred Dao Sovereigns are going to come out....” Face pale, Meng Hao gritted his teeth and shot forward to begin fighting with the twelve Quasi-Dao enemies.
He transformed into an azure roc which sped forward. Immediately, the Quasi-Dao enemies began to fall apart, and yet they didn"t dissipate, but instead, self-detonated!
Shocking booms rang out, and a fierce expression could be seen on Meng Hao’s face as he shot off into the distance in an azure flash. A Quasi-Dao self-detonation creates a destructive force that would cause even Dao Lords to frown. Meng Hao swished his sleeve, causing the force to fade away. Although it looked like he didn’t need to use much cultivation base power, Meng Hao was well aware that if he kept going... he wouldn’t be able to get very far through the clouds.
“I can"t let these clouds continue to grow. I need to get to the Door of the Ancient Realm as quickly as possible, that’s my only chance!” Meng Hao clenched his jaw. Then, the azure roc threw its head back and roared. Meng Hao transformed into an azure beam that sped into the clouds, rocketing toward the Door of the Ancient Realm.
However, before he could get very far, numerous cold snorts could be heard echoing around him. Astonis.h.i.+ngly... four faceless Dao Realm enemies appeared!
Those four faceless men were all 1-Essence cultivators, but as soon as Meng Hao laid eyes on them, his eyes glittered, and he breathed a sigh of relief.
“Only four, huh...?”
As the four faceless men closed in, he clenched his right hand and punched out. The starry sky shook, and a ma.s.sive windstorm swept out, instantly shattering the four Dao Realm enemies.
As they fell to pieces, Meng Hao suddenly felt a cold chill on his spine. Without the slightest hesitation, he shot forward. However, the coldness remained at his back, almost as if... there were someone behind him, breathing down his neck.
Meng Hao sent his divine sense out, but didn’t see anyone. But then, his face fell. Gritting his teeth, he spun around, and when he did, his scalp felt like it would explode. Standing there right behind him, almost touching his face, was... a white-robed woman.
She had long hair, pale skin, and listless eyes that stared dead at Meng Hao. Everything was very quiet; this woman’s sudden appearance on the scene was very strange. Why couldn’t he see her with divine sense?
Meng Hao’s pupils constricted, and just when he was about to back up, the woman suddenly reached out and grabbed him. She moved so quickly that he couldn"t dodge, and in the briefest of moments, her hand closed around his arm. Then she suddenly began to pull him further into the clouds.
Meng Hao’s face flickered. The place where the woman held his arm felt ice cold, and pulses of some sort of aura of decay were boring into him. Apparently that aura wished to corrode his entire body away.
Most shocking of all was that, as the woman dragged him along, the clouds up ahead transformed into a huge mouth, which was apparently where the woman was dragging him.
A sensation of deadly crisis rose up inside of Meng Hao, and he had the intense feeling that if the cloud mouth swallowed him up, he would be completely dead in spirit and body!
“Scram!” he shouted, causing the Paragon Bridge to erupt with power. An amorphous bridge appeared outside of him, and he wrenched himself free from the woman’s grasp, and fell back.
The white-robed woman looked at the Paragon Bridge behind Meng Hao, and laughed. The laughter contained something completely blood-chilling about it as it echoed out.
Meng Hao could sense how terrifying this Ancient Tribulation was, but he couldn"t flee. Gritting his teeth, he continued to speed in the direction he remembered the Door of the Ancient Realm being.
“Faster. Faster. Must go faster....” Meng Hao knew that his only chance to transcend the tribulation was to avoid spending a lot of time fighting in the clouds.
Just as he began to speed forward, four more figures appeared, figures that were far more powerful than the four he had fought moments ago.
2-Essences Dao Realm enemies!