Beyond the Timescape

Chapter 859: In the Depths of the Marsh

The image transmitted to Xu Qing by Little Shadow was shocking beyond comparison.

3,000 meters down in the muck was an absolutely spectacular cave. From the perspective of the cave, the muck was the sky. And the cave itself was like an isolated, standalone world. Everything was dark, but it was possible to see wisps of gray fog floating everywhere.

However, that wasn’t what had Xu Qing’s head spinning. What shook him to the core was the gigantic shrine floating in the middle of the cave. [1]

The shrine took up about ten percent of the entire space in the world of the cave. It was roughly rectangular, such that it initially could be taken to be a coffin.

Rotten ribbons hung down from it, which swayed back and forth like tentacles. The long ones descended into the darkness below, while the short ones were still some 3,000 meters in length.

The shrine was dark gold, but didn’t shine at all, as if it were completely corroded. It seemed to have existed for such a long time that it was completely infused with ancientness.

There was something terrifying enshrined within. It was a creature that resembled a spider. It had dark golden spots all over it, a male head, and sixteen legs. A tree branch had been stabbed into its forehead. Though the branch was old and faded, to Xu Qing, looking at it felt like looking at a sun. Four long ice spears pierced into the body of the spider, firmly locking it into place in the shrine. Xu Qing’s keen senses could detect moon fluctuations coming from all four spears. There was more. There were eight clay pots on eight of the terrifying entity’s sixteen legs. All of them exuded intense pressure that contained the aura of a god of stars.

This terrifying entity had been sealed to death! This shrine really was a coffin! It gave off the sensation of both storage and sealing.

Looking closely, it was also possible to see a host of sealing marks carved into the exterior of the shrine. Every one seemed to pulse with a godly sensation.

Xu Qing was shaken. However, everything up to this point was only part of the whole. In fact, it could barely be considered half.

What was the most shocking of all was... what was beneath the shrine. Underneath the shrine in the void of this cave world, where the mist swirled, there was something as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns. It was... a gigantic mountain made of gray-colored bone ash!

It was slightly smaller than the shrine, but not by much.

The mountain of bone ash emitted a constant stream of gray fog. Obviously, this was the source of the fog in the Ninedawns Forbidden Lands. [2]

It was hard to imagine exactly what kind of entity could create a pile of bone ash like this after dying. Surrounding the main pile were nine smaller mountains.

To be more precise, they weren’t actually mountains. They were nine skulls! They looked almost like the skulls of dragons, being completely vicious and pulsing with a sensation of ancient wildlands. They had no flesh on them, but from the gaping maws, it was possible to sense how furious and insane they had been in life. They pulsed with an ancient feeling, while at the same time, the sensation of a sealing was very strong.

The vision ended there.

Back on the marshy surface of the Ninedawns Forbidden Lands, Xu Qing shivered, coughed up nine mouthfuls of blood, and staggered backward. Although he had only seen the image as sent to him by Little Shadow, it was still difficult for him to sustain.

As for Little Shadow... it gave off no fluctuations at all, making it impossible to tell if it was alive or dead.

At the moment, Xu Qing wasn’t inclined to worry about Little Shadow. His expression flickered as he looked at the ground and pondered what he had just seen. He was already speculating like wild.

That shrine is itself a sealing mark. And the spider inside of it is a god! īt has the power of the three gods of sun, moon, and star on it. īt was suppressed by those three, but still needs additional sealing techniques to deal with. How formidable. And then there’s that pile of bone ash under the shrine....

Xu Qing took a deep breath. He wasn’t sure who that bone ash came from, but the nine skulls made him think of a name.

“Ninedawns?”

Xu Qing wasn’t sure. Based on the information he’d studied, the ninedawns resembled something with nine lanterns, which wasn’t exactly what he had seen just now. Xu Qing was starting to get the feeling that the information circulating about the Ninedawns Forbidden Lands was largely fictitious. That said, he wasn’t sure what the truth really was.

Whether or not that thing is a ninedawns, the fact that it’s here means it’s important. If it is a ninedawns, and the ninedawns is the national animal of the Firemoons, and has special significance, then what is it doing imprisoned down there? And why is it being sealed even though it’s obviously dead?

There was a scaffolding of sealing going on here. Three gods had sealed some unknown god, and that unknown god was sealing the pile of bone ash and the nine skulls.

There had to be some karma at play, but Xu Qing wasn’t sure what it could be. Frowning, he checked the bronze incense burner.

It’s going to burn out soon....

Thanks to Little Shadow’s work, it was now clear that the area 3,000 meters below the marshy surface was an important location in the Ninedawns Forbidden Lands.

And now Xu Qing knew where the gray fog came from. As far as he was concerned, there weren’t many options to pick from.

Maybe the key to getting out of here lies in the source of the gray fog. I wonder what would happen if I got some of that bone ash... or maybe one of those nine skulls....

It seemed like a completely crazy idea.

Xu Qing mulled it over briefly, then checked his bag of holding.

There’s another possibility that might help me last a bit longer here....

Xu Qing took out a piece of Crimson Mother’s flesh and tossed it into the incense burner. The incense burner vibrated, then more smoke spilled out of it. However, in this environment, the only result was that the breakdown of the incense burner slowed. And a side-effect was that the fog beyond the smoke grew thicker.

Again, it’s not a long-term solution. The more godly power I use, the stronger the confinement around me.

Xu Qing looked at the incense burner and sighed.

Thanks to the barrier created by the smoke, his godsource power had recovered to a degree. After doing some time calculations, he thought back to what he had seen just now.

The mountain of bone ash is beneath the shrine, so it won’t be easy to reach. The nine skulls, though, are further away from the shrine....

Xu Qing’s eyes glittered with determination and a bit of craziness. Looking at the marshy land beneath his feet, he unhesitatingly put away the surviving remnants of the incense burner.

As the gray fog swept toward him, his godpower surged, and he sank down into the muck. The instant he was submerged, he felt intense pain. It was a feeling like corrosion, whether from the muck or the fog. And the invasion corroded both his body and his soul.

Xu Qing forced himself to endure. With the help of his cultivation base and godsource, he dropped down. In the blink of an eye, he was at the 300-meter depth. The pain and corrosion were terrifying, and there were parts of Xu Qing’s flesh that had simply disappeared.

But he kept speeding downward. 600 meters. 900 meters.... When he reached the 1,200-meter depth, he looked like hardly more than a skeleton. Gritting his teeth, he dropped down another 300 meters. He was now at 1,500 meters.

That was his limit. His body was completely rotted away, and his soul was heavily damaged. In that critical moment, Xu Qing took out a piece of Crimson Mother’s flesh, put it in his mouth, and wolfed it down. The moment he did, something like the fire of a sun erupted in his belly. As it rippled through him, godsource proliferated within him.

His emaciated form nearly collapsed. Truth be told, in any other situation, directly eating some of Crimson Mother’s flesh like that would cause Xu Qing to crumble to pieces. That was why he hadn’t done so during the fighting with Master Stillwinter. But in this regard, the force of expulsion against godly things here plus the gray fog and the muck, were all helping Xu Qing. It was similar to how placing an overfull balloon under water could prevent it from popping.

With the addition of Crimson Mother’s flesh, he could continue a bit longer. Taking advantage of the new burst of force, he continued down.

1,800 meters. 2,100 meters. 2,400 meters. Around that time, the extra energy provided by Crimson Mother’s flesh was almost gone. 2,700 meters was another limit.

Xu Qing knew that he couldn’t just keep devouring Crimson Mother’s flesh. Even considering the environment, his body couldn’t take that for long. Extending his nearly vanished right hand in the direction of the nearest skull, he then closed his hand into a fist. That grasping gesture caused a well to appear. It was hard to say if it was illusory or corporeal, but that didn’t matter.

Unfortunately... that area was sealed, plus, he was quite a distance away. Therefore, all Fishing the Moon in the Well did was cause some ripples.

Xu Qing grasped nothing!

The fishing failed!

Xu Qing’s body was truly starting to melt away now. It was as if the muck was devouring him. But then a life lamp flew out and turned into a sundial. It activated, and the power of time erupted out.

Time reversed. Xu Qing vanished. When he reappeared, he was still in the muck. But instead of being at a depth of 2,700 meters, he was only at 300 meters. The environment affected everything here; even the time power of the sundial.

Without any hesitation, Xu Qing shot up. When he burst out of the muck, blood sprayed out of his mouth. His body was in really bad shape. He quickly took out the incense burner to float overhead.

Thanks to the barrier created by the incense burner, he could sit down cross-legged and focus completely on recovery.

Time passed. Every time the incense burner was about to burn out, Xu Qing would toss in a piece of Crimson Mother’s flesh to keep it going. It was an extravagant waste, but it kept the fog at bay.

Unfortunately... he was out of options. It didn’t matter that his current actions were like drinking poison in the hope of quenching one’s thirst. There was nothing else he could do.

Half a day later, he opened his eyes. His injuries weren’t completely gone, but his godsource was on the way to recovery. His soul threads were also lively again thanks to consuming some of Crimson Mother’s flesh.

His heart ached at how much he had wasted. But all he could do was suppress that pain and continue focusing on recovery.

A day passed.

When Xu Qing opened his eyes again, his godly power was about half restored. Looking down at the muck, he thought back to his earlier failure.

There’s one more option... that could theoretically work!

1. This is the same word for shrine that has appeared a few times. It contains the character for ‘god’ in it. Here’s a link to the same pictures I’ve shared twice before for this type of shrine. ☜

2. In Chinese, the same character can mean both “ash” and “gray” depending on various factors. Because of this, I originally translated the gray fog as “ashy fog” or “ash fog” for a few chapters. However, given the full context of this story arc (including things from upcoming chapters), the correct interpretation for the fog is that it’s gray. A comparable example in English is the word orange. It could mean the fruit or the color, or both. If you read a story and it had ‘orange-colored fog,’ you wouldn’t necessarily jump to the conclusion that the fog was coming from an orange fruit. But if you later found out it did indeed come from an orange fruit, it would make sense. ☜