Chapter 257: The Key!

Chapter 257: The Key!

After destroying that fake version of himself, he hadn’t gained any merit. This was unexpected.

Not only that, he had a faint, unsettling feeling that thing from earlier... might not have actually existed at all. It was a very strange sensation.

At this time, the three of them all wore solemn expressions, and Feng Jiu and Bai Hongtu were both shaken by what had just happened. Someone had silently followed them without a trace!

Suddenly, Bai Hongtu frowned, forming a hand seal and striking it toward Feng Jiu. From the corner of her eye, Feng Jiu caught this, and her willow brows shot up.

This pretty boy really holds a grudge!?

But she quickly realized the reason, as behind her came a sizzling sound. She turned to look and saw a young girl who looked

exactly

like herself. A blast of fire magic had struck the girl, sending white smoke curling from her body.

Feng Jiu shuddered, instinctively swinging her spiked club.

Whoosh!

The heavy wind howled as the club swept through, but it passed straight through the body of the girl who looked just like her. The young girl’s lips curled into a strange smile, and she lunged straight at Feng Jiu!

A cold gust washed over Feng Jiu, making her limbs turn icy. She couldn’t stop herself from trembling.

Clang!

A saber flashed, instantly slicing apart the strange-smiling girl, scattering her into nothingness.

Clang!

Another sound rang out, and the shadowy figure clinging to Bai Hongtu’s back identical to his own appearance was also slain!

“What the hell are these things?” Bai Hongtu frowned.

“They look like shadows to me. These creepy things seem to be waiting for an opening... to possess us,” Li Yanchu said.

Bai Hongtu turned his gaze toward the massive bronze gate, his eyes thoughtful, lost in contemplation.

The Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena.

The legendary place beyond the passes, said to contain the secret to immortality, was now right before the three of them.

But before the bronze gate could be opened, three shadows identical to them in appearance had appeared, clearly intending to take over their bodies. They were in extreme peril.

Feng Jiu spoke slowly, “The cave dwelling where the Fei was located had a formation leading to the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena. We... took the shortcut.”

Li Yanchu and Bai Hongtu exchanged glances, unable to hide their surprise.

“Feng Jiu, how do you know so much about this?” Li Yanchu asked.

“I read it in an old book at home.” Feng Jiu blinked her eyes.

Bai Hongtu curled his lip, just about to throw a jab at her, when Li Yanchu suddenly asked, “Do you have the key to this place?”

Bai Hongtu shot him a look and chuckled. “What are you thinking? How could there be such a coincidence?”

“There

is

such a coincidence," Feng Jiu said crisply.

Bai Hongtu froze for a moment, feeling utterly incredulous.

In the end, Feng Jiu’s slender fingers deftly twisted the sharp spikes on her spiked club. With a flash of light, the heavy, killing-intent-laden club shattered into pieces, and hidden within was a bronze key, small enough to fit in the palm of her hand.

Holding the bronze key aloft, Feng Jiu smiled. “This is the key to the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena. There are two of them, and either can open the gate.”

Li Yanchu’s expression stayed calm.

Bai Hongtu, on the other hand, exclaimed, “You’ve got to be kidding me! How could a little girl like you have the key to the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena? That’s way too much of a coincidence!”

Feng Jiu only gave a charming smile, and a thought dawned in Li Yanchu’s mind. The Grand Magus Bantu’s ambush on the caravan outside the pass must have been to look for Feng Jiu!

He hadn’t expected that Feng Jiu had already come beyond the pass ahead of him, and had even entered Mount Hengduan. And all along, she’d been carrying that heavy spiked club. So that was the secret hidden inside!

“You really are full of surprises,” Li Yanchu said slowly.

Feng Jiu handed over the bronze key. “Master, I’m entrusting the key to the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena to you. This place holds the secret to immortality!”

The corner of Li Yanchu’s mouth twitched slightly, but he still took the bronze key.

“I once went to a Blissful Land that was also said to contain immortal fate. But inside... it was riddled with danger, full of great demons and evil corpses, like stepping into the underworld itself. Now, whenever I hear the words ‘immortality,’ I just feel a headache coming on.”

Bai Hongtu nodded slightly. “Indeed, Yanchu has a point. The Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena is the holy land of Shaman Sect. Given Shaman Sect’s sinister nature, there’s no telling what kind of deadly traps it hides. We’d be better off finding a way to leave this place.”

Feng Jiu was stunned, her rosy lips parting slightly in surprise. Her master... wasn’t interested in the secret to immortality!?

And what was with her master’s pretty-faced friend? How could he have such self-control too?

“You really want to go in?” Li Yanchu asked her.

Feng Jiu froze, then fell silent.

A moment later, she lifted her head and smiled sweetly. “What’s so great about going into this shitty place? I was just curious, that’s all!”

Li Yanchu gave her a long, deep look, then smiled faintly. The three of them prepared to leave, turning to descend the towering steps.

Suddenly, the scenery around them shifted. They were back in that vast cavernous hall again. It was silent, and empty, and no trace of the bronze gate or even a shadow of the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena remained.

Feng Jiu gasped. “What’s going on!?”

Bai Hongtu was equally surprised. Just now, he had simply gone with the more cautious choice. After all, he was the kind of man who could walk away from even the Daoist sects’ seventy-two Blissful Lands without hesitation!

If the Shamanists hadn’t captured him beyond the pass, Young Master Bai would, at this very moment, be in the prosperous lands of Jinchuan, with beauties in his arms, drinking fine wine and enjoying songs at the pleasure houses.

Li Yanchu said slowly, “I don’t know who wrote that ancient book in your home, Feng Jiu, but there’s a good chance its account was inaccurate.”

Feng Jiu asked in surprise, “What do you mean?”

Li Yanchu replied, “It’s simple. In the legends beyond the frontier, the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena always appears in the form of a palace, like a mirage over the sea. But what we saw was a white jade stairway and an enormous bronze gate. There’s a discrepancy between the two.

“That’s one point. Another is those shadows that appeared before the bronze gate were extremely strange. We hadn’t even entered yet, so how could such evil things have come out? What we just saw wasn’t the real Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena at all, it was your

imagination

.”

Li Yanchu suddenly shifted the topic, voicing his deduction.

‘What!?’ Feng Jiu and Bai Hongtu exclaimed at the same time.

Feng Jiu, especially, said, “How could that be!?”

She could hardly believe it. “Are you saying everything we just saw was fake!?”

Li Yanchu, with his mastery of Qi Sight, a powerful primordial spirit, and the protection of purple-gold qi, had quickly seen through the trick.

"It's like a dream yet not a dream, like an illusion yet real. Just now, it was indeed false, but it could also have been true.”

Feng Jiu was still puzzled.

Bai Hongtu, who had once cleared the Longmen Village dungeon together with Li Yanchu, suddenly brightened.

“You mean, this was originally based on Feng Jiu’s own idea of what the Heavenly Palace of Myriad Phenomena should look like. Because she had the bronze key, she assumed there must be a massive bronze gate. So at first, it was all fake. But if those shadows had managed to possess us just now... then everything would have become

real

!”