After a long time, Chu Ci did her best and finally managed to calm back down. "Fang Xiaojiu, I am going to ask for a few conditions. If you agree to them, I will tell you everything I know and will help you get to the Beast Exhausting Range. We have the same goal, after all, so this will be beneficial to the both of us. If you do not agree, however, I won't say anything even if you kill me!"
Seeing her serious expression while trying to barter with him, Fang Xing rubbed his forehead and replied, "Fine. Tell me."
Chu Ci held onto her head for some time longer before sitting down and placing her hands on her waist. "First, can you not touch my clothes anymore?"
"What about you touching me?"
Chu Ci snorted. "As if I'd touch you!"
Fang Xing sighed. "And the second one?"
"I'm not kidnapped by you and we're considered working together. Therefore, we discuss everything!"
Fang Xing rolled his eyes. "Anything else?"
Chu Ci suddenly clenched her teeth. "Do not ever, ever, ever ever call me… Perky Butt!"
Fang Xing laughed. "Ok, Big Butt!"
The eyebrows of the gentle and dignified Chu Ci suddenly shot up. "I'm fighting you!" She leapt forward towards the laughing Fang Xing like a leopard, her teeth clenched tight. She raised her small fists and rained them down on him like a sudden squall….
In the end, the three stipulations had been accepted, although not without Chu Ci receiving two bumps on her head for rushing at Fang Xing.
Chu Ci realized it was definitely not a good idea to try to fight Fang Xing with her life, so she tried to use reason instead. Fang Xing desperately wanted to know more about this "grand opportunity" and didn't intend on wasting more time with this girl, so he simply accepted while keeping his inner thoughts hidden. Just how stupid could this girl be to try to haggle conditions with a bandit…?
"This grand opportunity is related to the nine coffins above the heavens…."
"Nine coffins above the heavens? What does that mean?"
"It means the nine coffins up and above the sky!"
"Nonsense. How can there be coffins up above the sky?"
"If I say there is, there is…. Do you still want to hear the rest or not?"
"Fine, continue…. But there are actually coffins up in the sky? What bad luck!"
"You…. Hmph! Stop interrupting me, or else even if you strip me naked, I still won't tell you anything more!"
"Fine fine fine. Go on. What a bad temper…."
Chu Ci gritted her teeth in hatred, but she curbed her temper and continued on. "According to rumors from the older generations, nine mysterious coffins appeared above the land of Tianyuan quite some time ago. No one knows when they appeared nor where they came from. They were discovered by a powerful ancestor some thousand years ago, but no one knows how many years they've floated high above—they're like constellations….
"In all these years, an uncountable number of cultivators have tried to obtain their secrets, but they've all failed. These nine coffins actually have an extreme amount of power within them. Seven hundred years ago, one of the coffins opened and some of its light fell upon the land somewhere north of East Videha, but the secret was simply too astonishing so not many people within the cultivation realm actually knew…."
"A coffin opened?" Fang Xing muttered to himself while thinking.
Chu Ci nodded. "That was the first time one opened. Only a few large sects and clans knew about it, and only they sent people to search for it. Outsiders didn't find out about the results of their search and only knew it triggered a large-scale catastrophe leading to countless fallen master cultivators, clans, and sects. At the same time, a countless number of new masters and clans rose up afterwards….
"Many years after that, information finally leaked and revealed that numerous manuals, secret pellet recipes, and even the weapons and tools of immortals had appeared where the coffin's light had fallen. Simply put, a great opportunity had fallen from the sky; no matter how ancient a clan or how well-established a sect, they still won't be able to help themselves. They risked everything, causing the catastrophe!"
Fang Xing suddenly slapped his head, startling Chu Ci who soon asked, "What happened?"
"Nothing, just continue!"
Chu Ci looked at him strangely before continuing, "To date, that was the first time the coffins opened. Despite the efforts of the large sects and ancient clans from East Videha trying to cover up the news, some of it still managed to leak within these few hundred years. Everything we know right now is from that leaked information. Some of the rules and restrictions around the grand opportunities of the mysterious coffin were also from those rumors…."
As she spoke, Chu Ci looked to Fang Xing. "The last time the mysterious coffin opened, the treasures it dropped and the grand opportunities that came from it couldn't be obtained by just anyone—it seemed to have its own very strict rules. Although there's an endless amount of scripts and manuals, pellet recipes, weapons, and tools, it can't be obtained however you please by whoever pleases. Perhaps even having a bit of luck is more important than one's cultivation level
"Back then in East Videha, the first group of people to enter the restrictive grounds covered by the mysterious coffin's light were those old cultivation monsters who hadn't been in the public eye, yet these people either died or were heavily wounded. Most of them were injured and killed by the traps within the grounds, but the large clans of East Videha didn't want to give up just like that, so they sent even more people to investigate. After many attempts, they concluded that to the mysterious coffins, the most important factor was bone age!"
"When young people entered, they were able to receive precious scripts easily despite their lower cultivation levels, yet those with a greater bone age but much higher cultivation level faced difficulties with every step they took. Not only did the older cultivators not receive anything, but many ended up dead. Because of this, the Spirit Mountain Temple sent messages out concerning the second opening of the mysterious coffin so something like the Snowy Mountain could be prepared…."
Fang Xing's eyes gleamed. "Spirit Mountain Temple can predict when they mysterious coffin will open in advance?"
Chu Ci shook her head. "I don't know about that. According to the theories of my royal big brother and my grand elder, studying the constellations can give a rough idea of when it'll open and where, but precise details are difficult to predict. A person can only do their best to prepare in advance and do their best to get to where the opportunity lands when it happens so they can hopefully become the first to enter and seek out the treasures within…."
"No wonder that old bastard Wanluo didn't even wait for me and just ran off with the others…." Fang Xing nodded to himself before asking concernedly, "Will there be nothing left by the time we arrive?"
Chu Ci laughed. "You don't need to worry about that. Apparently, it took a total of three years to take the treasures from that first coffin, and it's still not completely empty. That place is still there even now, although it's been locked up by the large powers of East Videha and ordinary people can't even get close to it. Naturally, the opportunities of this second coffin won't be gone in such a short period of time!"
Fang Xing let out a sigh of relief. "Thank god. Otherwise all my treasure would be taken by them…."
Chu Ci rolled her eyes. "Since when did it become your treasure?"
"Ever since I heard there was treasure inside!"
Fang Xing then asked for some more details. Many of his questions were answered, while yet new ones rose up as well. With so many different questions, he separated them into two categories: those with answers he needed to find, and those he didn't have to worry about….
The collection of questions he needed to know the answer to were very simple. Were there really that many treasures and opportunities within the mysterious coffin? There had been many when the first coffin landed, but would this second coffin have the same amount as the first? As for the other question, when he obtained the Book of Revelation and the Decapitation's Portrayal, were they also related to the first coffin?
He still somewhat remembered Bai Qianzhang had once referred to the Decapitation's Portrayal as "the mysterious coffin's Decapitation's Portrayal". What did that mean? And Xiao Jianming had also said the Book of Revelation was a treasure from the mysterious coffin, so was it actually related to these mysterious coffins? If all of this had come from the first coffin, then there seemed to be a lot of rather good stuff in them!
The questions he decided not to concern himself over were even simpler, such as "What the hell was this mysterious coffin thing?" This was a question not even those old cultivation monsters in the realm could answer, so why did he need to worry himself over it?
After some thought, all of the questions were concluded into a simple answer: wherever there's treasure, he just has to take it all for himself!"
As soon as he finished thinking it all through, Fang Xing grew tired and began releasing one yawn after another, and a turn of his head revealed that Chu Ci had already fallen asleep leaning against a jade bed. This little princess was really naive and innocent; how could she sleep so close to such a handsome man like him? He could only let out a smile. With a lack of options, he looked over to a fox coat and—after a small amount of hesitation—he placed it over himself and fell asleep as well….
With the power provided from the Spirit Stones, the Purple-Thunder carriage drove quietly through the night sky at an extreme speed, leaving things calm and peaceful. After a short nap, Fang Xing felt like he couldn't fall asleep completely, so he moved a little closer to Chu Ci to share half of the fox coat before returning to sleep.
Night skies were dark and cold, and even a cultivator would need a sheet or some clothes to cover themselves with if they wished to meditate or sleep. Fang Xing was a Foundation Stage cultivator, but this girl was merely Spirit Stage. It would have been bad if she were to freeze to death.
When Chu Ci woke up on the second day and saw she was wrapped up in a fox coat, the hatred in her gaze towards Fang Xing actually reduced somewhat. She gave a light snort and said, "It's hard to believe a little bandit like you actually knows how to treat people nicely like letting me have the fox coat…."
Fang Xing's face was dark and his response came from the gaps of his clenched teeth. "Did you know you like to take the blanket for yourself when you sleep?" As he spoke, he vowed to never be a good person again. He'd lent half of this fox-fur coat to the girl, but she'd completely tugged it away, leaving him freezing all night. When he woke up, he regretted it so much he would have strangled her if he could, yet she mistook it as him being nice to her….