Chapter 183 – The Sudden Change
The third trial wasn’t the real Nirvana, but a rift in space. It was just the space in the rift that was huge.
Wang Lin slowly traveled through the third trial. As he moved forward, he would grab at the seemingly empty space around him, and every grab would net him another wandering soul to consume.
Wang Lin hadn’t felt the sensation of consuming souls for a long time. He calculated that it had been dozens of years since he had left the foreign battleground.
However, due to the power of the law of the world, he still remembered his time in the foreign battleground like it was yesterday.
Xu Ligou and the second devil followed behind Wang Lin, alarmed and scared the whole time. They didn’t dare let out a single breath as they saw ancestors who were many times stronger than them being consumed without being able to put up a fight. They felt utterly powerless.
Although Wang Lin’s enormous soul was compressed back then for a sliver of Ji Realm knowledge, his ability to devour souls still remained, and as a result, he was a master of souls.
As Wang Lin walked, he sent his Divine Sense out in all directions. Since this realm was like Nirvana, and contained wandering souls, then it must also contain soul devourers.
Wang Lin wasn’t sure if soul devourers could devour each other. Unless it was the last resort, soul devourers wouldn’t attack each other, but would instead solve their problem in a symbiotic way.
After flying around for a long time, Wang Lin had devoured many souls, but no soul devourers had contacted him yet. He pondered for a while, then raised both his hands, and the nearby floating rocks started to move toward him.
Soon, the rocks crashed into each other to form a large rocky mountain. Wang Lin jumped onto the top of the mountain, then he flicked his right hand, causing a blue flame to rise from it.
Wang Lin’s eyes flickered. He put his right hand on the rocky mountain and the blue flame fused into the mountain. The mountain that had many large cracks in between the rocks was quickly surrounded by a blue light that emitted cold air. All the gaps in the rocky mountain were sealed by ice and it was bound together tightly.
Wang Lin removed his right hand from the mountain and the blue flame was absorbed back into his body. He took a deep breath. His Eyes of Divine Consciousness blinked continuously, and his right hand moved quickly. After a while, an illusionary circle appeared and he shot it toward the mountain he had just created.
When the illusionary circle landed on the mountain, the entire mountain flashed brightly, but quickly returned to normal. Wang Lin took another deep breath. His right hand moved and illusionary circles appeared one by one in front of him and fused into the mountain.
Soon, the mountain quickly turned into a miniature version of the restriction mountain.
Wang Lin almost fell over when he took a small step. He slowly started to enter the mountain until he was in the center. He then formed another illusionary circle and pressed against the stone wall.
The whole mountain shook, and it slowly shrank at a speed visible to the human eye, until it was the same size as the other rocks floating by. Anyone who looked at it now wouldn’t be able to distinguish it from the other rocks that were floating in the vicinity.
With Wang Lin’s body fortified inside the mountain, he left a small piece of his soul in his body using his Ji Realm Divine Consciousness and the rest of his soul exited his body. This part of his soul immediately formed an illusionary body.
Now that Wang Lin’s soul was no longer in his body, it was no longer restricted by his physical form. His Divine Sense scattered in all directions. From a distance, you would see layers of Wang Lin’s Divine Sense being sent out, causing all the nearby wandering souls to appear from the nothingness, faces pale with fear.
Shortly after, all the wandering souls received their orders. As Wang Lin’s Divine Sense spread out further, even more wandering souls felt Wang Lin’s presence. Their faces paled and they started to scatter.
Immediately after Wang Lin’s soul left his body, he returned to his soul devourer form. He quickly swept through the nothingness, and all the wandering souls he passed by would greet him with respect.
Gradually, Wang Lin felt the presence of another very large soul. It was another soul devourer, however, this soul was in a very strange state, as if it were sleeping.
The large soul didn’t respond to Wang Lin’s Divine Sense at all. Wang Lin faltered a little. He ignored the soul devourer and kept expanding his divine sense to bring more wandering souls under his control.
At that moment, Duanmu sat on another rock somewhere in the third trial with a bitter look on his face. Next to him was Wang Qingyue with a cool look on his face.
Duanmu and Wang Qingyue crossed the tunnel of nothingness together and arrived at the golden land of the first trial. In the first trial, they relied on Wang Qingyue’s Five Element Escape Technique, which allowed them to calmly pass the first trial and proceed to the restriction mountain.
The fact that Duanmu was able to pass the restriction mountain would surprise everyone that knew him.
A thousand years ago, he received a treasure from the treasure pagoda. It was a piece of jade with a single crack on it. Based on his understanding, this piece of jade only had one use left.
Later on, he did a lot of research and found out that the purpose of this jade was to break all restrictions. As a result, Duanmu’s resolve to go back to the Land of the Ancient Gods was reignited.
He knew that his cultivation was lower than the others. Back then, it was due to his luck and caution that he was able to preserve his life. He knew his limits very well and had decided to never coe back again, but when he found out about the use of the piece of jade, it moved his heart.
Still, he was very cautious and hesitant because he couldn’t even pass the first trial without mastering the Five Element Escape Technique.
Duanmu pondered this for a long time and gave up on learning the Five Element technique. In order for him to learn it, he would have to devote all his time, and even if he did learn it, he wasn’t guaranteed to pass the first trial. There were also attacks by large monsters to consider.
He vividly remembered one of his experiences in the ice world.
Thus, Duanmu seeked out his friend Wang Qingyue to travel with him. Wang Qingyue was a master of the Five Element Escape Technique, and after Duanmu told him that the first trial required the Five Element Escape Technique, he decided to give it a try. After all, if what Duanmu said was true, the temptation was too great.
In order to convince Wang Qingyue, Duanmu took out his piece of jade. After seeing the jade, Wang Qingyue immediately recognized that it was a long lost ancient weapon, causing the doubt in his heart to disappear.
However, he was very cautious and didn’t immediately agree. He wanted to wait until the Land of the Ancient god opened, then make the decision.
Duanmu didn’t mind. He had already made up his mind. If Wang Qingyue didn’t want to go, then he would trade this jade to the Six Desire Devil Lord for some magic treasures.
However, he still had to prepare in case Wang Qingyue decided to go. He could pass the first and second trial without any issue, however, the third trial was the problem. Afterall, it was the third trial that had forced them to use an inherited treasure to make a tunnel for them to escape a thousand years ago.
As for the weird creatures in the third trial, if it was only one or two, he wouldn’t be afraid. If it was eight to ten, as long as he paid a little attention, he wasn’t worried. Even if it were hundreds, relying on his cultivation, he could still survive. But if they numbered in the thousands, even if he was a god, he wouldn’t be able to do anything.
Those creatures were very bizarre. They were immune to almost all spells. Only the true fire in one’s body could force them to retreat. However, if there was a lot of them, there was no way to keep track of them all. If they were to land on someone’s body, they would suck away that person’s spiritual energy, and if too many landed on them, then the only road left was death.
As a result, he went searching for magic treasures that protected the soul. However, these types of magic treasures were simply too rare. Even though he managed to gather some, he still wasn’t sure about the third trial.
It wasn’t until he traveled to Nandou city and heard someone someone talk about the Death Spell that he suddenly remembered that he had heard of the Death Spell before. The Death Spell was a spell that specialized in attacking the soul. It was an evil spell. He was very excited, because if there was a way to get a person with this ability to help, then there was a chance of passing through the third trial.
He then began to search, until he found Wang Lin. The trip was originally very calm. Duanmu believed that as long as they worked together, the first three realms wouldn’t be an issue, especially after he learned of the candidate that the Six Desire Devil Lord had picked to pass the third trial. Duanmu was sure that as long as there was no internal fighting, reaching the Land of the Ancient God was only a matter of time.
Although the Land of the Ancient God had four realms, from the inherited treasure, they found out that the fourth realm was just a teleportation array that teleported someone to the body of the Ancient God.
The teleportation array teleported everyone based on the time it took to pass the first three realms. The less time it took, the closer one was teleported to the Ancient God’s body. It was even possible to be teleported directly into the Ancient God’s meridian. Once inside the meridian, not only would there be condensed dry Linq Qi Beads, there would also be the residue of numerous drugs. According to the inherited treasure, Soul Transformation pill residue would be among the drug residue.
To the ancient god, it might just be residue, but to them, it would count as real Soul Transformation pill.
Unfortunately, his plans were destroyed by a giant dragon inside the tunnel that caused everyone to scatter, especially Wang Lin, who charged into the dragon’s mouth. After that, a red dragon appeared. That series of events surprised Duanmu, and caused him to panic. In the crisis, he had to give up looking for Wang Lin, and quickly escaped with Wang Qingyue.
In fact, he was the fastest person to get past the first and second trials and reach the third trial. However, in the third trial, he had a bitter look on his face.
Without Wang Lin’s Death Spell, even though he was able to keep himself alive with the treasures he had gathered over the past thousand years, going deeper to find the entrance to the fourth realm was impossible.
As a result, although he and Wang Qingyue were the first to enter the third trial, they were stuck here, unable to proceed.
At that moment, Six Desire Devil Lord was also flying around the third trial, looking for the exit to the fourth realm. Whenever a wandering soul attacked him, he would wave his hand and a blue light would flash from the youth’s body. The wandering souls would give up on Six Desire Devil Lord and jump on the youth.
However, after the wandering souls enter the youth’s body, they would disappear without a trace. On the surface, there was no change to the youth’s body.
Six Desire Devil Lord relied on this method as he traveled. Although there were a few scares, there had been no real danger. The worst time was when he encountered the group containing thousands of wandering souls, but with a wave of his hand, the youth’s body flashed and all the wandering souls immediately flew to the youth instead.
He looked at the body he was holding and let out a cold smile. Although he fell into that junior’s trap and was hit by the lightning that caused his whole cultivation level to permanently drop one stage, down to the early stage of Soul Formation, with this treasure that he had spent a thousand years preparing, he was bound to enter the fourth realm this time.
After thinking about it, his heart pounded, blood surged, and his eyes were feverish. What is losing a stage of cultivation base compared to acquiring a Soul Transformation pill from the Ancient God’s body? After obtaining a Soul Transformation pill, he could become a YingBian stage expert. At that point, let alone the Sea of Devil, even in the Vermilion Bird star system, as long as he didn’t offend the Vermilion Bird Empire, he could do as he wished.
After these thoughts, he increased his speed as he searched around. The inherited treasure from the Land of the Ancient Gods was in his hands. Originally, it was his master who had it and gathered people to search this Land of the Ancient Gods.
His master died in the third trial and passed the inherited treasure to him. His master planned to use this treasure to open a tunnel to leave this place, but at the most critical moment, caught the eye of a creature that was much stronger and different from the other creatures around, ending in his master’s death.
Six Desire Devil Lord was horrified after witnessing his master’s death, and quickly fled into a tunnel to escape.
At this time, there was another person in the third trial, Ancient Emperor. He sat crossed legged on top of a rock with four flags spinning around him and a pagoda the size of his face on top of his head, emitting lights of harmony.
In the area outside of the light of the the pagoda, if one looked carefully, they could see countless wandering souls crowded around the edge of the light, greedily looking at the Ancient Emperor.
However, there wasn’t a single wandering soul willing to enter the light of the pagoda.
Ancient Emperor had a bitter look on his face. When he had left the second trial, he was chased by a streak of purple lightning. Relying on his life saving treasure, he was able to survive, but the treasure broke and his cultivation dropped down to the late stage of Nascent Soul.
After he entered the third trial, he didn’t dare to enter too deep. He made a base on a rock in the outer area, trying to recover his cultivation base back to the Soul Formation stage. With his current Nascent Soul stage cultivation, if he was in the first or second trial, he could protect himself, but here, in the extremely dangerous third trial, there was just no way for him to survive.
What made Ancient Emperor truly bitter was that the whirlpool to the third trial was motionless at first, then it suddenly teleported him to a very unfavorable location.
He was teleported to the middle of the third trial. If he didn’t immediately create this pagoda, he would have been swarmed by the wandering souls.
At that point, he was out of options. He could only keep the light of the pagoda going, completely trapping himself there.
Thinking about this, his face was full of hate. He blamed the mysterious person for causing all of this. His hate toward him was enormous.
He was, however, still confused about the identity of the mysterious person. According to his analysis, it should be that kid Wang Lin, but he refused to believe that he was forced into this pathetic state by someone of a younger generation.
Speaking of Wang Lin, he was currently spreading out his Divine Sense, until he swept the entire third trial. Besides him, there was only one other soul devourer, and the number of souls was much less than the Foreign Battleground. It only looked like there were a lot because the area was much smaller.
In addition, Wang Lin had already found the entrance to the fourth realm. It wasn’t in the center, but to the northwest.There was a large amount of wandering souls around the entrance, almost accounting for one-fourth of all the souls in the realm.
Meanwhile, all the wandering souls under his control had been sending him messages using a special method. They had followed his instructions and found Six Devil Desire Lord and Ancient Emperor.
What surprised Wang Lin was that the wandering souls also found Duanmu and Wang Qingyue.
Wang Lin pondered a little, then sent his Divine Sense toward the Ancient Emperor. According to a wandering soul, Ancient Emperor currently had the lowest cultivation base and was stuck at his current location.
After a short period of time, Wang Lin’s soul appeared at the end of the light of the pagoda above Ancient Emperor’s head after following the wandering souls under his control. He looked at the pale faced Ancient Emperor and began to ponder.
Wang Lin devoured the souls here and his soul grew very large. Although it was not the same level as before, in terms of quality, it was far beyond what it originally was. After all, his soul wasn’t normal, but a Ji Realm Soul.
When he arrived, Ancient Emperor’s eyes blinked and stared coldly in Wang Lin’s direction. Although he could only see the dark void, he could clearly feel a soul that was very different from the other souls around.
The moment that soul arrived, all the other wandering souls scattered. If he looked closely at the shadows, he could see their faces paled with fear.
After seeing this, Ancient Emperor’s heart skipped a beat. He quickly consumed a pill to make sure he had enough spiritual energy to maintain the light from the pagoda.
Wang Lin stared at Ancient Emperor inside the light. He sent out a message through his divine sense and ten wandering souls suddenly came forward. Although their faces were full of fear, they still charged into the light. The moment they touched the light, they were met with a strong resistance. They weren’t even able to get within five feet from Ancient Emperor before a green smoke would appear on their bodies, forcing them to retreat.
However, the light from the pagoda dimmed.
Wang Lin’s soul sent out another message. This time, all the wandering souls nearby, more than ten thousand, condensed into shadows, and stared at the pagoda.
Ancient Emperor’s heart skipped a beat. That was bad. He quickly made a gesture with his hand and sent waves of light into the pagoda. With every wave of light, his face paled a bit more. After the last wave of light, his face was white as chalk and his cultivation base dropped to the mid stage of Nascent Soul.
At the same time, all the wandering souls coordinated into waves and started to assault the light. However, all the wandering souls started to smoke and were only able to get within ten feet of Ancient Emperor. The distance to Ancient Emperor was still great.
Ancient Emperor let out a depressed laugh. He had already tried his best. The amount of wandering souls was just too great for him to resist. Even those seniors from a thousand years ago were all consumed by these wandering souls. How could he, who had damaged his cultivation to his degree, hope to survive? He was afraid that he would run out of Linq Qi and be unable to keep the pagoda going, then be swarmed by the wandering souls.
From beginning to end, Wang Lin didn’t make a move. He knew that if they were outside, Ancient Emperor would be able to kill him with the twitch of a finger. But here, he was a soul devourer, and could manipulate wandering souls. Their roles had reversed.
Of course, if he were to directly attack now, he wasn’t a match for Ancient Emperor. Even though he was a soul devourer, he was still too weak.
However, it was just that as the ability of a soul devourer was to devour souls, the ability of these wandering soul was to devour life force. Even if one’s cultivation base was high, if too many wandering souls attached on to them, they couldn’t resist.
If one knew wandering souls well enough, they would know that if just one of them appeared in the mortal world, it could cause a catastrophe. Of course, it would need to be a complete wandering soul, far stronger than the likes of the devil Xu Ligou.
The third trial of the Land of the Ancient Gods, in reality, was a death trap. Only a few had successfully passed this realm. The Land of the Ancient Gods has existed for countless years, and Six Desire Devil Lord’s master wasn’t the first to enter the third trial. Many had entered before, but like him, they all died in the third trial.
The wandering souls there couldn’t be easily destroyed, and they existed in large numbers. Even if the soul was consumed, as long as there was a speck of the soul left, it could be resurrected. It was an endless cycle.
The reason why Wang Lin was so at home here was due to his experience and some special encounters he had while he was in the foreign battleground. With those under his belt, he could act like he was the boss here.
If not for his body having been destroyed by Teng Huayaun, if not for Situ Nan willing to put his Nascent Soul into deep slumber to keep Wang Lin’s soul from being destroyed, if not for him accidently entering the crack into the foreign battleground, if not for him to starting to devour souls until he became a soul devourer… if any one of those of things didn’t happen, and Wang Lin could still have reached the third trial, he wouldn’t have the status of a king here like he does now.
All of the paled faced wandering souls were just food to Wang Lin, but without this food, in the mind of Ancient Emperor, he was simply a smart Core Formation junior. If it wasn’t for the various circumstances restricting all the people here, all they had to do was raise a finger to kill Wang Lin.
It’s just that in this world, there were too many unexpected matters, like under special circumstances an ant could kill an elephant, and while straws are light, they could still crush a camel. Some things in this world just don’t have a proper explanation.
One can only say that things change, and there is nothing that’s forever. Just like how Hunchback Meng, who was supposed to have died in the first trial, appeared in the third trial with power similar to the Ancient God Tu Si, and how he died back in the first trial just couldn’t be explained. Starting in the third trial of the Land of the Ancient Gods, things just became more confusing and weird.