Just a glance at the three words on the plaque, "Ten Thousand Stars Palace," made Zhang Ling's head feel heavy, and his vision blurred. Alarmed, he quickly averted his gaze.
After a moment's thought, he realized that these three ancient characters must have been carved by a powerful cultivator. Only a cultivator with a much higher cultivation level than his own could cause him to feel this way.
The palace gate was wide open, and the two huge stone doors seemed to be carved with stone carvings, but they were no longer clear.
One of the doors was also missing a part, with some gravel on the ground. There were many cracks on it, as if there had been a fierce battle here.
He probed inside with his divine sense, but it was blocked after only ten or so feet. However, now that he was here, Zhang Ling chuckled and walked in.
Passing through the broken stone gate, he immediately plunged into darkness. The passage inside was dim, without a trace of light.
Zhang Ling constantly released his divine sense to pay attention to his surroundings. Fortunately, after walking for a while, nothing happened.
The passage was long but also wide, with a distance of more than ten feet between the left and right sides. The walls were made of bluestone, and when his divine sense swept over them, it was immediately bounced back. A faint gray fluorescence could be seen flowing on the surface. Obviously, some kind of restriction was still in effect.
Ancient ruins like this, which have been passed down for a long time, mostly contain powerful restrictions set up by ancient cultivators. If one gets caught in them, they may be trapped, or even directly killed.
Walking carefully all the way, after about a quarter of an hour, Zhang Ling noticed a light ahead, and it seemed that the exit was in sight.
His spirits lifted, and he quickened his pace, but he also became more cautious, in case there were other cultivators lying in ambush ahead, or if he encountered other restrictions.
As a result, when he saw that the source of the light was actually a five-colored light wall several feet high, he relaxed slightly. With a flash of spiritual light in his hand, he took out the Heavenly Abyss Token.
He channeled spiritual power into it, and the Heavenly Abyss Token released a ray of spiritual light. He walked forward, and sure enough, there was no obstacle, and he easily passed through the light wall.
Once on the other side, Zhang Ling scanned with his divine sense, and a look of surprise appeared on his face.
All that met his eyes was a dim color, and everywhere he looked were collapsed walls and ruins. Directly in front of him was a towering palace that was half-collapsed. The inside was very different from what he had imagined, like coming to a ruin.
This ruin occupied a considerable area, several miles in scope, and everywhere was marked with damage.
Only the twenty or thirty feet around him were still relatively clean, with more than a dozen tall pillars standing on both sides. Five-colored runes flickered on them.
The place where Zhang Ling appeared was in front of the two largest pillars, with a five-colored light curtain behind him. Just as he was stunned by the scene in front of him, he suddenly felt a sense of tension, sensing twenty or thirty divine senses sweeping over him.
Zhang Ling immediately felt uncomfortable, but these divine senses only swept over him once before they were all withdrawn. Only then did he realize that there were actually thirty or forty cultivators here.
These cultivators were scattered in different places, either alone or in groups of two or three. Some people's eyes were directed towards him.
His arrival only attracted the attention of a few people. Some people glanced at him with cold eyes, while others were expressionless. More of them had indifferent gazes, seeming not to care about his arrival.
At the same time, he also noticed that these people were all high-level cultivators, with the lowest cultivation level being in the early stage of the Golden Core realm.
Zhang Ling smiled wryly and ignored these people. He chose a deserted place, sat down on a collapsed boulder, and closed his eyes to rest.
At the same time, he also carefully observed the place where he was.
Through observation, he noticed that the ruins he was currently in, although they looked dilapidated, still had spiritual light covering several places, and it seemed that some kind of formation was still in operation.
The most eye-catching thing was a circular high platform in the southeast corner of the ruins. This high platform was surrounded by several pillars, and it was covered with a layer of gray-white spiritual light.
Zhang Ling looked at it a few more times and recognized that it seemed to be a teleportation array. However, it seemed to be in a sealed state, and no one approached it.
Another place was in front of the ruined palace, where there were also more than a dozen giant pillars, with dragons and phoenixes carved on them. Some were engraved with images of true dragons and heavenly phoenixes, while others were engraved with images of three-headed, six-armed demons with single horns and iron forks in their hands.
What surprised Zhang Ling was that there was a figure sitting on each of the six pillars. He glanced at those people and quickly withdrew his gaze. This was because these people were all Nascent Soul old monsters, a whole realm higher than him.
He thought that he would encounter Nascent Soul old monsters after coming to this place, but he did not expect that he would see them as soon as he came in, and he saw six Nascent Soul cultivators at once.
Listening carefully, he could vaguely hear them seeming to be talking.
The six Nascent Soul cultivators on the pillars had different images, but each of them had an extraordinary aura.
A white-haired old Daoist with his hair in a bun and wearing a green robe was playing with a bronze ancient seal in his hand, as if no one else was around. He shook his head from time to time, as if he was carefully studying the treasure in his hand.
A black-faced man wearing black armor stood upright on another stone pillar, with his hands behind his back, as if he was thinking about something.
Not far to his left, a woman in a blue robe had a cold expression and exuded a cold aura. Suddenly, a teasing voice entered her ears, causing her to frown.
"Junior Sister Yu Ling, I didn't expect you to come to this place too. We haven't seen each other for a hundred years. Why don't we explore the treasures together?"
Sitting on a pillar in front of this woman was a middle-aged scholar with a fair face, but his gray-green hair made him look a bit sinister. He was constantly twirling a golden writing brush in his hand, with a smiling look on his face, and said to the woman in the blue robe, as if the two had known each other for a long time.
But the woman remained unmoved, still maintaining her meditative state.
The middle-aged scholar chuckled, and suddenly raised his hand and a palm-sized fiery red jade appeared, and then said.
"Junior Sister, why be so cold to your senior brother? This Fire Spirit Jade and the Ice Jade in your hand are complementary treasures that can open the Ice and Fire Eyes inside. As long as you act with me, we will divide the treasures inside equally."
When the woman in the blue robe heard this, she opened her eyes, a cold light flashed in her eyes, and she snorted.
"Hmph, I have no interest. Feng Yangzi, don't forget that you have been expelled from the sect. I advise you not to provoke me. If I tell the Great Elder of the sect about meeting you this time, your trouble will not be small."
"Hehe, Junior Sister, what are you talking about? Our past friendship doesn't have to be like this, right? If it wasn't for that old guy Ziyang intervening, we would have become Dao partners now."
