Great Demon Sun Wukong

As Sun Wukong was pondering, the three members of the Underworld God Army who had been enveloped at the very center of the Thunder Pond had ceased their struggles. Under Sun Wukong's deliberate control, after their souls had been disintegrated, the flow of Thunder Power through Thunder Pond had ceased. However, the power of the Five Elements had not stopped because, at this moment, even though the souls of the three had been broken down into pure energy and absorbed by Thunder Pond, their physical bodies remained intact due to the protection of those magical chains.

By rights, this would count as having killed those three. Yet, as Sun Wukong flushed their bodies with the power of the Five Elements, he suddenly discovered that he could attach his Divine Sense onto the force of the Five Elements, thus slowly infiltrating the chains. Although only a little bit, this excited Sun Wukong immensely. The secrets hidden behind the Underworld God Army, the purpose of the Patrolling Celestial World's existence, and what exactly the chains were connected to; if he could glimpse even a fraction of this knowledge, Sun Wukong would surely benefit tremendously.

However, what Sun Wukong hadn't realized at this moment was that the more one knows, the greater the danger often becomes. Those in power did not wish for too many secrets to be known. Whoever held more secrets held greater power. Especially concerning the secrets upon which those in power existed, which are considered taboo. Anyone trying to understand or touch upon these taboos would be seen as a threat and eliminated.

The secrets hidden within the Wasteland Soil Stele were taboo, the existence of the Thunder Fire Scorching Flame Cannon was taboo, the mission behind the existence of the Underworld God Army was taboo, and even the chains on them were taboo, and even the cyclical existence and destruction of the Nine Great Divine Kingdoms or the current Six Great Divine Nations was taboo. Regrettably, Sun Wukong hadn't realized this; otherwise, he would never have entertained the thought of prying into the secrets of the chains.

Although the scouring power of the Five Elements allowed Sun Wukong's Divine Sense to infiltrate the chains bit by bit, it was still extremely difficult, and the drain on Sun Wukong's Divine Sense and power was significant. His Divine Sense had only penetrated around one percent, and Sun Wukong was already feeling weary. Without some accident or special method, Sun Wukong felt there was little hope of completely infiltrating the chains in this lifetime.

Somewhat regretfully, he withdrew his Divine Sense and likewise withdrew the Five Elements Power enshrouding the Thunder Pond. However, at that moment, when the three chains once again came into contact with the Thunder Primordial Force within Thunder Pond, Sun Wukong noticed that the Thunder Primordial Force was actually surging towards those three chains. No, to be more precise, the three chains were absorbing the Thunder Primordial Force from Thunder Pond through the corpses of the Underworld God Army. But what surprised Sun Wukong wasn't this; he already knew the chains could absorb attributed energy. What surprised him was that as the Thunder Primordial Force was absorbed, the chain's previously impervious barriers against his Divine Sense had weakened slightly. Although it was just by a slight amount, under the scrutiny of Heaven and Earth Fire Eyes, it was distinctly noticeable.

The regret he had felt moments ago vanished in an instant. Even though the Thunder Primordial Force was dissolving the barrier within the chains just as slowly, and Sun Wukong probably wouldn't have noticed without the aid of Heaven and Earth Fire Eyes, as long as there was erosion and a chance of dissolution, there was hope. And most importantly, he didn't need to control it himself. In this case, Sun Wukong could simply leave the three chains and the corpses here without concern. After all, the Spiritual Power of this World Within the Artifact was already nearing the concentration required to congeal Spirit Stones, so he wasn't worried about the chains absorbing it.

Just as he planned to leave the area, Sun Wukong suddenly felt like he was forgetting something. Standing still and peering around, he found that neither Ji Meng nor Ying Zhao were anywhere nearby. Where had they gone? They had been cultivating near the Thunder Pond until now, using the Thunder Primordial Force emitted by the Thunder Pond to refine the impurities in their bodies and thereby enhance their talents. And now they were missing—could it be that they had accidentally been disintegrated by Thunder Pond? Surely not?

Feeling a bit anxious, Sun Wukong quickly closed his eyes, and his Divine Sense merged with the whole world. To his surprise, he found that the World Within the Artifact had once again expanded, leaving him with a boundless sensation. This wasn't like the Pangu Realm, where one lived on a planet; this was a separate space altogether. At the beginning, it was possible to feel the edges of this space, the edges being similar to a spatial barrier.

But now, Sun Wukong couldn't sense where the edge of this world was. However, he quickly spotted Ji Meng and Ying Zhao. After cultivating at the Thunder Pond for some time and realizing that, while the Thunder Primordial Force could remove the impurities from their bodies, it could also damage them. To prevent the Thunder Primordial Force from harming their foundations, the two of them had temporarily left the Thunder Pond, intending to find a place free from any Thunder Attribute Power to cultivate.

And they had indeed found such a place—the very spot where Sun Wukong had initially discovered the World Suppressing Stele in the Wasteland Soil No. 3. The traces where the Heavenly Stele once stood were still evident. And around it, the Earth Element was so rich that it was nearly material in substance, and the soil that had been in constant contact with the Heavenly Stele even had hints of Primordial Earth about it.

Earth, always synonymous with heaviness and steadiness, so after discovering the rich Earth Element here without any danger, both of them decided to stay and cultivate. Although neither of them had a pure Earth Attribute, the power here, which was close to the Primordial Earth, could still solidify their flesh bodies considerably, enabling them to endure Thunder Power tempering for longer periods. Sun Wukong didn't disturb the two who were cultivating, and after sensing they were unharmed, he quietly withdrew his Divine Sense.

However, when Sun Wukong's Divine Sense returned to his body and he opened his eyes, he was startled and instinctively slammed his forehead down. Sun Wukong, known for his iron bones and tough sinews, coupled with the natural hardness of a human's skull, struck with full force unconsciously, immediately heard a scream as he smashed a big pit into the ground in front of him. In front of Sun Wukong sat a headless figure.

"What are you doing, scaring me like that!" Seeing the person in front of him, Sun Wukong realized that the face that had just appeared before his eyes like a ghostly visage was Wu Ming's. The headless corpse reached behind with both hands and grabbed a handful of blood mist, which he then placed on his neck and kneaded for a moment until the blood mist turned into a head. Only then did Wu Ming speak, "Blame me? You've been sitting there for three Chinese Hours, we thought your soul had separated from your body. If it weren't for my sensitivity to souls, I would've thought about burying you and breaking up the party by now!"

Sun Wukong was mildly surprised in his heart, three Chinese Hours? How had three Chinese Hours passed so suddenly? Standing up quickly, Sun Wukong saw that the more than a hundred Underworld God Soldiers, who were originally gathered around guarding something, were now gone. In their place, there were two completely different groups of Underworld God Soldiers standing guard as before. One group consisted entirely of Soul Bodies, and the other was all dull-eyed zombies.

"What's going on here? What's that inside?"

"I don't know, to be honest, this is the first time I've encountered this situation in all these years. Neither Wu Ming nor I can control them." After speaking, Hei Kui helplessly pointed at the Underworld God Soldiers, which were now arranged into four circles forming a circular shape. "Here's the situation: after you sat down and didn't move, Wu Ming and I collaborated to separate the souls and bodies of those Underworld God Soldiers and branded them. But there were a few guys who were almost as strong as me that were repeatedly turned into pulp by the Dragon Emperor, those, over there, those five lumps. Wu Ming and I can't control those five, so every time they recover, they're turned into pulp again, until you woke up now." Experience more on My Virtual Library Empire

"At first, our plan was to order them to retreat outside, but when the command was given, they were indifferent and quickly regrouped into a circle like this one, and there were twice as many as before. Through the gaps in their movements, I saw something inside that appears to be an altar!" Wu Ming confessed, somewhat embarrassed.

His soul separation had not only failed to decrease the number of enemies, it had actually doubled them. This really was a case of stealing a chicken only to end up losing the rice. "Then can you control their souls to self-destruct?" Sun Wukong asked, looking at the Underworld God Soldiers. Wu Ming shook his head: "We have completely lost control over these guys."

Sun Wukong nodded, it seemed his guess was almost certain. When he had encountered the group of Underworld God Soldiers outside the city, Sun Wukong didn't notice at the time, not until the fifty resurrected Shield Soldiers appeared did he realize that those two hundred Underworld God Soldiers outside the city, except for one that looked like a squad leader, seemed to be like puppets, with no expression on their faces, not making any unnecessary movements. At that time, Sun Wukong marveled at how this army remained so disciplined and strictly obeyed orders after a million years; now it dawned on him that these Underworld God Soldiers were actually living puppets, completely following the orders of that squad leader.

So when the squad leader died, the fifty Shield Soldiers who were suddenly killed by the Dragon Emperor had lost the following orders, so they only knew to carry out the previous ones, which were to form a Shield Wall defense. The one hundred Underworld God Soldiers inside probably suffered the same fate, but at first, they knew how to counterattack, and the movements were so odd, therefore Sun Wukong surmised that there was at least one squad leader inside this underground space, and this squad leader, because of how Sun Wukong and the others behaved previously, had always remained hidden, controlling the Underworld God Soldiers.

Hidden? Hehe, let's see how you hide from the Heaven and Earth Fire Eyes! (To be continued. If you like this work, welcome to Starting Point (qidian.com) to cast your recommendation votes, Monthly Pass. Your support is my biggest motivation. Mobile users, please read at m.qidian.com.)