Molting the Mortal Coil

Walking up towards the third dais, Sage remembered he had questions for the Ancestor that were left unanswered. He’d been distracted by the sudden appearance of Guan Zhenyan and even the Soul Clone was busy trying to figure out how to deal with the problem of Zhenyan. It was only now that he finally remembered some of the holes in the past that he now was curious about.

The ancestor on this casket was very different from the first two. The statue on top of the casket had been fashioned with a sheet over the person lying atop it. The sheet was astoundingly detailed, the artist had somehow found a way to carve stone to make it look like partially transparent cloth. After kowtowing to the entombed ancestor, he couldn’t help himself and reached out to touch the edge of the sheet. It was hard like stone, but the surface texture of it had tiny ridges just like it was made of individual threads, and surprisingly it was even slightly warm. As for the ancestor under the sheet, the sculpture hid the majority of its features, smoothing the face into just a suggestion of what they might have looked like. The statue’s arms were crossed over its chest and the body was not overly muscled or slim, which made it hard to even determine a gender. The voice of this ancestor was also very neutral, with a smooth rich tone that he couldn’t tell if it was a stately woman or an eloquent man, “So you’re the next prospect?”

Before Sage could open his mouth a little wisp of Qi flew out from the mouth of the statue and sunk into his chest. The tiny ball of Qi seemed to go completely unnoticed by all the powers and energies in his own body. It flew around, traveling to every part of his body and then up into his Spiritual Sea. The sunlight over that stormy sea brightened for a moment and then returned back to normal. The little speck of Qi fell from the sky and penetrated through the walls of the Infinite Immaterial Seat. It ignored all of his maze-like defenses and found his Nascent Soul at the center. Then it flew right into the forehead of his Nascent Soul and entered the little galaxy of his cultivation. It appraised the collection of stars and planets then flew down to the largest one, entering into Sage’s Inner World.

Up to this point, Sage could only follow along with this little speck of Qi in fascination. He only knew it was there because he’d followed it with his Spirit Sense and consciousness the whole way. The rest of his body didn’t react at all to this outside influence. Only when it finally entered his Inner World did he feel that he could affect the Qi at all. He flexed the energy of the world and compared it to that speck of Qi. This was the first time he felt like he could fight back against it at all and that tiny bit of assurance finally returned a bit of confidence to him. While the tiny speck was flying around his Inner World, Sage got a little more familiar with the characteristics of that tiny invader. Eventually the Qi seemed to have seen enough and it flew back out of his body. This time, Sage felt that he could put up a resistance to it with his Nascent Soul and not just at the core part of his Nascent Soul.

Are all the Ancestors this powerful? Who knows what they could do to me with that tiny speck of Qi that I couldn’t even feel in my body. If I didn’t see it coming I would not even have known it was there till it got to the Inner World.

This little event made him realize just how far he was from the truly powerful people. There was no telling where this ancestor of his was on the scale of the universe. Were they extremely powerful or just a middling no-one? At the very least, Sage had grown somewhat familiar with this unusual method and could perhaps mount some sort of defense against it in the future.

“I didn’t really believe Huang, but it really is the legendary World Core. You really might be next.”

“Forgive me, Ancestor. I do not understand. Next? Prospect for what?”

“Haha, don’t worry. It’s nothing you need to be concerned with. Just the idle talk of us old folks.”

“Forgive me, I am the curious sort. I fear I’ll waste too much time trying to pry into this secret…”

“Haiya. Fine fine. We’re merely speculating on if you can be the next to reach our level. In order to do that you need something extraordinary and a World Core fits the bill. Got it? Still, that’s only the minimum requirement. It just means you have a chance. You don’t know how many had the potential but died along the way. Aiyo, I’ve already said too much. Run along, kid.”

Any hopes of further gifts were dashed at that point. Sage was pushed gently off the top of the dais, and he respectfully left. He still hadn’t asked his other questions, but he got a much different piece of information that he figured to be quite valuable. Especially since he was far more interested in the ancestor’s knowledge and not their trinkets. He could always earn riches and valuables on his own over time, but there were questions that he knew he might never be able to answer by himself.

For the fourth dais, Sage kowtowed to the ancestor’s statue and immediately blurted out his question, “This unworthy descendant has a burning question to be answered. If the Chong Clan is subordinate to the Lang Clan, why did you let them take over? I apologize for knowing nothing of your situation, but Great Ancestors, couldn’t you have stopped them with a wave of your hand?”

With such a rude display, Sage was already expecting to be reprimanded. He also hadn’t yet taken a detailed look at the casket and now that he did, he was surprised to see the shape of a massively muscled man. The man had a mane of thick shoulder length hair, along with a piercing gaze. The eyes of the statue were open and staring upwards with a fearsome stare. Even without being the target of that glare he felt a little shudder crawl up his spine. Especially when combined with the man’s grin. The lips were pulled back from the smile, just enough to reveal teeth that looked more like fangs. Most of them were pointed and sharp like a predator would have. Uh oh, this does not seem like the best choice of person to treat so disrespectfully.

“Haha, how bold! Just a little half-hearted show of respect and then right to demanding answers? The last time someone treated me like that I fed them their teeth.”

Sage instantly felt his body reacting, sweat dripped down his body and his legs got shaky. As a high leveled cultivator he had a very high degree of control over his own body, yet at this point he could do nothing against the terrifying aura released by the ancestor. Against this fearsome existence, he felt like an antelope staring down a lion. The man’s power completely overrode his defenses and made him feel like a normal earthling visiting the zoo and coming face to face with a ferocious beast. That stone casket was definitely not as reassuring as the cage in a zoo, especially since the last ancestor had already shown how much they could do to him from within one.

He wouldn’t just kill me here, right?