I established the Eternal Immortal Clan by taming beasts.

In the little one's amethyst-like eyes, the once calm starlight began to spin rapidly again, emitting an increasingly deep and mysterious light.

The little paws suddenly gripped Lin Che's collar tightly, a hint of excitement in their voices, as they eagerly pointed to the northwest side, slightly off-target:

"Master! Wait! Don't go over there yet, there's light here too! It's a golden light! It feels completely different from all that mess of 'scrap metal' on the ground! It's brighter! It's more special!"

Upon hearing this, Lin Che immediately stopped his hurried eastward journey and turned his gaze to the northwest, which Xiao Huan had pointed to.

"Oh? Golden light?" Lin Che's heart stirred slightly as he asked further.

"Xiao Huan, can you sense roughly how long that thing has existed? How old is it?"

Upon hearing this, the Crystal Seeker tilted its head slightly, and the purple light in its eyes rippled outwards like waves as it focused even more intently on sensing.

A moment later, it captured a sense of antiquity, vicissitude, and a vague feeling of time that seemed to have spanned a long period of time.

"Master, it's been a long, long time... much longer than that 'green one' from before!" the little guy tried his best to express.

"It seems... to be several thousand years old! Very, very ancient!"

"Several thousand years?!" Lin Che's eyes narrowed.

In this secret realm of Burial Valley, something that has existed for thousands of years is likely to be far more valuable than that spiritual herb that is hundreds of years old!

It is very likely a precious magical artifact left behind by ancient cultivators, a special carrier of inheritance, or a rare and precious material born after being tempered by evil energy and time!

Without the slightest hesitation, Lin Che immediately changed direction, his figure transforming into a blurry green shadow, and sped towards the northwest, his speed several times faster than before.

Following Xiao Huan's increasingly clear directions, Lin Che soon arrived at a slightly elevated pile of rocks.

Here, jagged rocks stand haphazardly like the fangs of a giant beast, their crevices filled with dark red sand and fine bone fragments, and the malevolent aura permeating the air seems even denser and more stagnant than elsewhere.

"It's right down there! Master, the golden light is down there!" Xiao Huan pointed with her little paws to an area in the center of the pile of stones and said with certainty.

Lin Che nodded.

On this ancient battlefield, due to the erosion of evil energy over the years, the interference of lingering will, and the influence of various metal debris, a special geomagnetic and energy field has been formed.

It has a strong interference and weakening effect on a cultivator's spiritual sense probing.

Even for Foundation Establishment cultivators, probing the underground with their divine sense is like sinking into a quagmire, making it difficult to clearly perceive details.

This is why many buried artifacts can only be discovered through personal excavation.

With Xiao Huan's precise coordinates, Lin Che's excavation work became extremely simple.

With a wave of his hand, sharp golden energy blasts, like shovels and plows, precisely cut and moved away the upper layer of rocks and thick soil.

Soon, one after another, incomplete, dark gold ancient skeletons were cleared out and exposed to the sunlight.

These skeletons come in various shapes and sizes, some humanoid and others resembling monsters.

Without exception, all of them had sharp penetrating wounds or comminuted injuries remaining on their bones. Judging from the shape of the wounds, they likely perished in the same battle.

They might even have been killed by the same powerful individual or using the same attack method.

"The battle here was fierce back then..." Lin Che felt a chill in his heart, but he did not stop digging downwards.

Just as he cleared away another layer of rubble and his gaze swept over a relatively flat bone fragment below, a sudden change occurred!

"Huh?!" Lin Che's pupils shrank sharply. Almost instinctively, his true essence erupted, and his figure transformed into a golden afterimage as he rapidly retreated!

Almost at the same instant he stepped back, the earth and rocks where he had been standing suddenly exploded!

A chilling, lightning-fast glint burst from the ground, sweeping past his afterimage, the sharp wind it generated even tearing through the air, emitting a piercing shriek!

It was a broken spear with dark red rust covering its shaft, but the tip still gleamed with a cold light!

The arm skeleton that held this spear was just a gray-white skeleton with its joints connected by a dense, almost tangible black aura!

This arm is connected to a more complete and strange skeleton!

"Boom!"

The ground shook, and soil and rocks flew everywhere.

A figure burst out from underground and landed in the pile of rocks.

Its entire body is composed of stark white bones, with thick skeletons that gleam with a dark, metallic sheen. The most eerie part is its lower body.

Instead of human legs, they are four thick bony limbs like those of a warhorse, with sharp bony hooves at the ends!

Its upper body vaguely retains a human-shaped skeleton, but there is nothing above its neck; it has no head!

A dense, almost black, malevolent aura emanated from the gaps between its bones, making the surrounding air thick, cold, and filled with a chilling killing intent.

The headless, horse-riding-like puppet beast locked onto Lin Che the moment it appeared.

He slightly raised the broken spear in his hand, and a chilling aura, purely condensed from killing intent, was firmly fixed on Lin Che.

The next moment, its hoof-like bony hooves slammed into the ground, producing a dull thud.

The entire skeletal body charged towards Lin Che like an arrow released from a bow!

It moved so fast that it left a faint black trail of malevolent energy behind it!

"Late stage of Foundation Establishment!" Lin Che instantly judged the strength of this peculiar puppet beast and dared not be careless in the slightest.

This was far superior to the previous Qi Refining stage weaklings; the condensation of its murderous aura and the ferocity of its charge had reached the level of the late Foundation Establishment stage.

He quickly formed hand seals and gave a low shout:

"Myriad Transformations Golden Scale Armor!"

Om-!

A dazzling golden aura burst forth from his body, rapidly intertwining and condensing on his skin, transforming into a set of ancient-looking, semi-transparent energy armor composed of countless fine golden scale phantoms.

At the same time, Lin Che advanced instead of retreating, his right hand clenching in the air, and a jet-black longsword appeared in his hand.

Faced with the headless knight charging towards him, Lin Che's pure metal-elemental true essence was frantically compressed and purified, flowing into the long sword in his hand like a hundred rivers flowing into the sea.

On the blade, a point of extremely concentrated, dazzling golden light suddenly shone, radiating an indestructible and all-severing sharp intent!

Armor-piercing strike, poised to launch!

Just as the headless knight charged to within a few feet of him, the broken spear, with a mournful whooshing sound, pierced straight into Lin Che's chest.

Lin Che used a mysterious footwork technique, his figure swaying slightly like a ghost, transforming into several elusive afterimages, narrowly avoiding the fatal stab.

The spear grazed his golden scales, sparking a few flecks.

It's now!

Lin Che's eyes flashed with a sharp light, and the long sword in his hand, carrying that point of golden light condensed to the extreme, stabbed straight at a certain spot protected by the headless knight's right ribs with lightning speed.

In his perception, that was precisely the core where the puppet beast's energy and baleful aura converged!

His experience in clearing out low-level puppet beasts along the way taught him that only by destroying their core could they be completely dismantled.

"Armor-piercing technique! Break through!"

However, to Lin Che's surprise, this headless knight seemed to still retain a trace of combat experience and instinct!

When the spear missed its target, it did not stiffly turn around like an ordinary puppet beast. Instead, with a strange flick of its wrist, the heavy spear, taking advantage of the momentum of its forward charge, swung its shaft violently to the lower right as if it were a living thing!

"clang--!"

A deafening clang of metal clashing against metal rang out!

The tip of the longsword landed precisely on the shaft of the spear!

The violent, sharp metallic energy clashed fiercely with the condensed malevolent energy attached to the spear, causing the existing cracks on the spear shaft to spread and emit a "crack" sound as it could no longer bear the weight.

What's even more chilling is that the headless knight actually used the reaction force of the block to cleverly exert force with all four hooves, and his entire skeletal body spun around like a top!

The broken spear, propelled by its rotation, traced a perfect arc, its tip whistling sharply as it once again pierced Lin Che's waist and abdomen!

A surprise attack!

Lin Che's heart skipped a beat; this monster was indeed extraordinary!

Without hesitation, he activated his movement technique again, golden light flashing beneath his feet, his figure transforming into a blurry golden afterimage as he retreated several feet, narrowly avoiding this cunning and ruthless attack.

"Hmph, in the end it's just a mindless, instinct-driven, brute-force-dependent dead thing!" Lin Che kept his distance, calmly assessing the situation.

This puppet beast is strong, fast, and even has a fighting instinct, but it lacks flexibility and does not know magic, which is its biggest weakness!

With a thought, Lin Che spread his five fingers on his left hand and made a grabbing motion towards the headless knight who had just completed his counterattack and whose movements were slightly sluggish!

"Bind!"

In an instant, a giant energy hand formed from golden true essence appeared out of thin air.

With his five fingers clenched tightly, he suddenly grabbed the middle of the shaft of the broken spear in the headless knight's hand!

The giant energy hand shimmered with golden light, gripping tightly!

The headless knight instinctively tried to pull back his spear, his knuckles creaking as he swung his baleful aura, but he couldn't break free from the restraints made of pure true essence.

This is the advantage of practicing Dharma!

Physical cultivators may be unparalleled in close combat, but magical cultivators can use ever-changing spells to control, interfere with, and even deliver a fatal blow from a distance!

"Now!" A cold glint flashed in Lin Che's eyes, and he no longer gave the monster any chance.

His aura suddenly surged to its peak, and he and the sword seemed to become one.

"Three Slashes of Breaking Army - Third Form: No Return!"

The deep shouts, like the clash of metal, echoed among the piles of rocks.

"Clang!"

In the next instant, Lin Che and the Ink Slash in his hand transformed into a pure, golden streak of light that tore through the air!

His figure seemed to have vanished, leaving only that resolute, unstoppable blade of light!

Countless tiny yet incomparably sharp golden blade energies spontaneously generated, rotated, and clashed, forming a violent blade energy storm several feet in diameter that could destroy everything!

Wherever it passed, the air hissed as it cut through the air, leaving deep grooves in the ground.

The storm of blade energy instantly traversed several meters, completely engulfing the headless knight who was trying to struggle!

"Bang bang bang bang—!"

The sound was as loud and dense as raindrops pounding on banana leaves!

The storm of blade energy surrounding Lin Che was the first to violently collide, cut, and shatter the headless knight's protective aura and hard bones!

Lin Che's golden light, a fusion of man and blade, acted like a drill, ignoring all obstacles and piercing through layers of malevolent energy and bone defenses with unparalleled precision, reaching straight into his right chest.

There, a fist-sized, constantly pulsating, dark red "core" radiating intense malevolent energy and metallic properties was protected by several thick ribs.

"broken!"

Lin Che shouted in his heart, and the golden light that had been condensed to the extreme on the tip of the blade pierced into the dark red core!

"Pop—!"

A soft sound, like a bubble bursting.

The pulsating core suddenly dimmed, its surface covered with cracks, and then completely exploded into a cloud of dark red mist, which was quickly assimilated and dissipated by the surrounding evil energy.

The moment the core shattered, the headless knight's ferocious resistance receded like a receding tide.

The bones that make up its body lost their connection and support of energy, and began to break and disintegrate inch by inch, turning into a pile of ordinary, soulless broken bones, which scattered on the dark red earth.

The tattered spear, which had been gripped by the giant energy hand, fell to the ground with a clatter.

"Phew!" Lin Che exhaled a breath of stale air.

The golden light and sword aura around him slowly subsided, and the Myriad Transformations Golden Scale Armor also turned into light spots and dissipated.

He stood there with his knife in hand, his gaze fixed on the pile of broken bones and the spear on the ground.

Lin Che stepped forward and picked up the broken spear.

The gun felt cold and heavy to the touch, and retained a strong aura of menace.

But what Lin Che cared about even more was that the material of this spear, which was "dropped" by a late-stage Foundation Establishment puppet beast, and the connection between its material and the trace of the secret realm's origin it contained, seemed to be much clearer and more profound than the items dropped by the previous Qi Refining stage puppet beasts.

"It seems that the key to unlocking the area that may contain treasure or special features may require collecting different types and levels of puppet beast cores or relics."

"The items dropped during the Foundation Establishment stage might be far more effective than those dropped during the Qi Refining stage, or they might unlock different secret treasures," Lin Che speculated in his mind.

"We'll need to keep an eye on the other Foundation Establishment stage puppet beasts from now on."

Lin Che put away his spear and continued his unfinished digging work.

This time there were no obstacles, and soon, deep underground where the headless knight had been entrenched, he touched a hard object.

Carefully clear away the surrounding soil.

A palm-sized, dark gold jade pendant with exquisite cloud patterns on the edges but covered with fine cracks and extremely faint spiritual light appeared in his hand.

This is a storage jade tablet. Although it is broken, it is not completely destroyed. You can still feel a very faint spatial fluctuation and residual spiritual energy inside.

"Found it!" Lin Che was overjoyed and was about to use his divine sense to explore the inside of the jade tablet, which might have been sealed for thousands of years.

Just then, at the edge of his powerful divine sense, he suddenly sensed several powerful auras rapidly approaching!