Mortal: The Path to Immortality

The cave was cold and damp, and the smell of rotting flesh filled the air.

"Senior Deok! Senior Deok!"

A series of urgent calls came from beside him, and Lu Nanzhu frowned, feeling a dull pain in his forehead.

He struggled to open his eyes, and his blurry vision gradually cleared. Before him was a dark stone roof and a row of iron railings that gleamed coldly.

He instinctively tried to lift his head, only to find himself completely wrapped in ropes, like a giant cocoon. The ropes shimmered with a faint magical power.

"Miss Ruyin!?" Lu Nanzhu turned his head and saw Xin Ruyin's face through a gap in a thick stone wall. She was currently being held in a nearby cell.

At this moment, Xin Ruyin was also pale, and her face showed signs of exhaustion.

"Senior De! You're finally awake." Seeing that Lu Nanzhu was conscious, Xin Ruyin breathed a slight sigh of relief.

Lu Nanzhu chuckled self-deprecatingly, which aggravated the bruises on his face, causing him to gasp in pain.

"Miss Ruyin, where is this place? And how did you end up here?"

Xin Ruyin sighed and said in a low voice:

"This is the cave dwelling of that black-robed cultivator. Not long ago, a senior in the Core Formation stage actually broke through the restrictions of the small mountain and captured Ruyin here."

She paused again, then continued, "That black-robed cultivator threatened me, demanding that I help him repair an ancient teleportation array."

Otherwise, they will search my soul and refine my corpse...

At this point, a hint of urgency flashed in Xin Ruyin's eyes:

"I wonder how Brother Qi is doing now. The commotion that day was quite loud, I'm really afraid of him..."

"Brother Yunxiao is alright." Lu Nanzhu interrupted her worries and said seriously, "He has been trying to find you these days, and he even came here to me."

Xin Ruyin was slightly taken aback, her eyes reddening slightly. Then, she looked at Lu Nanzhu with some surprise: "How come even Senior has been dragged into this?"

Lu Nanzhu shook his head with a wry smile, and then recounted in detail how he helped Qi Yunxiao, attended the Fu family ceremony, and was captured by a Core Formation cultivator.

"It's all Ruyin's fault for causing this trouble, which has resulted in you being imprisoned." Xin Ruyin lowered her head, her face full of self-reproach.

"I have a karmic connection with this person. Even without your involvement, it wouldn't end well if we bumped into each other again," Lu Nanzhu said with a relaxed attitude, changing the subject with concern.

"But Miss Ruyin, did that demon mistreat you?"

Xin Ruyin gently shook her head:

"No, that's not true. That person seemed to value that ancient teleportation array highly."

He has repaired most of the formation, but he needs my help to fix the last few key parts.

Moreover, when this formation is activated, it needs to be calibrated according to the celestial timing of the day in order to complete the repair.

Before that, I was still useful to him, so I never harmed him.

After hearing this, Lu Nanzhu's doubts deepened.

Luo Jin (Yu Liancheng) kept Xin Ruyin because she was useful, but why did he keep himself?

Two years ago, I almost killed him. Given the vengeful nature of demonic cultivators, it shouldn't be as simple as just locking myself up.

A moment later, the sound of a streak of light piercing the air came from outside.

Xin Ruyin's expression changed drastically, and she quickly composed herself, sitting obediently in a corner of the stone bed.

Lu Nanzhu also shut his mouth, staring coldly at the prison cell door.

A moment later, the stone door to the prison cell was opened.

Luo Jin, dressed in a black robe, slowly walked in and looked Lu Nanzhu up and down.

"It's truly fate that I met you here."

"I never imagined that young friend Lu would advance again in just two years. This 'Wind Spirit Body' truly lives up to its reputation as a supreme physique beneficial for cultivation."

Luo Jin paused, stared at Lu Nanzhu, and licked his lips. "I really wanted to take over your body, but unfortunately..."

"Who exactly are you?! Why did you capture me and bring me here?" Lu Nanzhu asked.

Luo Jin stepped forward, approached Lu Nanzhu, and whispered in his ear with a smile, "You'll find out when the time comes. Hehehe."

After saying that, Luo Jin let out a chilling laugh.

Then, he took out a thin rope that glowed with spiritual light from his storage bag and held it in his hand. This was the "Tethering Rope" that Elder Xiao had given to Lu Nanzhu.

It turned out that during the fight with Luo Jin in the underground cave, Lu Nanzhu hadn't had time to retrieve the item in the heat of the moment, which is why Luo Jin got it.

Lu Nanzhu suddenly looked at the ball of thin rope in Luo Jin's hand, his eyes flickering slightly.

"You do recognize this! Tell me! Where did you get this? Where is its owner now?"

Luo Jin's eyes were full of excitement.

"I found it," Lu Nanzhu said casually, turning his head away.

"Found it? Humph! Do you think I'm a three-year-old child?! This thing is made from the silk of the 'Nine-Section Spirit Silkworm'."

This kind of spirit insect is a unique spiritual object of the Great Jin Purple Origin Palace. As a lowly Foundation Establishment cultivator from the Southern Heaven, you are not worthy of wanting this kind of spirit insect!

"Stop spouting nonsense! Tell me! Where is the owner of this item now?!"

Luo Jin suddenly gripped the rope tightly, stepped forward, and lifted up Lu Nanzhu, who was bound tightly, and said angrily.

Lu Nanzhu immediately fell into deep thought: "Great Jin? Ziyuan Palace? What is all this about? Could this person also be a cultivator from Great Jin?"

Then why did it appear in Tiannan? Could it be... an ancient teleportation array!?

"What you say, senior, is truly unknown to this junior. I did indeed find this item in the ruins of an ancient teleportation array," Lu Nanzhu said sincerely, feigning a helpless expression. Seeing Luo Jin still hesitating, he added...

"The ruins of that ancient teleportation array are in a giant fissure in the ground. I found this thing in a crack in the wall of the fissure."

Lu Nanzhu had a flash of inspiration and, drawing on some impressions left from his previous visit to the ruins, began to frantically fabricate nonsense.

"An ancient teleportation array...? Could that thing be nearby too?" Luo Jin muttered to himself, then threw Lu Nanzhu, whom he had been lifting, back to the ground.

After a moment's thought, Luo Jin sent a beam of spiritual light to Lu Nanzhu, and a curse mark immediately appeared on Lu Nanzhu's forehead.

"Since you found this item, then in a few days, come with me to the ruins of the ancient teleportation array."

You'd better behave yourself, otherwise, if this curse takes effect, it won't be pleasant."

Luo Jin left those words without giving him a chance to refuse, and then left the cell, thinking to himself as he went:

"This person is really dishonest. If it weren't for the fact that we can't use the Soul Searching Technique, why would we bother with all this trouble?"

Seeing Luo Jin leave, Lu Nanzhu felt a little relieved and secretly rejoiced that he had not been subjected to "soul-searching and corpse refining".

"I suppose I'm of some use to him. The only hope is to lure him to that ruin; perhaps there's a sliver of hope for survival, however slim..."

But Elder Xiao's identity... could he really be from the Purple Origin Palace?

......

At the border of Yuanwu Kingdom, four streaks of light flashed through the air, revealing Luo Jin and his group of four.

At this moment, Luo Jin (Yu Liancheng) had a cold expression and was holding the imprisoned Lu Nanzhu with one hand; on the other side, the third leader of the Fu family was personally watching Xin Ruyin.

Soon, the group crossed the border and landed in front of the ruins of the ancient teleportation array.

At this moment, Lu Nanzhu was using his divine sense to explore his surroundings and discovered that the disciples of Spirit Beast Mountain who were originally guarding the outer perimeter had vanished without a trace.

At this moment, Luo Jin approached the barrier at the entrance and threw a sound transmission talisman into it.

Before long, a crack about ten feet wide appeared in the barrier.

"Let's go." Luo Jin said in a low voice. The four of them passed through the gap and through the entrance. The scene in front of them suddenly became desolate.

A massive fissure runs east to west across the earth, like a crack cleaved open by Pangu's giant axe, and the fissure is hundreds of feet deep.

The cliffs on both sides are not ordinary soil and rocks, but are inlaid with countless broken fragments of spirit ore and fluorescent stones.

The lower you fly, the lower the temperature gets.

At the deepest part of the crevice, a massive altar made of unknown bluish-black boulders was placed in the center.

Above the altar was a shattered ancient teleportation array. Most of the dozen or so crystal pillars, each several meters tall, had collapsed, and the intricate array patterns on the remaining base were now incomplete.

Before the ruins of the teleportation array stood a black-haired cultivator with his hands behind his back.

Lu Nanzhu stared intently, his pupils suddenly contracting as he immediately recognized this "old acquaintance":

"Elder Lin!?"