Chapter 1847: Cloud Rune Stone Mysterious World

The moment his vision cleared up again, Shang Xia extended his soul to assess the situation.

But just as it extended thirty feet out, he abruptly lost the connection, along with a thread of his divine soul.

No longer forcing his divine soul outward, Shang Xia focused solely on the immediate area around him as he landed. His feet touched solid ground, but his expression turned solemn.

After falling into the Nebula Forbidden Region, Shang Xia had indeed lost contact with the other three Sages.

Not only that, but the moment he tried to expand his divine soul, he might not have scouted out the area around him, but he understood the predicament he was in.

He had apparently fallen into a narrow space, haphazardly pieced together from shattered fragments of void.

The ground beneath him was a floating island less than 30 feet across, surrounded by jagged void shards hovering everywhere in the space.

The thread of his divine soul that had been severed earlier had touched the cracks between those void shards and was devoured instantly.

Had he not withdrawn in time and the suction force increased, the weak equilibrium holding the void shards together would crumble, likely causing the entire pocket of space to collapse. If that happened, he would most probably be thrown into a desperate situation.

Shang Xia raised a brow in mild relief and looked up at the direction he had fallen from. Above his head were drifting void fragments that had no proper heading. Their movements were too erratic for him to even track.

He shook his head and abandoned the idea of returning through the way he came.

What mattered was regrouping with Sage Jin and the others as soon as possible.

Even though that hadn’t been his original intent, it was clear that luck had not favored him. Trapped in the sealed and precarious pocket, there would be no opportunities to be found. With danger all around, regrouping was their best course of action.

From his sleeve, he retrieved the Talisman Sword given by Sage Jin. As he brushed his hand across the surface of the blade, the hidden restriction he had placed on it earlier was instantly removed. Imbuing a thread of his inner qi, the Talisman Sword rose into the air and drifted slowly from side to side. Only after some time did it finally settle on a direction.

Though Sage Jin had gifted him the Talisman Sword and explained its use, how could Shang Xia not take precautions, given his past experiences? When he kept the sword back then, hehad already slapped a bunch of restrictions on it.

... Whatever it was, when he finally saw where the sword was pointing, a look of surprise flashed in his eyes. It was exactly where the strand of his divine soul had been devoured earlier.

He couldn’t help but reevaluate his surroundings more carefully.

Just as Sage Jin had warned, the Nebula Forbidden Region was riddled with dangers. The chaotic arrangement of void shards was interconnected and any disruption would cause a massive chain reaction. Getting out wouldn’t be as simple as punching through a spatial crack and running for his life.

As he slowly inspected everything around him, he eventually made a discovery. Not in the space around him, but within the floating island beneath his feet.

His gaze swept the surroundings, and after a brief contemplation, he released his inner qi and sent it deep into the island below.

As soon as his inner qi wrapped around the island, he raised his feet and stomped lightly. The island cracked and rapidly began to collapse. But the fragments did not scatter. Instead, they remained bound by Shang Xia’s inner qi.

At the island’s core, a chamber was exposed. It was circular in shape and built entirely from Cloud Rune Stones.

Cloud Rune Stone wasn’t a type of spiritual treasure that was born naturally. Instead, it was created by Formation Grandmasters and used when deploying formations.

The stone chamber wasn’t just merely protected by formations laid down using Cloud Rune Stones... Instead, it was a Mysterious World crafted entirely by a spatial formation!

Shang Xia was no stranger to Mysterious Worlds. In fact, he had once made significant contributions in a Mysterious World in the Battlefield Between the Two Worlds, catching Kou Chongxue’s attention.

However, the space contained in the Mysterious World in the chamber was clearly much smaller and its spatial barrier was already on the verge of collapse.

"This seems more like a temporary shelter...” Shang Xia mumbled to himself.

After withdrawing his inner qi that was preventing the island from crumbling, he channeled it into the spatial barrier of the Mysterious World, probing it with his divine soul.

Moments later, he gasped softly. With several steps, he quickly arrived before the chamber before reaching out to press on a piece of smooth Cloud Rune Stone.

Rumble...

As the formation made from the Cloud Rune Stone slid backward to reveal the entrance, it emitted a faint glow and a thin stream of heaven and earth qi emerged from within.

The Mysterious World wasn’t large, perhaps four or five miles in diameter, but the moment Shang Xia stepped inside, his divine soul filled the place and he sensed everything.

He walked forward at a relaxed pace. With each step, he appeared dozens of feet away.

Most of the Mysterious World had once been cultivated farmland, though now overgrown and abandoned. Occasionally, he passed a grassy grave mound, marked by a broken tombstone.

As he approached the core of the Mysterious World, he saw ruins of a small village with crumbled walls and shattered structures. The moment he stepped inside, he saw countless skeletons strewn across the ground and rusted weapons embedded in bones.

Shang Xia sighed lightly, already guessing what had happened. "A final desperate stand in the face of death?"

He picked up a long hook from the ground. From the material it was made of, Shang Xia could tell it was a graded weapon at the very least.

But after decades, or maybe centuries, without a cultivator’s inner qi to nourish and preserve it, it had decayed. Its surface was stained red with rust, and it snapped in half with a light tap.

His gaze moved past the remains and settled on a lone thatched hut at the village’s center, the only structure still standing.

He approached the door, but suddenly paused. Eventually, he sighed softly.

If someone had been watching from a distance, they would have seen the hut ripple, its outline flickering.

Shang Xia, however, smiled faintly and pressed his hand against the door.

Creak...

As the wooden panels opened inward, the interior of the hut was revealed.

In the very center was a corpse who was seated cross-legged on the floor. It was impossible to tell how many years had passed, yet the body showed no signs of decay, if anything, it looked lifelike. One glance was enough to tell that the cultivator was no ordinary existence.

But Shang Xia’s gaze did not linger on the corpse. Instead, his eyes locked onto a transparent, round-bellied crystal jar placed behind it, atop a wooden box.

Inside the jar was a layer of colorless liquid, clear as water, filling about a third of it.

Yet at the bottom was a smear of vivid crimson. At first glance, it looked like the jar’s base had been painted with red lacquer.

"Interesting." Shang Xia chuckled softly. "Will you come out on your own, or must I drag you out myself?"