Chapter 968: Bone Dragon (1)

A melodious short whistle echoed through the cemetery of the Pure Sea Dragon Clan. Li Xiaofei's gaze remained fixed on the mound of earth behind the stone tablet. Suddenly, one of the burial mounds began to stir. Then, it burst open with a loud

bang

. A massive dragon head emerged from within.

"ROAR!" A thunderous roar followed.

The soundwave rippled in all directions. The flesh on the skeletal dragon’s skull had completely rotted away. Its bones were snow-white and resilient. Two bluish-gray flames flickered in its eye sockets.

It raised its head toward the sky. Then, its thousand-meter-long body crawled out from beneath the mound. Its skeleton, as white as snowy jade, carried a mechanical elegance. Its dragon claws were ferocious and razor-sharp.

It had no wings, yet it hovered effortlessly in the air. Its body moved with graceful precision, winding upward, drawing arcs through the sky like traces of Dao.

An overwhelming pressure radiated from the bone dragon’s body, distorting the air around it. It let out another sky-shaking roar before it slowly descended and came to a stop before Li Xiaofei. Its enormous skull touched the ground as it lowered its head respectfully in front of him.

So the second gift was an undead bone dragon mount,

Li Xiaofei understood at once.

He reached out and gently stroked the bones of the dragon’s skull. It had a faintly smooth, jade-like texture with a hint of warmth. The bluish-gray flames in the dragon’s eye sockets flickered as a wave of spiritual energy surged forth.

Li Xiaofei immediately grasped what it was trying to convey. The crown prince of the Pure Sea Dragon Clan stood before him. Its name was Ao Ying.

Ao Ying had perished in battle in the war where the Pure Sea Dragon Clan had been annihilated by the Reapers. It was Lin Beichen who had arrived at a critical moment and prevented the rest of the dragons from being devoured by the Reapers and turned into fodder for their evolution.

Lin Beichen had buried them with honor. Then, he had transformed them into undead dragons. Afterward, Priestess Qin had descended upon this place and made a pact with the dragon souls. When the funeral bell resounded through the nine heavens, the undead dragons would rise and fight for humanity. If they triumphed, the glory of the Pure Sea Dragon Clan would be restored.

Later, Priestess Qin had made another agreement with Crown Prince Ao Ying, using the short whistle as a signal. When the whistle sounded, Ao Ying would emerge before the others, follow the one who blew the whistle, acknowledge them as his master, and fight for them.

Since the Pure Sea Dragon Clan had been destroyed by the Reapers, Ao Ying’s heart burned with hatred toward them. He was willing to follow Li Xiaofei and battle across the heavens.

“Let’s go,” said Li Xiaofei as he leaped onto the dragon’s skull.

Ao Ying soared into the sky. Dragons could fly, were skilled in transformation, and could summon wind and rain. Dragons had always seemed to play a supporting role in the mythological system of Great Xia.

Yet many people of Great Xia claimed to be descendants of the dragon. This creature had always held a vital place in the cultural history of Great Xia, bearing the weight of countless generations’ totemic reverence. And now, Li Xiaofei stood upon the dragon’s head, rising into the sky.

He had only two words to describe the sensation: fast and steady. Ao Ying’s speed was astonishing. He moved several times faster than Li Xiaofei could at full speed, and he flew with remarkable stability.

Li Xiaofei didn’t feel the slightest tremor. It was far more stable than any high-speed rail. In the blink of an eye—

Whoosh.

They had already arrived outside the well. According to Priestess Qin, this well was in fact the sea eye of the Burial Sea. The Dragon-Suppressing Stone Pillars and the chained formations surrounding the wellhead had been laid down by the Reaper’s Ancestor of Wisdom. It had been designed to lock away the dragon palace within and sever its connection to the Burial Sea.

The Reapers drew their power from innate abilities. They were incapable of mastering human cultivation methods and martial records. But the Ancestor of Wisdom was, after all, a top-tier existence who stood at the peak of the tower.

He possessed the strength to break through the shackles of heaven and earth. Therefore, it was not surprising that he had mastered the arcane arts of formation-setting. Now that the formation of the Dragon-Suppressing Stone Pillars had been broken, the Burial Sea and the sea eye were connected once again.

The roar of surging tides grew more majestic by the moment. Funeral mists gushed continuously from the well mouth, flowing back into the Burial Sea. A strange transformation was underway.

Standing atop the dragon’s skull, Li Xiaofei looked out into the distance. A host of undead warriors had gathered all around him. Their bones were as white as snow, immaculate and pure. Not a speck of dirt or impurity could be seen upon them.

Flames flickered like starlight in their eye sockets. Countless 'gazes' were now directed toward Li Xiaofei. As he looked out at them, it felt as if he were standing beneath the vast Milky Way.

Now that he knew the origin of these undead skeletal warriors, Li Xiaofei’s heart filled with deep reverence. These were all saints and heroes of the human race. He bowed low to them, paying solemn respect to this boundless sea of skeletons.

In the next instant.

Swish.

A unified, synchronized salute, accompanied by the faint grinding of bones, appeared for the first time in the lifeless expanse of the Burial Sea.

A towering skeletal warrior stood at the very front, a powerful, unmatched force pulsing from his body. Even space and time rippled gently around him, as if bowing in submission to his presence.

Li Xiaofei faintly understood who this figure was. He smiled and gave a slight nod. Then, with a single thought—

"Roar!" The undead bone dragon, Ao Ying, let out a piercing howl and soared into the air.

It moved unhindered within the gray funeral mist. Its speed was like a streak of flowing light. At this moment, Li Xiaofei no longer needed to activate the Blood-Drinking Sword. He was no longer affected by the funeral miasma atop the dragon's skull.

I wonder how Liu Shaji and the others are doing. Could they really have run into the Heavenly Eye Guards?

Li Xiaofei mused silently.

A few minutes later, they reached the edge of the Burial Sea. The undead bone dragon burst free from the sea with a thunderous roar. Like a bird long caged, it let out a joyous cry upon escaping the Burial Sea, soaring freely through the skies above the Blade Ruins.

"Over there."

Li Xiaofei spotted several familiar figures standing on a metallic cliff. Ao Ying descended swiftly.

"Holy crap."

"What kind of monster is that?"

"Get ready for battle."

The five warriors standing at the cliff’s edge were shocked. It was their first time seeing such a massive undead bone dragon, especially one emerging from the forbidden zone of the Burial Sea. Instinctively, they fell into a combat stance, fully alarmed.

“It’s me,” said Li Xiaofei, jumping down from the dragon’s head.

“Senior!”

“Senior Li made it back alive!”

Zhu Zhixun and the others broke into cheers of joy upon seeing Li Xiaofei.

Seeing that none of them appeared injured, Li Xiaofei finally breathed a sigh of relief and asked, “Where’s Liu Shaji?”

Zhu Zhixun pointed into the distance. Li Xiaofei followed his gaze. Roughly a kilometer away, Liu Shaji was sitting on a protruding metal cliff with his legs dangling off the edge.

He looked completely battered. His clothes were tattered and soaked in blood. Several of his wounds were horrific, with flesh turned inside out, exposing bone. Some were so bad that his internal organs could be faintly seen through the gaps in skin and muscle.

Yet he looked completely unconcerned. A cigar was clamped between the fingers of his left hand, while his right held a bottle of red wine. He alternated between puffs and sips, thoroughly enjoying himself.

Smoke drifted out from the gash in his chest. Wine trickled from other open wounds. If it were anyone else, such injuries would have meant certain death but Liu Shaji wasn’t just anyone, so he was still alive.

Very much alive, and enjoying himself immensely. His face was flushed with a lingering afterglow of intense pleasure. Li Xiaofei glanced around the area and spotted the corpses of the Heavenly Eye Guards.

“You took out all nine of them by yourself?” he asked.

“Strictly speaking, it was ten.” Liu Shaji exhaled half a mouthful of smoke and said, “One of them didn’t make it in time for me to kill. Those five guys threw him into a pot and boiled him instead.”

Li Xiaofei glanced back at the five young warriors. All five wore expressions full of pride, clearly fishing for praise. Not bad. He hadn’t expected them to put the black pot combo to such effective use and actually eliminate a Heavenly Eye Guard.

“Those injuries of yours...” asked Li Xiaofei as he turned his gaze back to Liu Shaji.

Liu Shaji replied casually, “Minor stuff. Just surface wounds. What I gained from the fight is worth far more than the pain.”

A powerful energy was brewing inside his body. This hard-fought battle had surpassed all his previous ones. Liu Shaji had come close to death, but the rewards he had reaped were on an entirely new level.

The strength from his past life was awakening at an accelerated pace. Right now, he was in the Golden Immortal Realm. Next would be the True Immortal Realm.

In his past life, he had reached the level of a quasi-Emperor Realm. Liu Shaji could clearly feel that, after this battle, he would at least recover to the Great Luo True Immortal Realm.