Page 754

"I feel it, the strength of this seal has doubled compared to before," Ya said, frowning deeply. "If it keeps getting stronger with every hit, we have no way of dealing with it at all."

Lan Xi stood before the seal, her face showing a look of gravity.

If this continued, it would be disadvantageous for everyone.

But she couldn’t bear to give up just like that. War is merciless; could it really be that a million celestial soldiers were to be buried on the battlefield?

If the Immortal Realm were gone, their homeland would be destroyed, followed by calamity and suffering for all living beings.

Zhong Li was right.

She was a successor of the gods, born to protect this world by heaven’s mandate.

If she shrank back now, she’d have no right to become a god.

"Mi Xi, Ya, you both should leave!" Lan Xi turned her head back and looked at them with a firm gaze.

"Why? Aren’t you leaving?" Mi Xi asked anxiously. It was impossible to retrieve the Divine Artifact.

"I want to look again."

Lan Xi was adamant about it.

Mi Xi and Ya were sent away.

Soon, Lan Xi and the man in black were the only ones left at the scene.

"Ah Qing, try with your sword again." Lan Xi vaguely felt that Ah Qing’s sword was special. Although she didn’t know what exactly made it special, it could split open a Snow Mountain, counter the power of the Divine Artifact, and had carried her through danger.

He was strong in his own right.

Even as a mere mortal, he possessed a power that even immortals could only look up to.

"Okay!"

Lan Xi quickly moved away to a safe distance.

The man in black stood before the seal, raising the longsword in his hand and once again slashing at the bright shield.

Sword Qi surged like a rainbow, clashing with the shield, and soon a thunderous, deafening roar resounded as the Snow Mountain spread outwards with unstoppable momentum, causing avalanches and breaking the ice layers.

Lan Xi, watching from afar, was shocked by the rapidly expanding force.

"Ah Qing!" she called out loudly, her fingers tightly clenched, her heart in turmoil. Could Ah Qing be in danger? Could he dodge this force?

Soon, the Snow Mountain spread to both sides, revealing the mountain underneath.

A platform rose from below the Snow Mountain, ascending into midair.

The power of the seal was like a vast space; initially, the Qiankun Gu was only the size of a fist, but now the Divine Artifact was terrifyingly suspended in midair, as large as a house.

Golden runes flowed around it, radiating a terrifying power.

At this moment, Lan Xi had no interest in those runes; her only concern was whether Ah Qing was alright.

If he was safe, he should have returned to her side.

Lan Xi quickly used incantations to search for Ah Qing’s whereabouts.

But after a while, she could not sense his presence.

It was just like before, when she disappeared in front of him, no matter how hard she looked, she couldn’t find him.

"Ah Qing! Where are you?" Lan Xi bit her lip, her eyes sore and blurred with tears.

Although she knew he wasn’t dead, the thought of not seeing him made her feel as if her chest was being squeezed, cutting off her breath.

"Lan Xi!" The young man in black suddenly appeared in front of her. His hand braced against his longsword with a trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth. Upon seeing Lan Xi look over, he smiled faintly and shook his head, "I’m fine!"

"How can you be fine? You’re bleeding." Lan Xi stepped forward quickly, taking out a handkerchief to wipe the blood from the corner of his mouth.

She had only asked him to try the shield’s power again, yet this fool had used all his strength in a single strike, causing a backlash from the seal that was even more terrifying than before.

The man in black looked at the little woman before him, her long eyelashes damp with tears, clearly worried about him, scared to the point of crying.

The reason he hadn’t appeared immediately was that the rebounding force of the seal was so strong that even with his ability to move through time and space to avoid it, he had still been affected. To avoid worrying her, he stayed in the temporal void, waiting for his wounds to heal.

Though he was strong, he was still only a mortal.

A mere wisp of the seal’s power could obliterate him, but because he shared half of Lan Xi’s Divine Blood and could move swiftly through time and space to evade, the injuries could heal quickly.

The fluctuation he had just experienced nearly rendered his hand useless, and if not for having Lan Xi’s fast-healing Divine Blood, that might have been the end of him with that strike.

Lan Xi knew that he downplayed it, but the risk he faced was clear only to him.

"Ah Qing! Go outside and wait with my senior brother until I come out." Lan Xi stuffed the handkerchief into the young man’s chest and then looked towards the seal not far away.

Now that the seal was big enough, she could clearly see the runes on it.

She had studied seals and the art of unsealing. If she could comprehend the seal’s patterns and then follow the intent left by the War God to decipher it, she would be able to unlock the seal and obtain the Divine Artifact.

"No, I’ll stay with you," the young man in black firmly refused. No matter the situation, he wanted to be by her side to protect her.

However, Lan Xi shook her head, "What comes next, no one can help me with. Ah Qing, you’ve already helped me enough."

Seeing the determination in Lan Xi’s eyes, the young man in black was silent for a long moment before he slowly turned around and moved away a little.

But he did not truly leave Lan Xi’s line of sight.

He simply hid in a relatively safe place, watching Lan Xi cast her spell.

Lan Xi’s gaze fell upon the light that was covered with runes.

The woman’s snow-white dress fluttered as she slowly ascended from the ground and eventually reached the top of the barrier.

Her eyes fixed on a specific point atop the barrier, her fingers formed an incantation, and white Spiritual Energy followed the direction of her fingers, pouring power into the distant point of the Seal.

Immediately, her spirit entered a highly concentrated state.

Her soul drilled into the barrier, following the Seal’s pattern, searching for the correct pathway.

From a distance, the breathtaking beauty of the woman could be seen faintly within the golden light.

Her beauty was universally recognized; she was the heir of the gods, and with that, she bore a heavy responsibility.

From afar, Mi Xi and Ya gazed at the center of the snowfield, deeply captivated by the girl’s stunning beauty.

"Can Lan Xi really break the Seal?" Mi Xi asked with a worried expression.

Ya’s eyes were deep, he had never seen such a serious Lan Xi before.

In his memory, most of the time, she was mischievous and playful, like a child who never grew up.

Of course, except for that time—the Blood Demon Sea trip.

And when she was serious, the consequences were usually very serious.

"She’s still too stubborn," Mi Xi felt that the more he worried about something, the more likely it was to happen.

Ya clenched his fists, his heart feeling an oppressive discomfort; he thought if he trained hard enough, he could help her.

But when real trouble came, he was still powerless to do anything.

Shaoqing stood not far away, his gaze never leaving Lan Xi for a moment.

If there was an accident, he would rush to save her without hesitation.

Only he knew that she wasn’t being stubborn, but rather, she had a conviction in her heart. She was taking on the responsibilities that she should.

Therefore, whatever she did, he would support her.

Time passed by, bit by bit.

Lan Xi still stood motionless in mid-air, her hand’s Spiritual Energy connected to the tip of the Seal.

The Divine Artifact within the barrier spun rapidly, while the glow outside the light faded and brightened intermittently.

Sweat beaded on Lan Xi’s forehead, and her lips were turning white.

Should she give up?

At that moment, Lan Xi’s spiritual power roamed within the Seal.

She had lifted the majority of the Seal, but the small remainder she could not budge at all.

Beyond that point, the power of the Seal only grew stronger, even beginning to backlash against her Spirit Body.

Gradually, she began to sway unsteadily in the air.

Desperation set in for Lan Xi, and soon blood started to seep from the corner of her mouth.

Should she just give up?

No!

She refused to accept defeat. Why couldn’t the power of the Seal be broken?

If the War God intended that only his descendants with equal strength could inherit the Divine Artifact, what use was it?

Being a god meant being an invincible existence that could maintain peace in the world without the need for a Divine Artifact.

Therefore, she believed that the Seal could definitely be broken.

Her Spirit Body within the Seal was now lying flat on the barrier, pressed down by the intense force.

The path lay clearly before her, yet she could not stand up, unable to move an inch.

"Girl, if you insist on continuing forward, your Spirit Body will completely disintegrate, and you’ll end up an imbecile," an elderly voice echoed from within the Seal.

Lan Xi lay on the ground, struggling to lift her head, her rationality returning slightly.

"I am a god; as long as my body remains, my Spirit Body can still be cultivated back even if it disintegrates."

As long as she persevered in breaking the Seal, the Divine Artifact would naturally come under her control again. In the worst case, she could still ask her mother to intervene in the Demon War.

She had always known that nothing in this world came easy.

With that, she bit down on her teeth, enduring the excruciating pain all over her body, and crawled forward step by step.

Only by sorting out the pattern of the Seal could it be broken. The principle was like finding the correct route in a maze.

And the correct route she needed to take was right before her eyes.

Just ten more meters to crawl, and she would be successful.

Biting her teeth, Lan Xi used up her last breath and fearlessly crept forward.

Finally, she broke the Seal.

As the golden barrier gradually faded, the true form of the Divine Artifact became visible.

Lan Xi spat out a mouthful of blood, and then her entire body slid from mid-air to the ground.