Chapter 170 No more waiting, grab your weapons and attack!
"What is it?" Xiao Yu asked.
"Your Highness, do you still remember the aura on the stone door of the secret chamber in Prince Yu's mansion?" Chu Xuanyi said slowly, "That wasn't simply a sorcery, but a kind of... 'living' energy. I once saw a record of this power in a rare ancient manuscript, called 'the netherworld'."
Jiu stopped sipping her porridge, raised her head, and there was a hint of confusion in her big eyes, but she was listening very attentively.
"Underworld?" A cold light flashed in Xiao Yu's eyes.
"Yes. It's not a spell, nor a vengeful spirit, but more like a... 'plague' from another world. It has no entity, but it can corrode everything, devouring vitality and spiritual energy to strengthen itself. Formations and earth veins are the best nourishment for it." Chu Xuanyi's explanation made Xiao Jing's scalp tingle.
"What about that verse?" Xiao Yu asked again.
"'Roots below, mouth feeding on heaven.'" Chu Xuanyi's expression became more solemn than ever before. "If I'm not mistaken, 'roots below' refers to the foundation of their rituals, hidden deep beneath the capital. And 'mouth feeding on heaven'... what they're after is to feed on the dragon energy of the entire capital's national destiny!"
"What a huge appetite!" Xiao Yu laughed in anger, "Aren't they afraid of stuffing themselves to death?"
"They won't." Chu Xuanyi shook his head, "Because they are not the masterminds, they are just servants. What they are doing is awakening something - the Heart of the Netherworld."
"Heart of the Underworld?"
"It can be understood as the source of that 'plague'. Once awakened, it will spread in all directions, centered in the capital, turning the entire Great Yan into its meal. By then, everything will wither, all living things will be devastated, and the world will be transformed into a purgatory."
Chu Xuanyi spoke calmly, but the content of his words made Xiao Jing gasp for air, and he felt a chill running from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.
"Then...what should we do?" Xiao Jing was extremely anxious.
Chu Xuanyi was silent.
After a long pause, he slowly spoke, "It's too late. The other party has been preparing for a long time, and now the ceremony has reached a critical moment. The capital's national defense formation has been corroded and riddled with holes. By then, even without waiting for the 'Heart of the Netherworld' to awaken, the leaked Netherworld Qi alone will be enough to kill or injure most of the city's civilians."
"Brother Xiong Xiong..."
A timid, thin voice suddenly sounded.
Everyone looked over.
Ajiu put down the bowl of porridge in his hand, and looked at Xiao Yu with a pair of big black eyes. His little eyebrows were also tightly frowned like an adult.
"I...I was dreaming again." She said in a low voice.
The rage and anxiety in Xiao Yu's heart miraculously subsided a little the moment he heard her voice. He walked to the bedside and tried his best to make his tone sound less scary: "What did you dream about?"
"I dreamed of lots of mouths, more than last time." Jiu stretched out his little hand and gestured, "They were all underground, like a very long worm, gnawing at the ground beneath our feet. They ate so happily and were so full."
Her description was naive and strange, but it accurately confirmed Chu Xuanyi's statement.
"And then?" Xiao Yu asked patiently.
"In that giant bug's... heart," Ah Jiu tried hard to recall the scene in his dream, "there's a very dark spot. All the mouths are feeding into that spot. That spot... is so cold, colder than the coldest ice in winter. It's just... just like the feeling behind that stone door in that wicked prince's house, exactly the same!"
The bad prince, Prince Yu.
The feeling behind the stone door!
Xiao Yu's eyes suddenly lit up!
He turned around abruptly, strode to the wall, and pulled down a landscape painting hanging on the wall, revealing an extremely sophisticated map of the capital's land veins and hydrology drawn behind it!
"Xuan Yi!"
"I'm here!"
"Mark the seven destroyed nodes that Qi Qi discovered on the map!"
"yes!"
Xuan Yi did not dare to delay and immediately took out the red pen. According to his memory, he quickly circled seven points on the huge map.
When the seventh point fell, everyone understood.
Those seven points, scattered across the capital, seemed unrelated. But if you connected them with a line, they would form a giant, directional arrow!
The end point of the arrow is not a palace or temple, nor a strategic location.
But...
"The abandoned well in the imperial mausoleum?" Xiao Jing cried out.
That place was the site of the imperial tombs of the previous dynasty. After the founding of the Great Yan Dynasty, it was completely sealed off and abandoned for hundreds of years. Except for a deep well that was said to lead to an underground river, it was almost forgotten.
The most dangerous place is the safest place.
Who would have thought that Prince Yu and the elders of the Wugut tribe would hold such an important awakening ceremony there!
"I am Gen, and I eat the sky..." Xiao Yu looked at the point on the map, murderous intent flashing in his eyes, "I see."
All the clues are closed at this moment.
He knew where the enemy was and what they were doing.
He also knew that he had no time.
"Your Highness, no." Chu Xuanyi seemed to see through his thoughts and immediately stopped him. "That place must be where the enemy's defenses are the most stringent and their forces are the strongest. If you go there now, you will be walking into a trap."
"So what?" Xiao Yu sneered and turned around. "Do you want me to sit here and watch them eat up the capital like a snack?"
"Xuan Yi, you guard this place well and protect the last line of defense in the capital."
"Ajiu, you..." He looked at the little girl on the bed, paused, and his tone was more serious than ever before, "...stay here too and take good care of yourself. Wait for me to come back."
"Brother Xiongxiong, are you going to beat the bad guys?" Ajiu asked with his little face raised.
"Yes." Xiao Yu's mouth curled up into a bloodthirsty arc, "Go and smash their mouths."
He no longer hesitated, turned around and walked out.
Outside the door, Xuan Yi had already brought the war horse.
"Pass the order down!"
"Select three thousand elite Xuan Armored Soldiers and bring all armor-piercing heavy crossbows! Then send a message to Mo Li at the Observatory, asking him to bring all disciples who can still move, as well as all usable formation plates and magical instruments!"
"Gather outside the abandoned well of the imperial mausoleum within one stick of incense!"
In the suburbs of Beijing, there are abandoned mines and imperial mausoleums.
This was once the royal quarry of the previous dynasty, but was later completely abandoned due to the hollow mountain and unstable ground veins.
A hundred years of wind and rain have made this place deserted, with only a few huge dark mines left.
“Da, da, da…”
The uniform sound of horse hooves, coming from far and near, broke the dead silence of the place.
Under the cover of night, three thousand Black Armored Army soldiers, like a black steel torrent, silently surrounded the entire abandoned mine area.
Torches were strictly limited, with only sporadic points of light flickering at the end of the team. But in every soldier's eyes, a cold light was reflected, sharper than the flames.
"Your Highness." Xuan Yi urged his horse to the front of the team and said in a low voice, "Everyone is in place. The perimeter control is complete. Not even a fly can fly out."
Xiao Yu sat upright on his warhorse, his dark black uniform making him blend in with the night. He didn't look at Xuan Yi, his gaze fixed like a hawk on the largest mine entrance ahead.
"Mo Li." He said lightly.
"The students are here!"
Mo Li, dressed in a blue and white Taoist robe, walked out quickly from the team with a dozen disciples from the Observatory who were dressed in the same attire.
"What's the atmosphere like here?" Xiao Yu asked.
Mo Li took out a palm-sized compass. The compass needle did not point to the north or south, but was spinning wildly in place, as if it was drunk.
"Your Highness," Mo Li's expression was extremely solemn. "The earth energy here has been completely polluted. No, it should be said... it has been completely devoured, leaving only an empty shell. Now, it is filled with an appallingly high concentration of netherworld energy. This compass is useless."
As he spoke, he threw the malfunctioning compass aside as if it were a useless stone.
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