Chapter 1709: No Room For Optimism
It was deep into the night. Six cold moons could be seen hanging in the sky.
At the Serene Moon Race’s valley, Qin Lie, Teng Yuan, Brett, and the others followed You Pu to the scene of death hurriedly.
The thirteen dead Serene Moon Race clansmen were arranged in a row next to the moon ponds.
“When did they die?” You Pu asked with a gloomy look on his face.
These thirteen Serene Moon Race clansmen had apparently gone through many hardships before they passed through a spatial rift and arrived at Spirit Realm by accident.
They knew the rough location of the Dark Shadow World.
Their sudden deaths had instilled a deep sense of unease in You Pu. He was afraid that Teng Yuan’s guess was true, that the shadow beings had slipped into Boluo Realm through these thirteen survivors.
“It wasn’t all that long ago,” You Yun of the Serene Moon Race said helplessly. “They looked fine. I’m not sure why, but their souls suddenly just… dissipated right in front of me.”
“Dissipated?” Qin Lie asked with a frown.
You Yun shot him a complicated glance before nodding slowly. “It was almost like a hurricane had blown their souls apart. They dissipated quickly and left no traces behind.”
Many years ago, she and You Qianlan had clashed against Qin Lie.
Her error in judgment and unfortunate crime against Qin Lie had resulted in her being locked in an underground prison for nine whole years.
When she came out, she learned that the Serene Moon Race wasn’t the only race that was allied with Qin Lie. Nearly every race in Boluo Realm was firm friends with him.
A couple more years had passed after that, and they changed from allies to vassal forces of Qin Lie after Seven Spirits Islands had become connected to the Frost Desolation Abyss.
And now, Qin Lie was the most famous and important person in the entire Spirit Realm. His successes far exceeded her expectations.
Every time she thought back to the past, every time she recalled how she had driven the Serene Moon Race to a corner in front of Qin Lie, she couldn’t help but regret her decision.
A lot of Serene Moon Race clansmen in the valley harbored the exact same thought.
“Please allow me to inspect them,” Qin Lie said solemnly.
Teng Yuan and the others knew that this Qin Lie was a rank ten subsoul. They nodded in silence and allowed him to perform his inspection.
Qin Lie focused his soul consciousness and passed it through the Serene Moon Race clansmen’s brains. As mentioned earlier, not a trace of their souls had been left behind.
This meant that the corpses before his eyes were completely dead. There were no soul traces to be found whatsoever
“What if I use another method?” An idea entered his mind.
A thick aura of death suddenly spread out of Qin Lie’s body.
“Eh!”
Everyone detected it quickly and changed their expressions a little. Their surprise was quickly replaced by curiosity instead.
“Dead souls…”
Qin Lie changed his soul secret art to Castor’s power so that he could gather the dead souls scattered around the place.
“Swhoosh!”
Traces of invisible soul mist only the soul could barely perceive suddenly appeared to Qin Lie’s senses.
These soul mists twisting with death aura slowly approached him.
“Bang!”
However, a pitch black light suddenly exploded from inside the balls of dead souls.
As a result, the tiny bit of dead soul energy that took quite a lot of effort to gather was completely destroyed.
Even Qin Lie, the driving force behind the power, was hurt by the explosion. He let out a dull groan, and his complexion looked dark and eerie.
He could feel a mysterious power inside the thirteen corpses. It was interfering with his ability to find the truth.
This power was mysterious and powerful. It was also an evil secret art of the soul.
“What’s wrong?” Teng Yuan asked in surprise.
“I don’t know. No shadow beings have tried to ambush us yet… but I dare say that the powerful ones had learned about Boluo Realm’s exact location already.” Qin Lie sucked in a deep breath before continuing, “There’s probably a shadow being mark inside each of their bodies. Their sudden deaths likely have something to do with these marks. They also came active and interrupted me while I was searching just now.”
Every Boluo Realm expert wore a gloomy look after hearing this.
You Pu blamed himself vocally. “Dammit! It’s all my fault!”
“Y-you’re saying... that the shadow beings have found out our location through these Serene Moon Race clansmen, and that they may appear in our world very soon?” You Yun asked shakily.
Qin Lie nodded and replied, “That is the optimistic outcome.”
“What about the less-optimistic one?” You Yun asked again.
“The shadow beings may have been hiding inside their bodies all this time, and they had slipped into Boluo Realm after these Serene Moon Race clansmen were killed,” Qin Lie said coldly.
“You’re saying that the shadow beings had purposely let them escape?” You Pu exclaimed in shock.
“Wait. Did they say that they were... hunted by the shadow beings when they showed up?” Qin Lie’s expression changed.
You Pu smiled helplessly at him before replying, “Yes.”
“You fool!” Qin Lie shot him a cold look before yelling, “Not a single one of them is over rank nine bloodline. How could they possibly survive being hunted by the shadow beings? They’d fallen to the shadow beings’ hands long before they knew it!”
“Because of you, the shadow beings had probably learned of Boluo Realm’s coordinates already. Some of them may even be here right now. They may make their way to Boluo Realm right once they’re done with whatever they’re currently dealing with.”
“Boluo Realm is now compromised. It’s no longer a safe place.”
“I, I didn’t want this to happen either,” You Pu said while staring at the ground.
“Qin Lie, are you saying that the shadow beings will be arriving soon, if they aren’t here already?” The demon dragon Scott actually looked happy to hear the news.
“That’s right,” Qin Lie replied.
“In that case, can you check if there’s any shadow being in Boluo Realm right now?” Scott asked excitedly.
Qin Lie pondered for a moment before saying, “First, I can’t confirm that a shadow being has infiltrated Boluo Realm. Two, I’ve never encountered a shadow being before, so I have no idea about their shape and structure. I can’t guarantee that I’ll be able to find them with the soul and drag them out of their hiding place.”
“Still, why don’t you give it a try? I heard that you’re the one who found the two Soul Race princes hiding in the Central World back then,” Scott said encouragingly.
“I’ll try. I was going to try one way or another,” Qin Lie agreed with a nod.
A pause later, he added, “The rest of you should try as well. Spread your soul across all of Boluo Realm and see if there’s anything amiss.”
“Alright.”
“We’ll try.”
Teng Yuan, Tyler, and everyone agreed to this.
“This is no laughing matter, so please be careful. By the way, I’ll be sending someone to destroy the spatial rifts your clansmen used to come here,” Qin Lie said to You Pu.
“I understand,” You Pu replied with a bitter smile on his face.
“Barett, please transport these thirteen corpses to Sky Bearing City. Also, tell my grandpa everything that has happened here,” Qin Lie instructed.
“Right on,” Barett agreed.