Chapter 412: Heavenly-Grade Golden Core – Three!
Lead-gray clouds churned across the sky, abruptly freezing the mist blanketing the island. A deep, rolling thunder echoed from the heavens, sounding like the grinding gears of some colossal, unseen machine.
A heavy solemnity settled in Xiao Mei’er’s eyes. *I stand in an auspicious position,* she calculated inwardly. *I have multiple layers of protection, plus the Spirit Light Talisman grandfather gave me. With my Feng Shui Spirit Root, I only need to endure two waves of the lightning tribulation to forge an Earth-Grade Golden Core.*
Suddenly, the needle on her Feng Shui compass spun into a violent blur.
Above, the dense canopy of dark clouds began to rotate, spiraling into a massive, suffocating vortex. Deep within its eye, purplish-black lightning writhed like a nest of vipers, emitting a continuous, skin-crawling sizzle.
Reacting instantly, Xiao Mei’er whipped her right hand outward. Four banner flags shot forth with a sharp *thwack*, embedding themselves flawlessly into the four cardinal nodes around her.
To the east stood the Azure Dragon Banner, a phantom serpent coiling around its shaft.
To the west, the White Tiger Banner trembled with the phantom roar of a beast.
To the south, the Vermilion Bird Banner flared, its fiery wings poised for flight.
To the north, the Mystic Tortoise Banner stood resolute, depicting a tortoise and serpent locked in an eternal embrace.
The moment the Four Symbols Banners activated, the ambient sounds of howling wind and chirping insects were instantly snuffed out. An eerie silence claimed the space, broken only by Xiao Mei’er’s rapid, shallow breathing.*BOOM! RUMBLE!*
Muffled thunder rolled through the heavens. The lightning flickering within the vortex wasn’t the usual blinding silver-white of a standard tribulation; it was a sickly, mud-like purplish-black.
This was the Turbid Fiend Thunder—a catastrophic force specifically tailored to obliterate a Feng Shui Spirit Root. Its destructive potential was extraordinary.
Yet, before the pillar of thunder could fully coalesce, the atmosphere warped. An entirely alien, overbearing force seemed to hijack the tribulation clouds. The Turbid Fiend Thunder abruptly mutated, shifting from a dual-colored strike into a devastating five-colored pillar. Its mass and raw power multiplied exponentially.
It became a chaotic, churning maelstrom of black, azure, crimson, white, and yellow—a terrifying manifestation of primal energy.
Witnessing this apocalyptic shift, Xiao Mei’er’s heart skipped a beat. “Why did the turbid thunder change?”
She whipped her head toward her grandfather, only to find Wu Lao staring at the sky in equal bewilderment.
She then looked to the Ancestor. The figure remained completely unfazed, exuding an aura of absolute, unshakeable calm.
“Ancestor, what is happening?” she asked.
“A Fated Chance!” the Ancestor declared.
“You mean… by surviving this lightning tribulation, I will reap unimaginable benefits?”
“Mhm!”
“Don’t worry, Mei’er,” Wu Lao chimed in, his confidence bolstered. “If the Ancestor says it’s fine, then it’s fine!”
Hearing their reassurance, Xiao Mei’er let out a shaky breath. Yet, beneath her relief, a knot of dread tightened in her stomach. A primal instinct warned her that something was horribly wrong.
Directly below her, buried deep underground, Jiang Chen listened to the exchange, his lips twitching in dry amusement. *This fake Ancestor is just a manifestation of the secret realm’s mysterious power, shaped entirely by Wu Lao’s own desperate desires. Of course it’s only going to tell them exactly what they want to hear.*
*BOOM!*
The next thunderclap was apocalyptic, violently shaking the very foundations of the secret realm.
It sounded like the screeching clash of divine metal.
Like ancient forests splintering and mountains tearing themselves apart.
Like the deafening roar of a cosmic flood.
Like the explosive detonation of a dying sun.
Like the catastrophic collapse of the earth itself.
A deafening sizzle tore through the vortex as a five-colored pillar of thunder—over ten feet thick—blasted downward. Viscous, chaotic matter flowed across its surface like liquid reality. Wherever it passed, the sheer atmospheric pressure caused the very fabric of space to groan, emitting sharp, brittle cracks like shattering glass.
The color drained from Xiao Mei’er’s face. “Mystic Tortoise Suppresses Calamity!” she shrieked.
The northern Mystic Tortoise Banner violently expanded. The phantom tortoise shell solidified into a massive, towering black shield. Intricate water-suppressing runes carved into its surface anchored themselves to the earth, desperately attempting to ground the incoming thunder pillar.
But she had vastly underestimated the sheer, unadulterated violence of the mutated turbid thunder.
The moment the lightning struck, the phantom tortoise shell disintegrated like wet tissue paper. It offered absolutely zero resistance against the terrifying onslaught.
Driven to the brink, Xiao Mei’er triggered one of her ultimate trump cards. “Five Elements Protect the Body, Generate!”
With a frantic flick of her wrist, five Talismans detonated simultaneously around her.
The Metal Talisman forged a towering aegis of steel.
The Wood Talisman birthed a thicket of iron-hard vines to entangle the strike.
The Water Talisman summoned a torrential downpour to dilute the fiendish energy.
The Fire Talisman erupted into a blazing inferno to incinerate the thunder’s force.
The Earth Talisman ripped boulders from the ground to reinforce her footing.
The cyclical power of the Five Elements fed into one another, weaving a luminous, transparent cocoon around her. As the turbid thunder obliterated the Mystic Tortoise shield and swept toward her, the Talisman array flared with blinding intensity.
*CRACK!*
The thunder instantly punched through the metal shield. The torrential rain flash-boiled into steam. The vines were instantly reduced to ash, and the inferno was snuffed out in a heartbeat. Only the earth and stone managed to plug the breach, stubbornly holding the line for two agonizing seconds before crumbling.
The fractured remnants of the turbid thunder split in two. The first half slammed directly into Xiao Mei’er. Her delicate frame convulsed violently as her Spirit Weapon-grade robes exploded into shrapnel, briefly exposing her pale skin to the elements.
Almost immediately, sickly, spiderweb-like gray veins crawled across her flesh as a corrosive fiendish aura invaded her body.
This was a lethal affliction. If she failed to purge it, the lingering corruption would permanently cripple her foundation, even if she successfully formed her Golden Core.
Stifling a groan of agony, Xiao Mei’er activated another trump card. The Tai Xuan Pendant resting against her collarbone erupted with a blinding white light. A surge of pure, concentrated essence flooded her Meridians, forcibly halting the spread of the gray necrosis.
The second half of the thunder strike missed her entirely, slamming into the earth nearby and gouging out a massive crater.
Yet, the residual current didn’t dissipate. Instead, it burrowed deep underground, arcing through the soil as if actively hunting a target.
Deep below, Jiang Chen’s eyes narrowed. *Is it coming for me?*
However, after tearing through Xiao Mei’er’s layered defenses and being grounded by hundreds of feet of solid earth, the strike’s kinetic force was entirely spent.
With a pathetic *zap*, a tiny arc of static electricity landed on his shoulder and vanished without leaving a mark.
Jiang Chen blinked in the darkness. “Did something just spark?”
Up on the surface, Xiao Mei’er coughed up a mouthful of smoke, her voice trembling with grievance. “Grandfather, Ancestor… this doesn’t feel right at all. If I hadn’t been standing in an auspicious node, I would have been forced to burn the Spirit Light Talisman just to survive that!”
A heavy silence stretched across the island before Wu Lao finally spoke. “Stay strong, Mei’er. You possess the Feng Shui Spirit Root. You only need to survive one more wave of the lightning tribulation to forge an Earth-Grade Golden Core.”
Hearing this, a spark of hope reignited in Xiao Mei’er’s eyes. *He’s right. I still have several trump cards in reserve. I just need to hold the line against the second thunder snake.*
Despite her battered and disheveled state, a fierce anticipation began to bubble within her chest.
After all, she was only one step away from achieving an Earth-Grade Golden Core.
But before the ozone stench of the first strike could even clear, the clouds above violently churned. Two colossal serpentine heads breached the surface of the vortex.
They flickered between illusion and reality, their massive forms still gestating within the womb of the storm.
Xiao Mei’er’s face lit up with manic relief. “This is it! Two snakes, just as expected—wait, what?!”
Before the words fully left her mouth, a third monstrous head breached the clouds. Then a fourth. Then a fifth.
Five apocalyptic serpent heads loomed in the heavens, baring their crackling fangs at the world below. Xiao Mei’er and Wu Lao stared upward, their minds completely blanking in sheer, unadulterated horror.
Logically, a cultivator with a Feng Shui Spirit Root should only summon the serpents of Wind and Water.
Yet, the first beast was a Gengjin Sharp Thunder Snake. Its massive body was armored in diamond-shaped scales that gleamed with a razor-sharp, metallic coldness. Terrifying, sword-like fangs dripped with lethal voltage as its jaws parted.
The second was a Qingmu Decay Thunder Snake. Sickly, bluish-purple parasitic vines strangled its form, pulsating with toxic, miasma-spewing tumors. When it hissed, writhing, mycelium-like lightning crackled deep within its throat.
The third was a Lihuo Blaze Thunder Snake. It was a living inferno, its serpentine pupils dancing with apocalyptic hellfire. Every subtle movement it made scorched the very air, leaving trails of burning plasma in its wake.
The fourth was a Xuanshui Yin Thunder Snake. Its entire mass was composed of hyper-condensed, liquid plasma. Icy-blue runic patterns flowed across its fluid surface, and terrifying geysers of abyssal lightning surged from its maw.
The fifth was a Wutu Nether Thunder Snake. It was as impossibly massive as a floating mountain range. Its body was encased in impenetrable, tectonic plates of thunder-forged earth, and every microscopic shift of its weight sent devastating, ring-shaped shockwaves of lightning rippling through the sky.
Staring up at the five-headed elemental god of death, Xiao Mei’er’s face twisted into a mask of utter despair.
“Screw this!” she wailed, tears streaming down her soot-stained face. “I don’t want to form a Golden Core anymore!”