Mo Fan took a deep breath and looked up, only to see that the teleportation vortex that had brought him in had long since vanished. He examined his surroundings and found that the walls were all crimson rock, somewhat resembling the colour of cooled lava.
“It seems I am deep underground now…”
Mo Fan took another deep breath and immediately tried to activate his Earth Escape divine ability, but it failed. As expected, he could not use Earth Escape here!
“Calm down. I must stay calm!”
“The more critical the moment, the less I can lose my composure!”
Mo Fan muttered to himself, gradually regaining his calm. He then began to think about how to escape next.
Undoubtedly, from the look of this Nirvana Pool, the Fire Phoenix Palace was not as peaceful as it appeared on the surface. It hid an unspeakable terror!
Why were so many fire-cultivating demons dead beneath the Nirvana Pool?
The Fire Phoenix Saint King must know!
In Mo Fan’s view, there were only two possibilities.
The first was that the Fire Phoenix had killed these dead demons herself and left them here to extract the residual demonic energy from their corpses using a special array, supplying it to other demons for cultivation.
In plain terms, she was using these corpses as fertiliser, but not for flowers or plants, rather for the prodigies of the Fire Phoenix Palace!
The second was that these dead demons had likely come here to cultivate just like him in the past, but for some unknown reason, they had all perished in the Nirvana Pool, becoming sustenance for other demons’ cultivation.
Either possibility chilled Mo Fan to the bone, without exception proving that the Fire Phoenix Palace was no benevolent place!
Of course, Mo Fan’s desire to slip away quickly had another important factor.
He had discovered that he seemed to have destroyed the entire Nirvana Pool…
If he had only taken some of the spring liquid, it would not have been a big deal, but he had just noticed that even the five-coloured stone supplying energy to the Nirvana Pool was cracked. Even if he poured the spring liquid back in, it would be useless. Before long, the Nirvana Pool would lose its cultivation function and become nothing more than a pool of ordinary bathwater.
This discovery made Mo Fan restless, and in his heart, he cursed the golden coin over and over.
In his opinion, if the golden coin had not greedily absorbed the Nirvana Pool’s energy, the five-coloured stone might not have shattered so quickly.
But since the deed was done, his regrets would change nothing.
With no way out for the moment, Mo Fan could only grit his teeth and sit in the pool. To avoid giving himself away, he even deliberately released a small amount of the stored spring liquid from his inner space, so that it did not look so empty at a glance.
In this way, Mo Fan waited a full day. The black vortex reappeared above his head, followed by the fire spirit’s voice emanating from it.
“Boy, time is up. You should come out!”
Hearing this, Mo Fan breathed a slight sigh of relief. He then flew straight toward the black vortex and, in the next moment, reappeared in the Nirvana Hall.
“Hm?”
“You little fellow were inside for a whole day. By rights, with your cultivation, you should have broken through long ago. Why are you still only at the late Demon General stage?”
As soon as Mo Fan appeared, the fire spirit frowned and scrutinised him, a hint of doubt in its eyes.
Mo Fan could only smile bitterly in his heart. How could he not want to break through?
It was just that during his earlier cultivation, most of the energy had been stolen by that damned golden coin in his mind. What he truly absorbed was only a tiny portion, which was why he had taken all the spring liquid into his inner space.
But regarding the breakthrough, Mo Fan was still confident.
The amount of five-coloured spring liquid in his inner space now was considerable, more than enough for him to reach the peak of Demon General!
However, facing the fire spirit’s doubt, Mo Fan could only smile bitterly and say, “I do not know why, but I found cultivation so boring that I fell asleep while practising inside.”
“What?!”
“You actually slept in the Nirvana Pool?!”
The fire spirit’s eyes widened in shock, and it gnashed its teeth, cursing, “What a hopeless case! Such a waste! An utter waste!!”
Faced with the fire spirit’s heartbroken expression, Mo Fan merely scratched his head awkwardly and tentatively said, “Well, Senior, if there is nothing else, may I take my leave?”
“Get lost! A puddle of mud, do not soil this king’s eyes!”
“…”
Mo Fan was speechless and turned to flee in a flash.
Seeing this, the fire spirit huffed in anger, muttering, “I truly do not understand why the Saint King would give such an important opportunity to this mangy toad. Even the Holy Son only gets five chances to enter the Nirvana Pool in ten years, yet this fellow does not know how to cherish it!!”
“Or perhaps… he discovered something…”
After a moment, the fire spirit sensed something amiss and grew solemn.
It looked up at the black vortex overhead, then stood on its hind legs and poked its head into the vortex to see what was happening inside.
“Ren Mian, what are you doing?”
Suddenly, an indifferent voice sounded, startling the fire spirit. It turned and saw the black-robed youth returning.
“Holy Son, did you not just leave yesterday? Why are you back so soon?”
The fire spirit frowned.
“Yesterday, I was merely tired and had not finished cultivating, so after resting for a day, I found myself on the verge of breaking through my current bottleneck. Thus, I wished to enter the Nirvana Pool again to cultivate,” the black-robed youth, addressed as Holy Son, said with a smile.
“This… you have already used four chances this year. Why not rest properly and enter the Nirvana Pool later? How about that?” The fire spirit’s eyes darted as it suggested.
“Enough talk. I want to go in now!”
“You said it yourself, I have only used four chances. Is there not one left?!”
The black-robed youth snorted coldly. Seeing the fire spirit’s troubled expression, its features scrunched as if deep in difficult thought, the youth wasted no more time and flew straight into the black vortex.
Oh no!
“Holy Son, you cannot enter now!!”
The fire spirit shouted, but it could not stop him. It paced in place, its face bitter.
“Disaster, disaster. The Saint King said the Nirvana Pool can only be opened five times in half a year, or it risks collapse…
The Holy Son has already entered four times, plus that little toad earlier, that makes five. Going in now would exceed the limit?!”
Inside the Nirvana Pool, the black-robed youth noticed something wrong the moment he landed. The spring liquid in the pool seemed to have diminished by nine tenths!
“How could this be?!”
The black-robed youth frowned, but soon his eyes gleamed. He opened his mouth and sucked up all the remaining spring liquid. Just as his storage pouch was about to overflow, the pool finally ran dry!
The horrifying scene Mo Fan had witnessed reappeared, searing itself into the black-robed youth’s eyes.
His pupils contracted in shock!
Among these corpses, a large portion were people he recognised, once hailed as prodigies, who had later vanished without a trace.
The Fire Phoenix had merely explained that they had gone into seclusion, but this sight made the black-robed youth’s scalp tingle.
“So that is how it is!”
“They are all deceiving me, all of them!!”
The black-robed youth roared, crimson flames surging from his body as terrifying killing intent erupted from him!
“What terrifying killing intent!”
Outside the Nirvana Hall, the fire spirit suddenly shuddered and looked up at the still-present teleportation vortex overhead. It immediately sent a strand of divine sense probing inside.
“Holy Son, how dare you destroy the Nirvana Pool!!”
The fire spirit’s furious roar echoed through the entire Nirvana Pool space. The black-robed youth looked up and spat lightly, “Scram!”
Soon, the black-robed youth left the Nirvana Pool and headed toward the hall’s exit.
“Holy Son, you destroy the Nirvana Pool and think you can just leave like that?”
The fire spirit flashed forward, blocking the black-robed youth’s path.
