Chapter 134: Snow and Ice Stretching Vast as the Sea

"Damn it, so creepy, so creepy." Qian Mo patted his chest, then muttered, "Good thing I am a person of strength. If I were an ordinary person, I'd turn around and run."

"So many people buried below, how should I get them out? Or should I just go down and loot directly?"

"This is both a physical and a delicate job."

Qian Mo stroked his chin and said.

If he searched through them all one by one... that would be a very unwise and time-consuming idea, simply unfeasible.

Wait.

"Since I am the Lord of the Reincarnation Hall and the Master of the Yama Prison, I should be the one in control of their life and death. Since I control life and death, their souls and physical bodies..."

An idea flashed across Qian Mo's mind as he spoke. He must be up to some bad ideas again.

"Hehe, something fun has come up." Qian Mo smiled slyly.

Qian Mo bought a ninjutsu from the system mall, originally from Naruto: "Earth Release!"

After learning it, he transformed directly and burrowed straight into the ground.

...

Not long after, Qian Mo had retrieved all the coffins of the past generations from below and placed them on a flat piece of ground.

There were easily over a thousand coffins here; searching them one by one was completely unscientific.

Qian Mo then bought a bunch of treasure-seeking mice from the mall. These mice were specially designed for hunting treasures, and their pricing corresponded directly to the system mall, meaning they wouldn't waste time on things of little value.

This saved Qian Mo a lot of mental effort, as searching by himself would have taken forever. Besides, the Tianji Pavilion auction was going to start in the afternoon.

He had to hurry.

Following Qian Mo's command, the treasure-seeking mice scurried off toward the most valuable coffins.

About ten minutes later, all the mice had taken up positions, and every spot they occupied held a valuable coffin.

"Not bad, pretty efficient, got it done in ten minutes." Qian Mo nodded with satisfaction. The faster the speed, the quicker he would get his hands on the treasures.

Qian Mo stretched out both hands, and a peerless, space-shattering divine power struck towards the locations of the coffins where the mice stood.

Qian Mo pressed his hands together: "Amitabha, esteemed benefactors, you have passed away for many years, and the treasures you left behind are of no use anymore. Little old me will take them off your hands. If any of you are unhappy about it, come find me; this prison master doesn't mind recruiting you as members of my prison."

Uh, will saying this offend all of them? Oh well, what's said is said; if they come, I'll just refine them into puppets, Qian Mo thought to himself.

"Ahem, well then, it is your blessing that this prison master has taken a fancy to your belongings."

"Open the coffins!" As he spoke, Qian Mo raised two fingers slightly upward. Instantly, the divine power attached to the coffins was influenced by primal force, directly prying them open.

Click-clack—

The sound of numerous coffins scraping against each other rang out once more.

"Tsk tsk, how exciting. This is my first time looting stuff from dead people." Qian Mo expressed intense excitement inwardly. Most of the dead people he had looted previously were killed on the spot and plundered immediately. These were completely different—they had been buried deep underground, accumulating underground sediment and avoiding the sunlight for many years.

In his previous life, this was collectively known as—grave robbing!

Specializing in taking things from dead people.

Row upon row of coffins flew into mid-air and came to a halt.

From within the coffins, strands of cold, damp, and terrifying aura suddenly radiated outward.

It was clearly visible to the naked eye; those were the so-called death qi, black gases tinged with a faint green.

Death qi, having been preserved on the bodies of the deceased for many years without any place to discharge, constantly remained in one spot. Over time, strange mutations and corpse-animation phenomena would occur, which was hardly surprising.

"With so much death qi, won't they actually come back to life as corpses?" Qian Mo's eyes widened slightly as he spoke.

Qian Mo secretly recalled the treasure-seeking mice, leaving only himself as the sole living person among all the corpses.

...

Inside the coffins, one coffin suddenly opened its eyes, the pupils radiating a scarlet color, with thick death qi swirling around the body.

This was the phenomenon of corpse mutation. Following that first one, all the opened coffins transformed in the exact same manner. Those that had originally retained intact appearances now dissolved into bare skeletons, surrounded by dense death qi.

Suddenly, the numerous corpses flew up into the air.

Each and every one of them carried a chilly, terrifying death qi.

...

When Qian Mo saw this scene, he was genuinely startled: "Holy crap, they really turned into corpses!"

"Is this a corpse mutation?!"

"Those who disturb us shall die!" Each corpse released a terrifying aura simultaneously and shouted.

All their gazes locked onto Qian Mo.

They charged straight toward him.

"Holy crap, they can even talk? Incredible, incredible, these corpse mutations have leveled up." Qian Mo was startled by their speech. He activated his penetrating eyes and scanned the area once, seeing them displayed as non-living entities.

Seven-star...
Seven-star...
Seven-star...
......... Dou Sheng!
Eight-star...
Eight-star...
Eight-star...
...... Dou Sheng!
Nine-star...
Nine-star...
Nine-star...
...... Dou Sheng!
.........

Row upon row of ranks displayed themselves completely.

The entities before his eyes were all at least seven-star, with the highest reaching nine-star.

What kind of sacred beings could have made them like this?

Qian Mo was very curious.

"They're all high-tier Dou Sheng! Incredible. If I refine all of them into puppets, the power of my Yama Prison will be out of this world. So many high-tier Dou Sheng puppets can definitely form an ultra-powerful array, hehe!!"

Looking at the corpses before him, Qian Mo was no longer frightened but excited. These were all good things!

"In front of the strong, no matter how many corpses there are, they are mere ants!" Qian Mo muttered, completely disregarding them.

Qian Mo erupted with the aura of a Dou Di, though it didn't have much effect on lifeless corpses.

...

"Great Buddha's Salvation Light!"

Qian Mo flicked his finger and shouted. The most effective thing against such death-qi-imbued entities was Buddhist light.

Buddhist light completely counters this kind of death qi.

In an instant, a strand of brilliant golden light enveloped the entire earth.

The army charging toward Qian Mo instantly found themselves unable to take another step upon feeling this Buddhist light, and the death qi all over their bodies began to rapidly evaporate.

"Ah!!"

The corpses let out terrifying screams, and the death qi on their bodies was instantly dissipated completely.

Lacking the support of death qi, the corpses plummeted to the ground one after another.

"Aiyaya, make sure not to break them; these are good things." Qian Mo hurriedly threw out his aura to catch the falling corpses, storing them back into his storage ring. These corpses could make several high-grade magic arrays.

Even if they fell, though, nothing much would happen; after all, they were the physical bodies of high-tier Dou Sheng, and a Dou Sheng's body is quite sturdy.

"If only they were Dou Di bodies," Qian Mo muttered.

Having finished all this, Qian Mo clapped his hands: "Next is the looting phase."

Flying high into the air, Qian Mo reached out and grabbed towards the numerous coffins below. Countless streams of Dou Qi transformed into individual giant hands, snatching the treasures from within the coffins, and streaks of storage rings flew back toward Qian Mo.

The numerous storage rings hovered in front of Qian Mo's eyes. However, because the rings had also been infected by death qi, wisps of dark energy lingered on them. With a gentle wave of his hand, Qian Mo instantly dispersed the death qi on the rings.

"I'll pass on the storage rings; my own storage ring looks much better," Qian Mo said.

Qian Mo had two storage rings on him: Yao Chen's and his own. Most of the items in his own ring were things he didn't need, which he usually sold to the system.

With that, Qian Mo transferred all the treasures from the hundreds of storage rings into his own.

Watching the continuous stream of golden light resembling flowing water, Qian Mo laughed with incomparable joy.

His eyes flashed with a golden glint.

"Hehe, they're all treasures, all treasures belong to me," Qian Mo laughed, drool almost dripping from his mouth.

After looting everything and carefully confirming that nothing was left inside, Qian Mo tossed the rings back into their respective coffins.

With a slight wave of his hand, the coffin lids that had been hovering above fell back down one by one.

"Out of over a thousand coffins, only a few hundred had valuable items. Not good, not good," Qian Mo shook his head in disappointment, though thankfully the fortunes amassed in these hundred-odd ones were decent enough to dispel the disappointment in his heart.

Still, Qian Mo felt a lingering chill and asked with some puzzlement, "Why is it still so cold? Could it be caused by the remaining death qi in these coffins?"

"No way. Since I've already played the good guy to the end, I might as well finish the job. As the saying goes, 'Do a good deed to the end; send a Buddha all the way to the Western Paradise.'"

"Great Buddha's Salvation Light!"

"Maximum intensity!"

Qian Mo shouted, and a golden beam of light shot up into the high heavens once more, illuminating the entire expanse of coffins. Its power was much greater than the previous one, and although the miniature world here was small, the Buddhist light illuminated every corner of it.

Especially the coffins before him—he had only purified a hundred-odd of them previously; the rest had yet to be purified, meaning their internal death qi must still exist. Therefore, the main target of purification now was the remaining coffins.

...

Ten minutes passed...

The death qi lingering above the coffins vanished without a trace, and Qian Mo withdrew the Great Buddha's Salvation Light.

Looking ahead, the gloomy and dismal atmosphere of the coffins was completely gone.

"Mhm, not bad. It feels much more comfortable now," Qian Mo nodded and said.

"Since that's the case, it's time to put you all to rest." Having said that, Qian Mo chanted a spell: "Mo Emperor Universe, coffins return to place! Hocus pocus alakazam—"

With a downward sweep of his divine hand, a mass of Prond Primordial White Flame appeared in his palm, rapidly burning all thousand-odd coffins until not even ashes remained.

"Still want to go back? Now that I've found you, you still want to go back? Impossible. Going back would just let you generate death qi again, polluting the environment and harming the next grave robber," Qian Mo said with a righteous expression.

Fortunately, Qian Mo had moved these coffins out beforehand, leaving no signs of tampering below. The higher-ups of the outer imperial family would definitely never know that the coffins of their ancestors and others had been plundered by this young master.

Having finished all this, Qian Mo clapped his hands and landed on the ground: "This grave-robbing trip was a huge success. Time to get out of here!"

Just as he was about to leave, an incomparably intense cold surged toward him.

Qian Mo shivered involuntarily and said, "Holy crap, why is it so cold? Didn't I already disperse the death qi? Why is it even colder than before?"

The more Qian Mo thought about it, the more wrong it felt. There had to be something even better or more precious than the coffins hidden here.

Being able to produce such intense cold—"Could it be some extremely powerful magical artifact? Otherwise, where would this chill come from? Ordinary things wouldn't make me feel cold."

Qian Mo quickly summoned the Prond Primordial White Flame to protect his body, only then feeling more relaxed.

"Incredible, incredible. There's definitely a great treasure here. It seems this adventure isn't over yet; I still need to head toward the final BOSS. This cold thing must be the big BOSS." The more Qian Mo thought about it, the more excited he became.

He walked toward the source of the extreme cold, arriving in front of the gravestone located at the very edge when he first entered.

A familiar line of text surfaced in Qian Mo's field of vision once again.

Because he could sense that the source of the cold was radiating from this very spot.

"Is it here? Why couldn't I sense it when I first came in? Could it have been blocked by those death qi?" Qian Mo wondered, speaking to himself.

The closer he got, the colder he felt, requiring him to increase the intensity of the Prond Primordial White Flame to resist it.

"What on earth is this thing that can even threaten the Prond Primordial White Flame?" Qian Mo's brain was running low on processing power, and the system was sleeping at a crucial moment. Damn it.

Qian Mo looked down at the base of the gravestone, furrowed his brow, and upon closer inspection, realized that the layers of soil underneath were somewhat frozen into ice crystals.

Curious, Qian Mo bent down slightly and touched it with his hand, immediately freezing the tip of his finger into a small block of ice.

Qian Mo's pupils constricted as he shouted, "Holy crap, it freezes!"

"What kind of ghost thing is this?" Qian Mo immediately used the Prond Primordial White Flame to melt it before recovering.

Looking closer at the soil layer, there was a very obvious protruding object.

Qian Mo activated his penetrating eyes and looked down, only to be dumbfounded—there was nothing underneath...

Then he looked at the gravestone again. The spatial fluctuations of this gravestone were extremely abnormal.

Qian Mo touched it with his hand; it was icy, freezing cold.

"Could it be that these ice crystals are radiating from this gravestone?" Qian Mo questioned.

Frowning deeply, what kind of thing could actually freeze him? This sparked his intense curiosity; if he didn't uncover this mystery, Qian Mo would feel thoroughly uncomfortable inside.

"The spatial fluctuations of this gravestone are very abnormal. Could there be a spatial dimension inside it?" Qian Mo guessed, taking out the Burial Token and tapping it against the stone.

There was no reaction whatsoever. Qian Mo tapped it in other places, still no reaction.

"It seems this token is useless against this gravestone," Qian Mo thought to himself.

He put the token back into his ring: "Forget it. Since that's the case, I can only break it open myself." He shook his head as he spoke; no matter what, he had to find out this secret today.

Qian Mo gathered his power into his hand. The moment he reached out to touch the surface, his expression instantly froze in shock, because he sensed the aura of a Dou Di from this gravestone!

"A Dou Di's barrier? Could this be something left behind by a Dou Di from the ancient times of the Western Continent's imperial family?" Qian Mo cried out in astonishment.

Then he reached his hand forward again. Even if it was a Dou Di, it was only a low-tier Dou Di, not worth mentioning.

If that Dou Di had known Qian Mo's thoughts, he would have been so furious that his face turned black and he coughed up a mouthful of blood.

...

A Dou Di, not worth mentioning? This was the rank countless people yearned for! Even a low-tier one was a genuine Dou Di, yet you dared to say it wasn't worth mentioning!

A Dou Di's dignity cannot be insulted!

Bah, a Dou Di's dignity? That's useless trash in front of me, Qian Mo.

Qian Mo stretched out his hand and directly shattered the sealing barrier left behind by the Dou Di.

In an instant, a spatial ripple appeared before Qian Mo. He withdrew his hand and licked his lips: "Treasure, your young master is here. Since you dared to freeze my young master's hand, I'm definitely going to tame you."

With that, Qian Mo reached out and ripped the void open.

Qian Mo leaped right inside.

...

...

Inside the gravestone was a small spatial world. Right at the center of this space sat an ice coffin, radiating a freezing chill.

An endless, biting cold pervaded the entire space.

At this moment, Qian Mo had traversed the void and arrived within this realm. As soon as he appeared, he shivered violently and hugged his arms, trembling as he said, "Holy crap, what on earth is this? Why is it so cold?!"

"Prond Primordial White Flame, turn up the heat!" Qian Mo urged, whereupon the temperature of the Prond Primordial White Flame instantly increased.

Qian Mo summoned Mobai and asked, "Son, do you know what's causing this? How can there be something so cold that it actually threatens my physical body?"

Mobai, summoned into Qian Mo's hand, was struck by a gust of cold wind. He shivered violently in disbelief and said, "How is this possible? How can there still be something this cold in this world that can make me shiver?" Then Mobai shook his head and said, "Dad, I don't know what this thing is either."

"Holy crap, even you are being threatened?" Qian Mo asked in disbelief. The Prond Primordial White Flame exceeded the taboos of this plane, yet it was still being threatened?

"Yeah, Dad, you must find it and ruthlessly ravage it," Mobai said with lingering resentment.

Uh, alright, I didn't expect you to hold such a grudge. But even without you saying so, your young master was going to dig it out and ruthlessly ravage it anyway.

"Alright, you go back first. Turn up the heat a bit more, or else I'll be frozen into an ice sculpture," Qian Mo said. Mobai nodded, not wanting to stay a moment longer, and darted back into Qian Mo's body.

Qian Mo looked up. The entire space was filled with white ice crystals, with massive blocks of ice and crystal scattered all around. A vast, snowy white world with piercing cold winds blowing through. Now that he had increased the temperature of the Prond Primordial White Flame, his body felt much warmer, devoid of the previous bone-chilling cold.

Seeing the scene before him, Qian Mo was dumbfounded: "What on earth happened here?"

Looking at the boundless expanse before him, Qian Mo almost thought he had broken out of the Dou Qi Continent.

Qian Mo walked among it all. There was not a single human figure here, only block after block of ice crystals.

Qian Mo looked at a distinct area ahead, which turned out to be a lake, though it had long since frozen into an ice lake.

His curiosity and interest in all of this grew stronger and stronger.

In the vast snowy world, as far as Qian Mo's eyes could see, there was nothing but ice and more ice mountains. Qian Mo activated his divine sense to scan the area. This space wasn't particularly large, so it was quite easy to traverse with a single leap. Deep within the ice mountains lay a large coffin, completely frozen over, and this coffin was the only one in the entire space.

"An ice coffin? Judging by the looks of this place, it must have formed a very long time ago," Qian Mo said with a slight hint of surprise.

His body leaped upward, surveying the entire space, and he flew toward the coffin he had just spotted to see what new tricks awaited him inside.

"Primal Flame Palm!"

Qian Mo flew into that mountain range. Since it was ice, he would use fire to conquer it! Qian Mo unleashed the ultimate technique attached to the Prond Primordial White Flame.

In an instant, the entire space shook violently, and the void shattered. High up in the sky, a massive five-finger handprint imbued with violent flames condensed in the air and lunged downward toward the ice mountain below! ——

"Go! Primal Flame Palm! Burn!"

The Primal Flame Palm sped downwards, its boundless, intense heat melting the external ice and snow into water, which ultimately turned into nothingness.

Boom boom—!

!!!

——

The two collided at high speed, emitting a violent explosion. In an instant, the entire space trembled fiercely, and the surrounding ice mountains began to melt along with it—no, rather, they were shattered apart.

The collision of ice and fire created a dazzling spectacle.

Ice and water vapor instantly formed... and dissipated into the air.

"Uh, it actually formed a natural phenomenon: ice and fire interacting to create water vapor..." Qian Mo muttered, suppressing a laugh.

Qian Mo now had a strong feeling that the origin point of these ice elements was definitely inseparable from that ice coffin. He needed to check it out properly. If there was some treasure that could be absorbed and refined, he would have made a killing.

"Wait. In such a mysterious myriad worlds and Dou Qi Continent, there are naturally formed heavenly flames; could there also be naturally formed heavenly ice?" As Qian Mo thought about it, the more logical it seemed. Furthermore, texts usually only mentioned the flame-world of the Zhongzhou region, never touching upon mysterious things other than flames—it was entirely possible that such things existed.

Thinking this, Qian Mo's eyes lit up, and a continuous smile crept up the corners of his mouth.

However, ice and fire naturally opposed each other; would he even be able to refine it?

Forget it, if it doesn't work, I'll just store it in the system first and study it slowly.

Qian Mo made up his mind: if it's heavenly ice, I'll take it; if it's not, I'll take it anyway!

With that thought, Qian Mo looked down at the scene below.

The dust from the collision was quite thick, sweeping across the entire space.

The dust gradually diminished until it completely dissipated.

...

Not long after, the dust below truly cleared away, and Qian Mo wore an excited expression.

Presented before his eyes was a large ice coffin, though the ice on top of it hadn't diminished in the slightest.

However, Qian Mo wasn't disappointed. He hadn't expected that single palm strike to clear away the ice on top anyway; his main goal was just to blast away the ice mountain covering it.

Now in a state of excitement, Qian Mo flew toward the ice coffin before him. Moving at high speed, he descended in a flash...

...

Qian Mo landed in front of the ice coffin. This coffin emitted an intensely chilling icy vapor, visible to the naked eye as white frosty mist.

Looking at the ice coffin before him, Qian Mo felt a peculiar sensation—the eeriness of the ice coffin itself, a weirdness that was hard to express in words.

One had to experience it personally to truly understand it.

Qian Mo reached out to touch the ice crystals on the surface. Passing his hand over them, the sensation left in his palm was a freezing, piercing pain. The surface was very smooth, with layers of ice lines connecting directly to the ground below, looking extremely sturdy yet somehow fragile.

Following this pattern, Qian Mo slowly stroked the perimeter of the coffin. When he withdrew his hand, it was completely frozen over.

Startled, Qian Mo furrowed his brow and increased the temperature of the Prond Primordial White Flame to thaw it.

"This power is truly formidable," Qian Mo muttered to himself.

Lowering his head to observe the surrounding traces, he couldn't tell what color the coffin actually was because the ice on top was too thick, completely obscuring the original color of the coffin. It simply looked like massive blocks of ice shaped into a coffin, but no matter how one looked at it, there was no mistaking that this was definitely a coffin.

As for how to open it, that required some serious study. Should he use brute force... or was there some kind of mechanism...?