The world beneath the dark water was completely different from what could be seen from the shore above.
The moment Hua Wuying entered the pool, her heart sank. The water was bitterly cold against her skin. Even with a water-avoiding talisman and a flame light barrier shielding her, a chilling yin aura still seeped through the spiritual defenses.
The soft glow of the moonlight stone was quickly swallowed by the oppressive, dark azure water. This left visibility extremely poor—far worse than what it had looked like from the safety of the shore.
What was even more strange was that from above, it had seemed as if the moonlight stone could illuminate the sandy bottom. Once she actually dove in, that so-called bottom felt impossibly far away, receding into the gloom. All around her was a dead, silent darkness, broken only by the faint, muffled sound of the water being stirred by her own desperate movements.
Following Yu Xiaotang's instructions, she slowly descended along the jagged stone wall at the edge of the pool. The wall was slick and cold, covered in layers of thick moss and grime, and it showed nothing unusual at first glance. After descending five or six zhang, the water pressure began to rise against her chest. The pale blue membrane formed by the water-avoiding talisman caved inward slightly under the weight, while the surrounding darkness grew even heavier. Even the moonlight stone's visibility was compressed again by the thick water.
Logically, she should have reached the bottom she had seen earlier, yet beneath her feet was still nothing but a deep, yawning darkness. Going lower only revealed an endless and inky blackness.
"How deep is this pool, really?" she wondered uneasily.
She slowed her descent and carefully observed the wall with what little flickering light she had left. The deeper she went, the colder the water seemed to become. That biting yin chill grew more pronounced, making her bones ache with a dull throb despite the several layers of protection she wore.
Just as she hesitated over whether to keep descending or return to the surface to report first, she suddenly felt something off about the stone wall to her left. The flow of the water there seemed to hit an invisible barrier and it subtly changed direction.
Her heart stirred with a sudden intuition. She guided the moonlight stone closer to the spot. Where its light reached, the wall still looked like ordinary, slick stone. Yet when she focused closely, she noticed that beneath a thick layer of dark green moss, the texture of the stone wall seemed slightly… discordant.
She cautiously swam closer and brushed aside the thick, slimy moss with her hand. The stone wall beneath was finally exposed.
It wasn't natural rock at all, but some kind of ancient stone material with a faintly dull sheen. On its surface, there were several deeply embedded marks that had been carved into the stone itself. They looked like damaged grooves—or perhaps they were fragments of some forgotten pattern. These markings were incredibly ancient. The lines were simple and archaic, completely different from the formation inscriptions commonly seen in the present Cultivation Realm. They carried an aura of vast age and weight.
The patterns were broken and incomplete, and most of them were eroded by time until they were barely visible to the naked eye. Even so, the remaining parts still emitted faint fluctuations that warped the nearby light and her divine sense. It was precisely this fluctuation that subtly blocked her divine sense and created the illusion seen from the water's surface.
"Is this… the remnants of some ancient restriction or formation?" She was shaken by the realization. Something like this actually existed on the outskirts of the Corpse Burial Abyss. Was it a naturally formed relic, or something placed here by someone?
She tried injecting a thin thread of spiritual energy into the remaining pattern. There was no response at all—it was as if it had long since fallen into complete dormancy. Just as she was about to withdraw her spiritual energy and return to the surface to report, a sudden change erupted.
The seemingly dormant markings, after absorbing that tiny thread of spiritual energy, flickered extremely faintly. It lasted only an instant, but the spatial fluctuation released in that moment made every hair on her body stand on end.
"This is bad!" Alarm bells blared in her mind, and she immediately tried to retreat. It was already too late.
The seemingly dormant markings that had flickered once seemed to trigger a chain reaction. Centered on the point she had touched, waves of dim, dark gold light silently rippled across the surrounding stone wall. The light spread rapidly, sketching out a much larger and more complex incomplete pattern. At the same time, an irresistible and terrifying suction force suddenly surged from the center of that dark gold pattern on the stone wall.
"Ugh!" She let out a muffled grunt. The three layers of protective barriers around her body instantly creaked under the massive strain. The flame light barrier was the first to extinguish in the cold. Right after that, cracks spread across the membrane of the water-avoiding talisman.
The golden light of the Vajra Body Protection Talisman flashed frantically as it resisted the terrifying pull, yet it still couldn't stop her body from being dragged inch by inch toward that increasingly bright "gateway." Deep in the pool, centered on that glowing gateway, a silent vortex began to form.
Above the surface, the once calm water suddenly churned violently. A clear depression appeared at the center and it began to spin.
"Hua Wuying!" Liu Shaoyu cried out from the shore. Through the sound transmission jade talisman, she could feel the massive suction from below and the woman's terror.
"What is going on?!" Yu Xiaotang's eyes sharpened as she instantly appeared at the edge of the pool, staring at the suddenly formed vortex. She could feel the spatial energy fluctuations beneath the water rapidly intensifying.
Hua Wuying had triggered something.
"Young Sect Master! There's something wrong underwater! It's… it's an ancient remnant formation! I'm being pulled in!"
"Hold on!" Yu Xiaotang didn't hesitate. With a flick of her wrist, a silk rope shot straight into the churning water. "Grab me!"
Liu Shaoyu immediately grabbed Yu Xiaotang's arm. The two of them worked together, trying to haul their companion up by the other end of the rope. Yet the suction underwater was far beyond their imagination. Even with their combined strength, they couldn't pull Hua Wuying up even a bit. Worse, under the terrifying pulling force, their feet carved two shallow grooves into the slick rock beneath them.
"This pull… something is wrong. It's spatial power!" Yu Xiaotang's expression shifted. This wasn't something an ordinary formation or a water beast could do. What lay hidden beneath this pool was very likely an unstable spatial node—perhaps even a damaged, small-scale teleportation formation or a spatial rift.
"Young Sect Master! Let go of me! The pull is too strong! You will get dragged down too!" Hua Wuying screamed hoarsely from underwater. She could feel the golden light of the Vajra protection rapidly dimming. Once it shattered, she would be torn apart instantly. She didn't want to drag anyone else down with her.
"Shut up! Hold onto the rope!" Yu Xiaotang shouted sharply. By now, the other disciples had rushed over to help, everyone pouring their spiritual energy into maintaining the rope.
At the same time, Yu Xiaotang rapidly communicated with the system in her mind. "System! Analyze the nature of the spatial node below immediately and find a way to stabilize it or cut off the suction. Now!"
[Ding. Emergency scan in progress. Consuming 10 points.]
[Analysis result. Detected unstable low energy spatial rift. Internal energy is chaotic. Suction is caused by spatial instability.]
[Recommended option one. Use stronger spiritual energy to strike the node's weak point instantly. Forty percent chance to temporarily disrupt the suction. Thirty percent chance to cause node collapse and trigger spatial turbulence.]
[Option two. Inject stabilizing energy. Sixty percent chance to temporarily stabilize the node and form a temporary passage.]
[Option three. Recommend abandoning the rescue target and immediately severing the connection.]