Chapter 849: Hidden Passage
Although the cave was quite spacious and wide, it had a linear interior, meaning there was only a single path for Yuan and the others to traverse.
However, even after walking back and forth this cave multiple rounds, they were unable to find any secret passages that the demons could’ve used to hide themselves.
“I don’t see any formations in this place. If there’s really a secret passage, it’s not concealed by a formation— or it’s concealed by a formation that’s so powerful that even I cannot see it. However, demons don’t have the power to create formations or arrays.” Yuan said.
“I also don’t see anything out of the ordinary with my divine sense.” Feng Yuxiang said.
And she continued in a worried voice, “What if this is a trap? We should probably leave this cave for now.”
“Wait.” Lan Yingying suddenly said.
“What is it? Do you see something?” Yuan turned to look at her.
“I’m not sure, but that area feels off for some reason— the ground.” Lan Yingying pointed at the ground right before the dead end.
“The ground?” Yuan walked over to where Lan Yingying pointed and inspected the ground.
When he couldn’t find anything wrong with it, he decided to stomp on the ground.
“Hm?” Yuan raised his eyebrows when he felt a hollow feedback from the stomp.
“It’s empty here.” He said to them before stabbing into the ground with the Empyrean Overlord.
The ground immediately collapsed, revealing a hidden staircase that led underground.
Furthermore, the scent of demons that had disappeared suddenly appeared again. “I can smell them again! Demons! They’re below us!” Yuan quickly said.
“How did we miss such an obvious passage? This must be the work of a treasure that can misdirect our senses. We should be careful, Young Master.” Feng Yuxiang warned him.
“Good idea, especially since I can smell more than three demons now.” Yuan suddenly said.
“Huh? How many demons can you smell?” Feng Yuxiang asked.
After taking a few deep breaths, Yuan replied, “About seven or eight.”
“S-Seven or eight? That many?” Lan Yingying was speechless.
“Don’t worry, they don’t seem very strong. The strongest one appears to be a peak Spirit King, but it’s only a low-ranking demon.”
“If you say so…” She nodded.
“Young Master, allow me to go first.” Feng Yuxiang said.
Yuan nodded, but before walking the staircase, Yuan wore his mask.
“Why the mask?” Feng Yuxiang asked.
“It won’t be fun if the demons recognize me,” he chuckled.
Feng Yuxiang was speechless.
‘He’s treating this like a game…’ She sighed inwardly.
Sometime later, they began descending the narrow staircase.
Many minutes later, at the end of the staircase, they entered a spacious room with multiple paths to choose from.
“Which way?” Feng Yuxiang turned to look at Yuan, who was already pointing to a path.
“I understand.”
Feng Yuxiang, without hesitation, began walking towards the path picked by Yuan.
“I’m surprised you can smell the demons from so far away… How do you do it?” Lan Yingying asked him.
“I don’t know. I just instinctively know their location when I smell them, and they have this very distinctive scent that’s hard to miss.” Yuan shrugged, even though he was unable to smell demons before acquiring the Divine Paragon’s memories and experience.
Lan Yingying tried to smell this ‘distinctive scent’ that Yuan spoke of, but she was not successful.
After walking for ten minutes straight, Feng Yuxiang came to a stop when she arrived at a dead end in the form of a cliff.
However, once they were actually standing on this cliff, they were amazed by the scenery before them.
“This is… a city?” Yuan mumbled in a low voice as he gazed upon a city that had already been reduced to ruins.
Although the city wasn’t so large that he couldn’t see the end, it was still quite shocking to find a city of this size beneath the Demons’ Valley.
‘This place isn’t in the Divine Paragon’s memories, but since I only have a small fraction of his memories, I wouldn’t be surprised if he found this place later.’ Yuan thought to himself.
After all, if nobody knew about this place, it would still be populated by demons right now.
“What now, Young Master? Should we hunt them one by one— at least until they notice our presence?” Feng Yuxiang asked him.
“No, that would take too much time. We’ll gather and deal with all of them at once.” Yuan said with an excited smile on his face.
“How are we going to do that?” Feng Yuxiang asked.
“Like this.”
Yuan suddenly released his demon sealing aura, instantly filling the entire underground city with his presence.
The very next moment, eight different auras appeared in response to Yuan’s provocation.
“They’re coming.” Yuan warned them.
Feng Yuxiang and Lan Yingying immediately prepared for battle while Yuan continued to stand there in a calm manner, and they watched as eight red-skinned demons emerged from the city before flying towards them.
In less than ten seconds after Yuan announced their presence, all eight demons stood before them.
“How did you find this place, human?” The demon emitting the aura of a peak Spirit King asked.
Yuan pointed at his own face and said, “I followed your scent.”
“Our scent? What are you, a dog? No, not even a dog would be able to do that.”
And it continued, “Whatever. It doesn’t matter how you found this place. It was foolish of you to come here with just the three of you.”
“Hahaha! It’s been thousands of years since I’ve tasted human flesh and blood!”
“I call dibs on that woman with the smooth-looking skin beside him! She looks incredibly delicious!” One of the demons suddenly pointed at Lan Yingying.
“Then I want that big-breasted woman! I bet her meat is incredibly tender and juicy!” Another demon laughed as it pointed at Feng Yuxiang.
“Unlike that masked person, they don’t smell human. They must be magical beasts disguised as humans.”
“Who cares if they are humans or magical beasts! All it matters is how they taste, and I am starving!”
“Let’s get ’em!”
However, before the demons could even move two steps, Yuan released his demon sealing aura.
[Demon Sealing Zone!]
With a wave of his sleeve, Yuan confined all eight demons in the Demon Sealing Zone, taking them by surprise.
“W-What the fuck is this?!”
“This feeling… It’s the Demon Sealing Zone!”
“What?! The Demon Sealing Zone?! Impossible!”
The demons were confused and terrified at the same time.
After all, only very few people within the Demon Sealing Clan can use the Demon Sealing Zone, and they are mostly high-ranking demon sealers.
However, Yuan’s cultivation level was too weak to be a high-ranking demon sealer, hence why they thought nothing about him— until now.
After capturing the demons, Yuan approached them and spoke in a calm voice, “I’m interested in something. If you answer my question, I will let you out of the Demon Sealing Zone.”
“Hmph! As if we will believe you!” The demons sneered.
Yuan ignored their response and began questioning them anyway, “Let’s start with an easy one.. How long have you lowly demons been hiding down here?”