Chapter 050: Ancient Elixir

Inside the illusion array, a stone chamber about tens of thousands of feet in size, with night pearls embedded in the ceiling illuminating the entire secret room. The ground was covered with many gullies and potholes, clearly the scene of a great battle.

"As expected of a cave dwelling, the ancient aura inside is much stronger than outside." The ancient aura in the chamber was extremely dense, far surpassing that of the forest.

Yang Tian walked through the secret room, his gaze sweeping around. When he saw a medicinal garden, his eyes lit up and he quickly walked over.

"How is this possible? All withered." Approaching the medicinal garden, he looked at the gullies inside, clearly indicating a battle had taken place there, and most of the spiritual herbs had been destroyed.

With a somewhat gloomy expression, Yang Tian felt unwilling and hurried into the garden, quickly scanning the remaining spiritual herbs.

This medicinal garden was a thousand feet in size, almost entirely planted with spiritual herbs, but unfortunately most had died.

"This is Purple-Red Spirit Grass!" Noticing one surviving herb, Yang Tian rushed over, staring blankly at the vibrant plant. Its age was astonishing, and the medicinal power flowing within made Yang Tian click his tongue in amazement.

"What a pity. This herb grows to a certain age, then withers directly, only to sprout anew. Who knows how many cycles it has gone through? Alas!"

Gazing at the Purple-Red Spirit Grass, Yang Tian suddenly sighed. This cave dwelling had been sealed for who knows how many years, going through cycles like the birth and death of humans. Spiritual herbs also have lifespans.

He quickly searched through the garden. Most of the herbs here were rare species, many of them several thousand years old. If taken outside, they would likely cause a scramble.

"What's this?" His gaze fell on a herb that had been gnawed down to a corner, with a trace of crystalline liquid remaining. Yang Tian suddenly realized something and quickly looked around.

"This little guy isn't afraid of being stuffed to death, just eating it directly?" When he saw Xiao Bai lying on the ground, its little head drooping, gnawing on a herb, Yang Tian rolled his eyes and quickly grabbed it.

"Ao wu." Xiao Bai looked at Yang Tian with aggrieved eyes and whimpered softly. Yang Tian ignored it and stuffed Xiao Bai into his robe. Although Xiao Bai could absorb medicinal power, most of it was lost.

After searching the garden for the time it takes to drink a few cups of tea, he found over a dozen herbs and then walked further inside.

Looking at the gullies on the ground, Yang Tian followed the traces of battle and walked forward for about half an hour before stopping.

In front of him, two skeletons lay horizontally on the ground, with many broken weapons scattered around. From the appearance of the skeletons, they seemed to have perished together.

"Even the strong have their day of falling." Gazing at the two skeletons, Yang Tian murmured, a trace of sorrow flashing in his eyes. These people must have been supremely powerful in life, but in death, not even their bones were buried.

"Eh?" At that moment, Yang Tian's attention was caught by a pitch-black gleam.

"This is?" His eyes brightened, Yang Tian crouched down and picked up a finger bone, looking at the void ring on it. His face was filled with joy: "The relic of an ancient cultivator should be quite generous, right?"

With a thought, Yang Tian sent a sliver of his mind into it. After a few seconds of silence, he withdrew his divine sense with a face full of black lines and couldn't help cursing: "Damn it, it's actually a high-grade void ring."

High-grade void rings are a type of exotic treasure. Their internal space is extremely vast. High-grade void rings can enhance soul power and require soul force to break through.

Sighing, Yang Tian put away the Void Ring, then rummaged through another skeleton, coming up with a Void Ring and a golden token.

The token was reddish-gold, as if cast from molten gold, showing no change after all these years. On it were engraved three golden characters: Dan Xuan Sect, faintly exuding a trace of pressure.

"Dan Xuan Sect... I seem to have heard of it somewhere." Gazing at the golden token, its material was extremely hard, showing no signs of damage after countless years. Even a peak Xuan artifact would have lost all its power by now.

Putting away the token, Yang Tian shifted his gaze to the stone chamber ahead. When he noticed the characters on it, a glimmer of joy flashed in his eyes.

"Treasure Artifact Pavilion. This should be the chamber where artifacts are stored." Looking at the inscribed characters, Yang Tian pushed open the stone door and walked in.

The chamber was about a hundred zhang in size. Despite the long years, it was still very clean. On both sides stood shelves, on which various artifacts were displayed.

Walking over quickly, Yang Tian picked up an artifact resembling a small tripod. Unfortunately, most of its essence had dissipated, leaving it merely an ordinary Blood Artifact.

At this moment, Yang Tian's gaze focused entirely on the patterns carved on the tripod. These patterns still retained some power, but even the interwoven divine patterns could not withstand the erosion of time.

"Several of them have even developed divine patterns, close to advancing to Dao Artifacts. But unfortunately, the cave master fell and didn't reinforce these artifacts with formations, causing the essence to leak away." Sighing, Yang Tian collected the artifacts with carved patterns into the Void Ring. These patterns were ancient artifact-forging techniques; studying them could yield some divine insights, beneficial for future artifact crafting.

Yang Tian broke into several more chambers, gaining many treasures from ancient cultivators, but they were of little use to him now. At this point, he arrived at the Alchemy Pavilion.

"The last chamber. This should be the cultivator's treasure vault." Just as Yang Tian broke through the door, a sudden explosion sounded from outside.

"Someone is breaking the illusion array?" His face darkened. Gritting his teeth, Yang Tian kicked open the treasure vault door. A dense wave of ancient aura rushed at him, and the chamber was filled with red light.

As Yang Tian stood stunned, a torrent of pills surged forth, burying his entire body under them.

"This is..." His throat moved as he looked at the gleaming red pills around him. The sheer quantity made his scalp tingle, and a burning heat surged in his eyes.

"Pills actually refined from ancient aura. The ancient cultivators were truly heaven-defying." Staring blankly at the pills in the chamber, each one contained enough ancient aura to equal half a day's worth of Yang Tian's absorption.

Rumble! Loud explosions echoed continuously from outside, accompanied by the sound of a woman's shout, and it seemed there was more than one person.

"Xiao Bai, hurry up and collect the pills." His heart tightening, Yang Tian urged, as suction force surged from his palm, and the sea of pills in the chamber crazily flowed into the Void Ring.

"Roar." Xiao Bai opened its mouth and inhaled, and the densely packed pills in the chamber began to decrease.

At the illusion array, three members of the Jiang family were continuously striking it. Three golden greatswords interwove, sharpness bursting forth, and the emitted sword qi kept slashing out.

With a sudden loud crash, the outer illusion array was completely destroyed. The three golden greatswords hovered in the air, emitting ancient aura, their power astonishing.

"Go!" Jiang Ling shouted, charging into the cave dwelling.

"Damn it, they're in." The pills in the chamber were decreasing, but not even half had been collected. Yang Tian cursed and directly closed the door of the alchemy chamber.