Chapter 406: The Fourteen Prisoners in 132
D-132 only housed fourteen inmates. Considering that most other Unit D cell blocks had over a hundred prisoners, that was obviously a very low number. In fact, it was such a low number that it didn’t take any effort for Xu Qing to memorize the details of every single prisoner.
When the door of D-132 opened and the smell of decay emerged, Xu Qing looked quietly at the entrance, observing. Beyond the door, it was pitch black.
After a moment of thought, Xu Qing stepped inside. Once he was in the darkness, the cell block door slammed shut behind him. The sound echoed into the ears of the jailers, filling their hearts with astonishment.
Inside the darkness of D-132, the only sounds to be heard were Xu Qing’s footsteps. He didn’t use his jailer’s authority to light the lamps in the cell block. That was because he preferred this darkness to light. It suited him more. After all, he preferred moving about in the shadows.
When he adjusted to the darkness, everything was murky, but he was able to see. Just like the cell block where he had slaughtered all the inmates, D-132 had a large open area in the middle surrounded by cells. Xu Qing walked the pathway that led past the cells. It was only when he reached the nineteenth cell that he stopped.
There was an inmate in the cell. It was a figure seated cross-legged, back to Xu Qing, so tall that its head nearly touched the ceiling. It wore no clothing, but was covered with countless tentacles, some long, some short, all of which swayed back and forth and covered it like a garment.
The giant seemed to be completely ignoring Xu Qing. It was also apparently eating something, as chewing sounds echoed out from its head, which slowly bobbed up and down.
Xu Qing stood outside the cell, watching coldly. By means of his shadow, he could see exactly what this prisoner was eating. It was feeding on its own tentacles, slowly ripping them off one by one and consuming them. Xu Qing was also able to get an overall picture of the prisoner.
As the information in his records had revealed, this prisoner was a cloud troll. On the trip to the county capital, Xu Qing had seen some cloud trolls in Cloudywind Prefecture. They weren’t intelligent, and tended to be about 300 meters tall. This prisoner was much smaller than that, and also looked somewhat different from the cloud trolls Xu Qing had seen. [1]
Looking away, he continued walking past all the cells. About seven or eight cells later, he saw the second inmate.
It was a woman, and she was human. She was filthy, and seemed to be covered with bite-shaped scars. Despite her dirty state, she was pretty, and also had an attractive figure. She was currently crouched in a corner of the cell, her arms wrapped gently around a scarecrow. She seemed to be trying to get it to sleep. When she sensed Xu Qing’s presence, she raised her index finger to her lips and quietly shhh-ed. It was almost like she was trying to prevent him from awakening a child. The floor of her cell was covered with straw. If you looked closely, you would just be able to make out the shapes of countless more scarecrows, all tattered and damaged.
Xu Qing observed coldly. Based on this woman’s information, she had once been a chosen disciple from the Supreme Void Demonization Sect. In a fortuitous encounter, she ended up acquiring some precious materials that were similar to longevity beans. As a result, her sect had high hopes for her. However, later on it came to light that she was brutally murdering and eating human babies. The matter caused a huge stir. She had been sentenced to death, except that the family members of her victims demanded that she live out her days in endless torment. Thus, she ended up locked up in here.
As Xu Qing looked on, all of the tattered scarecrows on the floor of the cell suddenly opened their eyes. Glaring at the woman, they howled and lunged. The scarecrow in her arms did the same thing, shrieking as it snapped viciously at her. The woman shivered and allowed the scarecrows to viciously bite her. At the same time, she looked up at Xu Qing and smiled. It was a strange smile, almost like a greeting.
Looking away, Xu Qing continued on to the next prisoner.
In that manner, he walked around the entire cell block, familiarizing himself with all the prisoners based on the information he had. He also looked for anything suspicious.
Xu Qing wasn’t very curious about D-132’s reputation for being unlucky. Considering that he had been put in charge of this cell block, he wanted to make sure he had the entire place in control.
After his initial inspection, Xu Qing got the feeling that the inmates in D-132 were a lot more freakish than the inmates he had killed the day before.
In fact, the seventh prisoner wasn’t even a living thing with flesh and blood. It was a rotating stone disc, like a millstone. It turned and turned endlessly, pulsing with a gravitational force that seemed capable of sucking in and crushing anything else in the cell. That disc was a species that Ghost Hand hadn’t talked about in his lecture. According to the information, it was a Rockdevil.
Many strange and unusual species had come to be after the arrival of the broken face of the god. Another example was in the two hundred thirty-seventh cell, within which was the thirteenth inmate.
This inmate had no body. It was only a head that rolled this way and that inside the cell. When it noticed Xu Qing, it stopped and stared at him with crimson eyes. Then it smiled.
“This is so fun! You’re already dead, yet you don’t know it. So fun! Next time you’re going to die at the hand of someone wearing a straw hat. Except, you’re already dead! How can you die again? You died horribly. Your whole body exploded, leaving behind only a head. And the killer promised to take your head somewhere. Tragic. So tragic! Everyone’s looking for you, except they can’t find you.... Hahaha! They have no idea where you’re buried. But I know. I saw.
“You want to resolve this situation? Just throw me into the cell with that cloud troll. Stick me there, and I’ll help you figure it all out. How about it? You’ve just got to trust me. That’s all I’m here for. To help you run this place. You know, the people who survived as guards here only did it with my help.”
Xu Qing didn’t say anything in response. After sizing up the head, he moved on to the last cell and the last inmate.
This one was special.
There was no cultivator inside the cell. Only a painting, hovering in the air. It depicted a large family with the elderly and young ones all living together under one roof. There were a total of twenty-three family members, and all seemed to be smiling. Among them was a burly man with children clustered around him. He was smiling the most broadly, and the artist had clearly spent time capturing his facial expression perfectly.
Looking at the painting, Xu Qing’s eyes glittered. This was one of the new species that had come into being after the broken face of the god arrived. They were called the Paintedfolk. They were a species that didn’t exist in corporeal form. Rather, they lived their whole lives inside of paintings. To them, everyone in the outside world existed in a painting, while they did not.
Eventually, Xu Qing had walked in a full circle, and was back to the cell with the first inmate. The cloud troll there had stopped chewing, and was now muttering to itself.
“Don’t trust 237. Doesn’t matter what it says. Don’t trust it.”
237 was the cell-number of that jabbering head.
Ignoring the cloud troll, Xu Qing went to the cell block door, sat down cross-legged, and stared out into the darkness. He found all of these inmates very interesting.
Time slipped by slowly but surely. The cell block was comparatively quiet.
He saw nothing suspicious or fantastic. He just sat there, not interacting or talking. And whether it was during his short tour earlier, or just sitting there cross-legged, he kept poison swirling around him at all times. He didn’t let it spread out far. He kept it close, separating himself from everything else.
This was his normal cautious routine.
So far, he had not seen anything that made D-132 seem unlucky. That said, he was ready to take his time finding out the details. Seeing that the day was over and it was time to end his shift, Xu Qing stood to leave. He had already registered for a slot to seek enlightenment of The Emperor’s Sword, and it was almost that time.
However, as Xu Qing got to his feet, he looked over at the cell with the human woman in it and noticed something.
A young boy stood there, in front of the cell, seemingly talking with the woman inside.
Eyes flashing, Xu Qing waved his hand, sending his black iron skewer flying out. It glittered with red lightning as it shot to the cell and slammed into the ground right in front of it.
The boy vanished.
Face expressionless, Xu Qing walked over. As he neared, Patriarch Golden Vajra Warrior projected a message to him.
“Milord, there wasn’t anything there!”
Xu Qing looked into the cell and saw the woman in the corner, smiling at him. After looking at her for a moment, he turned and walked back to the main door. Exiting, he closed the door behind him, then projected a message to the patriarch via divine will.
“You didn’t see anything?”
“Huh? Milord, there wasn’t anything there. I couldn’t see or sense anything.” The patriarch was being cautious in his response, and was feeling quite anxious. He felt like he was on Xu Qing’s bad side right now... therefore he cherished every opportunity to shine. But he really hadn’t noticed anything.
Xu Qing frowned and looked at his shadow.
“... milord... n-nothing....” the shadow stammered. Just like the patriarch, the shadow felt like it was also in Xu Qing’s disfavor.
Eyes glittering, Xu Qing looked back at D-132. However, right now he needed to keep his appointment to seek enlightenment of The Emperor’s Sword. Stowing his curiosity, he left the Corrections Division.
Evening was already approaching. Dark clouds filled the sky; it seemed it would be a rainy night.
As Xu Qing flew up toward the Swordsage Palace, he suddenly noticed a 300-meter sword pavilion shining with dazzling light. As it rumbled, dozens of beams of sword light erupted from it.
An old man wearing a swordsage uniform rushed out from that sword pavilion, his hands flashing double-handed incantation gestures as he tried to stop the sword light. Unfortunately, he failed, and one of the beams of light shot straight toward Xu Qing. It moved with such speed, and with such power, that it obviously surpassed the Gold Core level. It was more like a Nascent Soul attack.
Face turning grim, Xu Qing shot backward. At the same time, his Violet-Heaven Supreme-Limitless Crown glittered brightly, helping him to dodge.
Sword light screamed past him.
“My apologies, young friend. I’m so sorry!!” The old man managed to stop all the other sword energy, then looked over apologetically at Xu Qing. “I was just researching a new technique, and made a bit of a mistake.”
The old man smiled wryly. Despite being a Nascent Soul cultivator, he was still being very apologetic as he approached and clasped hands.
Xu Qing studied the old man with a frown. He didn’t get a sense that the incident had been intentional. After all, a single stream of Nascent Soul sword energy wouldn’t be enough to kill him. Besides, this was the county capital, and he had just come out of the Corrections Division. Killing someone here would require launching a single deadly blow that wouldn’t miss.
After a moment of thought, Xu Qing nodded.
It seemed most likely the whole thing was an accident. That said, he kept his guard up as he proceeded to the Swordsage Palace.
Before long he arrived. After spending his enlightenment credits, the spell formation was activated and Xu Qing disappeared. When he reappeared, he was inside the location to seek enlightenment of The Emperor’s Sword.
The location was roughly the same as the one back in the Swordsage Court in Emperor-Receiving Prefecture. There was a large boulder, upon which was chained a sword. The ground was filled with a large spell formation.
When Xu Qing arrived, there were seven or eight other individuals seeking enlightenment. Three of them were new swordsages that Xu Qing recognized. All had their eyes closed and their defenses up.
Xu Qing found a place to sit down. Back on his first attempt, he had nearly succeeded. The swordsage back then had claimed everyone felt that way, but Xu Qing wasn’t convinced. The reason was that he already had an illusory version of The Emperor’s Sword in his sea of consciousness. Although it had been fading ever since then, the majority of it was still there.
Besides, given what Kong Xianglong had told him about his own experience, Xu Qing was very confident that he could succeed this time around. Filled with anticipation, he closed his eyes and cast his senses into the huge rock.
The moment he made contact, he saw the same blurry scene as before. This time he didn’t need to waste as much time as before. Pushing through the mist, he eventually caught sight of the image of The Emperor’s Sword. Focusing on the sword, he got closer and closer. As he did, it became more and more clear. He could also hear the thrum of a sword, and even saw illusory figures surrounding it.
Those figures weren’t possible to make out clearly, but they were moving in unison. They were drawing a sword and then chopping down with it!
Plain and simple.
That said, when looking at the move, Xu Qing didn’t feel that it was simple at all. The image of those figures striking with the sword filled his heart and mind with intense rumbling. As that internal storm grew stronger, he noticed one of the figures chopping down with the sword and splitting a sea apart so deeply it hewed a ravine into the sea floor. He saw another figure slashing the ground, turning the earth of half a prefecture into dust. He saw another person slashing a sword into a forbidden region, transforming it into rubble. Many of the figures slashed their swords toward nonhumans, who screamed before they died.
Finally, he saw a figure whose face wasn’t visible. This person wore an emperor’s robe, and was very noble and mighty. He hovered in the sky, facing a gigantic entity rising from the deep sea that was covered in tentacles and exuding boundless mutagen. He slashed down with his sword, and a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering howl erupted from the deep sea as the gigantic creature was slashed into bits.
That figure in the emperor’s robe was the Swordsage Palace’s Grand Emperor.
As for the entity in the deep sea... it was a god.
All of those scenes seemed fixed in the River of Ancient Time, and as they appeared to Xu Qing, his mind spun. Then, all of those sword strikes superimposed.
They became one single sword!
The Emperor’s Sword!
Xu Qing felt himself shaken to the core.
Six hours later, he vanished from the spell formation. When he opened his eyes, they glittered like swords. Calming himself, he took a deep breath and cast his vision into his sea of consciousness.
There inside was a dazzling Emperor’s Sword. He had successfully gained enlightenment of The Emperor’s Sword!
1. Xu Qing saw the cloud trolls in chapter 388. ☜