Chapter 655: Chapter 455: Taking the Blade

Song Lingxue’s gaze was like a millennium-old frozen ice, tightly locking onto the direction of the Martial Hall, motionless for a long time.

Amidst the silence, she had already sensed Chu Zheng’s presence.

After a while, she finally moved; she raised her hand and banished Taiyi Hongfeng into the chaotic void, sparing his life.

At the same moment, the dark gold battle armor covering her, adorned with countless battle scars, emitted a low mournful wail.

Numerous mysterious blood-colored talismans shone on the armor’s surface, then quickly dimmed and withered like stars burning out. The heavy armor plates seemed to come alive, disassembling, falling apart, and transforming into countless streaks of dark golden light, dispersing into the cold starry sky, as if they had never existed.

The battle armor receded, revealing a pure black martial robe devoid of any designs beneath, with a jet-black jade button tugging around her tall and slender figure, outlining an unprecedentedly dangerous aura in the starlight.

In this moment, what Song Lingxue shed seemed more than just armor, but a shackle of identity.

Then, she gently clasped her right hand in the void before her.

Buzz–

The space rippled like water, and a battle halberd, shrouded entirely in dense blood fiend aura, its halberd blade flickering with a sinister cold gleam, appeared in her grasp out of nowhere.

This blood-colored fierce weapon, which had accompanied her in countless battles and drank the blood of countless foes, now quivered slightly in her hand, emitting a low buzz, as if eager for the next slaughter.

Song Lingxue lowered her eyes, her gaze landing on the halberd’s body, staring at it for a long time, until the halberd’s buzz gradually subsided, and the surrounding starlight seemed to dim somewhat.

Finally, a trace of indescribable complexity swept through the depths of her icy eyes, which swiftly transformed into a dead silence of indifference.

She abruptly raised her arm and flung the battle halberd from her hand.

In an instant, the blood-colored battle halberd shot out like a scarlet meteor off a bowstring, leaving a sharp space-shattering trace, plunging into the deep and boundless star sea.

The bloody glimmer pierced the darkness, its light growing weaker and weaker, until it completely vanished at the far end of the unknown star domain, like a past wholly buried.

Having done all this, Song Lingxue did not linger further. She slashed at the void before her with fingers like a blade.

Stab–

A pitch-black spatial portal suddenly appeared in front of her, akin to a crack in the heavens.

Wild spatial tempests gushed forth from it, yet Song Lingxue, without a hint of hesitation, stepped into that deep rift.

The next moment, her figure had already torn through layers of spatial barriers, ignoring the heavy restrictions surrounding the Martial Hall, directly descending into the core area of the Martial Hall, standing before the ancient-feeling purple-black stone hall.

The hall door was tightly shut, with countless blurred patterns engraved on the stone wall, exuding an unyielding and immense pressure.

Without a glance or any form of announcement, Song Lingxue directly raised her hand and pushed forcefully against the heavy hall door.

Boom–

The blood-colored talisman flowing on the door flickered irregularly, erupting with blinding divine light, then shattered into pieces like glass crushed by colossal strength.

The incredibly heavy door was forcibly blasted open by her casual push, brisk aura winds sweeping from behind, making her black robe flap and sounding like a cold whip, drawing into the lifeless dark hall.

Deep in the hall, sitting cross-legged on the ground, was Martial Ancestor Ji Zhouyin. At the moment Song Lingxue forcibly broke in, he opened his eyes.

Those eyes, seeming to penetrate eternity, were no longer calm like an ancient well, but flickered with a trace of extremely fine astonishment:

“Song Lingxue? You should be at the vanguard camp, why are you here?”

He slowly lifted his gaze, focusing on Song Lingxue, his voice calm, yet carrying a hint of an imperceptible query.

Abandoning one’s post and forcibly intruding into a forbidden place are both major taboos.

Song Lingxue, meeting the obscure gaze of the Martial Ancestor, stepped into the hall step by step, finally stopping three feet before Ji Zhouyin, her black attire, under the hall’s dim light, akin to a deep abyss capable of devouring everything.

She did not explain, nor did she salute, she looked down at Ji Zhouyin before her, her voice ponderous, clearly resonating in the silent hall:

“I have come to take something from you.”

Ji Zhouyin’s gray robe moved slightly, maintaining his seated posture, yet those deep eyes slightly squinted, sharp gleams were as solid:

“What do you want?”

His gaze carried a hint of inquiry; Song Lingxue at this moment felt extremely strange, entirely different from their previous meeting.

Song Lingxue’s expression remained extraordinarily calm, without a ripple, as she spoke two faint words:

“Emperor Palace.”

“Emperor Palace?!”

As those words exited her mouth, fissures appeared on Ji Zhouyin’s previously inscrutable face, his pupils contracted suddenly, his mountain-like seated body trembled fiercely, and he abruptly stood up.

“You…”

For the first time, Ji Zhouyin’s voice lost its composure, tinged with a slight yet noticeable quiver, his gaze fixed stubbornly on Song Lingxue, as if to pierce through her primordial spirit.

“How do you know about Emperor Palace?!”

This name had been a secret sealed in the Martial Hall since ancient times, even he only learned about it from Yan Feng’s mouth when he was confirmed as the successor to the Martial Ancestor.

In ancient times, what Emperor Palace referred to was when the heavens tilted and the Tao was extinguished; it was a fierce weapon that truly cut down ancient ancestors and slaughtered the ancestral realm gate courts!

The owner of this fierce weapon was the mentor of the former Martial Ancestor Yan Feng, a figure who once dominated an era, nearly becoming a martial giant, yet was eventually erased from the river of time, leaving not a trace nor whisper behind.