Occasionally, heavy and oppressive yellow arcs of lightning flashed across the dim sky quietly.

Lu Sheng walked along the ruined plaza step by step with his knife in one hand.

The plaza was of a circular shape, with a white statue at its center. The statue was in the shape of an old woman that had both of her arms broken off holding a walking stick in her armpit. Her head was slightly raised, and she wore a wrinkly cape on her back.

Everything else, aside from a piece of sapphire about the size of a nail embedded in the chest of the statue, was gray.

Lu Sheng walked all the way here by breaking through walls without seeing any sign of living beings on his way here. The only strange thing that he saw was this statue.

“Whooosh…”

The wind got colder as it surged around the plaza, causing the corners of his clothes to flap backward. A faint layer of white frost started to appear in some of the corners.

Lu Sheng didn’t notice any of this, and instead looked left and right. All around him was an endless amount of abandoned houses. In some places, the damaged walls were falling apart. Everything he saw was gray.

Only the statue emitted a tiny dot of blue light.

“This place… is actually another world?” This was his first time in another world, since it was impossible to come into contact with this level of stuff in the Great Song. Only the Three Sacred Gates had the means to accomplish this. The other powers were too far below their level.

Other world, the world outside. Outer World, outer empty world, and many other names all pointed to the same thing: a space that was not part of the original world.

Lu Sheng didn’t know what kind of world the Black Seal Temple was, but from the buildings around and the atmosphere here, he guessed that this was a ruined and barren kind of dangerous environment.

He slowly walked up to the sapphire embedded in the statue.

And reached out to touch it.

“Hissss!”

Instantly, a blinding light shone out of the sapphire, and the ground began to shake.

Dense, black smoke spewed out of the statue’s mouth and nose. Massive amounts of smoke quickly landed on the ground and combined into pitch-black monsters with wolf heads and human bodies.

“AROOOO!!”

The shortest among the monsters was at least three meters tall, while the tallest even reached four meters tall. They were like hills standing in the plaza.

Their bodies were covered in black fur. They held long knives in one and black shields in the other hand. In the center of their shields was a complicated blue rune.

“Orikila!” one of the wolf-headed men shouted, abruptly charging toward Lu Sheng and striking downward with his knife.

“Whoosh!”

His speed wasn’t fast, but judging by the distinct sound of his knife breaking the sound barrier, it possessed immense strength. With his three-meter long knife, this one stroke could have cut Lu Sheng in half.

“Impressive strength, but too slow.” Lu Sheng turned sideways, his palm spiking upward slightly.

His palm accurately spiked the center of the wolf head with a hiss.

“Bam.” The wolf-headed man exploded in an instant, turning into black smoke and disappearing.

The rest of the wolf-headed men charged toward him in a frenzy, but Lu Sheng easily spiked their heads as well, killing them instantly.

“Bind level strength with mortal speed. Their body is only slightly stronger than an ordinary human’s too.” Lu Sheng roughly assessed the wolf-headed men.

After he killed the wolf-headed men, he once again inspected the sapphire. Cracks started to appear on the gem, but it was still emitting a blue light, though it was much dimmer than before.

Lu Sheng once again inspected the sapphire with his senses. He sensed something that was different from Devil Qi, Inner Qi, and True Qi, though this energy seemed to be incompatible with him as it was repelling the True Qi in his body.

Retracting his hands, Lu Sheng gave up on the idea of clawing the gem out. He could vaguely sense that if he displaced the gem, something troublesome along the lines of an explosion would be triggered.

“What an… interesting place.” Lu Sheng was very curious about this new form of energy. If not for his time limit, he would have liked to study it further.

“Snap.”

Suddenly, the sound of a branch breaking came from the far side of the plaza.

Lu Sheng abruptly turned his head and looked toward the far side. A thin shape hurriedly ran into a building at the edge of the plaza.

The buildings surrounding the plaza expanded outwards in a circle, their gray roofs filled with uneven holes. Under some of the eaves, strange statues in the shape of babies with wings flapped their wings and attempted to fly away.

The shape darted into a building in the blink of an eye.

Lu Sheng stomped his feet. The ground shook a little as his whole body shot out like an arrow, appearing next to the person a hundred meters away within a few blinks of an eye.

“Bam!” He smashed the wooden door of the building to the right, exposing a thin man holding a blade.

“Ko!!” the man roared, rushing toward Lu Sheng. There were two other people in the room. One held a cleaver, while the other held a pitchfork. Both attacked Lu Sheng at the same time.

“This scent…” Lu Sheng sensed the scent that was incompatible with him in a flash.

“Natives of this world?” He heard from the elder that he might encounter residents of the Outer World.

Many of them were not friendly at all, and most of them saw these intruders as demons from strange worlds.

But that made sense. According to the elder, even large formal sects like the Thousand Sun usually only aimed to reap resources when they sent people to the Outer Worlds. As for the Outer World natives, the usual tactic was a massacre or being captured for experiments. No one really treated them like humans.

During his brief hesitation, Lu Sheng acutely sensed that all three weapons coming toward him had faint patterns made of white light on them.

“Bam!”

After three consecutive dull thuds, Lu Sheng swung his knife horizontally with one hand. All three were knocked back from the impact, and slammed into the wall before falling to the ground.

Compared to their strength, the bodies of these three creatures were very fragile. Lu Sheng was about to inspect their wounds and interrogate them, but all three unexpectedly began to spew blood from their mouths as their eyes lost focus—they were about to die.

“Contradicting power… The power they exhibited was the equivalent of that of an ordinary human who had achieved Intent Proficiency, but their bodies were weaker than those of normal adults. They were more like delicate children… what a strange Outer World,” Lu Sheng concluded as he inspected the bodies.

“Oh well, might as well complete the mission first. I have plenty of time to come back in the future.” He inspected the bodies further, and found pieces of small white rocks before leaving the house.

“According to this paper, the Bell of Death is to my right.”

He, again, took out the piece of paper to check his location, then promptly continued being on his way.

More information appeared on the paper.

‘To ring the Bell of Death, a Mallet of Necromancy are required. To ring the bell three times, three mallets are required. The Mallet of Necromancy usually appears in the shape of a light-blue sapphire.

“Light-blue sapphire?” Lu Sheng immediately thought of the statue back in the plaza. He returned, and clawed the gem out of the statue.

This time, he didn’t sense any impending explosion. The white light on the paper seemed to have repressed the gem.

He kept the gem, and quickly crossed the plaza toward the direction marked on the paper.

Soon, he reached the corner of the street, and saw another statue, this time in the shape of a man wearing a hat. In the middle of its forehead was another embedded sapphire, emitting a blue light.

Lu Sheng was about to claw it out.

“Please wait.” Suddenly, a voice came from behind him.

Lu Sheng turned his head, and saw a man wrapped in a white robe walking toward him. Only his eyes were exposed. Everything else, including his nose, was covered tight.

“And you are?” Lu Sheng frowned.

“I’m the inspector in charge of security and proctoring this test. I am also the guard who will prevent you from getting into any dangerous situations,” the masked man in white said flatly.

“Then Master Inspector, what seems to be the problem?” Lu Sheng was a little perplexed.

“In my personal opinion, don’t choose this gem. I know a way that, although possibly more difficult, will benefit you more,” the inspector said calmly.

“I am grateful for your recommendation, but I’m more inclined to grab the loot in front of me,” Lu Sheng responded flatly.

“Though choosing this gem might seem easy right now, you will encounter many troubles in the future. You will regret it, so please consider this carefully,” the inspector said in a low voice.

Lu Sheng smiled. “I have considered it very carefully. This gem is positioned in such a convenient position, and there isn’t any sign of strange or troublesome power on it.”

The inspector frowned.

The sapphire was prepared for Song Du all along, placed here for him to pass the test. The messy monsters on it had mostly been cleansed.

But the inspector never expected Lu Sheng to show up before Song Du, who was familiar with the environment. Hence, he was forced to show himself to stop Lu Sheng.

The Song Family had paid a substantial bribe for this test, so of course he couldn’t ignore it.

“This is specially prepared for one of the other candidates, right?” Lu Sheng suddenly guessed.

The inspector’s heart jumped.

“This an Outer World. You are reading too much into this,” he said flatly.

“Is that so? It’s easier for people to mess around precisely because it’s an outer world.” Lu Sheng smiled.

“You….” The inspector was speechless.

Suddenly, a scurry of footsteps came from behind them. Teams of black-clad monks with blood trailing from their eyes and their hands in front of their chests soon appeared behind Lu Sheng.

The monk leading them relaxed his arms, and abruptly charged, appearing in front of Lu Sheng. His leg accurately swiped toward Lu Sheng’s neck.

Lu Sheng reached out to catch it, but, unexpectedly, the monk’s leg exploded into countless drops of black liquid, passing through his palm, then formed into a leg once again. The strike ruthlessly connected with Lu Sheng’s neck.

“Bam!”

Lu Sheng held the monk’s leg with a surprised expression on his face.

A mocking expression appeared on the inspector’s previously cold face.

“This kind of attack is the specialty of the Black Seal Temple—there’s no way to block it. Every part of their body can turn into black liquid. Normal candidates can deal with the attacks of three monks at most, but there are at least twenty of them here. I would recommend—”

“Bam!!”

The inspector didn’t even have the time to finish. His pupils dilated abruptly.

Lu Sheng just squashed the head of a monk with one hand with lightning fast speed.

A mob of black-clad monks abruptly charged at him and struck out ruthlessly with their legs and fists. Many other monks started to circle around in a formation, changing their positions quickly around Lu Sheng.

With a couple of splashes, ten or so monks exploded into black water, and condensed behind Lu Sheng, their palms cutting toward Lu Sheng’s back.

The rest of the monks fanatically rushed up as well, holding Lu Sheng with all their strength. Lu Sheng was wrapped inside of a giant ball.

At the same time, the inspector nodded toward the sapphire. Immediately, Song Du charged out from a corner, and quickly clawed out the sapphire. He nodded back, and charged out. Soon, he disappeared into an alley.