Chapter 64: Begging the Immortal on Bended Knee!

Among them, quite a few were recognized or had been heard of by the people around Martial Dao Shen Yu.

Sighs mixed with inexplicable emotions could be heard from time to time beside Martial Dao Shen Yu.

"That person seems to be the young hero Shishan, yet he has turned into this state."

"That is Xu Jin of the Golden Fist, who once fought through all the martial arts halls in Nanxi City. To think he would die here like this."

"Hao Long, the Indestructible Vajra who fought sea monsters bare-handed—judging by his appearance, he won't last much longer either."

"These are all renowned figures of the Earth Martial Sect."

"In front of such a natural disaster, what are we so-called top-tier experts, compared to ordinary people?"

"......"

Clearly, seeing these once-illustrious grand masters now dressed in rags, haggard, and even shivering under the cold wave, on the verge of death, ultimately brought a crushing sense of oppression.

A catastrophic calamity capable of annihilating everyone was no longer just a tale from the mouths of immortals, but had truly manifested upon the bodies of these martial arts masters!

Then, what about the master of the Earth Martial Sect?

He was the pinnacle master of Body-Tempering Martial Arts!

In this world, there was no such thing as an official ranking list for the world's experts, yet a few individuals remained universally acknowledged as the supreme paragons.

Even if they only represented their respective paths of martial arts, that status was recognized by all!

They stood as mountains in the eyes of all martial arts practitioners.

Xu Yuan, Master of the Earth Martial Sect, was one of them.

Many believed he had already surpassed all previous generations of Earth Martial Sect masters and was currently creating his own legendary technique; once successful, he would become a new martial arts myth.

He was simply too overbearing and confident; there was no one in the world he dared not fight or challenge. Even if defeated, he would soon challenge them a second and a third time, until he gradually neared victory.

It was as if he never knew how to admit defeat!

In truth, those in the world who could steadily defeat him were probably fewer than the fingers on one hand.

How fared such a person at this moment?

Not only did others want to know, but Martial Dao Shen Yu also wanted to find out.

He accelerated once again, letting the detection device silently glide past one person after another.

The further inward they went, the more experts there were, yet the more haggard they became. At this moment, all of them were hauling the crushed earth and rubble from the very front. When the foremost vanguard finally appeared on the screen, everyone was stunned.

A tall man with his upper body bare, revealing muscles like tempered steel, was striking the frozen earth at the very front with palm after palm.

Every single palm strike carried a soft, flowing internal force.

Fine cracks were beaten into the frozen ground before it collapsed, and several visibly elderly elders nearby hurriedly rushed to transport the shattered soil.

Could this tunnel, over a dozen kilometers long, have been dug entirely in this manner?

"Master, it is time to take the Qi-Restoring Pill," a much older elder whispered cautiously, carefully pouring a pill into the master's mouth.

The moment Xu Yuan swallowed it and reined in his power, torrential sweat instantly poured out of him.

Even his bulging muscles rapidly withered away, and large wrinkles appeared across his skin.

The flush on his face faded rapidly as well, turning as pale as white paper.

"Signs of depleted true qi," Sword Return One murmured in a low voice.

The pinnacle of Body-Tempering Martial Arts, this top-tier powerhouse not even a hundred years old, had been pushed to this state as well?

"Next one, step up quickly!" The elderly man nearby, his face full of heartache, suddenly turned around and glared fiercely at someone nearby. "Master has dug for half an incense stick longer than his time, how dare you slack off."

That person gritted their teeth, once again stirring their true qi, but after executing only two palm strikes, they coughed up a mouthful of blood and collapsed straight down.

"Don't play dead! You, a dignitary of the Dragon Fist, it's not that easy for you to die! Get up!" The elder lunged forward, raining blows with fists and kicks, his sharp voice echoing throughout the entire tunnel.

"This should be Elder Han Ling," Sword Return Three whispered quietly to explain to Martial Dao Shen Yu. "He was Xu Yuan's very first master after joining the sect. All things considered, he is over a hundred and sixty years old, and his strength barely ranks among the top tier."

Martial Dao Shen Yu raised an eyebrow, recalling the rumors.

It was said that Han Ling of the Earth Martial Sect had only ever done one thing right in his entire life, and that was treating Xu Yuan like his own son. Yet that single thing alone had benefited him for a lifetime.

"Enough," Xu Yuan waved his hand, his voice low but still carrying force. "Elder Wang has also reached his limit. Help him go rest; I will continue with the next stretch."

"Master!"

Han Ling's voice rose in pitch, but Xu Yuan cut him off directly.

"Men of our martial generation, whining and fussing, what kind of spectacle is this!"

He surged his true qi once more; his muscles bulged and his color returned, and then he struck the frozen earth palm after palm.

Apart from Han Ling, whose face showed grief and sorrow, the rest of the people felt neither surprise nor emotion.

Nothing remained save the numbness born of despair.

"Cough, cough." The fallen Dragon Fist was still coughing up blood, his eyes unfocused, leaving only a struggling, breathless murmur. "In this life of mine, I have been through countless life-and-death battles. I never thought that instead of dying in combat, I would perish beneath this natural disaster... How ironic."

If it were an enemy, no matter how formidable, he would still dare to throw a punch.

Yet this natural disaster offered nothing from the very beginning but endless despair.

It was utterly impossible to overcome; strong as the Master was, he could only meet defeat.

No one else spoke.

In truth, they all knew very well that it was impossible to tunnel through this passage and escape.

No one knew how much further ahead lay, yet everyone had already reached their absolute limits.

Ever since the unimaginable cold wave penetrated deep underground, turning everything into frozen earth and making the excavation of the tunnel ten times, a hundred times harder, they had known that the Earth Martial Sect was finished.

Everything they did at this moment was merely to ensure that when someone eventually found them in a hundred or a thousand years, the name of the Earth Martial Sect would not be disgraced.

At the very least, they would have fought until every last person died of exhaustion.

Yet at this exact moment, a voice vastly different from the general weakness of the rest abruptly rang out within the dim cavern.

"The Earth Martial Sect is left with only these few people?"

"——!"

Xu Yuan, who had been preparing to swing his next palm, jerked his head around sharply, staring fixedly at the source of the voice.

Not just him, but the others, after a momentary numbness, made the exact same motion.

What was that voice? Were they hallucinating?

Yet in the next moment, a pitch-black sphere materialized amidst the dim glow of the torchlight.

The voice of Martial Dao Shen Yu sounded once again.

"The Earth Martial Sect has fewer than a thousand people left?"

This time, it was heard with crystal clarity.

Even the Dragon Fist who had been lying on the ground waiting to die suddenly jerked upright, staring fixedly at the place the voice came from.

It was Han Ling's piercing shriek that broke the silence.

"What kind of monster are you?!"

It was evident that he, too, was long past his limit and his mind was even somewhat muddled.

At this moment, he actually threw himself in front of Xu Yuan to shield him.

However, Martial Dao Shen Yu also discovered that this detection device surprisingly came equipped with a three-dimensional projection function.

Thus, within the pitch-black cave, a luminescent figure materialized before everyone's eyes.

"I am a reincarnated immortal..."

Martial Dao Shen Yu lowered his voice, intending to offer an explanation.

However, before he could finish his words, he saw Xu Yuan—the pinnacle of Body-Tempering Martial Arts, a top-tier powerhouse of the world, renowned far and wide for his overbearing, formidable, and never-say-die nature—suddenly drop to his knees with a heavy thud, slamming his forehead straight against the frozen ground.

"Xu Yuan begs the immortal on his knees to save my Earth Martial Sect!"