I just became the Pirate King, and you're telling me I also time-traveled at the same time.

Chapter 1063 The Method of "Moon Breath Guidance"

She looked at Chu Yang and Sun Wukong.

"When Su Wanwan was cultivating next to Yue Xin, the wolf clan's power that seeped out would attack her. She couldn't withstand it. With her current cultivation level, even a touch of that power would severely injure her."

Chu Yang's expression changed.

It wasn't panic, but the calm that comes after "I understand".

"So you need us to go in and hold them off," he said.

"Yes," Bai tide said, "You three—no, you two." She pointed to Chu Yang and Sun Wukong, then glanced at Tang Sanzang, "The monk can just watch from the side, don't chant sutras."

Tang Sanzang: "..."

"The moonlight within the inner tomb will nourish your bodies, allowing you to stay inside," Bai Xi said. "Your task is to block the wolf clan's power seeping from the seal's cracks while Su Wanwan is cultivating. You don't need to kill the wolves; they can't get out. You just need to block that power and prevent it from touching Su Wanwan."

She paused, then added, "Those forces won't be too strong. The seal is still intact; only a very small portion of the wolf clan can infiltrate. But their numbers will be numerous, wave after wave, without end. You'll need to take turns; when one person holds off the others, the other two will rest. I'll stay outside maintaining the seal's stability and won't be able to go in to help you."

"How long?" Chu Yang asked.

"Every time Su Wanwan cultivates for two hours, you will need to stay inside and guard her for two hours," Bai tide said. "Come in once tomorrow, once the day after tomorrow, for ten consecutive days. After ten days, the seal should be stable."

Chu Yang turned to look at Su Wanwan.

Su Wanwan was also looking at him at the same time.

Their eyes met in mid-air.

Su Wanwan opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but not knowing where to begin. She wanted to say, "I'm sorry for dragging you all into this," and "Thank you for coming," and also, "Actually, I could try on my own"—but these words circled in her throat, and in the end, she couldn't utter a single one.

Because she knew that Chu Yang wouldn't let her try alone.

Chu Yang looked at her for two seconds, then looked away and said to Bai tide, "Okay."

Just two words.

It was as straightforward as agreeing to the most ordinary thing in the world.

Sun Wukong, arms crossed, nodded in agreement: "I, Old Cheng, am just curious to see just how good these wolves really are."

Tang Sanzang stood at the very back, sighed softly, and said nothing, but did not take a single step back.

Bai tide looked at the three of them, and something suddenly lit up slightly in her light-colored eyes, like the silvery-white liquid in the center of the moon flashing for a moment.

"Then get ready," she said. "Open the door after half an incense stick's time."

She said that when she opened the door, she used the word "open the door" instead of "go in".

Su Wanwan later understood the difference between the two words. "Go in" means you walk into a place, while "open the door" means you open a door. Once the door is open, the things behind it can come out. Therefore, the moment the door is opened is the most dangerous.

Bai tide spent half an incense stick's time explaining to each of them their positions and precautions after entering. She went into great detail, specifying exactly where Chu Yang should stand, where Sun Wukong should stand, and how far Su Wanwan's prayer mat should be placed from Yue Xin.

Su Wanwan listened attentively, but one thought kept swirling in her mind—she was about to enter a place that had sealed the wolf clan for countless years, and then meditate and cultivate right under their noses. Those wolves would hate her, would try every means to attack her, and would bare their teeth at her through the seal, while she could only sit there with her eyes closed, slowly infusing her own breath into the heart of the moon.

She took a deep breath, suppressed that thought, and replaced it with another—Chu Yang and Sun Wukong would stand in front of her.

It's not dependence, it's trust.

"Alright," Bai Xi said finally, walking to Yuehua's withered bones, squatting down, and gently stroking the silvery-white skull. Her movements were very light, like touching the head of a sleeping child.

"Yuehua," she whispered, her voice so soft it was almost inaudible, "I'm sorry to trouble you again."

The runes on the skull suddenly lit up.

It wasn't the slowly flowing light from before; instead, it exploded all at once, a silvery-white light bursting forth from every bone, instantly filling the entire stone chamber. Su Wanwan instinctively closed her eyes, the light filtering through her eyelids and turning her vision a pure white.

The light lasted for about three breaths before slowly fading away.

Su Wanwan opened her eyes.

The stone chamber has changed.

The withered bones of Yuehua remained in their place, but the stone wall behind them—the silvery-white wall covered with moon-reflecting branches—was gone. In its place stood a massive stone gate. The gate was two zhang high, its surface as smooth as a mirror, covered with runes identical to those Su Wanwan had seen beside the moon's heart. The runes radiated outward from the center of the gate, concentric circles like ripples on water. Each circle of runes was a different color; the very center was silvery-white, the next circle pale gold, then cyan, blue, and purple, layer upon layer, as if a whole rainbow had been flattened and embedded into the stone.

In the very center of the stone gate, there is a handprint.

It was a fox's paw print, with five fingers and the shape of the paw pads clearly visible. The paw print wasn't large, not much bigger than Su Wanwan's hand, so it should be Yuehua's own.

Bai tide stood in front of the stone gate, raised her hand, and placed her palm on the claw mark.

There was no light, no sound.

The stone gate opened silently.

The door led not to the gloomy cave Su Wanwan had imagined, nor to some void abyss. Behind the door was a long, downward-sloping stone staircase. The staircase was narrow, allowing only two people to walk side by side. Every few steps along the walls on either side of the staircase was embedded a glowing bead. The beads were small, but their light was so bright that it illuminated the entire staircase as if it were daytime.

The stone steps were very deep, stretching as far as the eye could see. The further down you went, the darker it became, and at the very bottom, the light had faded to just a few faint stars.

Air rushed out from the stone gate.

Su Wanwan will never forget that taste in her life.

It wasn't a fishy smell, nor a foul smell; it was a very strong odor, like that of a wild animal. Not from a single wild animal, but from a large group of wild animals huddled together in one place for far too long. That odor had seeped into the stones, into the air, so strong that it instinctively sent chills down one's spine.

Sun Wukong was the first to smell it.

His expression changed—not from fear, but from seriousness. Su Wanwan rarely saw that kind of seriousness on his face; the last time she saw it was before he encountered a truly formidable opponent. He narrowed his eyes slightly, and the golden cudgel slid out from behind his ear, gently turning in his hand until it returned to its normal size. He then planted it on the ground with a dull thud.

"That's interesting," he said.

Bai tide stood to one side of the stone gate, making way for the passage.

"Go inside," she said. "I'll maintain the seal from the outside. Remember, two hours. Whatever happens inside, I'll pull you out after two hours."

Su Wanwan glanced at Chu Yang.

Chu Yang nodded.

Su Wanwan took a deep breath and was the first to step through the stone gate.

The stone steps were narrower than she had imagined. The stone slabs were cold under her feet, covered with a very thin layer of dust, accumulated over countless years. The scent of wolves in the air grew stronger with each step she took, so strong that her nose was filled with that savage, primitive, and unadorned aroma.

She walked up about thirty steps, and the stone door behind her closed silently.

The light inside the stone chamber was blocked out, leaving only the beads on the stone steps and a few faint lights in the distance.

Chu Yang walked behind her, the white donkey's hooves making a crisp clattering sound on the narrow stone steps, echoing back and forth in the empty passageway, sounding like many donkeys were walking.

Sun Wukong walked at the very back, his golden cudgel slung over his shoulder, the tip of the cudgel almost touching the stone wall above. With each step, he left a shallow white mark on the stone wall.

Tang Sanzang walked ahead of Sun Wukong with steady steps, but Su Wanwan noticed that his hands were always tucked into his sleeves, and his knuckles were slightly white.

At the end of the stone steps is an archway.

The archway wasn't large, just big enough for the white dragon horse to pass through. Behind the archway was a hall more than three times the size of the stone chamber above. The hall floor was flat, paved with huge bluestone slabs, which were covered with runes, similar to those Su Wanwan had seen on the stone door, but denser and more intricate, covering the entire floor like a giant spider web.

In the very center of the hall, something was floating.

It is the heart of the moon.

It was exactly the same as the one in the stone chamber above, but more than ten times larger. The center of this moon was as big as a human head, and the silvery-white liquid inside churned even more violently, like a pot of boiling silver soup. Its light spread outward from the center, illuminating the entire hall brightly.

Directly below the center of the moon, there is also a skeleton.

But this skeleton is much larger than the one above. It's not a fox's skeleton.

It's a wolf.

The wolf skeleton was enormous, at least ten feet long from head to tail. Its bones were thick and strong, with sharp bone spurs at the joints. Just looking at the skeleton, one could imagine how ferocious the wolf must have been when it was alive. The wolf bones weren't silvery-white, but black—not ordinary black, but a charcoal black like the residue left after being burned. The bones were covered in cracks, from which a dark red light shone, like the embers of a dying ember.

Beside the wolf skeleton, there were two smaller wolf skeletons, one on the left and one on the right, standing guard like protectors.

Su Wanwan stood under the archway, looking at the three black wolf skeletons, and suddenly felt that something was wrong.

Before she could figure out what was wrong, the wolf bone moved.

From the two empty eye sockets on the largest wolf skeleton, two dark red lights suddenly shone. The lights were small, like two glowing embers, but the hatred bursting from the bones—yes, hatred, Su Wanwan felt it clearly—was so intense that it almost solidified, like an invisible knife slashing straight at her.

She instinctively took a half step back, her back bumping into Chu Yang's chest.

Chu Yang reached out and pressed down on her shoulder to steady her.

"Don't back down," he whispered.

Su Wanwan gritted her teeth, withdrew her half-step, and stood still, facing the two dark red lights.

Two beams of light stared intently at her from within the wolf bone's eye sockets.

No, I wasn't staring at her.

They were staring at the moonlight emanating from her.

Su Wanwan could feel the wolf skeleton recognizing her. It was trying to determine whether she was Yuexin herself, or merely something imbued with lunar energy. The recognition process lasted for about two breaths, then the wolf skeleton's jaws suddenly snapped open—

No sound.

But Su Wanwan "heard" it.

It wasn't heard with ears, but with breath. The wolf skeleton emitted a silent howl, a howl that spread in all directions along the air, along the ground, along the runes. It wasn't attacking; it was summoning.

From all around the hall, from the cracks in the runes on the floor, from the fissures in the walls, and from the dark corners, something began to seep out.

Those things had no fixed shape. Sometimes they looked like mist, sometimes like shadows, sometimes like a large group of eyes huddled together. They surged out from all directions, converging towards the center of the moon, but were blocked by an invisible barrier three zhang away from the center.

That barrier was the edge of the rune.

The moonlight, at a distance of three zhang (approximately 10 meters), formed a silvery-white halo. Within the halo, the area was clean, bright, and safe. Outside the halo, the black, shapeless things multiplied and became denser, crowding around like a pack of starving wolves staring at their prey through a fence.

Su Wanwan stood in the very center of the halo.

She looked down at her feet. There was a slightly raised platform on the bluestone slab, not large, just big enough for one person to sit cross-legged. The platform was directly below the center of the moon, no more than a foot away. When she sat down, the center of the moon was almost half an arm's length above her head, its silvery light pouring down and enveloping her completely.

The moonlight surged into her body like a tide.

It was more than ten times denser than the stone chamber above.

Before she could even adjust her breathing, the energy ball in her dantian exploded—not literally exploded, but like a seed breaking through its shell, it instantly grew into a large tree. Moon energy poured in from the top of her head, traveled down her spine, rushed into her dantian, and then spread from her dantian to her limbs and bones, stretching every meridian and soaking every inch of her skin with moon energy.

That feeling is hard to describe.

It felt like she was being soaked in warm water, being ironed from the inside out. It was comfortable, but too much comfort turned into torture. Her body greedily absorbed the lunar energy, but the absorption rate couldn't keep up with the flow of energy. The lunar energy accumulated more and more in her body, to the point that she felt like she was about to burst from the inside out.

She gritted her teeth and, following the method of "Lunar Breath Guidance," expelled the excess lunar energy from her body.

The moonlight emanating from her pores overflowed, forming a thin, silvery-white halo around her. This halo didn't dissipate; instead, it was slowly absorbed by the moon's center above her head. The moon's center absorbed her overflowing moonlight, causing the silvery-white liquid within to churn even more violently, even emitting a low, thumping sound like a heartbeat. (End of Chapter)