Beyond the Timescape

Chapter 559: A Bronze Coffin Under the Heavenfire Sea! (part 1)

The other four sundials will come to a stop soon.

Because each sundial was fourteen hours behind the dial in front of it, they stopped moving in a specific order. Anticipation filled Xu Qing’s heart.

As he waited, he rose through the lava until he was only three meters below the surface. There, his eyes glittered. The lava was turning out to be very beneficial. Not only did it allow the violet crystal to melt the life lamps, it also... upgraded his Golden Crow Assimilates Myriad Spirits. At least, that was what it seemed like to Xu Qing. He had yet to confirm it. But considering his Golden Crow Assimilates Myriad Spirits could assimilate the remains of a fallen sun, then fundamentally speaking, this sea of flames should be beneficial to it.

After Golden Crow Assimilates Myriad Spirits became a nascent soul, it reached the third stage of development.

After some thought, he sent the golden crow nascent soul flying out of his forehead, surrounded by dazzling light. It started out as an ordinary nascent soul, but it took only a moment for it to transform into a golden crow. As it circled around Xu Qing, its cries echoed out in his mind. Then the golden crow inhaled deeply, causing the power of fire to sweep into its mouth. A tremor passed through it and its eyes narrowed. At the same time, the fire surrounding it grew more intense.

After fully digesting the fire, the golden crow shivered and let loose an even more piercing cry. Then it circled around Xu Qing again before diving directly into the lava.

Stunned, Xu Qing looked to see what would happen after that. A moment later he breathed a sigh of relief. The golden crow was a spirit, and its spirit qualities grew stronger after turning into a nascent soul. And considering its connection to Xu Qing’s mind and heart, he could sense everything about it.

The golden crow remained at the three-meter mark, devouring the fire. As it did, its aura grew more intense, and it grew even more tails. Two hours later, Xu Qing’s second sundial stopped. By then, the golden crow’s number of tails had gone from 100 to 130. Excited, Xu Qing had the golden crow continue its devouring.

Time slipped by slowly but surely.

Soon, three of the sundial life lamps had stopped at the noon position. It took a few more hours for the others to stop. When that happened, the lava around Xu Qing pulsated.

For a moment, he looked dazed.

But then that dazed look vanished from his eyes, to be replaced with astonishment. He could now sense that the five sundials contained an ability that he could activate with a mere thought. As for what that ability was, he couldn’t tell by merely sensing it.

I guess I’ll test it out! Eyes narrowing, he settled down and sent a thought out. Inside his sea of consciousness, the five sundials thrummed as they appeared around him as projections.

The five sundials slowly rotated around him, looking almost like the petals of a huge violet flower. Dazzling light shone out as five balls of light like suns appeared above his head, arrayed in a pentagonal shape. The sundials complemented him. The balls of light were like stars. And they made Xu Qing absolutely resplendent.

What was more, the five sundials emanated the power of time, which poured into Xu Qing, filling him with a mysterious sensation. It almost made it seem like he himself had come from within time.

The entire process lasted for only a moment before the feeling vanished. The sundials went dark, and flew back inside of him along with the suns. The first sundial immediately began moving again, tracking time, but the others remained still. Stunned, Xu Qing looked around, then cast his senses inside of himself. He didn’t detect anything unusual.

What’s going on?

Frowning, he thought back to everything that just happened, and couldn’t determine what the ability was that came with the sundials’ eruption of power.

Confused and curious, he kept waiting.

Fourteen hours later, the second sundial life lamp started tracking time again. The others did the same, all of them in fourteen hour intervals. After the fifth sundial started moving, the first one eventually stopped at the noon position.

Xu Qing did some calculations. It’s been seventy hours. That’s about three days.

Twenty-four hours passed. During that time, as the sundial life lamps remained in a stopped position, that explosive aura once again built up.

Four days. That’s a complete cycle. Could it be that the effect wasn’t very obvious because I’m in this lava?

Xu Qing looked at the golden crow off in the distance, which now had over 200 tails. Looking away, he flew up out of the lava.

Once he was hovering midair, he unhesitatingly activated all five of the sundials. Five sundials and five suns rotated around him, and the sundial’s power erupted.

Xu Qing immediately felt heat everywhere.

He was surrounded by lava! He had... returned to the exact spot he had occupied before in the lava! The realization struck him and his eyes filled with disbelief. Looking around, he confirmed that he had returned to the same spot.

I was definitely midair a moment ago!

As waves of incredulity assailed him, he realized there was one obvious possibility.

Could this be some sort of time reversal?

The speculation caused his heart to pound. After doing some basic calculations based on the height to which he’d flown, and the time it took, he realized that seven breaths of time had passed during the whole process.

I went back seven breaths of time? The first time I tried it, I was just sitting there cross-legged, so it wasn’t obvious what happened! [1]

Eyes glittering, Xu Qing decided that he needed to do some more tests to come to a firm conclusion.

As the golden crow continued its devouring, Xu Qing remained in the lava for eight days. During that time, he used the power of the sundials twice. He varied his testing methodology.

The first time, he burst into motion and went as far as possible before unleashing the sundials’ power. What he found was that he went back seven breaths of time.

The second time, he broke some magical devices and threw them off to the side, then injured himself intentionally. Then he used the sundials’ ability. What he found was that the sundials didn’t affect other objects. Only himself. The things he’d broken remained broken and in the same place. But his body returned to the state before it had been injured, and he looked exactly like he did seven breaths of time earlier.

Those tests gave him a much deeper understanding of the sundials’ ability.

It returns my body to the state it was in seven breaths of time previous! Using this ability at the right time would be like having a spare life. I could also use it as a deadly weapon!

After some thought, he quelled his shock. At the same time, he realized that all of this seemed to be because of the violet crystal.

Just what is the violet crystal...? It can seal the shadow, seal gods, gives me shocking regenerative capabilities, and contains some sort of time magic....

After a while, he stowed the questions to consider later, and turned his attention to the golden crow.

The golden crow now had 280 tails, which was its limit at this level. It would need to absorb lava from a deeper level to progress any further. Paradoxically, the golden crow couldn’t go any further down than three meters. That said, the increase from 100 tails to 280 was a huge boost to the golden crow. It now pulsed with a sensation that seemed to indicate it was on the verge of provoking a second heavenfate tribulation.

Xu Qing’s session of cultivation in the lava had reached its conclusion. There was no reason to stick around any longer.

I’ll return this eyeball, then leave the east and go meet Eldest Brother at Mount Heavenly Ox.

He had already been in the eastern part of the Moonrite Region for almost half a year, and was wondering how the Captain was doing. He actually missed him. Before leaving the Heavenfire Sea, he turned and looked into its depths.

I’m really curious to see the Red Moon Cathedral’s warding spells that Senior Duanmu mentioned....

For one thing, he was curious why the Red Moon Cathedral felt they needed to set up warding spells there. Now that he had the power of the sundials, he felt that as long as he was careful, he shouldn’t run into any trouble.

With that, he tightened his grip on the eyeball. The eyeball trembled and released more of its protective power.

Satisfied, Xu Qing retracted the golden crow, then held the eyeball tightly as he dropped down deeper into the lava. Soon he reached a depth of 300 meters. He kept going until he reached 600 meters. 900 meters....

The further down he got, the hotter it became. Thankfully, the eyeball’s protective power kept the heat mostly at bay.

Xu Qing eventually passed a depth of 2,700 meters. There wasn’t just intense heat down here, there was also immense pressure. More veins than ever could be seen on the brown eyeball.

The deeper Xu Qing got, the more he realized he was sensing a familiar aura. It was the god power of Crimson Mother. That realization caused him to put up his guard even further. As he carefully descended, he felt a sensation of crisis building within him. Without any hesitation, he unleashed the power of his violet moon nascent soul. Violet moon power spread all around him.

As a result, that sensation of crisis faded away. It was also by means of the violet moon’s power that he was able to determine the source of the red moon power that he sensed.

After a moment of hesitation, he continued downward.

1. Up to this point, units of time have not been super important, but here they do matter. The common unit of time that I translate as “hour” is actually a specific unit of time common in ancient China. In that system of time measurement, the day is broken up into 12 two-hour periods called “shichen” when transliterated. To make things simple, I convert those units into hours. In other words, when I say the clocks are “fourteen hours apart,” in Chinese they are actually “seven shichen apart.” So the “seven shichen” seems to correlate to the “seven breaths of time.” ?