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Lily sprinted as fast and stealthily as possible, suppressing her aura along the way. Fear still lingered in her heart. She couldn’t believe that Ibaraki Doji actually had the strength of a Throned Monarch!

How exactly did this happen? Ibaraki Doji was an archdemon that had existed for hundreds of years, but it was unlikely for him to suddenly achieve such rapid progress. The reason for this was unknown, but it didn’t matter. The current Ibaraki Doji was enough to kill Lily easily; he was even more dangerous than the first time they met.

Lily’s means of resisting Ibaraki were exhausted, and it was precisely because of her trump card, the Raccoon Mita, that she dared to venture into the mines to seize the treasure.

But she didn’t expect that Ibaraki’s domain could release so many vengeful spirits. Moreover, these vengeful spirits were all mentally connected to Ibaraki Doji. If any one of them found Lily, Ibaraki would know immediately, and with his speed, he would easily catch up with her.

Once he caught up, the consequences would be unimaginable!

Because Lily couldn’t utilize her full speed, those vengeful spirits gradually flew past. She had to use the terrain to avoid the vengeful spirits, but there were just too many of them and their flight paths were irregular. The situation was too dangerous, further hindering the speed of Lily’s escape.

“Not good. If this continues, I’ll be trapped here…”

Lily could only avoid the vengeful spirits on one side and take a detour forward.

Gradually, Lily heard the voice of a demon.

“It’s easy for Ibaraki to guess the direction of my escape. He must’ve guessed that I was heading in the direction of the imperial army,” Lily was alarmed, “Because I was in a hurry, I didn’t deliberately take a detour… This Ibaraki sent a demon to scout the area at the right time.”

With so many demons and vengeful spirit patrolling everywhere, the possibility of being discovered was getting higher and higher.

Lily continued to cautiously sneak around and avoid detection. She couldn’t afford to be impatient or anxious right now; she could only escape little by little. Once she was discovered, everything would be over. She had to endure and gradually escape the range of the domain.

“Hmm?”

Lily observed the movements of these vengeful spirits from the bushes and found that there seemed to be a place up ahead where all the vengeful spirits would go around.

It was very strange, so Lily found an opportunity to sneak past through the dense bushes. A gust of cold wind blew, and she saw a huge circular hole in front that measured at least a hundred meters deep and more than ten kilometers in diameter. Its shape was unusual and didn’t seem naturally formed.

Lily could see the bottom of the deep pit, which had various trees growing in mist. But these trees looked obviously smaller than the giant trees in the surrounding mountain forest.

Furthermore, none of the vengeful spirits dared to fly here and instead chose to bypass the pit.

Lily then carefully climbed down the steep rocky wall of the deep pit.

After she descended a few meters down the deep pit, she felt a strong killing intent assaulting her. This killing intent was very ancient and didn’t seem to come from a specific place, but echoed in the deep pit.

Although Lily did not know what was down there, it couldn’t be worse than being found by Ibaraki, so she chose to go down to the bottom of the pit.

Lily went down to the bottom of the pit veiled by mist, and although there were many trees growing, these trees looked relatively young, no more than a decade old.

This was a very strange occurrence in this primitive mountain forest. It seemed like things only began to grow here only ten years ago.

“Could it be that this deep pit only appeared in recent years? How exactly did it form?”

Suddenly, as Lily was walking, she felt an extremely strong killing intent sweep directly over her without warning.

“Ahh!” Lily cried out involuntarily, obviously spooked by the killing intent. Although Lily’s soul was incredibly resilient and this killing intent couldn’t harm her soul, it was still enough to deeply shock her.

Lily’s legs softened and she fell to the ground. She saw a shattered boulder in front of her which was scarred by a shocking sword mark.

To call this a boulder was an understatement. It was more like a toppled mountain!

The sword mark exuded a terrifying aura that made one’s soul tremble, and Lily couldn’t help breaking out in cold sweat.

“Hm?”

Lily noticed that, under the sword mark, there was a fragmented skull covered with moss.

It was a huge skull the size of a millstone. Just looking at the skull made Lily, who had the power of a Throned Sovereign, feel intimidated. She felt that when this being was still alive, it must have been very frightening.

Lily looked around and realized that, at the bottom of the deep pit, there were many ancient bones scattered around. They were covered with moss or vines and weren’t easily discovered at first.

Because of the overwhelming murderous aura covering it up, Lily didn’t notice the eldritch energy emanating from these bones.

Most of them were the bones of demons!

“No!”

Lily noticed that, among these bones, there were other skeletal remains of various sizes that ranged from being as small as humans to as large as giants. They didn’t emit any eldritch energy, but a very uncomfortable, dangerous aura that she had never encountered before.

Since they were neither demons nor humans, what other force did those bones belong to?

Although Lily felt very frightened here, it was only psychological pressure, after all. It was better than going up to face the threat of Ibaraki Doji. No matter how frightened Lily felt, she could only hide here temporarily.

Gradually, Lily grew more attentive and noticed that most of the broken bones exuded a small amount of aura that resembled the sword mark’s.

She walked around in the deep pit and realized something.

“This is a battlefield— a battlefield where a terrible fight took place only a decade or two ago. How is that possible?”
“Every skeleton of the beings that died here seems no weaker than Ibaraki Doji, and there are many even stronger than him! There are so many of them! What kind of terrifying battle took place in Shuten Doji’s Tanba territory?”
“Why have I never heard of this battle? Did Shuten Doji participate?”
“It’s impossible for him not to know about such a terrifying battle.”

“Master…” Kagura suddenly spoke at this time, her tone carrying a bit of awe and sadness, “It seems to be the celestial maiden swordstyle.”

“What?”

“I feel that the sword marks on the boulder, as well as the sword slashes that cut through the bones of those huge creatures, are very similar to the celestial maiden swordstyle in ancient times.” Kagura said.

“But this deep pit seems to have only appeared less than twenty years ago!”

“Yes, although the marks of this swordstyle are ancient, judging from the degree of rock breakage and weathering, it seems to have been created in recent decades¹.” Kagura shared similar thoughts.

“I thought that the celestial maidens had long ceased to exist. However, just a decade or two ago, they actually had a battle with something here?”

“Master, I feel that the celestial maiden sword marks left behind here and there seem to share the same kind of fluctuation and are likely from the same celestial maiden.”

Lily nodded; she also had this feeling in her heart, “The same celestial maiden fighting with so many different powerful creatures in this deep pit? No, I should say that it was the battle that formed this deep pit, right? This celestial maiden is so strong! But, doesn’t she have a partner?”

Lily began to probe carefully at the bottom of the deep pit. She didn’t know what happened to the celestial maiden afterward, but if she hadn’t died in this deep pit, she should have left long ago. Otherwise, with such a powerful existence lurking about, how could Shuten Doji be at peace?

Lily repeatedly explored the deep pit. Although she dared not say that she had searched every place, she did not find any bones suspected of being the celestial maiden’s.

Lily was somewhat relieved. It seemed that this celestial maiden might still be alive.

Then where was she?

Looking at the Heian Dynasty, there didn’t seem to be any mention of a female powerhouse in recent years. Had she gone into seclusion? Or did she return to Takamagahara?

As Lily walked, she found a crumbled down mountain wall in the middle of the deep pit. The shrubs on the side of the mountain wall seemed to emit some kind of fluctuation that attracted her.

Lily plucked away the shrubs and found a cave that had collapsed along with the mountain wall.

She stepped inside and walked along what was originally supposed to be the side of the cave. The cave wasn’t too deep, but there seemed to be a slightly welcoming yet unfathomable aura inside.

Lily noticed that, in the collapsed cave, there was a small bamboo bed spread in the corner between the wall and the original ground. It seemed to be made from local materials, but the carvings were very delicate. It had a similar aura to the sword marks of the celestial maiden.

It must have been temporarily made by the celestial goddess herself.

“This looks like the place where the celestial maiden used to live.”
“Such an expert, yet living in this humble place. She was either on a training journey or fleeing.”

Lily seemed to be able to imagine the scene from that year.

A powerful celestial maiden in white, fluttering clothes was being chased down by unknown forces and hid here before she was finally discovered. Surrounded by those terrifying forces and countless demons and monsters, the celestial maiden fought alone against the horde, so much so that the topography of Tanba was altered by the battle.

After the battle, the celestial maiden disappeared.

“Hmm?” Lily suddenly noticed that there seemed to be an unnatural bulge on the edge of the tattered bamboo mat, covered in dust.

Lily went forward and brushed away the dust, finding an old but very delicate jewelry box.

“Jewelry box?”

Lily carefully dug the jewelry box out of the dust and saw that there was a lock on it, but the lock was hanging off to the side.

She opened it but found no jewelry inside, only a comb, a small bronze mirror, and some used rouge, among other items.

Lily was very knowledgeable and knew that, although these things were feminine products, they were not extraordinary!

The materials used weren’t repertible in the Heian Dynasty, but they were somewhat similar to the women’s products in the dressing room of Lily’s mirror space. However, they weren’t as elegant and appeared relatively simple.

Lily examined the small mirror. Although the material felt extremely hard, it held no power. The contents inside seemed to be the celestial maiden’s dressing supplies and there weren’t any treasures.

Judging from the fact that the jewelry box fell here and wasn’t locked, it was very likely that the celestial maiden hiding here was suddenly attacked by the demons and mysterious forces, and before she could put away the jewelry box, she rushed out of the cave to fight.

But it seemed that this celestial maiden did not return here after this battle.

Lily had a bad feeling in her heart.

“Hmm?” Lily noticed that the jewelry box seemed to have another compartment.

After a little research, she found the mechanism to open it. After all, this was just a jewelry box, not something that was deliberately hidden.

Click! The upper layer popped up with a sound, revealing a little interlayer. Lily pushed the upper layer away and saw a small paper fan inside the interlayer.

This paper fan was very strange. Although it was high-end, the material used was from the Heian Dynasty.

This made Lily feel even stranger. Why would a celestial maiden with high standards treasure this paper fan from the Heian Dynasty?

She couldn’t help but open the paper fan to take a look.

On one side of the paper fan, a little girl with short silver hair was drawn using fine brushwork.

The little girl had a pair of big, icy-blue eyes².

1. Robinxen: A time slip? Or are they in hiding?
2. Robinxen: Gasp, could this be what I think it is.