He didn't give Qin Mu a chance to speak, muttering to himself, "I'm afraid Wu Zun might be playing tricks, using a wheel battle to wear me down... This is getting tricky..."
Before long, the Loulan Golden Palace finally appeared before everyone.
Qin Mu looked into the distance, seeing an endless expanse of grassland suddenly giving way to a vast lake, its emerald waves rippling, as wide as an ocean nestled within the prairie.
From afar, Qin Mu could faintly see the other end of the lake was lined with continuous mountains, their peaks draped in silver, piled high with snow.
And among those majestic mountains stood a peak radiant with golden light. Qin Mu opened his Divine Firmament Celestial Eye to see, only then realizing it wasn't a mountain of gold, but a magnificent palace complex of golden splendor.
These palaces were so numerous that they completely covered the entire mountain, which was why from a distance it appeared as a golden mountain composed entirely of gold.
On the grasslands, there was no fixed currency; only gold circulated. Along their journey, they had been using the gold ingots gifted by General Bian Zhenyun to pay for meals.
For the people of the grasslands, gold was a rarity, of immense value. Yet these palaces were crafted entirely from pure gold, a testament to their opulence.
Sacrifice Jiu Bashan arrived at the lakeshore. Qin Mu looked around and saw a wooden boat moored there. On the boat stood a man with horns on his head, dressed in black, leaning on a bamboo pole at the prow.
In the shallow waters of the lake, wooden stakes were planted haphazardly, each bearing a decayed human head.
"The Great Wu harvesting souls to refine their arts—they make even our Heavenly Saint Sect look less demonic."
Qin Mu looked toward the man. His face bore some resemblance to a goat, but it was a brown goat's face, different from the usual white goat, and it had very little fur.
"A Goat-Faced Great Wu?" Qin Mu was slightly startled.
When he was in the capital treating border soldiers afflicted with Wu poison, those soldiers had mentioned encountering a barbarian with horns on his head who had shone a mirror at them before they lost consciousness.
Qin Mu had originally thought the barbarian Great Wu was wearing a mask. Now, seeing the Great Wu on the wooden boat, he realized that there truly were horned barbarians.
The Goat-Faced Great Wu glanced at them and uttered in a shrill voice, "Wu Khan, Wu Zun has been waiting for a long time! Please board!"
Sacrifice Jiu Bashan stepped onto the boat and laughed, "This lake is made of Weak Water, which has no buoyancy—even a feather floating on it would sink. You can only cross with the boats of the Loulan Golden Palace. Let's board."
Qin Mu and Ling Yuxiu stepped onto the wooden boat, followed by Azure Ox and Fox Spirit. The Great Wu's gaze fell on Qin Mu and Ling Yuxiu, a cold laugh escaping his lips as he poled the boat toward the opposite shore.
Ling Yuxiu smiled, "We can't walk on Weak Water, but why not go around? Or fly across."