The Ancient Moon Ruins stood before them like the skeletal remains of a dead god, a monument to a civilization that had once commanded the tides of the world. Massive pillars of white marble, now cracked by the weight of eons and choked by frozen, bioluminescent vines, reached toward the dark sky. The air here was no longer just atmosphere; it was so thick with lunar energy that every breath Qin Feng took felt like swallowing cold, crackling lightning.
The silence of the ruins was heavy, broken only by the low hum of the mountain's core and the crunch of Qin Feng's boots on the frost-covered stone. He felt a strange vibration in his chest, a resonance that seemed to synchronize with the pulse of the ruins.
At the end of a long, statue-lined walkway stood a massive circular door, thirty feet high and forged from a pitch-black stone that didn't just lack light, it seemed to actively absorb it. This was the Gate of Whispers, the threshold between the forgotten world and the secrets of the Eclipse.
"Wait," Ye Chen said, her voice barely a breath, sounding more like a warning than a request. She reached out, her fingers brushing Qin Feng's shoulder to stop him as he instinctively stepped toward the dark portal. "The gate is not merely locked. It is guarded. Not by a man, but by a soul-bound sentinel of the old era."
As if responding to her words, the shadows at the base of the gate began to churn and thicken. A giant figure emerged from the darkness, a Lunar Warden ten feet tall, encased in translucent crystalline armor that shimmered like frozen moonlight. It held a massive halberd that glowed with a faint, rhythmic pulse, like a heartbeat that signaled the end of any intruder's life.
[DING! Boss Encounter: The Lunar Warden (2nd Layer Foundation Establishment).] [Detection: This guardian is immune to physical attacks from those without the 'Moon-Shattered' bloodline.]
The Warden didn't speak. It didn't need to. It simply swung its halberd in a wide, sweeping arc. A wave of violet Qi sliced through the air, traveling with such terrifying speed that Qin Feng had to activate Ghost Step just to keep his head. The shockwave of the missed strike hit a pillar behind him, turning the solid, enchanted marble into fine powder in a fraction of a second.
"It's immune to normal physical attacks?" Qin Feng growled, his hand tightening around the handle of his black-ebony pickaxe. He felt the familiar surge of adrenaline, but mixed with a new, strange heat. "Then it's a good thing I haven't been a 'normal' miner for quite some time."
"Husband, look at the center of the gate," Ye Chen's voice resonated in his mind, sharp and focused despite her own fatigue. "The seal is shaped like a crescent moon, but it is empty. It doesn't want Qi; it wants recognition. Your blood... it's reacting, isn't it? The runes on your skin... they aren't just for power."
Qin Feng looked down at his forearm. The silver runes beneath his skin were indeed pulsing violently, glowing with a light that matched the rhythm of the gate's heartbeat. A sudden flood of memories that weren't his own, flashes of a man in black robes standing before this very gate, hit him with the force of a tidal wave. He realized then that his "luck" in finding the Empress and the System wasn't just a coincidence of fate. His ancestors hadn't just been lowly miners; they had been the guardians of this very sanctuary, reduced to slaves by the shifting tides of history.
"Cover me!" Qin Feng shouted, his voice echoing off the high stone walls.
Ye Chen moved with a speed that defied her current level of exhaustion. She unleashed 'Moonlight Needle: Storm', sending hundreds of violet needles toward the Warden's crystalline joints. The needles didn't damage the giant, but they created a cage of static energy that slowed its movements, dragging through the Warden's Qi like it was thick syrup.
Qin Feng didn't aim for the Warden. He charged directly toward the pitch-black gate, his feet barely touching the ground.
"Step aside, scrap metal!"
The Warden roared, a hollow, metallic sound, and swung its halberd down vertically. Qin Feng twisted mid-air, the blade missing his shoulder by an inch, the wind of the strike cutting his tunic. He leaped onto the face of the gate, his golden and violet Qi merging into a single, blinding point at the tip of his pickaxe.
He slammed the weapon into the center of the gate's moon seal, but he didn't use brute force. Instead, he opened a small cut on his palm, letting a drop of his blood, now infused with the 'Eclipse' essence, flow into the crystal mechanism.
The effect was instantaneous.
The Lunar Warden froze mid-swing, its halberd hovering inches from Qin Feng's back. The angry red glow in its crystalline eyes turned a soft, respectful silver. It lowered its weapon and slowly sank to one knee, its form beginning to dissolve into a fine, sparkling mist that fed back into the ruins.
[DING! Boss Defeated via 'Bloodline Recognition'!] [EXP Gained: 25,000!] [Relationship Level Up: 95% Resonance.] [Rarity Discovery: You have unlocked the 'Eclipse Lineage' passive trait!]
The massive gate groaned, a sound like grinding continents, and slowly rolled open. It revealed a hallway illuminated by floating lanterns of cold fire, stretching as far as the eye could see. But as the doors parted, a series of whispers filled the air, thousands of voices speaking in a forgotten tongue, telling the history of a fallen empire and a secret that had been buried for ten thousand years.
"What are they saying?" Qin Feng asked, feeling a strange, hollow sense of nostalgia. It was as if he had come home to a house he had never visited.
Ye Chen walked to his side, her eyes wide with shock as she read the ancient script appearing in glowing lines on the walls. "They are saying... that the Moon Empress was never meant to rule alone. She was the shield of the world, but there was always a sword that stood beside her. The 'Eclipse Overlord.' Qin Feng... this isn't just a ruin. It's your family's treasury. Your people weren't just miners... they were the architects of the moon's power."
Qin Feng looked down the long hallway. At the very end, past rows of ancient armors and scrolls, he could see a pedestal holding a glowing, pulsating orb, the Heart of the Moon.
"My family?" Qin Feng laughed, though there was no humor in it, only a cold, hard edge. "My family died in the mud, Ye Chen. They were worked to death in the dark while the Azure Sky Sect built their palaces on our bones. If this place belongs to me, then it's time I took back every drop of blood they stole."
As they stepped across the threshold, the System's interface shifted, turning from its usual gold to a deep, regal purple, reflecting the true nature of his power.
[NEW SUB-QUEST: 'Reclaim the Throne of Shadows'] Objective: Reach the Inner Sanctum and stabilize the Heart of the Moon. Warning: The Azure Sky Sect has breached the lower valley. Their 'Blood-Seeker' hounds have found your trail. Time is running out.
"They're faster than I thought," Qin Feng muttered, sensing the distant, rhythmic vibrations of the Sect's army far below through the stone floor. "Let's move, Empress. I want to be sitting on that throne when the Sect Leader finally claws his way up here."
Ye Chen looked at him, seeing the change in his eyes, the transformation from a man fighting to survive into a man fighting for his legacy. "Then let us show them, Husband. Let us show them what happens when the moon finally meets the sun."