A wave of sorrow rose from beneath the waters of Yunmeng Marsh.
Su He suddenly turned around, looking into the underwater garden, but he could see nothing. An inexplicable tear fell, purifying a patch of marsh water.
The sorrowful aura from below was too intense, infecting all directions, making it hard for Su He to maintain his composure.
A white dragon burst forth from the water, soaring straight into the sky, coiling under the moonlight and starshine. She gazed at the setting crescent moon, yet remained silent, not even a dragon’s roar escaping her lips.
The sorrowful aura converged, all of it absorbed by the white dragon. She floated in the sky for a while, then slowly lowered her head to face Su He.
Her eyes were like autumn waters, deep and silent…
“Am I beautiful?” After a long while, the white dragon asked again.
Su He did not understand why, but he still answered honestly according to his heart: “Beautiful! Extremely beautiful!”
“Thank you!” With a flick of her dragon body, the white dragon dove back into Yunmeng Marsh, never to appear again.
Su He was utterly baffled.
What had happened after he left?
In the distance, the golden dragon Meng Xuan peeked out, sneaking over with a sly look. Su He cast a resentful glance at her.
Give me back my earth robes—two of them!
“What did you do to Auntie?” Meng Xuan asked softly. Why was there such a fleeting sorrowful aura? Even the fish were crying!
Su He: “?”
Shouldn’t she be asking what she did to me? With my tiny claws and turtle shell, what could I possibly do to her? She even dug out the deepest secrets I had hidden!
Any deeper would be traversing through.
Su He had already called for the toad in his heart, asking it to make a trip to the Mountain Sea Mystic Realm to see if any of his uncles or ancestors had broken out of their shells.
The toad moved faster in the Mystic Realm than he did.
The toad hadn’t come with him to Yunmeng Marsh, staying in the small world, completely engrossed in the grand undertaking of nation-building, especially since Feng Yaya had transformed into a beast, entrusting the realm to it.
The toad accepted the critical mission, not willing to relax for even a day.
Ripples stirred beneath the water, and Liu Ru emerged, giving Meng Xuan a glare before bowing to Su He: “Honored guest, the princess is being mischievous. The earth robes are too valuable to be demanded. Yunmeng Marsh will trade this item in exchange, hoping for your understanding.”
She handed a hammer to Su He.
Meng Xuan exclaimed in surprise: “Eh? Skybreaker?”
She raised her eyebrows at Su He and transmitted her voice: “This is a hammer forged by a certain Dragon King in imitation of a heaven-opening artifact, a true treasure!”
She signaled for Su He to quickly accept it.
This mother dragon always favored outsiders over her own.
Su He shook his head and chuckled lightly: “Sister Liu Ru jests. That was a gift for Sister Ji, there’s no reason to ask for something in return. Besides, Sister Ji also gave me an elixir, I might have even profited!”
I’m not foolish!
No matter how precious the earth robes are, they are merely the membrane of a small world. Although only naturally formed small worlds possess them, with the myriad of heavens boasting three thousand great worlds and a hundred thousand small worlds, earth robes do not possess a unique attribute.
But Ji Feixue is unique!
If I could really get on good terms with Ji Feixue, would I care about two earth robes? Who knows how many people are rushing to give gifts, unable to even deliver them!
Seeing his firm attitude, Liu Ru chuckled and took back the hammer, then said to Su He: “If little Su He has any troubles he can’t tell his family about, come find me in Yunmeng Marsh. Even if there’s nothing wrong, you can also come here to play.”
Su He was delighted; wasn’t this how relationships were formed? He had already gone from an honored guest to little Su He!
He chuckled: “I’m just afraid of coming too often and annoying Sister Liu Ru.”
Liu Ru covered her mouth and laughed lightly, bowing shallowly to them before sinking back into the water to seek out Ji Feixue. Once underwater, her expression turned grave; she had clearly sensed the princess’s sudden outburst of sorrow.
Why would the princess suddenly become like this?
Meng Xuan watched Liu Ru leave, then turned to Su He with a strange look in her eyes: “Sister Ji…” Since when did you get so close to Auntie? Should I start calling you uncle?
She pouted, looking down on Su He: “You don’t want a treasure, foolish!”
After expressing her disdain, she leaned in closer to Su He: “I’ll show you something good!”
She mysteriously pulled out a jade mirror, displaying it before Su He—it was the Hakutaku List. She flipped to the Young Dragon List, indicating for Su He to look.
The list was filled with dragon seals and phoenix scripts, none of which Su He recognized.
He blinked at the little golden dragon.
Meng Xuan suddenly realized: “Look at your own!”
The Hakutaku List connected with Divine Sense, using the owner’s own script. Naturally, the golden dragon Meng Xuan used the dragon clan’s script.
The dragon clan always liked to involve various forces, like Yunmeng Marsh and Xuantian Gate. There were even rumors of a dynasty founded by the dragon clan in ancient times.
The dragon clan had its own script, unlike the Dragon Turtles who were all lone rangers, only White Spirit leisurely creating a unique script when she had nothing better to do.
Su He took out the Hakutaku List. The jade mirror flashed, displaying his information.
He, Dragon Turtle, ranked 89,973 on the Young Dragon List.
The Young Dragon List contained a hundred thousand individuals, all elites of the heavens who had not reached the third level of Traverse Heaven. Young Divine Beasts were also listed, and Divine Beasts were not limited by age. If they could break out of the Young Dragon List and enter the Battle List while still young, that was entirely possible.
Even other races could do so. There were freaks who had entered the Battle List at the second level of Traverse Heaven.
The world was vast, with all kinds of existences.
“What was White Spirit’s initial ranking when she first entered the Young Dragon List?” Su He asked curiously. Meng Xuan admired White Spirit and should have known this information.
“She never entered!” Meng Xuan’s eyes lit up when Su He mentioned White Spirit: “At first, she fought with the likes of Feng Yuan, and at that time, they were all unopened younglings who couldn’t enter the Young Dragon List.
Later on—White Spirit’s claim to fame was against a fifth-level Traverse Heaven from the Sealed Emperor Palace, along with seven fourth-level Traverse Heavens, annihilating them without injury, entering the Battle List at 50,000. By the time she acted again, she directly entered the top 3,000 of the Battle List and was removed after two thousand years.”
??
Removed, what does that mean? Was she only ranked three thousand before her death?
Meng Xuan knew what Su He was thinking from his look and huffed: “Hakutaku is an old stickler; you could kill it and it still wouldn’t change your ranking. But if you catch it and beat it up, demanding to remove your ranking, it will obediently do so. However, in recorded history, only seven beings have successfully removed their rankings.”
She leaned in and said to Su He: “Hakutaku is ranked fifty-three on the Battle List, undoubtedly a legend in the myriad heavens and worlds.”
Su He was stunned, his mouth agape.
I bow down to my clan sister…Meng Xuan waved a paw: “Don’t compare yourself to such beings. The fact that you could kill your way onto the Hatchling List before even opening the heavens has already left countless beings across the myriad realms dumbfounded.”
This was different from others making the list. The Dragon Turtle was born to attract attention, and even without being on the list, countless organizations and powers in the myriad realms would keep an eye on his movements.
In fact, this was true for all members of the Four Spirits. Any of the Four Spirits would inevitably rank within the top two hundred on the Battle List after a hundred thousand years. How could a being destined to reach such heights not draw attention?
Su He browsed the Battle List and found that Ji Feixue was not on it either. No name on the Battle List meant that she had beaten Hakutaku.
Her true ranking was at least before the fifty-third place.
He pondered whether he should go somewhere to get two more earth garments to offer?
As the little golden dragon spoke, it was unwittingly led by Su He to Chenfeng Mountain. It was only when a bolt of lightning struck its forehead upon ascending the mountain that it realized what was happening.
Still not having had its fill, it wagged its tail and returned to the foot of the mountain. There, it saw Su He with surging waves beneath him, carrying him as he faced the lightning and entered the second area. Then he stopped moving, lying down on the spot and entering a state of seclusion.
Ji Feixue didn’t mention the matter of divination, which was tantamount to allowing him to absorb it like this.
Time was running out. The various guests attending the Dragon God Festival were almost all here today. It was uncertain how many more days Chenfeng Mountain could remain open, so Su He seized every moment to draw in the essence of the divination.
Inside the realm bead, the small divination was operating at full power, spinning wildly around Tai’a Mountain.
As the realm bead spun, the spiritual energy of Chenfeng Mountain surged into his body.
The elixir that Ji Feixue had fed him, along with the true essence flowing towards his limbs, spread throughout his body in an instant. A loud boom echoed in his mind, and a scene unfolded before his eyes.
It was a newly born small world, a cluster of soft and sticky land no more than a hundred miles across, floating alone, surrounded by desolation. Outside the barriers of the small world, a membrane enveloped it. The small world grew day by day, the membrane gradually aged, cracked, and turned into chaos.
Divine Beasts flew over, helping the small world refine the chaos, and it grew day by day.
This is…
The message brought by that elixir? Was that elixir meant to convey information?
Another scene appeared, still the creation of a small world, the exact same scene repeated three times, until the fourth time, when the small world was being created, a sword immortal passed by, feeling that the creation of the small world was too slow, drew his sword and slashed, and the small world was created in an instant.
But this time, no membrane garment appeared.
Only naturally created small worlds would have a membrane garment.
…
Dongyun Mountain, the Formless Sword Sect’s water prison.
There was a foot of stagnant water on the floor of the water prison, and the air was foul.
A small table with four legs floated above the water surface, with a pot of clear wine and several home-cooked dishes on it. Feng Yiju, dressed in a scholar’s robe, sat cross-legged above the water surface, facing a scholar who was half-submerged in the water, yet seemed unconcerned.
He took a small sip of wine, put down the cup, and asked, “Has the Sect Leader changed his mind?”
Feng Yiju smiled faintly: “Living in Dongyun, one is ultimately confined to a narrow view. If Junior Brother had seen the Xuantian Sect Leader create tens of thousands of talismans with a stroke of his pen, and destroy worlds with a wave of his hand, you would think the same.”
After sixty years of meticulous planning and three hundred years of strategizing, all he got was Dongyun. The tens of thousands of miles of Dongyun’s territory, in front of such mighty beings, could be annihilated in the blink of an eye.
He still remembered the Dragon Turtle that had come to protect Su He during his Tribulation Crossing, its presence as imposing as a mountain! Su Huanian’s sword, powerful enough to take him down with her, left not even a mark on the Dragon Turtle.
The Dragon Turtle had asked Su Huanian if she wanted him to be directly suppressed. Feng Yiju could feel that the Dragon Turtle was not joking or being polite.
But truly, killing a Feng Yiju was of no consequence, as easy as blowing away dust!
In the world of cultivation, all is illusionary; only strength is real!
The scholar pondered for a moment: “But Dongyun has not yet been refined, Qingyuan has not developed, and the Great Ming King’s demonic likeness has yet to undergo the Traverse Heaven Sacrifice and Refine. Brother, you can’t shatter the mirror in one day.”
One wrong move and the whole game is lost. During the battle of Qingyuan, Su Huanian somehow came with a thought projection, and Feng Yaya’s matter was revealed.
Su Huanian publicly burned her marriage certificate, severing her marital ties with the Sect Leader. Behind her, the Sword Cleansing Pool, Heaven’s Secrets Pavilion, and even the Beast-taming Valley were all showing signs of disloyalty. It was just that the First Seats and the real power elders had not yet returned. There had not been a true split.
Feng Yiju pondered for a moment: “Dongyun should not be disturbed for the time being. If you and I do not act, Xuantian Sect and Yunmeng Marsh will not detect anything amiss. Let’s first find a way to elevate our realms.”
The scholar remained silent.
Dongyun was special, otherwise, Brother would not have needed to develop a sect here under the pressure of prison ghosts. Brother had the ability to create the Formless Sword Sect and could take Qingyuan away from Dongyun for a broader world.
Wasn’t the sacrifice of countless disciples because of Dongyun’s uniqueness?
He poured himself another cup of wine, held it in his hands but did not drink it. After a long while, he looked at Feng Yiju: “Brother knows my race is special. I am from the Dry River clan of the Tianyuan Great World.”
“My clan cultivates through warfare, and Qingyuan has accumulated a lot in the battle. If it weren’t for the mountain soul entering my body, I would have broken through the realm and left long ago. Even so, I have still made considerable progress these days. A month ago, I felt my blood boiling and was restless and anxious, which must have been when the Divine Beast worshiped by my clan approached this place.”
He respectfully bowed to the heavens with both hands: “My clan worships the Divine Beast Zhu Yan, which is formidable in battle. It is the natural enemy of all Divine Beasts in the myriad realms.”
He said proudly: “Let me out, Brother, and I will surely find the Divine Beast Zhu Yan. Perhaps I can persuade it to stop the Dragon Turtle, and Brother will not need to take risks!”
Feng Yiju was moved, but then slowly shook his head. Junior Brother admired Zhu Yan but did not know the high status of the Dragon Turtle.
Whether Zhu Yan could stop the Dragon Turtle was still a question.
Moreover, what he had done could completely avoid offending the Dragon Turtle, so why create unnecessary complications?
(Note: Chapters 8 to 16 of this volume have been modified. If you are reading and find the plot confusing, you may reread from chapter 8. All modifications and replacements will take about 10 minutes at 12:00 PM on May 17. If you start reading at 12:10, you can read normally.)