Unsheathed

Chen Ping’an’s group lingered for a moment where they were, and only after Di Yuanfeng and Huang Shi exchanged a glance with one another did they rush toward the lush mountain.

They had arrived in an area with a large, round bluestone slab that resembled a caisson ceiling. It should’ve served as the sealing of a temple or monastery, but instead, it was being trodden upon underfoot in this secret area.

At the center of the caisson ceiling was a lotus flower, and it was surrounded by two flood dragons that were connected mouth-to-tail to one another. Outside the circle formed by the two flood dragons were many more layers, all of which were extremely complex and ornate.

Di Yuanfeng had tapped on it with his bamboo hiking pole many times to discover that the caisson ceiling was crafted from some type of extremely sturdy material that resembled both metal and stone.

Even if the caisson ceiling were possible, Di Yuanfeng wouldn’t dare to move it on a whim. After all, they still had to leave the immortal abode through this place.

Earlier, he had Huang Shi had lingered there momentarily as a safety precaution.

If someone tried to sneak in here after them, then they would have to face a flurry of attacks.

Chen Ping’an was walking along at the very back of the group, and he pulled out a Yang Energy Illumination Talisman in secret. There was still no sign of any baleful aura in this place, and talismans also burned slower here than in the outside world, presumably because of how abundant this place was with spiritual energy.

Thus, everyone only observed the caisson ceiling briefly before turning their attention elsewhere.

Up ahead was a white jade arched bridge, nestled among the lush foliage and sitting above a small stream.

There were all types of exotic beasts engraved onto the railing of the bridge in a stunning display of craftsmanship, and all of them were so realistic that they gave off the appearance of slumbering beasts that could awaken at any moment.

Near the surface of the water beneath the bridge was a large stone column, engraved upon which was a mighty beast that was said to be a type of dragon. The creature had a pair of horns on its head and was clad in a suit of armor-like dragon scales. It had been carved so that it was resting on the ground, raising its head to look out at the water.

Chen Ping’an fell deep into thought.

The statue of the exotic beast under the bridge wasn’t all that rare, but this type of dragon had a very strange name.

In the Majestic World, it was generally referred to as the Ba Xia. However, Chen Ping’an had also seen statues of this creature under various bridges across the Southern Garden Nation of the Lotus Flower Blessed Land.

However, those differed slightly appearance from the Ba Xia of the Majestic World, and according to the Treatise on Architectural Methods, which was the book that Chen Ping’an had read the most times among the books provided to him by Imperial Preceptor Zhong Qiu, the creature was known as the Water Avoidance Beast, and it was capable of devouring the water of rivers.

In ancient times, it had been a pet to the ruler of the cultivation world, but it was said that the fire god detested the beast and often killed them by boiling whatever body of water such creatures resided in.

However, there were no such strange records in the Majestic World, only some vague stories about suggesting that the Ba Xia was one of the nine sons of the dragon.

Chen Ping’an cast away this train of thought as he pulled out another Sword Qi Bridge Crossing Talisman. After a brief hesitation, he decided not to hand it off to Huang Shi this time, instead stepping onto the arched bridge himself.

He was able to cross the bridge without any incident, then turned back and waved to everyone, indicating that it was safe to cross the bridge.

Di Yuanfeng’s trio all had different reactions to this. Daoist Master Sun was of the opinion that Chen Ping’an was most likely trying to display his usefulness to everyone, now that they had entered the immortal abode. However, his efforts were ultimately going to prove futile, and he was going to be killed anyway.

He should’ve never agreed to join this party in the first place, and he certainly shouldn’t have entered this immortal abode with this group. All of a sudden, a chilling thought occurred to Daoist Master Sun. Would he suffer the same fate as Chen Ping’an and also be killed once he outlived his usefulness?

Young official immortals that embarked on journeys away from their sects generally did so both to search for treasures and to further their cultivation. As long as they didn’t encounter anyone from enemy sects, they would generally be quite amicable and easygoing. Even if it were only a brief encounter, self-introductions would be made to establish an acquaintanceship, and at the very least, a civilized facade would be maintained.

In contrast, vagrant cultivators that didn’t want to act alone generally formed groups of three or four. Any fewer than that and there wouldn’t be enough people to get much done, and any more than that and the group would be prone to internal conflict.

People in large groups tended to turn on one another even before they had reaped any spoils, and trying to take fated opportunities from official immortals was an exceedingly difficult task, so they had to be particularly vicious when competing with their fellow vagrant cultivators.

It was often the case that vagrant cultivators were willing to band together in the face of official immortals, but as soon as there no longer existed a common enemy, they would immediately turn on each other to try and take all of the spoils for themselves. If one didn’t even have the ambition and ruthlessness to try and take all the spoils for oneself, then they may as well retire from being a vagrant cultivator.

Di Yuanfeng noticed the uneasy look in Daoist Master Sun’s eyes, and he smiled as he asked, “What’s wrong? Are you worried about being screwed over by me and Huang Shi? This is a massive place, how much of the treasures in here will the three of us actually be able to carry out of here? There’s clearly too much for us to claim on our own, so there’s no need to resort to killing one another.”

This was quite a reassuring notion for Daoist Master Sun, and a pleased smile appeared on his face.

Di Yuanfeng’s trio made their way over the arched bridge, and while the other two weren’t looking, Daoist Master Sun crouched down to feel the surface of the bridge with his hand. In doing so, he discovered that the material was not just ordinary mutton fat jade. Just like the caisson ceiling from before, this was another immovable treasure that couldn’t be taken out of this place.

Daoist Master Sun gently flicked the railing of the bridge with his finger, and the resulting sound was incredibly crisp and pleasant.

It was like the first time he had ever heard two lesser heat coins clinking together, an intoxicating sound that he would never grow tired of.

As he approached the entrance of the mountain, Di Yuanfeng looked up at a staircase that led straight to the mountain summit, and he smiled as he suggested, “Let’s take a slightly longer route so we can take in the surrounding sights and scenes. Once we’ve confirmed that there’s no one else around, we can go straight to the summit.”

The other three raised no objections to this.

Situated at the entrance of the mountain was a giant archway that was quite plain and simple in design, and there was a set of couplets engraved onto the pillars on either side of the archway.

Stillness and silence are required for one to reach divinity.

Spirituality only arises from both inner and outer beauty.

Chen Ping’an stared at the couplets for quite some time.

The couplets didn’t really work well together, more like a pair of independent phrases thrown together than something that was meant to complement one another.

Huang Shi was the first to turn his attention away from the couplets, having already cast his gaze toward the mountain summit in the distance.

Meanwhile, Di Yuanfeng’s attention had been drawn to what was directly behind the archway. There were thirty-six engraved stone steles split up into two different lines, but for some reason, all of the characters engraved upon them had already been polished smooth and erased.

The only pieces of text that revealed anything about this place were those couplets, but they were completely inexplicable and didn’t seem to be saying anything in particular.

Daoist Master Sun looked up at the couplets as he scoffed, “What kind of nonsensical couplets are these supposed to be? It’s no wonder this immortal abode was destroyed!”

There had been many cases of small worlds changing locations or being destroyed by powerful cultivators throughout history. Those small worlds would either mysteriously disappear or descend into the world as blessed lands. However, Daoist Master Sun was convinced that this was not a blessed land.

Even though this place was very abundant with spiritual energy, he felt like it was still somewhat lacking compared with the blessed lands spoken of in legends. Even in the cultivation world, there were people similar to the historians in the imperial courts of mortal empires, and according to their accounts, blessed lands were places with spiritual energy as viscous as water.

The water fortune in this place was quite rich, but it was still far from matching those historic accounts.

Compared with his three companions, Chen Ping’an was more familiar with blessed lands, but even so, he was unable to glean much from his observations. As for trying to determine the rough time period this immortal abode was from based on the construction style of the buildings, that was not a feasible option for him as he still knew very little about the Northern Complete Reed Continent.

It was moments like these that deepened Chen Ping’an’s admiration for official immortals. The foundation of a sect was something that had to be accumulated over time through the efforts of generations after generations of ancestral hall disciples.

He would just have to memorize this scene for now, and if the opportunity arose in the future, he would try to draw the main buildings here for Cui Dongshan to examine.

“That is indeed quite strange,” Di Yuanfeng agreed with a smile and a nod.

From there, the four of them continued onward at a decent pace, passing by numerous halls, pavilions, pergolas, and walkways. Occasionally, they would spot a set of withered remains, and judging from their postures and positioning, it seemed that all of them had abruptly perished without warning.

None of them chose to enter any of the buildings. Instead, they wanted to explore the Daoist temple on the mountain summit first.

Generally, the most prized treasures in an immortal abode would be situated in high places.

This immortal abode was riddled with thin scratches all over the place, but none of them were very deep.

It was as if a massive storm of sword qi had descended upon this place without any warning, and it was undoubtedly the case that a sword immortal had to have been responsible for this, but it was unclear whether they were at the Unpolished Jade Tier or the Immortal Tier at the time.

Chen Ping’an looked up into the heavens, wondering how the storm of sword qi seemed to have been able to find and strike all of its targets with such unerring accuracy.

In any case, it seemed that this entire immortal abode had been vanquished in the blink of an eye.

As they made their way up the mountain, they were met with deathly silence.

Daoist Master Sun was walking along in a very uneasy fashion, constantly looking around in an anxious manner as he unconsciously gripped his string of Treasure Pagoda Bells, concerned that there could be demons or malicious spirits lurking here in secret.

Alternatively, there was a possibility that the soul of one of the sets of remains here could’ve become a malicious ghost and taken over this immortal abode for the past countless centuries. Even if the soul had belonged to a mentally handicapped dimwit, surely it would’ve already cultivated itself into an earth immortal ghostly entity by now!

With these unsettling thoughts in his mind, it was only by gripping his Treasure Pagoda Bells that Daoist Master Sun was able to maintain some composure.

There was actually one more secret to the bells. The lower the cultivation base of the sinister entities present nearby, the higher the frequency at which the bells would chime.

The higher the cultivation base of the sinister entities in question, the louder the bells would ring, and as previously mentioned, the bells’ detection capabilities seemed to cap out for malicious entities at the Dragon Gate Tier, the presence of which would cause the bells to chime at an unsettlingly loud volume. If a Golden Core Tier demonic entity were nearby, the bells wouldn’t chime at all, remaining completely silent instead, but in reality, their chimes would ring out in the mind’s lake of the owner that had refined them.

The silent cautionary warning from the bells had already saved Daoist Master Sun on one past occasion, and he was praying to the heavens that there would be no repeat of that incident.

Di Yuanfeng’s trio had already held a secret discussion among themselves and determined that they wouldn’t have much trouble taking care of a Dragon Gate Tier cultivator, even if the cultivator in question were an official immortal with some formidable treasures in his possession.

Hence, Daoist Master Sun didn’t mind if the bell chimed. As long as the bell chimes were audible to everyone and not just in his mind’s lake, they could be deafeningly loud and still pose no concern to him.

Whenever the four men passed by some sets of remains, Di Yuanfeng would sweep a sleeve through the air, unleashing a blast of force that pulverized the clothes worn by the lifeless bodies, and even many cultivator accessories that should’ve contained spiritual energy were unable to avoid a fate of destruction.

However, all of the sets of remains were able to remain completely unharmed, and that was another strange phenomenon.

Even after repeating the process over a dozen times, Di Yuanfeng didn’t have anything to show for it. Daoist Master Sun decided that it was his turn to try his luck, doing the same thing ahead of Di Yuanfeng, but his efforts also failed to yield any dividends.

Di Yuanfeng turned to Huang Shi as he asked, “Would you like to try your luck, Brother Huang?”

Perhaps Huang Shi really was luckier than his two companions as shortly thereafter, he encountered a set of remains dressed in clothes that remained unharmed in the face of the burst of force unleashed by the sweep of his sleeve. Daoist Master Sun immediately pounced on the body to strip off its clothes, completely throwing his facade as an unfathomable immortal of the Lightning God Manor out the window.

Screw pretending to be an unfathomable immortal, I’m just a vagrant cultivator who’s never even touched half a grain rain coin in my life!

However, after stripping the clothes off the set of remains, he still reluctantly handed them over to Huang Shi in accordance with the rules followed by vagrant cultivators.

Eventually, it would be Chen Ping’an’s turn to claim a treasure, and that was most likely when he was going to be killed.

A hint of sympathy welled up in Daoist Master Sun’s heart, and he contemplated trying to talk Di Yuanfeng and Huang Shi out of their original plan.

Just as Di Yuanfeng had said earlier, there were presumably more treasures in this place than the four of them could possibly hope to leave with, so surely there was no need to kill Chen Ping’an for his share of the spoils.

However, Daoist Master Sun was feeling a little hesitant, and he felt like this wasn’t an urgent matter anyway, so he decided to see what other spoils would come their way first.

Otherwise, if it turned out that there actually weren’t even enough treasures to go around for everyone, then any attempt made by him to convince Di Yuanfeng and Huang Shi to spare Chen Ping’an would only evoke annoyance within them, and perhaps they’d even kill him along with Chen Ping’an.

This entire time, Chen Ping’an continued to trail along behind the trio.

After walking up the final step, they made their way onto the white jade plaza in front of the Daoist temple, where they discovered two rather small sets of remains on the ground. With a sweep of Di Yuanfeng’s sleeve, their clothes were completely eradicated, but each of them left one item behind.

The two items would’ve been formidable immortal artifacts in the past, but at the moment, they were riddled with cracks and severely compromised.

Di Yuanfeng crouched down and carefully stowed the two items up his sleeve.

“It looks like the treasures in this place are most likely all going to be in rather rough condition,” Huang Shi remarked.

Di Yuanfeng nodded as he smiled and replied, “In that case, we’ll take a quantity over quality approach.”

Daoist Master Sun erupted into laughter upon hearing this, and a hint of amusement had even appeared on Huang Shi’s face.

Meanwhile, Chen Ping’an still remained rather distant from the group. He had grown accustomed to thinking of a path back to safety before focusing his attention on reaping spoils.

Standing on the mountain summit, he could see everything within a radius of around fifty kilometers. Of course, everything gradually became more blurry and indistinct the further away it was, but beyond that, there seemed to be a clear boundary, beyond which everything was enshrouded in a boundless expanse of mist, striking Chen Ping’an with a sense of oppression, as if they were trapped in some ethereal cage.

This was both a good thing and a bad thing.

The good news was that this immortal abode was a legendary baseless land, one that wasn’t connected to the rest of the world, much like the broken small words of ancient times.

This indicated that the immortal abode had a very long history, and perhaps it really was home to some priceless natural treasures or perhaps even an immortal scripture or two that could guide one to becoming an earth immortal.

The bad news was that such a place was easy to enter, but difficult to leave, unless someone could break open the restrictions of the small world.

Chen Ping’an’s Sword Immortal was definitely capable of doing this. Even the most resilient of restrictions surely couldn’t compare with those in the Malicious Ghost Valley of the Skeleton Shoal.

However, if it came down to that, then he would become the foremost public enemy to everyone, and that completely went against his original intentions of earning money while keeping a low profile.

Chen Ping’an didn’t want to become a second Jiang Shangzhen, someone that was detested by all cultivators of the Northern Complete Reed Continent.

Huang Shi’s trio was most likely only this composed because they hadn’t yet noticed the phenomenon in the distance. This told Chen Ping’an that even though Huang Shi was a Vajra Body Tier martial artist, he wasn’t a particularly formidable one.

Then again, given Chen Ping’an’s current powers, that distinction hardly made a difference.

If the worst outcome were to eventuate, then he would be the only one out of the four capable of leaving this small world alive. His three companions were still completely oblivious, and they were most likely secretly plotting against him at this very moment.

The Daoist temple before them wasn’t very large, and it no longer had a plaque. Prior to entering the temple, the four men couldn’t help but take a glance up at the green glazed roof tiles above. Out of all of the many buildings on this mountain, the temple was the only one that had these roof tiles.

Even after the passage of so much time, the roof tiles were still glistening like new, and it was clear that they were all prized treasures in themselves, rather than the ordinary glazed tiles used in mortal empires.

Daoist Master Sun was trembling in excitement at the sight of all of these precious roof tiles. By his estimates, they had to have been worth at least seven or eight lesser heat coins, and if they were top-tier glazed tiles crafted using advanced immortal secret techniques, then they could even be worth that many grain rain coins!

Huang Shi and Di Yuanfeng were both pure martial artists, and they had no connections to any immortal sects, so just like Daoist Master Sun, they were also unable to accurately estimate the value of these roof tiles. However, the two of them were also aware that these were certainly no ordinary roof tiles.

Chen Ping’an turned back in the direction that the four of them had come from, and there was still no one else behind them.

If possible, he wanted to ask the next group of people to enter this place roughly what time they had entered this small world.

Chen Ping’an had been mentally calculating the time this entire time, and if the flow of time in this place differed from that of the Majestic World, then he would have to resort to one of two plans, one for the best-case scenario and one for the worst.

————

Zhan Qing’s group had arrived at the entrance of the immortal abode, and the Vajra Body Tier martial artist who was a guest elder of the Zhan Clan was examining the footprints on the ground.

“There are many people hiding nearby, Young Master Zhan,” Gao Ling cautioned.

Zhan Qing smiled as he replied, “They’ll just have to eat our dust. If they have the guts to enter the immortal abode, then they’d better be prepared to pay the ultimate price.”

He didn’t have any positive feelings toward vagrant cultivators or official immortals, even though he was a legitimate cultivator.

Perhaps deep down, he still identified himself as a young master from a noble mortal clan, and as a result, he had grown accustomed to hatching plans and borrowing the power of others to accomplish his objectives, rather than use his fists and some treasures to do all the dirty work himself.

Hence, he felt nothing but disdain and annoyance at his high-and-mighty fellow cultivators. However, if a situation arose in which he had to get his hands dirty and personally kill someone, then he certainly wasn’t going to hesitate.

“You’re not worried at all that the two groups of people ahead of us could reap all the spoils and leave nothing behind for you?” Bai Bi jibed.

Zhan Qing smiled as he replied, “If they’re able to refine all of the immortal treasures, devour all of the pills, and digest all of the secret scriptures inside in the blink of an eye, then what choice do I have but to concede? However, as long as they’re not able to do that, I’ll be able to track them down eventually, at which everything in their possession will be mine anyway.”

Gao Ling was becoming more and more impressed with Zhan Qing.

Previously, he had thought of Zhan Qing as a useless fool whose only saving grace was that he had chosen a set of good parents.

However, he could now see that if anyone dared to underestimate the young man in a so-called battle for the Great Dao, then they would be sure to suffer an untimely demise.

The two Vajra Body Tier martial artists led the way into the dark cave, holding lit candles to illuminate the path forward.

Bai Bi was feeling very relaxed. As long as no major mishaps arose, she wouldn’t even need to do anything on this treasure-hunting trip.

Even if Sun Qing of the Rainbow Sparrow Residence and Shen Zhenze of Cloudtop City were to both arrive here in person, that would only count as a minor mishap.

The two Vajra Body Tier martial artists would already be plenty for them to deal with.

Before long, the four of them had arrived in the chamber with the four deity murals painted on the walls.

Zhan Qing’s brows furrowed slightly here. Breaking formations had never been his strong suit. That Nascent Tier vagrant cultivator master of his possessed a vast wealth of knowledge and experience, so he was most likely very well-versed in the art of breaking formations, but he had never taught Zhan Qing anything about how to explore secret areas in search of fated opportunities.

He had always told Zhan Qing that pursuing such sporadic opportunities would only lead him down a wrong path that would hinder his cultivation, so he told Zhan Qing to have patience and wait until he reached the Dragon Gate Tier before engaging in such pursuits.