Entry: I Secretly Cultivate Immortality in the Martial Arts World

27: Chapter 27 The True Understanding of the Profound Origin Martial Soul!Gu Yan took off his blood-stained mask, looked at the corpses on the ground, and remained silent for a long time.

He was not a person who loved to kill.

When he was in the Taiyi Dao Sect, he Cultivated with a calm heart and rarely had disputes with others.

But since leaving the Sect, the evil he had seen had spread like weeds.

At first, it was an indiscriminate cleanup, but later, he became more focused, specifically hunting down the Extreme Yin Demonic Cult.

Starting from the northern branch of Youzhou, he traced its lineage all the way, destroying its branches.

Branch altars, hidden outposts, money shops, and pharmacies—anyone with ties to the Demonic Cult was turned into dust by his hands.

A few times, he even caught a glimpse of Xu Gang and Ye Chen from afar.

But Gu Yan did not step forward to acknowledge them; he just swept past like a ghost, continuing his cleanup.

Thus, three years passed.

Over the past three years, all 108 branch altars of the Extreme Yin Demonic Cult had been destroyed, the four great Protectors had been slain, and the Left and Right Envoys had died by his sword.

In the final battle, the Demonic Cult Master was actually at the Peak of the Sixth-Turn Martial Immortal, yet he only lasted ten moves under Gu Yan.

Standing amidst the mountain of corpses and sea of blood, Gu Yan suddenly felt a sense of absurdity.

He had originally planned to come out of the mountains to sweep away the demons after reaching the Nascent Soul Realm, but he hadn’t expected to be invincible under heaven while only at the ninth layer of Foundation Establishment.

The vengeance for his parents in this life and the debt owed to Elder Xuanqing were now considered settled.

Yet, there was no joy in his heart, only a sense of emptiness.

When he first started, perhaps there was still some anger, but later, he gradually became numb.

”To kill one is a crime, to slaughter ten thousand is a hero?”

No, he never felt that he was a hero.

He was just a passerby, accidentally falling into this world, and unable to stand the filth before his eyes, he simply cleaned it up.

That was all.

From Qingzhou to Zhongzhou, a journey that would take an ordinary Martial Cultivator only half a year on horseback, took Gu Yan a total of five years.

During these five years, wherever the Black-Clothed Ghost Mask went, bandits vanished and the Demonic Cult went into hiding.

At first, some people tried to track his whereabouts, whether for revenge, recruitment, or simple curiosity.

But no one could keep up with his pace.

Gu Yan’s whereabouts were elusive; sometimes he traveled a thousand miles a day, and other times he remained still for days.

People in the Jianghu gave him many titles: Ghost Mask Killing God, Yama of the Interstice, Black-Clothed Patrol Envoy...

In the end, the most widely circulated one was imperma nence yama.

It carried the meaning of the Black and White Impermanence claiming lives, and Yama determining a person’s life and death.

Rumor had it that the Martial Dao cultivation of the imperma nence yama had reached the Peak of the Sixth-Turn Martial Immortal, or perhaps even the seventh turn.

He acted without any pattern, regardless of whether it was righteous or evil, asking only about good and evil.

If an Elder of a righteous Sect bullied the common people, he would kill them without hesitation.

If a demonic cultist had not committed evil, he would not bother with them.

He traveled alone; no one knew his origins, and no one could get close to him.

Many hot-blooded warriors or those with ulterior motives had wanted to follow him, but they couldn’t even touch his shadow.

Some feared him like a tiger, claiming his killings were excessive.

More people revered him like a god, grateful for his slaying of evil and protection of good.

For a time, the public security in various prefectures actually improved significantly.

It wasn’t that the officials were responsible, but that the evildoers dared not act rashly.

They did not know when the Yama would come, they only knew that once their evil deeds were discovered by him, they would surely die.

Gu Yan was completely unaware of this.

He just kept walking and killing along the way.

In the early winter of the sixth year, Gu Yan finally arrived at the capital of the Great Qian Dynasty, Jidi City.

The city walls were towering and majestic, but beneath the prosperity, it was still hard to hide the undercurrents and the hardships of the lower classes.

Gu Yan had no interest in these matters; his powerful Divine Sense quietly covered the entire imperial city.

He quickly locked onto his target: the Scripture Pavilion located on the west side of the imperial palace.

Outside the tower, there were heavy guards, and in the shadows, there were several powerful auras lurking.

Gu Yan restrained his aura, lowering his presence to the minimum.

His figure flashed, crossing the palace wall and landing on the eaves of the Scripture Pavilion.

Inside the tower, bookshelves stood in rows, and the classics were as vast as the sea.

Gu Yan began to read from the top floor; as his Divine Sense swept over, the contents of the books were imprinted into his mind.

However, the result left him very disappointed.

While it was true that the world’s martial arts were gathered here, the pinnacle of Martial Dao only reached the seventh turn.

As for records regarding the eighth and Nine Transformations, there were only a few words in myths and legends, which were ethereal and vague.

The only Cultivation Technique that reached the seventh turn was called ”True Explanation of the Xuanyuan Martial Soul”.

Gu Yan quickly recorded its contents with his Divine Sense.

According to the ”True Explanation of the Xuanyuan Martial Soul”, the first six turns of Martial Dao were all about tempering the Physical Body, opening acupoints, and accumulating True Yuan.

To break through to the seventh turn, one needed to Cultivate the spirit and soul, and condense a Martial Soul.

In the Early Stage of the seventh turn, one would condense the soul; the Martial Soul would be initially formed, capable of leaving the body for hundreds of feet, greatly increasing perception, but lacking offensive power.

In the Middle Stage, one would shape the form; the Martial Soul would become solid, capable of controlling objects to attack enemies, which was very miraculous.

In the Late Stage, one would manifest sanctity; the Martial Soul would be like an External Incarnation, possessing 70% of the main body’s strength and fearing no physical damage.

As for the eighth and Nine Transformations, the Cultivation Technique only had a few words, which were vague.

It only stated that the Lifespan of a seventh turn could reach a thousand years, the eighth turn two thousand, and the Nine Transformations three thousand.

However, throughout the ages, the seventh turn of Martial Dao was already a legend, and the eighth and Nine Transformations existed only in records, almost like myths.

Although he did not find the Cultivation Technique for the eighth and Nine Transformations, the ”True Explanation of the Xuanyuan Martial Soul” pointed out the subsequent direction of the Martial Dao in this world for Gu Yan.

This might provide him with quite a bit of reference for his Breakthrough to the Golden Core, and even the Nascent Soul and Soul Transformation.

His goal achieved, Gu Yan did not stay any longer, leaving as silently as he had arrived.

Shortly after he left the Scripture Pavilion, in a dusty quiet room deep inside the imperial palace, an old man wearing a worn python robe and with a withered face slowly opened his eyes.

”Has he left...” the old man muttered to himself, a complex look flashing in his eyes.

He had long since sensed someone sneaking into the Scripture Pavilion.

That aura was extremely obscure; if not for the special Cultivation Technique he practiced, he would not have been able to detect it at all.

But the intruder’s cultivation was unfathomable, at least the seventh turn, or perhaps even higher.

Therefore, he did not dare to show himself.

Moreover, as long as the other party was not here to kill the emperor or overthrow the Dynasty, if they wanted to read a few books, let them read; even if they moved them all away, it would be no problem.

He had also heard a little about the rumors of the imperma nence yama in the Jianghu recently.

If the visitor was that fierce star, hiding was the wise choice.

The old man sighed heavily and closed his eyes again.

...

It only took Gu Yan one month to return to the Taiyi Dao Sect.

On the way back, bandits vanished, the Demonic Cult went into hiding, and even corrupt officials restrained themselves a lot.

Occasionally, when he encountered injustices, he would still intervene, but the frequency was much lower than before.

The evildoers were not all killed; they had learned to hide or temporarily stopped their actions.

The evil in human hearts, perhaps, could never be eradicated.

All he could do was to make this land a little cleaner for a while as he passed through.

When Gu Yan saw the familiar cloud-shrouded mountain gate of the Taiyi Dao Sect from afar, a faint sense of belonging and peace arose in his heart.

After all, this was the place where he had stayed the longest since coming to this world.

There were familiar courtyards and familiar people.

Unknowingly, this small world of the Taiyi Dao Sect had become his anchor in this world, a place he could call home.

Back in his small courtyard, Gu Yan began to carefully comprehend the ”True Explanation of the Xuanyuan Martial Soul”.

This seventh turn Cultivation Technique was completely different from his previous rough method of improving his Martial Dao Realm by relying on spiritual power.

It required him to truly calm his heart and, according to specific methods, visualize, condense, and nourish his own Mental Energy.

”Divine Soul Cultivation... Martial Soul condensation...”

Gu Yan immersed himself in it, comparing it with the immortal Cultivation knowledge he knew from his previous life, constantly verifying and deducing.

”Fortunately, I am only forty-one now, my Lifespan is long, and the thing I lack the least is time.”