Zhou Yihang had just reached the foot of Wuwang Mountain, ready to ascend, when a sudden warning stirred in his heart. He watched as a local Earth God burrowed out of the soil, a stone still perched atop its hat.
"If the Earth God has tracked us down here, Prefect Xue and Stone Dragon cannot be far behind!"
He was about to kill the Earth God to prevent it from reporting back, when voices carried over: "City God, the Earth Gods have asked the local demon deities and beasts—they say Xu Ying has been seen in this area."
Prefect Xue's voice came next: "Where is Old Zhou?"
"According to the Earth God, Zhou Yihang has also arrived nearby. We followed him here—the old man's Grass-and-Tree Soldier Art is truly remarkable, able to locate Xu Ying's hiding place."
"Then we should thank him properly. When we encounter him, send him on his way."
"Yes."
Zhou Yihang's heart grew cold. He slipped away silently, thinking: "My injuries haven't healed. I shouldn't clash with them now—better to remain hidden."
After a moment, he saw countless Earth Gods burrowing out of the ground, searching across the mountains and fields.
Zhou Yihang thought: "Even if Xu Ying were buried underground, these Earth Gods would dig him out. Still, searching the entire mountain range won't be easy."
Suddenly, one Earth God called out: "City God, look at the sky!"
Zhou Yihang looked up, and his heart nearly stopped. Above Wuwang Mountain hovered a luminous field, roughly half an acre in size. This "light field" was formed when the sun's essence crystallized like golden seedlings, planted in midair to catch the morning sunlight, blazing with brilliant radiance.
From a distance, it looked like a glowing rice paddy.
This light field over Wuwang Mountain was at least half an acre wide—far larger than anything Zhou Yihang or Prefect Xue had ever seen or even heard of!
"Beneath that light field must be Xu Ying. He practices demonic arts and has advanced rapidly, producing an anomaly that even demon deities cannot manifest!"
Zhou Yihang whispered, "This man is truly an unrivaled genius in the demonic arts. It would be a pity to kill him. I'll leave his corpse intact."
He raced toward the half-acre light field. Meanwhile, City God Xue Lingfu led Stone Dragon and the other deities in the same direction.
Beneath the light field, Xu Ying activated the Primordial Unity Guiding Art. The primordial energy within him surged ever stronger, refined by the Pure Yang Anomalous Fire into pure yang energy.
As his cultivation deepened, the darkness within his Domain of the Ineffable retreated further, revealing more territory. These new regions were tempered by thunderous sound, illuminated by the great sun, and nourished by energy that transformed into rain—making them flourish with vitality. Xu Ying felt his blood and qi grow ever more vigorous, his physique ever more powerful.
With each breath, he stirred fierce winds that whipped up sand and stones. Light half a foot long flickered from his eyes—the manifestation of spirit sense!
The coffin girl's gift of the Pure Yang Anomalous Fire made his cultivation astonishingly swift, even strengthening his spirit sense.
"What will happen when I open this Mysterious Pass?"
Xu Ying's spirit sense approached the darkness and gazed up at this gateway within the human body.
The gateway stood between heaven and earth. On one side, the Heavenly River cascaded downward in torrents; on the other, majestic mountain ranges rose in splendor, each descending from the heavens above!
Only by breaking through this gate that separated heaven and earth could he explore the vast inner world beyond!
"The coffin girl said that the Nuo shamans' Hidden Vision Latent Transformation technique is wrong, and that her path is the correct one. But Qi-refiners like her have vanished, and their cultivation methods have been replaced by Nuo sorcery."
Xu Ying pondered silently: "Then is Nuo sorcery the true path, or is Qi-refinement?"
Nuo sorcery was practiced far and wide, while Qi-refining techniques had become the art of demons. What story lay between these facts?
He gathered his blood and qi, concentrated his spirit, and was about to push open the gate when the earth began to quake violently. A deafening roar, like the sky collapsing, reached his ears. Xu Ying stumbled, immediately halting his cultivation to steady himself.
Yuan Qi was sent tumbling, his tail snapping around a large boulder for stability, eyes wide with alarm.
"Doesn't the Nether invasion only happen at night? Why is it happening in daylight?" the Great Bell wondered.
Xu Ying steadied himself and looked toward the sound. What he saw left him stunned. Ten li to the west, the earth shook, dust erupted, and from among the mountains, a sun burst forth from the haze!
Sunlight blazed, flooding the world with brilliant light!
Within that radiance, a towering mountain rose from the earth and gradually ascended into the sky, its massive body blotting out the sun as it hung suspended in the heavens.
Enormous boulders continued falling from the floating mountain—some crashing to earth, others drifting in midair.
Xu Ying stared at the spectacle, then turned to look eastward. There, another sun was rising. Two suns, one east and one west, mirrored each other.
The Great Bell's voice reached him: "A-Ying, what have you done now?"
Xu Ying murmured, "I didn't do anything. Could this be my doing?"
"That's hard to say."
The Great Bell floated over. "I've suppressed Stone Mountain for three thousand years without incident. But since meeting you, trouble started the first night—the Nether River changed course, then came the ancient well and black coffin, and my temple was destroyed! Then there was lashing the Plague God, being hunted on the road. Now, a sun has emerged from underground. Every crime scene has you at it, and you claim no involvement?"
Xu Ying snorted and strode forward.
Yuan Qi hurried after him: "A-Ying, where are you going? Old Bell is right—stop committing crimes!"
Xu Ying looked back with a grin: "This sun and this mountain have appeared near our Wuwang Mountain. As two great demon kings of Wuwang, how can we not investigate?"
Yuan Qi peered in the distance: "It seems to be near Shuikou Temple."
His massive body slithered forward at startling speed. "Climb on my back—I'll carry you there!"
Xu Ying lightly leaped onto the great serpent's back. The Great Bell followed, but it was too slow to keep pace with the serpent, so it slipped directly into Xu Ying's mind.
Zhou Yihang and Prefect Xue had been climbing the mountain and had also witnessed the earth-shaking event. They were stunned.
Prefect Xue immediately declared: "Capturing Xu Ying is secondary—this sun and immortal mountain are far more important! That brat Xu Ying will certainly head there too. We can catch him when we arrive!"
Zhou Yihang looked up and saw the half-acre light field descending from the sky, heading downhill toward Shuikou Temple.
"Shuikou Temple is nothing but a rundown shrine—how could a sun and an immortal mountain erupt from it?"
Confused, he changed course and raced ahead toward Shuikou Temple, thinking: "Xu Ying is heading there too. If I arrive first, he'll walk right into my trap!"
Shuikou Temple had always been at the foot of Wuwang Mountain, but since the Nether invasion, the earth had been constantly shifting, pushing the two locations further apart. Now Shuikou Temple was over ten li away.
Yuan Qi carried Xu Ying forward at a speed comparable to Xu Ying's full sprint. Many wild beasts and great demons were fleeing in the same direction—only they were moving against the flow.
From the sky, a boulder the size of a small building plummeted down. Yuan Qi dodged just in time; the stone smashed into the ground, carving a massive crater!
Xu Ying jumped and looked upward. Above them, the enormous shadow of a mountain blanketed the sky. Then light appeared—the sun emerged from behind the mountain, illuminating its ancient, majestic form.
Boulders rained from the sky like a storm.
Those floating in midair were manageable, but the falling ones were deadly—one careless hit meant being crushed to pulp.
An even larger stone fell ahead of them, making Yuan Qi shriek.
Xu Ying dropped to the ground and approached the fallen boulder, examining it closely. "Strange—this stone even grows hair. Old Bell, have you ever seen anything like this?"
The enormous stone that had fallen from the sky was covered in something resembling both hair and tentacles—countless strands twisted together like rope, tangled and wild.
These growths covered the stone's surface, some sprouting from cracks, others spreading like moss across the face.
The Great Bell floated out and examined it with spirit sense: "Odd. This stone is not quite stone, not quite hair, not quite flesh. What is it?"
Even with its vast experience, it had never seen such a bizarre stone.
Yuan Qi, well-read as he was, couldn't identify it either.
Suddenly, the earth shook violently again. Ten li away, another towering mountain rose from the ground, ascending skyward!
This second mountain hung inverted, its eruption far more dramatic than the first—fire and brilliant light burst from within its body as it ascended!
At the same time, strange whistling sounds rose from beneath the earth, like bowstrings snapping, but far louder. Standing within that sound, one felt as though being torn in half!
Xu Ying sensed a strange sword energy surging from below. His face changed dramatically. "Yuan Qi, get over here!"
Yuan Qi rushed to his side. The ground beneath them suddenly cracked open, and from the fissure, bizarre currents of energy erupted upward like a wall of sword energy stretching dozens of li long!
The sword energy grazed Yuan Qi's tail. He felt a sharp pain, and looking back, found his tailtip had been sharpened considerably. Tears of pain streamed down: "My tailtip was already blunt so I could better use the Elephant-Force Ox-Demon Fist. Now that it's been sharpened, my martial technique will be greatly weakened."
The sword energy wall grew wider and taller, nearly matching the height of the two mountains in the sky.
When the fissure's stored sword energy was finally exhausted, the wall gradually dissipated.
Xu Ying and Yuan Qi stared in awe. Following the massive fissure, they saw it stretched in an impossibly straight line, its surfaces smooth as mirrors.
As if some peerless giant had wielded a heaven-reaching sword and cleaved the earth in two!
"The world has gone mad," Yuan Qi murmured.
Xu Ying approached the fissure and peered down into its unfathomable depth.
"An unsurpassed swordsman's sword energy was sealed within this fissure, buried deep underground for ages. Without the Nether invasion—this collision between the Nether realm and the mortal lands—the fissure would never have cracked open."
Xu Ying reached out with his senses, still detecting remnants of sword energy leaping and clashing hundreds of zhang below. "A pity—the stored sword energy has already dissipated. I can't study the swordsmanship hidden within."
Yuan Qi was equally shaken: "That single strike surpasses even Yuan Tiangang's swordsmanship at Wangxiang Terrace!"
Xu Ying tried to perceive the sword intent, but the era of that peerless master's strike was too distant. As the energy dissipated from the fissure, the sword intent had grown extremely faint.
Then he sensed something behind him—the sword casket on his back was trembling, as if something alive within danced with delight.
Moreover, a faint sword energy and sword intent were seeping from the casket, connecting with his spirit sense!
His heart leaped with joy. This was Yuan Tiangang's sword casket, containing his sword energy, which had been refined over time into a treasure.
Xu Ying had carried the casket, but it had never responded to him. Who would have thought that today, the casket would sense the peerless sword energy erupting from underground and spontaneously connect with him, helping him comprehend the sword intent within the great fissure?
The Great Bell also detected the sword energy and intent within the casket. It hummed with surprise: "This junior's future is boundless—he's close to awakening spiritual intelligence, just like me! Not bad, not bad!"
Its tone was proud, clearly considering its own achievements far superior to the casket's—it regarded itself as a senior.
Xu Ying continued sensing the sword intent in the fissure while walking toward Shuikou Temple. The closer he got, the stronger the sword intent grew, making the sword energy in the casket dance with excitement!
"Hurry to Shuikou Temple!"
From a distance, Xu Ying spotted several officials in fine robes carrying gourds, racing along the fissure. One called to the others: "This sun and these two immortal mountains erupted from that ruined temple at Shuikou Temple!"
"Have you notified the Governor?"
"We have. But he must have already seen the anomaly at Shuikou Temple!"
Xu Ying's heart jolted: "The sun and immortal mountains erupted from the ruined temple? How is that possible?"
He had been to Shuikou Temple before—a large temple by the water, long neglected, without a resident deity, its incense long extinguished. It had fallen into disrepair, becoming a shelter for foxes and weasels.
Could that ruined temple really have ejected immortal mountains and a sun?