This was an antiquity, a small, palm-sized bronze mirror, likely the vital weapon of some deceased cultivator. It had faint traces of a Way of the Heart on it. But it was evident that the former owner’s cultivation hadn’t been high, not exceeding the middle established foundation period. 

What was so interesting about a dead established foundation’s scrap relic? 

But Zhuoming, floating in the sea like a corpse, slowly sat up straight. His misplaced eyes even returned to their original positions. 

A lotus stalk reached out of the seawater like a snake and snatched the bronze mirror. There was a flash of spiritual light, and the mirror reflected a vague map. The surrounding seawater also seemed to have been disturbed. Tiny eddies swirled up in it. 

Wangge Luobao said, “We southern barbarians have limited knowledge. What does Sanyue’s proper immortal say—is this…the legendary Territory Map of Great Wan?” 

“Of course not, do you think an established foundation can shoulder the Territory Map of Great Wan? Not even Zhao Yin had that authority—anyway, the original was destroyed long ago by the Southern Sage.” Zhuoming pressed himself up against the bronze mirror. After his fit just now, he was temporarily normal for a while. “It’s said that Zhao Yin once fell into the Territory Map and assimilated a part of it into his Way of the Heart. This must have been passed down to his kinsmen through his Way of the Heart.” 

“Tsk. Other families’ inheritances are pearl and jade ware at most, while their family has a Way of the Heart,” Wangge Luobao said, laughing. “Amazing, worthy of a great family of Xuanyin.” 

“All those Zhaos made it as one of Xuanyin’s four great families purely thanks to their high birthrate. Each generation of them is worse than the one before. Never mind fumbling around for their own Way of the Heart, it’s rare for them to be accomplished enough to go out and find someone else’s. When those good-for-nothings establish foundations, each one of them has a vestige of their ancestor.” 

As he spoke, a small lotus seal appeared on the surface of the bronze mirror. As the seal dispersed, the bronze mirror turned to slag, which was sucked up by a mouth on a lotus stalk. 

Zhuoming smacked his lips. “Tsk, a chicken rib—is this the only one you found? Are there more?” 

“There are many.” 

Wangge Luobao blew a whistle. A number of Miah cultivators carried a big box over in response. Inside, it was piled full of all kinds of immortal tools. There was a rattle as it was put down. The box was overflowing. Quite a few immortal tools fell out. 

Each of these items had once been the vital item that a cultivator committed their life to, that had been tied to their thoughts. After death, like their distinguished nameless owners, they were heaped together like junk, tossed around by the “evil cultivators” and “southern barbarians” they had regarded as lower classes of person. 

“The legends about the Territory Map sound truly bizarre,” Wangge Luobao said. “The reflection of the spiritual veins…does that make it the reflection of the spiritual mountains? And that reflection wouldn’t be ‘tamed.’ It ran off as soon as it came into the world, and its every tremor shook the roots of the spiritual mountains, as if that Red-Eyed Yu had latched onto the spiritual mountains’ shadow.” 

Zhuoming didn’t so much as glance up. “What’s so strange about that? People have shadows, so why can’t spiritual mountains have shadows? The spiritual mountains are far filthier than you imagine—the work of the sages, the shelter of the people, bah! Everything high-sounding is contemptible, the grander the dirtier. Aren’t your Shu’s Lingyun Mountains and South Sea Hidden Realm more of the same ugliness?” 

Wangge Luobao sensed that he was implying something. “Wait, are you saying that the ‘Territory Map’ the Southern Sage destroyed is probably like the South Sea Hidden Realm? It’s also a hidden realm?” 

“How would I know? It’s some grubby history from thousands of years ago.” Zhuoming leaned against the immortal tools inside the box. “The history books wouldn’t record anything disgraceful.” 

Having said this, he started picking and choosing, selecting the Ways of the Heart in good condition and “eating” them as if he were munching on melon seeds, even providing commentary as he ate. 

“The Zhaos really do have monotonous ways. Apart from a few medicine and toolmaking Ways of the Heart thrown in like props, they’ve pretty much all followed after Zhao Yin. Inheriting their ancestor’s Ways of the Heart without a second thought—it’s no wonder the tree fell and the monkeys scattered as soon as Zhao Yin died.” 

“This one is different… Bah, this one died by losing their mind.” 

“And this one, too… Hss, is there some flaw in their family’s bloodline? They can only choose among a few Ways of the Heart, and if they choose a different one, they lose their minds?” 

“I advise you not to taste the ones who didn’t follow the path of their clan.” Wangge Luobao leaned languorously against the box. “That sort, unless their family background is perfect, and they’re talented themselves, they’re certain to be pushed out to the fringes of their clan. What worthwhile resources can they have?” 

As Zhuoming sucked up the Ways of the Heart in the relics, he freed up an eye for him. “Are you being reasonable again?” 

Wangge Luobao said, smiling, “Since time immemorial, groups of people with a great deal of curiosity and a love for new things have been like scattered sand, prone to internal conflict. A big clan like the Zhaos, with thousands of years of history, its branches scattered through every part of the country but still maintaining its identity, must be extremely close-knit and isolationist, with the ones holding power in the clan already old hidebound walking corpses. Old walking corpses only like young walking corpses. Those who are daring enough to rebel must all carefully weigh their opponents.” 

Zhuoming, sneering, said, “Wow, there speaks the experience of steering southern barbarians.” 

“That’s right. That’s why my Miah clan won’t allow those steam-belching iron monsters and factories to establish a presence in the Three Islands, and, apart from weapons of self-defense, won’t permit those iron tools to destroy the rules of my clan’s ancestors.” Getting to his feet, Wangge Luobao said, “There is hidden intent behind Moon Plated Gold. The Cloud Soaring Flood Dragon upsets the environment. The Xiuyi kiss the asses of the Chu and the Wan, parroting their ideas, and the rich and powerful congratulate themselves on having friends in Great Wan’s Jinping. They forget their own origins…they simply ought to be killed. Listen to this.” 

At this point, Wangge Luobao suddenly raised his voice. In the melancholy ancient Miah language, he began to sing a mourning song. 

It wasn’t only the Xiuyi who loved to sing. Among the Miah, it was even more common for people to have good voices, and they rarely sang alone. They were particular about joining in when you heard singing. Even if a courting couple were singing a love song, if a passerby heard, they still had to help out with a few notes of backup. 

When the Miah cultivators on the island heard his voice, no matter what they were doing, they all stopped. 

Hoist my brother’s bones, return the beautiful pearls…

As more and more voices joined in, the atmosphere changed little by little. 

The originally lingering and sorrowful mourning song began to turn ferocious. When the Miah cultivators sang accented syllables, they pounded the ground heavily with their hands or feet. 

Pearl, please do not weep.

Boom—boom—

Weave a pair of gloves, I will raise my brother’s knife.

Boom—boom—

It was as if they had all formed a resonance with the song. Little by little, they all turned and faced north—the direction of the western continent. 

Even a person who didn’t understand a single word of the Miah language would have been able to guess the grief and hatred in the singing from these people’s expressions. 

Wangge Luobao, leading the song, had easily provoked the Miah cultivators’ emotions. He looked down and seemed to inadvertently meet Zhuoming’s eye. There wasn’t a trace of a spark or any anger in those odd-colored eyes; rather, they held self-satisfied derision, as if he were showing off: You see, it’s not that I’m deluding the people with lies; this is the will of the people. 

Zhuoming pulled a long face and slowly digested the Way of the Heart of another immortal tool. He thought, I’d heard that the way of beast-taming often turns out assholes, and sure enough, this guy really is bad news. 

Suddenly, Zhuoming stopped eating. He sank his consciousness into the thousand hearts and hundred ways of the lotus roots. He found that the “chicken ribs” he had been gobbling up for fun had gradually formed a recognizable picture. 

This group of Zhaos came from Southern Wan’s Guzhou and Ning’an, and Ning’an wasn’t much more than a hundred li from Jinping. 

The Territory Map he had put together seemed to be precisely the area of Ning’an and Jinping. 

Zhuoming’s eyes slowly opened wide. His head turned upside down. The corners of his mouth reached up to his temples. 

The word was that…the most luxurious, most yearned-for city of Jinping, which could pull the tide of the whole continent effortlessly, had a Dragon Vein that wasn’t very stable. 

The den of the Kaiming and the Luwu was also there. For over a decade, because of the Kaiming Department, Great Wan’s domestic “evil cultivators” had practically been eliminated. Heaven’s Design Pavilion’s dog Pang had fixed up the borders until they were like impregnable fortresses. The other three nations had suffered at the Luwu’s hands for a long time, yet they still didn’t dare to imitate rich and arrogant Southern Wan in opening their doors to a large quantity of common cultivators. 

If they knew there was a means of crossing the borders and going straight for Jinping…

Would the three great spiritual mountains think it was more important to punish the “evil” that hadn’t been fully eliminated after all these years, or would they think it was a higher priority to drag down Southern Wan, which refused to play by the rules? 

He thought Jinping also had one of the Misty Willow’s roots. 

“Lao Wang, Lao Wang, stop leading the chorus in mourning.” Zhuoming stuck his head out of the sea. “After this event in the South Sea, no matter what prejudices the four great spiritual mountains have, I figure that they’ll make an attempt to hold their noses and collaborate, work together to hunt down all us evil cultivators. Rather than wait for that, wouldn’t it be better if we struck first?” 

Xuanyin Mountain’s Latent Cultivation Temple, above the clouds. 

By the ninth day Xi Ping stood guard outside the protective screen the princess had left behind, the vertebrae and ribs that had been broken by the great mountain array had healed. 

Duanrui’s protective screen only blocked interference from the outside world. She hadn’t put much strength into it, and it certainly wouldn’t have been harder to break through than the great mountain array. With Xi Ping’s current cultivation level, he in fact wouldn’t have had a hard time breaking it if he’d wanted to. 

But when Duanrui had left, she had only given Xi Ping a calm look, as if to say, “You’re just in time.” Without reinforcing that protective screen in any way, she had floated up, returning to the Principal Peak and her own business. 

A Way of the Heart was a path of no return. Once a Way of the Heart was complete, it couldn’t be broken; if it broke, the person would be finished. 

When an established foundation cultivator’s Way of the Heart was first completed, the boundary would be unstable; they would be at their weakest. Even if Xi Ping was dying to charge in and throw a tantrum like he had when he was little, ask ten thousand “why”s, all he could do now was stand guard and save the princess the trouble. 

Xi Ping didn’t move a muscle, as if he had become a rock on the mountaintop. No one knew what he was thinking. 

On the evening of the ninth day, the spiritual light and rosy glow on the mountaintop suddenly gathered into a thread pointing to the place where Zhou Ying was in seclusion. Then a faint sound reached Xi Ping on the wind. It was the protective screen Duanrui had left behind breaking. The person inside had left seclusion. 

The superimposed light swept over Xi Ping’s eyes. His eyelashes trembled, as if he were waking from a dream. 

Then the next moment, without waiting to see Zhou Ying, he suddenly turned tail and ran, as if he would run into a ghost if he lingered for a moment. 

Only when he was once again intercepted head-on by the great mountain array did Xi Ping in his agitation remember to take the disciple name token out of his mustard seed. He tumbled into Xuanyin Mountain’s inner sect practically in a panic. 

The sound of an ascended spirit battering down the “door” had made all the auspicious animals in the Latent Cultivation Temple bristle. Zhou Ying had naturally heard it, but he had been entirely unmoved, as if it had been only an impetuous bird flying past the window. 

He opened a pair of entirely new eyes. He beheld the mountains and waters as though he were the universe. Clamorous noises and colors passed through his senses and no longer vexed him. 

A stack of letters from the Kaiming Department and the Luwu awaiting his response had accumulated. Zhou Ying paid no attention to them. His eyes fell on the note Duanrui had left behind. 

Princess Duanrui had written: I am incapable of guiding you. You must explore this way yourself. 

Zhou Ying was entirely unsurprised. He shredded the note and took a brocade box from the mustard seed he carried. 

Before entering the Latent Cultivation Temple, he had emptied the mustard seed of everything, including the reincarnation wood, giving all of it to Bai Ling for safekeeping. All he had brought with him was this one thing. 

The lock on the box was called a “conscience-examining lock.” It was only a common open-eyed grade immortal tool—little different from a mundane “cypher lock” that could only be opened with the matching cypher; it only had a few extra embellishments. 

When he touched the lock, a line of text appeared above the box: The way of clarity’s Way of the Heart is utterly sincere. It does not practice self-deception. A thing either is, or it is not. 

Zhou Ying said, “Yes.” 

The old writing above the box disappeared at his answer. The cypher that needed to be matched appeared: In fact, the way of clarity and unfeeling is not among the so-called “three thousand paths of the Great Way of the spiritual mountains,” yes or no? 

Zhou Ying paused. Then he gently tapped out spiritual energy, erasing all the writing except for the “yes.” 

The cypher sank into the immortal tool. There was a click. The conscience-examining lock was gone. The brocade box opened. Inside the box was a thick stack of notes, hundreds upon thousands, all of them with spiritual energy attached. 

Zhou Ying didn’t riffle through them. Now that his emotions had been sealed, it seemed that even his curiosity had vanished. But one of the notes was swept up by the preserved spiritual energy. As if it had come to life, it jumped out on its own and landed in his hand. 

On it was his own handwriting: Duanrui cannot lead you. You might as well try finding the heart demon seed and using it to refine your Way of the Heart.

When Zhou Ying had read it, the slip of paper dissolved automatically. He waited patiently for a moment. No second slip of paper flew out of the box. So he calmly closed the little box and put it back into his mustard seed. 

When he came to the window, Zhou Ying looked in the direction of Xuanyin’s inner sect. 

After establishing a foundation, his vexatious spiritual sense had become over a hundred times stronger than before. Had he entered a different way, it would have been difficult for him to maintain spiritual clarity when he opened his eyes. He supposed that the Heartless Lotus had gone entirely insane then. 

But the way of clarity and unfeeling was precisely capable of making all that passed through a person’s senses ephemeral as mist, completely changing that excessively acute spiritual sense into a mere tool. 

Zhou Ying “saw” at a glance the faint demonic energy spreading through Xuanyin’s thirty-six peaks. 

The heart demon in the Impassable Sea was dead. Only this seed that Zhou Kun had stolen remained. It had at first been hidden in the Impassable Sea. Then it had been unwittingly brought along by the three high elders, directly leading to the Dignitary of Rites Zhao Yin passing away. 

A heart demon was a fairly powerful thing; whether ascended spirit or shed skin, if you picked up a trace of it, even if you wouldn’t die, it would still peel off a layer of skin. But at the same time, it was also very “weak.” Once a person became alert and noticed it, it was easy for its traces to be exposed. Xuanyin’s masters inspected their Ways of the Heart every day; they weren’t befuddled mortals. Yet eight years after Zhao Yin’s death, they had yet to find that heart demon seed hidden among the Xuanyin Mountains… That didn’t make sense. 

Zhou Ying pondered objectively and without a trace of judgment: so the heart demon seed that had come up the mountains with the three elders in the first place must have taken root in a place that everyone thought was impossible. 

Zhou Ying turned his gaze towards Xuanyin’s Principal Peak. His special eyes allowed him to see the Bell of Tribulation concealed above the Principal Peak. 

The great immortal tool of the mountains, said to punish all evil it met, was making no sound, but it was quivering every moment, like a fierce beast with drooping eyelids ready to open its mouth and snap its jaws.

Zhou Ying sent a Heavenly Question, asking Princess Duanrui whether he could come cultivate on the Principal Peak for a time. 

Just then, another letter from Bai Ling flew in through the window. Zhou Ying waved a hand and pressed it down, tossing it unopened into a corner with the other letters.

He was no longer interested in the mundane trifles of the Kaiming and the Luwu. They only took care of things for the immortal mountains. Since the immortal mountains had given no instructions, he wasn’t going to bother to read the letter. It would suffice for Bai Ling to deal with it himself. 

On the Lingyang River, a puffing Jinping Day Cruise boat had just set out. The scattered shoals of fish reassembled, mouths opening and closing as they ate the algae at the bottom of the river. 

Suddenly, a strange lotus stalk reached out from the sparse aquatic plants at the bottom of the river. Some fish with poor vision were lured over. Blood spread faintly outward. 

But the Lingyang River was full of stains left by people and bubbles spat out by steamboats. That trace of blood quickly vanished.