Cold light suddenly flashed over Zhaoting. The snow falling around the sword halted. It disturbed the master of Flying Jade Peak, who was immersed in the sword aura. 

Zhi Xiu abruptly opened his eyes. His expression was somewhat bewildered: the sword energy he had placed on Xi Ping had been given play… pure and complete ascended spirit sword energy—even he hadn’t used it in the mortal world! 

In fact, the sword energy Zhi Xiu had given Xi Ping amounted to a protective talisman. Normally it would exist within his spiritual bones. At Xi Ping’s cultivation level, with the help of two white spirits, he could probably set off a bit of sword aura. Provided his opponent was unprepared, it was possible for him to go above his grade and restrain an early established foundation cultivator, giving him enough time to escape with his life. He had plenty of money, anyway, so he could use this move over and over. As long as that brat didn’t go take on the other three great sects all on his own when he left the mountain, the sword energy could last for three to five years. 

But just now, the sword energy that ought to have persisted for three to five years had been shot out all at once! 

How could that be?! 

Never mind using it, if Xi Ping hadn’t picked up an ancient demonic god’s relic, an ordinary open-eyed cultivator’s spiritual bones wouldn’t even have been able to contain ascended spirit sword energy. 

To use an analogy, for a half-immortal, Zhi Xiu’s sword energy was like a mountain. With his back to the mountain, a half-immortal could quarry stone and chop wood; if he had the skills, he might be able to use those things to build a maze and put on a show to make himself seem more impressive…but who had ever heard of someone picking up the mountain and pounding a person with it? 

Zhi Xiu stood up abruptly—no, there was no point now in thinking about how the kid had done it. 

Completely unrestrained ascended spirit sword energy was enough to cause a local earthquake in the mortal world; it wouldn’t be hard for it to bring down mountains and crack open the earth… Was Xi Shiyong still living? 

His rebellious disciple was amazing. How could he always manage to bring about disasters beyond his expectations?! 

With a wave of his sleeve, a beam of sword energy hit the clouds, making a crack in the thick cloud layer that was letting down snow. Starry sky flashed out. Zhi Xiu quickly began to divine Xi Ping’s location. Astonishment gradually appeared on his face—he couldn’t divine it. 

At the Sea of Stars, the Dignitary of Fate High Elder Zhang Jue frowned as he looked into the depths of the abyss: a fog was rising.  

Xi Ping was still living, but he wasn’t far from the “moment of parting.” 

The reason this had all gone wrong was that the bones of his right hand had been broken, so he only had his left hand to use. 

When the real bones of his left hand had been smashed and grown back through the power of the mysterious hidden bones, it had perfectly suited the ancient demonic god’s “way of death”…and apart from the demonic god himself, no one understood that way of death. 

The left hand that had grown back by means of the hidden bones could “play” directly in another person’s spirit. Xi Ping had tried this out with a ship full of Indignant Cicadas. He was a broad-minded person; he had just thought “my left hand is more useful than before and has an added function,” and the rest didn’t matter. If a senior had found out about this, they might have flipped—even when Liang Chen had possessed him, he hadn’t been able to invade his spirit; he could only wait for him to open his spiritual eyes so he could snatch his body. Music that could cloud a person’s intellect could only be played by a god or a demon; the effect was only so limited because of his cultivation level. 

But the sword energy that Zhi Xiu had placed in his spiritual bones wasn’t “limited”…and even more unluckily, for reasons unknown, this area of the sea had struck up a resonance with his left hand. 

Ascended spirit sword energy was like a natural disaster. It had disturbed the legendary Resurrection Vortex that could swallow all things. 

The vortex grew bigger and bigger as it spun, and the sword aura lingering in the area continued to hover around; even the sea breeze turned into blades. 

The water dragons that had been pecked full of wounds by the great roc turned quickly and attempted to guard the convoy. 

The Southern Shu assassins, the evil cultivators, Great Wan’s shipment convoy…not one of the three sides that had just been embroiled in conflict had any more attention to spare for each other. 

When Lin Zhaoli recovered, he gave a long whistle, ordering the convoy to retreat at full speed. 

Miserable and distressed, he flew several dozen zhang up, turned his head, and found that the “sea monster” Xi Ping who had stirred up the East Sea was still standing in place, unmoving, watching his reflection in the water and having some kind of marriage interview with himself. Lin Zhaoli shouted to him, “Xi Shiyong, stop preening! Hurry up!” 

“Lord Lin!” 

Once the Resurrection Vortex started to spin, there would be more than one whirlpool. The water dragons were desperately holding off the largest of the whirlpools, but rapidly moving little whirlpools quickly began to spin in other places; their danger zone was no less than that of the big whirlpool. A spiritual stone freight ship that had had its protective inscriptions scraped off by the great roc had been sucked into a small whirlpool. 

In the whirlpool was lingering sword energy that quickly cut shocking gouges in the ship’s hull. Lin Zhaoli had to go save the ship before anything else. 

When he took another look after putting aside his many other pressing problems to rescue the freight ship and surround it with the few surviving guard ships, Xi Ping was gone. 

Xi Ping had been blown off his sword by the storm raised by the whirlpool. 

His outsides seemed completely intact, but inside, his meridians had all collapsed into some unknown state. He had truly become a paperman who could be blown away by a puff of wind. He couldn’t move a single finger—not even of his left hand; his arm wouldn’t take orders. 

By coincidence, there just happened to be a whirlpool where he landed. It swallowed him whole. 

The scattered sword energy immediately broke his white jade hair crown. Fortunately, the sword energy had been stored in his bones for a long time and “recognized” his aura. When it touched him, it suddenly turned gentle. 

The “big cuttlefish” that had been sucked into the same whirlpool as him was much less lucky. In just this short time, countless sword slashes had cut through the immortal tool, so dense it was as if it had been lattice cut before being deep-fried. 

The cuttlefish’s master White Amaranth was gone, and the immortal tool had gone out of control. The Exonerators on board had to save themselves. 

Wei Chengxiang wasn’t pretending to be unconscious anymore. In the high-speed swirling whirlpool, she couldn’t even open her eyes. The sword aura surging all around seemed to be resonating with her spirit, nearly boiling her brain. 

She kept her teeth firmly clenched, maintaining a line of clarity. 

In the chaos, Old Nine rifled through his mustard seed for a long moment, pulled out a water-repelling pearl, considered, felt unsafe, and added an extra protective array to the outside of the water-repelling pearl. He grabbed Wei Chengxiang and stuffed her into the water-repelling pearl, then escaped from the big cuttlefish. 

But as the saying goes, luck isn’t equivalent to virtue. When bad luck came, neither the righteous nor the evil could escape it. 

Old Nine’s luck evidently wasn’t any good. 

As soon as he left the cuttlefish, the water-repelling pearl crashed firmly into a beam of sword energy. The mere open-eyed grade protective array disintegrated on the spot, and the sword energy poured into the water-repelling pearl, cutting Wei Chengxiang’s ankle. 

Wei Chengxiang felt sharp pain leap up from the injury. The sword energy seemed to have burrowed into her body, splitting open all her meridians and blood vessels. 

At the same time, as the water-repelling pearl went to pieces, ice cold seawater poured ruthlessly into her nose and mouth. 

Old Nine quickly reached out to grab her, but just then, yet another beam of sword energy flew over from somewhere. Old Nine scurried away like a frightened rat, but the whirlpool pulled Wei Chengxiang, who had no power to resist it, down towards the bottom of the sea! 

At the critical moment, a hand appeared out of nowhere in the whirlpool and pulled Wei Chengxiang to a halt—it was Lü Chengyi, who had vanished earlier. 

Lü Chengyi held Wei Chengxiang with one hand and gestured to Old Nine with the other. The two half-immortals swam towards the surface at full speed. 

All of Wei Chengxiang’s senses were numbed by the rapidly swirling water. Her consciousness gradually dimmed. Many people’s faces flashed before her eyes: her mom, her grandpa, Auntie Chun, the heavily made-up women of rat alley, her fellow workers with their faces covered in coal dust…

Strangely, none of their expressions were pained. They were all faintly smiling at her, as if they had come to take her away from worldly suffering. 

But worldly suffering wasn’t prepared to let her go. 

Just as Wei Chengxiang was about to take the hands of her nearest and dearest, a figure struggling in the water appeared in her peripheral vision. 

Wei Chengxiang’s slackening consciousness instantly returned. All the friendly faces disappeared abruptly—she had seen White Amaranth. 

The sword energy had cut off half of White Amaranth’s arm. His established foundation had been destroyed, but all those protective immortal tools hadn’t been bought for nothing; in the end, they had let this great evil cultivator escape with his life. 

Wei Chengxiang’s eyes nearly popped. He wasn’t dead? How could he dare not to be dead? 

Why was it that the innocent could only obey the mandates of heaven, while evildoers could always escape calamity? Was it because good people were worthless, and each batch would be replaced by another when they died? 

There was a crisp sound in her ears, as if something had broken. 

Spiritual energy mixed with sword aura poured into her bones, bursting open the tender skin beside the girl’s eye and on her cheekbone, then following her cheek and tearing down to her lower jaw. She wanted to scream from the pain, but the seawater was covering her nose and mouth, pressing down on her heart and lungs, not letting her cry or scream. All she could do was futilely breathe out the last mouthful of air in her lungs. 

Boom—

The raging waves beat against the shore. The overpowering seawater surged desperately towards the land, reshaping the originally low-lying land that had allowed countless people to tread on it. 

Earth and stone cracked, the veins of the earth severed, and at last mountains burst from the level ground.

All the spiritual stones Wei Chengxiang had eaten seemed to turn into fuel, trying to burn up her mortal body all at once. Her spirit suddenly became clear and spacious, like the former location of Rat Alley when it had been flattened—

Her spiritual eyes were wide open. 

She opened her eyes in the deep sea. The skin on nearly half her face that had been burst open by the spiritual energy was still oozing blood. Her burning gaze met Lü Chengyi’s. 

Naturally Lü Chengyi couldn’t miss sensing an event as big as the opening of spiritual eyes. Undisguised joy immediately appeared on the calculating old fox’s face. 

A beam of sword energy came their way, and Lü Chengyi pulled Wei Chengxiang aside without any hesitation, using his own back to block it, just as decisive as he was in killing witnesses. Though the sword energy only brushed past him, it still cut into his back hard enough that the flesh tore. Blood spurted out. Lü Chengyi clenched his teeth, trembling, and squeezed out a smile. As if in consolation, he patted his imagined Tai Sui on the back of the hand. 

The next moment, his eyes suddenly opened wide. First he leaned back. Then he looked down at the person he was protecting in disbelief. 

The moment he had thrown himself towards her, Wei Chengxiang had pulled out the defensive knife at his waist. She stabbed the open-eyed grade weapon into his belly. 

Lü Chengyi opened his mouth. 

Liang-shixiong, you…

But he only gulped mouthful after mouthful of salty and bitter seawater. It seemed to be the taste of retribution. 

Wei Chengxiang didn’t want to know what last words the evil cultivator had. She held the knife with both hands and fiercely cut upwards, disemboweling the great evil cultivator, cutting all the way from the base of his abdomen to his neck. Then her hands were knocked away by the damaged array on the knife, and she left the knife with its curved blade in Lü Chengyi’s throat. 

She felt neither fear nor remorse. 

With one stroke, the half-immortal whose last breath had been squeezed out by the bottomless abyss was separated from the trembling, terrified girl. 

The water was clouded with blood and air bubbles stirred up by the whirlpool, but the eyes of vengeance can always see their foe. 

Before Old Nine could react, Wei Chengxiang exerted all her effort to escape the whirlpool and burst out. There was plentiful spiritual energy in the place where the three parties of cultivators had fought, still unceasingly pouring into the newborn half-immortal, giving her the strength to escape fate. 

The weak of Jinping’s southern outskirts rested; the one who couldn’t close her eyes took on the regrets of the slumberers. 

She didn’t turn back to look at Lü Chengyi as he was pulled into the abyss. 

The bloodstains on Wei Chengxiang were quickly washed away by the restless seawater. She approached the head of the evil cultivators, who was on his last gasp. 

White Amaranth, who called himself an Exonerator, had dozens of identities in the Land of Turmoil. He had smuggled spiritual beasts, traded in illicit snow wine…made enough money that even a good-for-nothing like him could safely pass to the established foundation level and support nearly a hundred pretty girls. Whenever this was mentioned, he spoke as if he had no alternative, saying something like “there’s no way around it, when you have dealings with important people, you have to follow their customs,” sighing that a true gentleman who had been noble and benevolent all his life had simply been forced into debauchery by beautiful girls. 

White Amaranth had used up all his strength now. He couldn’t even dodge the sword energy that was everywhere in the whirlpool. When he saw his “ally” swimming towards him, he was overjoyed. 

Miss Sixty! Holy woman! 

The holy woman smiled at him and pulled him by his remaining arm. 

He would be saved. 

White Amaranth relaxed, nearly going limp in her arms: after this, the Exonerators and the Indignant Cicadas would be brothers who had gone through mortal peril together. The Exonerators would share everything with them…

Then a beam of sword energy swept through the whirlpool. The weak and frail “Miss Sixty” suddenly held down his head with all her might. Before the happiness on White Amaranth’s face could vanish, his intact skull was held to the beam of sword energy by Wei Chengxiang! 

The peerlessly keen sword energy pierced the center of his brow. Its fury didn’t abate, and it stabbed right through Wei Chengxiang’s palm. She was covered in blood, in so much pain that the corners of her eyes twitched, but she didn’t care at all. She let go and tossed this corpse into the abyss as well. 

Old Nine was stunned by this sudden change. For a time, this old half-immortal whose cultivation was clearly stronger than hers was terrified. When he met Wei Chengxiang’s gaze, Old Nine didn’t even have the strength to fight. He turned and fled. 

Before she could chase after him, the heedlessly fleeing Old Nine was hit across the midsection by the damaged Southern Shu ship that had gotten mixed up in the whirlpool. Confused and disoriented, he rolled over, and a beam of sword energy skewered him and the damaged ship. 

Wei Chengxiang stared for a moment. Then she clasped the reincarnation wood in front of her chest with a bloody hand and surged towards the surface. 

“Uncle.” Seawater flowed past her wide open eyes. “I’ve taken my revenge, but I don’t feel happy. I…” 

The reincarnation wood was silent. 

“…uncle?” 

Xi Ping only had time to give Xi Yue an order through the dragon-taming chain: “Get onto the main ship, don’t approach the shore, don’t leave the ship!” 

Then he was pulled down into the whirlpool amid Xi Yue’s heartrending cries and knew nothing more. 

The Resurrection Vortex dragged both the living and the dead to the bottom of the sea, then tossed them out. 

The strange thing was that the bottom of the sea was calm. 

Xi Ping was suspended in the water, drifting with the current. After a moment, he bumped into his old acquaintance Lü Chengyi. 

These two people whose battle of wits had caused the East Sea to flare up had been completely neutralized. They bumped against each other peacefully. 

During the collision, Xi Ping’s left hand suddenly gave a light shake. Lü Chengyi’s corpse lowered its head towards his left hand. A savage brand appeared on the ghastly pale face. Next, silver light slowly came from the center of the corpse’s forehead. After floating clear of the body, it dropped towards the bottom of the sea and was caught in Xi Ping’s disheveled hair. 

The dazzling silver light dispersed… It turned out to be a finger bone. 

Something at the bottom of the sea let out a faint sigh and drew that bone down. The finger bone was wrapped in Xi Ping’s seaweed-like hair, so it had no choice but to carry this big encumbrance down with it. 

The moment the bone touched the bottom of the sea, an amazing sight appeared: an enormous inscription, too big for the eye to take in, was exposed. 

Had a cultivator proficient in inscriptions been present, they would certainly have been dumbfounded—because this wasn’t any kind of inscription that existed on earth! 

Xi Ping and the finger bone sank to the center of the inscription; then, as if something were pulling them in, they both disappeared. 

Far away in Guzhou, Prince Zhuang’s spiritual sense was suddenly touched. It was as if his right thumb had been burned. 

Prince Zhuang frowned and tucked his thumb against his palm… Strange. It had been eight years since his spiritual sense had been touched by over there.