This time Zhi Xiu was ready. He grabbed the Third Elder.

Given Zhi Xiu’s age and generational ranking, he hadn’t had any prior opportunity to interact with these ancient Kunlun sword cultivators, and since he had become a shed skin, Kunlun had been an enemy to him. He had no admiration, either, for the strict government decrees and protocols, the isolationism and poverty on the northern continent under Kunlun’s rule. His older brother’s death was even inextricably tied to this Third Elder. If the Third Elder had been killed by Wanshuang or some other person, Zhi Xiu would have had no objection; if the Third Elder had come at him with his sword raised, he also wouldn’t have been unwilling to personally help the senior on his way.

But he couldn’t stand by and watch him turn into furnace ash in this hopelessly muddled way.

That a shed skin sword cultivator of the Kunlun Mountains, the northernmost end of the northern continent, with wintry skies and frozen earth, who had wielded a sword hundreds of millions of times amid the snow, should in the end come to such a sorry fate.

Too pitiful…and too tragic.

The sword cultivator of the north was beefy. Zhi Xiu barely managed to hold on. Beside him, Wen Fei mimed a joint being displaced.

Zhi Xiu understood. With a “pardon me,” he clamped the arm whose shoulder he had dislocated around the Third Elder’s shoulders, meanwhile sweeping out with one foot—

But while the veins on his hand were already raised, he loosened his grip before he could exert strength. Zhi Xiu seemed to have sensed something. He allowed the Third Elder to struggle free of his arms and throw himself into the Unbound Furnace like a moth throwing itself at a flame.

Since spiritual energy had been prohibited, Lin Chi, the only toolmaking cultivator here, could no longer send his consciousness into the furnace. Xi Ping was left alone inside the furnace flame. Now, he could see others, but they couldn’t see him.

The scream of Lingyun’s Sect Leader had yet to fade from his ears. That shed skin master of the beast-taming way had died like a waking dragon under Wangge Luobao’s control. Xi Ping nearly missed a breath. Then Kunlun’s Third Elder also charged into the Unbound Furnace.

There was indescribable despair on the Third Elder’s face.

A shed skin sword cultivator was the world’s apex of fighting prowess. Whether orthodox or evil, no one dared to say one’s name directly or look him in the eye…but now he was blubbering.

Xi Ping instantly averted his gaze. It was as if fine pincers had pinched his heart. This past decade and more, he had become accustomed to separation in life and parting by death. He could accept his grandmother passing away suddenly, quiet and serene, surrounded by her family, and even yearned a little to be able to protect his country eternally like Princess Duanrui. But he couldn’t accept a death so wretched and utterly without dignity. Just imagining this repulsive fate falling on anyone he cared about was enough to drive him mad.

Tao County’s troops simply used artillery fire to blow away the crooked and slanting reincarnation wood trees. Trucks cleared the way, and the first batch of swift horses raced toward the shore of the Xia River. The Luwu everywhere swiftly swapped out their equipment, once again getting in contact with flying goose machines. The spiritual energy prohibition line, which had come to a standstill, was racing outward once more.

Enough…enough…

Xi Ping wanted to put out the Unbound Furnace, but while he counted as the master of the furnace flame, the “materials” burning in that furnace far surpassed his cultivation level, and he wasn’t inside the Unbound Furnace himself. There was nothing he could do with the furnace flame.

But the spiritual mountains evidently didn’t think it was enough.

Beside the Xia River, Wen Fei and Lin Chi looked at Zhi Xiu, who had suddenly loosened his grip, with doubt all over their faces.

Zhi Xiu was silent. Just then, someone put in a word: “Even if he hadn’t let go, that old fool’s Way of the Heart would still have shattered. Never mind letting it go to waste, the exploding essence could have leveled both banks of the Xia River.”

It was Xuanwu who had spoken.

Xuanwu had swum here through the icy waters of the Xia River. He was even paler than usual. His dripping wet silvery hair hung loose down his back, as if he were coated with a layer of moonlight, or as if frost had formed on him.

He looked like a living Silver Moon.

“Some people think very highly of themselves once they cross the shed skin boundary and no longer cultivate, such that when it comes to the end, they are still torn apart by selfish desires and make a humiliating spectacle of themselves.”

Zhi Xiu quickly said, “Elder Xuanwu, there is something that perplexes me that I would ask for your instruction on: when you did not stint to bring the Silver Moon down into the mortal world for the sake of pulling the Late-Autumn Red up by the roots and nearly turned Tao County into a no-man’s land, I do not see that you had the least drop of pity for the mortals. But now you are prepared to die for the cause of the so-called ‘people of the world,’ blend your thousand years of cultivation with the Unbound Furnace—the relic of a person you scoff at as an ‘evil cultivator.’ Is there no conflict between your past and current actions?”

Wake up!

Xuanwu turned upon him irises that were the same color as the whites of his eyes, finally giving Zhi Xiu a glance.

Zhi Xiu abruptly shut his mouth—Xuanwu’s eyes were full of haughty pity.

“So as General Zhi sees it, before I was ‘damaging the country and causing suffering to the people,’ and now I am ‘sacrificing myself for the public good,’ and you suspect that I have gone crazy?”

“I would not dare…” Zhi Xiu began.

“Ha! No wonder you were unable to enter the mainstream, no matter how good a sword cultivator you might be.” In a voice so solemn as to be peculiar, Xuanwu said, “Heaven and earth are impartial. They treat all things as straw dogs.¹ As long as the Great Way is clear, all living things will naturally each have their places, and blessings and disasters will naturally belong to their fates. I have never diverged in the slightest from the Great Way, yet you wish to pass presumptuous judgment on me from a commonplace perspective. You think you are bemoaning the state of the universe and pitying the fate of mankind. How is it any different from killing the tigers and wolves to protect the mice and rabbits, destroying a dam to keep an anthill intact? A nobody looking at the sky from the bottom of a well, reckoning based on enough achievements and experience to fill the bottom of a bottle, still dares to speak of ‘orthodox and evil, public and private.’ Zhi Xiu, who do you think you are?”

Zhi Xiu had no answer to give. This argument was excessively coherent. He couldn’t immediately judge whether Xuanwu was being controlled by the Sanyue Mountains or whether his own boundary was insufficiently high and he was incapable of understanding.

Xuanwu surveyed the three from Xuanyin and Wu Lingxiao. He thought that these people had either mistakenly wound up on wrong roads and failed to live up to their potential, or else their cultivation was meager and their ignorance had yet to be dispelled. They were so stupid that there was no saving them, and anyway it would have been wasting words. So he gave a cold laugh, flicked his sleeves without thought of turning back as he went to his duty, and stepped into the Unbound Furnace.

The furnace flames throwing themselves at his face turned the water clinging to him into vapor. Xuanwu’s gaze as he stared at the furnace flame was almost greedy and impatient.

Xiang Rong had also once made a futile attempt to use the Unbound Furnace to become a full moon sage and accord with the Way, but he had only bent his Way of the Heart, forcing it into a shape it did not belong in. Xuanwu had sensed that though afterward the soul of that brother of his had gone into the immortal mountains, the Sanyue Immortal Mountains had not accepted him, or else the Silver Moon would not have taken Xuanwu back—the ridiculous imbecile, losing his head because he was caught at a bottleneck. In cultivation, one always had to reject self at pass after pass, cut away occluding thoughts. How could one take a shortcut like this? It was like a joke.

He was different. Now that the ancient inscriptions had come into the world and the world was in chaos, he could sense that this was the true moment to “accord with the Way.”

The moment that the furnace flame enveloped his Way of the Heart, a feeling of freedom that made him wild with joy surged up in Xuanwu’s heart. He felt his heartbeat unite with the Sanyue Mountains far in Dongheng. From now on, he was the spiritual mountains, and the spiritual mountains were him. The spiritual veins spread all around were his body. The mountains and rivers, the sun and moon were all a thought away for him.

Xi Ping watched in terror as Xuanwu was cloaked in flames, his snow white skin and hair put to the torch, his Way of the Heart melting like a wax candle. A thousand years of accumulated essence was drained in an unending stream by the Unbound Furnace. But the “burnt corpse” felt absolutely no sensation. Deranged, he let out inhuman laughter: “Perfect…I have become perfect….I am the only orthodoxy of the Sanyue Spiritual Mountains…”

Evil spawn of an unchaste woman…

His Highness is merciful, taking into account a slight blood relationship… If you want my opinion, in the end, he is a demon’s child.

How could a person like this open his spiritual eyes? And His Highness has even brought him to study under the sage…

He is only a retainer of record, he won’t go far.

Suddenly, a certain peculiar feeling flitted past. There was no need for the Luwu outside to send flying goose messages, Xi Ping already knew—the widening spiritual energy prohibition line had reached Dongheng!

When the first set of spiritual mountains entered the spiritual energy prohibition, the spiritual energy floating over the mountains like the tide instantly froze. The ancient inscriptions that had occupied the spiritual mountains all lost effect. The cultivators darting through the sky, like locusts that had flown into a cloud of pesticide, pitter-pattered as they dropped.

The hidden bones took heavy losses, instantly losing thirty to forty percent of their reincarnation wood trees. At the same time, Xi Ping recovered control over the reincarnation wood inside the spiritual energy prohibition line.

Xuanwu’s laughter came to an abrupt halt. Xi Ping quickly turned his head and seemed to hear him indistinctly call out “Mother”… It also may have been something else, but there was no way to seek verification now.

He vanished with the smoke and flame, “according with the Way.”

The Unbound Furnace had already swallowed three great shed skins. Zhi Xiu seemed not to have recovered from Xuanwu’s words. He kept staring at the Unbound Furnace, not averting his gaze for a long time. Wen Fei and Lin Chi’s reactions were extraordinarily uniform. They took a step forward simultaneously and put themselves between Zhi Xiu and that fatal furnace.

Xi Ping split off a portion of his consciousness to jump to the shore of the Xia River. A reincarnation wood tree that had been lying along the road scrambled to sprout twigs and catch firm hold of Zhi Xiu’s boots. The first group of Luwu to arrive reined in their horses and raised the loudspeakers they had brought along. A single cry could have scared away all the wandering ghosts in the surrounding towns and villages: “General—Zhi!”

Zhi Xiu: “…”

He came back to his senses and didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “I have no intention of throwing myself into the oven, the Xuanyin Mountains have no influence over me, I was just… Shiyong, you’re going to pull off my boots! Let go…”

Just then, Wu Lingxiao suddenly interjected: “The Xuanyin Mountains have no influence over me. So what you mean is that it was the spiritual mountains that forced them to die?”

She abruptly raised her head. “Shed skins accord with the Way and the spiritual mountains, become a part of the heavenly commandments—is that what you mean? So when Wu Guang killed my shifu, was he also…”

Zhi Xiu sighed softly.

“But…but why not me?” Wu Lingxiao’s unfocused gaze fell on Wanshuang. Her mind was in confusion. Her indistinct words were slightly incoherent: “Because I’m a sword-bearing half-puppet? But the sword-bearing half-puppet’s Way of the Heart was shared with the Sword Ancestor, even Wanshuang acknowledged me… Can it be that the spiritual mountains are not the sage…?”

“Fellow Cultivator Wu,” Zhi Xiu suddenly somewhat rudely interrupted her, “matters have already reached such a pass that thinking too far would be unprofitable. The hidden bones have yet to be expelled. Since the three seniors have won us some time, let us all find a place to discuss what to do next, all right? My country has a new material which it now appears can be used inside the spiritual energy prohibition. If you are willing, Lin-shixiong can swap out a portion of your bone jade. At least you will be able to move freely.”

Saying so, without waiting for Wu Lingxiao’s response, he turned to the Luwu and said, “Fellow Cultivator Wu finds it difficult to move here. Female disciples, come and help her up.”

Xi Ping’s heart tightened: that tone… He seemed to know something! Then his Way of the Heart…

“Shifu, listen to me…” In his panic, Xi Ping immediately wanted to pull Zhi Xiu’s consciousness into the Law Breaker’s space, but just then, something tugged fiercely at his consciousness, and the twigs holding Zhi Xiu’s calves instantly lost their support and drooped limply.

His true body!

After swallowing the Sanyue Mountains, the spiritual energy prohibition had spread over Xuanyin to the east, fixing Great Wan’s collapsing veins of the earth in place. The hidden bones had lost another portion of their spiritual energy source. Then the Lingyun Mountains and a portion of the South Sea were also encircled.

It was just at that moment that Xi Ping’s true body, taken by Wangge Luobao, ended up inside the spiritual energy prohibition.

Xi Ping had been forced to part from his true body to begin with. Now, caught unawares, his vision became a blur, and his injured consciousness was pulled right over by his true body.

But before he could react, an invisible barrier was placed on Xi Ping’s consciousness and gave him a solid knock. Xi Ping’s consciousness was already tensed to the utmost. He nearly fainted.

Yao Qi and Chang Jun had naturally also ended up inside the spiritual energy prohibition. The tracking talisman suddenly lost effect.

The spiritual threads on the blood talisman indicated that Xi Ping’s body was within a hundred zhang. Then the bright red blood suddenly congealed and turned rust-colored. It wouldn’t react no matter how they poked it. The two half-immortals in the sea were completely in the dark. They wanted to ask for help, but they found that they also couldn’t send Heavenly Questions. In the vast sea, they were helpless and alone, having turned back into mortals.

Chang Jun felt that his senses were deadened, too. He shouted into Yao Qi’s ear: “This must be that evil cultivator’s demonic art! Ziming-xiong, I think I’ve gone deaf!”

Yao Qi quickly tilted his head to dodge his flying spit. “Not completely deaf, I can still hear a bit…and it seems that we can still use the upgraded immortal tools. Strange, can this demonic art be targeted only at people?”

“The upgraded immortal tools are a close-kept secret of Xuanyin’s Moon Plated Peak, only just revealed on the South Sea. How could an outsider know about them? He must not be prepared.” Chang Jun analyzed the situation meticulously and came up with a conclusion. “What do we do now? Go back?”

Yao Qi grudgingly looked at the already useless tracking talisman. “But we’ve come all this way…”

“But we can’t use spiritual energy!” said Chang Jun.

“With our cultivation levels,” said Yao Qi, “does it make a difference whether we can use spiritual energy?”

Chang Jun: “…”

That was fair enough.

“Let’s go!” said Chang Jun. “Search the area!”

Yao Qi pressed a button on the boat. The boat passing stealthily along the seabed extended a pair of thousand-li eyes and took in the whole of the pitch-black seabed. Shortly, the thousand-li eyes stopped moving.

The bottom of the sea was very dark, but there was a place darker than all the rest, as if it was soaking up all the light.

“What’s th…”

Before Yao Qi could finish, the pitch-black spot suddenly became agitated. A whirlpool as violent as those of the Resurrection Vortex arose. Because of the spiritual energy prohibition, the two half-immortals’ eyesight and hearing weren’t very good, and their reactions were unavoidably delayed. By the time they realized what was happening, the whirlpool had already reached them. A gale abruptly rose on the sea and greedily sucked up all the spiritual energy in the surroundings. The upgraded immortal tool, letting out spiritual energy in all directions, definitely couldn’t escape.

Shortly, where the whirlpool had swept, the bodies of marine life appeared. Yao Qi, Chang Jun, and their boat were all gone.

And meanwhile, from chaos, Xi Ping faintly recovered a portion of his senses—the senses of this true body.

He dimly felt that he seemed to be floating in water.

He couldn’t open his eyes, couldn’t move. The spirit at the center of his brow had been pierced by something, and all his meridians and acupoints seemed to have been nailed in place.

Xi Ping suddenly belatedly regretted casting his true body aside. What the hell was that bastard Wangge Luobao doing?

“Tsk, spiritual energy has been prohibited.” The clinging Miah language came to his ears. Then a finger pressed against the center of his brow. Wangge Luobao switched over to the Wan language and said softly, “The Eternal Spring Brocade, extraordinary—and you’re also extraordinary, little Shiyong. You actually found a way to force the hidden bones to this pass. No wonder you are the one to break through.”

Xi Ping had no way to answer. All he could do was hurl abuses inwardly: I’m your fucking dad!

Wangge Luobao laughed and smoothed his slightly furrowed brow. “Wait a little bit, and we’ll be able to have a chat… No need to worry, where getting rid of the hidden bones is concerned, we’re on the same side.”

Xi Ping wasn’t in the mood to listen to this odd-eyed man’s nonsense. He only hoped that divine lightning would come from the sky and cook this Southern Shu evil cultivator who refused to die, even if he had to go with him to the grave. He had to get back to Tao County. Shifu…

Just then, Wangge Luobao suddenly said, “Do you want to know where accompanying plants come from?”

Xi Ping was startled.

Before the ancient inscriptions from outside the Beijue Mountains had appeared in the world, he and the cultivation world had all believed that “a shed skin outside the three thousand paths of the Great Way” would necessarily give birth to an accompanying plant.

But now that he had learned the whole story of the spiritual mountains, looking back on it, that was a little off.

Before the Kunlun Mountains formed, it seemed that there had been no distinction between “orthodox and evil.” Among cultivators, it was jungle law, the weak prey to the strong, and there had been no concept of “demonic gods.” It was only when the ancient inscriptions had descended and built a great framework of “orthodox and evil” in the world that the “orthodox” cultivators had begun to pursue the selfless and undesigning “Great Way for all,” with the goal of becoming sages who cast off the mundane dust.

The four great demonic gods—Eternal Spring Brocade, Late-Autumn Red, Reincarnation Wood, and Heartless Lotus—must all have become shed skins after Kunlun had formed but before the other spiritual mountains had arisen. The sages who “accorded with the Great Way” had concentrated spiritual energy, laid the foundations for the spiritual mountains, while the shed skin demonic gods rejected by the Great Way had left vestiges of themselves in their accompanying plants, like “impurities” in the system of the spiritual mountains.

So the problem was: while deciphering the instructions in the Unbound Furnace, Lin Chi had seen that after Kunlun had formed, the Ways of the Heart of the people who “did not accord with the Way” had broken, and they had been consumed by the orthodox. The ancient inscriptions had sifted out only the people who were going to the same end as them.

Then how had the four great demonic gods survived and even been able to become shed skins amid the rise of the four great spiritual mountains on the southern continent?