Earlier, when Xu Fengnian was dozing off on the beams inside the palace, the exceptionally tall woman in white stood in the bustling streets of the capital. By all logic, she should have been particularly eye-catching.
But in reality, aside from a few sidelong glances and cold stares, no one truly looked at her directly.
She was utterly bewildered.
If the northern practitioners of Qi cultivation were all vassals of the Liyang Dynasty—a peculiar faction of dragon-supporting officials—then the Qi practitioners of the Nanhai Guanyin Sect were far purer, quietly traversing the world like true immortals who feasted on mist and drank dew. As the sect master of the Guanyin Sect, Tantai Pingjing, who appeared to be a woman in her thirties, was already a hundred years old. Otherwise, the sword-devouring ancestor Sui Xiegu wouldn’t have spent most of his life unable to forget her.
Tantai Pingjing was, of course, a transcendent being. When she led her sect northward from the Nanhai to Beiliang, the ostensible reason was the impending war between Beiliang and the Northern Desert, requiring Qi practitioners to “bridge the river” for countless wandering souls of the world—a way to accumulate merit for themselves. At the time, Xu Fengnian had his suspicions, but given the sheer combat power within Beiliang’s territory, neither Tantai Pingjing’s personal cultivation nor the strength of the entire Guanyin Sect could stir up much trouble. So he let it be, and the Beiliang Dao welcomed these white-robed immortals with open arms.
But Xu Fengnian didn’t truly turn a blind eye. After all, in the “Land Immortal Ranking” that the charcoal-selling girl had shown him, Xie Guanying was at the top, with Xu Fengnian himself following closely behind! Now, Xie Guanying was a stray dog, still relentlessly hunted by Deng Tai’a. So, looking across the world, the only opponent Xu Fengnian truly needed to fear was Tantai Pingjing—she had undeniably become the foremost threat in his mind.
Before their reunion on the walls of the Western Chu capital last night, Xu Fengnian had always believed that even if Tantai Pingjing wanted to act on behalf of heaven, she would do so only after Cao Changqing’s death. But he never expected that even with Cao Changqing still alive, she could already absorb the lingering fortunes of Western Chu. And now, after Jiang Ni decided to leave Guangling Dao, she had begun voraciously devouring the fortunes of the Great Chu Jiang clan like a whale swallowing the sea.
Xu Fengnian took a step forward, leaving the vicinity of the imperial city gates, and then stepped into what appeared to be an ordinary bustling marketplace. Shops and stalls of all kinds stretched along the street, teeming with common folk, travelers, and all sorts of characters. Below, yellow dogs lay dozing; above, birds flitted around the eaves—a scene of peace and prosperity under the sun.
Under the blazing sun, Xu Fengnian stood at one end of the street, while the woman in white stood at the other.
With his now terrifyingly sharp vision, Xu Fengnian still couldn’t clearly make out her face. It was hazy, as if she stood alone in the bustling crowd, isolated and solitary.
Xu Fengnian hesitated for a moment before finally taking a step forward.
For an instant, all sound ceased—but in the next moment, the clamor returned.
Two elderly men in plain clothes brushed past Xu Fengnian, one on either side, muttering as they went:
“Li Bai’s talent was too great, his pride too towering—he lost his inner peace. What a pity, what a pity.”
“Old Du, after your kingdom fell and you fled to Shu, you lost all your scholarly air and became nothing but a stubborn old fool. Don’t you dare belittle me!”
Xu Fengnian’s heart shuddered, but he didn’t turn to look at the two old men.
From the corner of his eye, he saw vendors on the left selling jade, paintings, and hairpins, their cries filling the air.
One man held up a jade seal and proclaimed, “I have three imperial seals, inscribed with the small seal script: ‘Mandate of Heaven, House of Jiang,’ ‘Encompassing Heaven and Earth, Aiding the Divine,’ and ‘Ruling the Myriad Lands.’ Who wants them? Today, I’ll sell them for just five taels and three mace!”
Almost immediately, a fellow vendor laughed and scolded, “Those worthless things haven’t been worth a penny for twenty years! Who are you trying to fool? Three mace is already too much!”
Another man spread his hands before his chest, and between them, a hazy, ethereal scene unfolded—mountains standing tall, rivers flowing—as if a painting had come to life. “This ‘Great Feng Landscape Scroll’—just two mace, and it’s yours.”
Yet another man, holding a brush, casually waved it and lazily said to Xu Fengnian, “For just one mace, I, Wu Gusu, will gift you five hundred characters.”
In Xu Fengnian’s vision, the ordinary, worn-out brush in the calligrapher’s hand was encircled by two intertwined iron trees.
Soon, another brush-wielding man chuckled, “One mace for five hundred characters is a fair price. But, honored guest, would you care to take a look at the brush in my hand, Han Songshan’s? For one mace and five, it can produce twenty years of brilliant prose. I recall a young man from the Jiang family once bought one from me long ago.”
Wu Gusu—the Northern Han’s Sage of Calligraphy. Han Songshan—a literary giant renowned during the Southern Tang.
Xu Fengnian didn’t respond and continued forward.
By the roadside, two men sat on small stools, playing chess without a board or pieces. Yet before them, faint sounds of clinking, galloping hooves, and flowing rivers could be heard.
One of them said angrily, “Li Sanhuang, how can you play with such a distracted mind? Do you truly not care for that blessed grotto-heaven anymore? Fine, fine! How dull! I won’t take advantage of your state—let’s adjourn this game for a hundred years.”
The other man sighed deeply, his face twisted in pain, and turned to look at Xu Fengnian with a complicated gaze.
Xu Fengnian remained unmoved.
Li Mi, the Grand Preceptor of Great Chu, styled Sanhuang!
A man carrying three feet of sword energy walked toward him—not a sword, but pure sword energy.
He glanced at Xu Fengnian, who didn’t stop, hesitated for a moment, then reluctantly stepped aside, muttering, “Why hasn’t that brat Li Chungang come? I’d love to test his Two-Sleeved Green Snakes… Hmph! ‘Where there are flood dragons, slay flood dragons’—is that really worth boasting about? What’s so special? In my time, flood dragons were as common as dirt… Though I wonder how that junior Deng Tai’a fares now… If it weren’t for the bad luck that comes from touching the living, why would I yield? Damn it, damn it… Who was it last time? Lü something? Now that man was truly formidable. Admirable, admirable…”
Xu Fengnian walked on, his expression unchanged.
No one on this street was pretending.
That was the truly terrifying part.
What would a dragon enthusiast do if a real dragon coiled around the beams amidst thunder? What would a demon-slaying priest do if real fiends and monsters lunged at him with bared fangs?
As Xu Fengnian advanced slowly, curses began to rise.
“The Great Qin was tyrannical, slaughtering innocents! How could it occupy such a high position?!”
But as soon as these words were spoken, someone quickly hushed the speaker in a low voice, “True Lord, be cautious! Mortals have gods watching over them from three feet above—how are we any different?”
“In just two hundred years of the Spring and Autumn era, the literary heritage has suffered immense damage. Three hundred years later, the Central Plains will face an unprecedented catastrophe—the Zhao and Xu families are both to blame!”
“Thank goodness this isn’t one of those places, or you’d have already been annihilated body and soul!”
“How dare this brat betray the Heavenly Dao first, then join forces with that Wudang Taoist to sever the connection between heaven and earth?!”
“Longhu Mountain shall rise, Wudang Mountain shall fall! When that audacious Lü Dongbin turned and walked back into the mortal world, Wudang’s incense should have been extinguished!”
Amid the curses, the chirping of sparrows sounded like phoenixes, and the barking of stray dogs roared like flood dragons.
Xu Fengnian focused his spirit, refusing to let even a wisp of his chaotic Qi scatter. Every step he took was excruciatingly difficult.
Like a frail child walking alone through a canyon, buffeted by fierce gales.
Xu Fengnian’s lips curled into a cold smile. Trying to drain Beiliang’s fortunes, are you?
Those so-called “taels” and “mace” must be the unique “currency” of you celestial immortals—probably similar to mortal fortune-telling by weighing bones. If I succumb to temptation and stop to buy today, the Xu family and Beiliang’s wealth would surely be drained dry.
When Xu Fengnian reached the middle of the street, two figures finally smiled at him with goodwill—a monk and a Taoist, sitting cross-legged on opposite sides of the street. Unlike the vendors and passersby, they sat on steps, as if perched on lotus thrones. Though Xu Fengnian didn’t know them, they nodded at him warmly—one with compassion, the other with natural ease.
Xu Fengnian nodded back in greeting.
A furious shout erupted, directed at the old monk: “Old bald donkey! How dare you sabotage the fortunes of the Central Plains?! And you still dare to come to our eastern lands—”
The old monk smiled wordlessly and vanished.
Three armored soldiers patrolling the street hesitated briefly upon seeing Xu Fengnian but still respectfully made way for him.
At the far end of the street, Tantai Pingjing remained standing in place.
Xu Fengnian finally noticed the struggle and pain on her face. Her eyes were slowly turning silver, growing colder and more emotionless, while a blinding light erupted from her chest—like a moon hanging over the vast sea.
Xu Fengnian frowned.
To see through the finite body and comprehend the infinite realm—a heart-moon shining with great radiance.
This was one of the rare signs of enlightenment recorded in obscure Taoist texts.
He remembered the laughing girl telling him that before his death, Huang Sanjia once said: Since the dawn of time, the past thousand years had been favorable for Buddhist and Taoist ascensions. But in the future, when a scholar proposed “preserving heavenly principles and extinguishing human desires,” Confucian sainthood would become much easier—like a shortcut, akin to Buddhism’s “instant enlightenment,” allowing one to ascend in a single step. But the cost would be the gradual erosion of human virtue and the decline of worldly morals—a foolish act of picking up sesame seeds while losing watermelons, a great tragedy of “the sun setting in the west while the moon fails to rise over the sea.”
Xu Fengnian roared, “Tantai Pingjing! After witnessing such absurdity, how can you still not awaken?! What difference is there between this heaven and our mortal world?! Why, after Lü Dongbin, did figures like Gao Shulu, Liu Songtao, and Li Chungang all refuse to ascend?!”
The moment Xu Fengnian spoke these words, the previously noisy street fell eerily silent. Only a few scattered rebukes followed: “Audacious mortal!” “Treacherous blasphemy!”
Xu Fengnian swept his gaze around and sneered, “So-called ‘banished immortals,’ so-called ‘born of destiny’—when you return here, isn’t it all just about seniority and connections? Descending to the mortal world—I’d guess it’s one of two scenarios: the unlucky ones are like mortal officials exiled to remote regions, while the lucky ones are like privileged youths sent to the battlefield to earn merit. What’s the difference between celestial beings fishing for mortal fortunes and mortal merchants hoarding coins? Of course, I imagine you immortals still live carefree lives—with your grotto-heavens as mansions, watching mortal dramas with your eternal lives, becoming true ‘superior beings’ among the celestial ranks. Most of you achieve it once and for all. But I’m curious—do those who’ve made great contributions to the Heavenly Dao in the mortal world ever face situations here where no further rewards can be given? Are there ‘promotions in name but demotions in reality’ in your celestial bureaucracy? Are there immortals who ‘borrow power from the tiger’?”
For a moment, no one answered.
Xu Fengnian’s body began to sway, like a rootless duckweed in a celestial gale.
Then, a voice—neither too loud nor too soft, yet brimming with authority—spoke. It was distinctly feminine, coming from the south.
Xu Fengnian turned and saw her seated on a rooftop, adorned in phoenix crown and ceremonial robes, majestic and resplendent. On her shoulder perched a crimson sparrow, clutching a small, snow-white… flood dragon in its beak.
As she appeared, the entire street trembled violently, the tremors growing stronger without pause, originating from a towering building.
But Xu Fengnian couldn’t make out the building’s details at all—even though its windows were open and he knew someone was there.
After the earth-shaking tremors, everything abruptly calmed.
A middle-aged man in bright yellow dragon robes stood beside Tantai Pingjing, a magnificent sunrise unfolding behind him.
Among all the figures Xu Fengnian had encountered on this street, only this man and the woman stood out as extraordinary.
The dragon-robed man was likely the one who had dragged Xu Fengnian into this celestial realm.
Yet he smiled at Xu Fengnian and said, “The heavens indeed have their share of flaws, as you’ve described. But the celestial realm holds countless wonders—far beyond what your mortal eyes can grasp from this single street. The cycles of the Heavenly Dao are not as mercenary as you believe. When you return—”
Xu Fengnian wanted to shout “Bullshit!” but found he couldn’t even open his mouth here.
But then, a voice suddenly boomed from the north, voicing Xu Fengnian’s thoughts:
“Shut your mouth!”
The dragon-robed man chuckled, as if resigned.
The woman on the rooftop smirked.
She teased, “You northern brute, this child on the street doesn’t even want to acknowledge his ancestry, yet you still speak up for him? How fiercely protective. With Xu Xiao’s matter, you’ve already angered the masses—”
The deep voice, seemingly thousands of miles away, retorted mockingly, “Shut your trap, woman! Focus on birthing that baby you’ve been carrying since the Great Qin era—still not born yet? Aren’t you ashamed?!”
Hearing this, Xu Fengnian felt a surge of satisfaction.
As expected of my true self.
The woman stood up, furious. “You northern savage! The mortal world’s rites and music have collapsed—do you truly think the Heavenly Dao won’t crumble as well?! Even mortals understand that a thousand-mile dike can be destroyed by an anthill!”
The voice returned, even more domineering: “Then let it crumble! I’ll patch it up myself! A real man stands between heaven and earth—you women just sit back and watch. I guarantee you’ll be fine!”
Enraged, she seemed ready to break the rules and charge from south to north.
The dragon-robed man sighed, clearly accustomed to the clashes between these two titans.
*Thud! Thud! Thud!*
The sound of war drums echoed, approaching from the north.
At this, the rooftop woman suddenly calmed down.
The gentle-faced man narrowed his eyes, a flicker of anger crossing his features.
The towering building that had caused the earlier tremors shook once more.
Then the uninvited guest sneered coldly, “Which bastard dared to call my Great Qin tyrannical? Think hiding in the east makes you untouchable?!”
Suddenly, a figure on the street erupted in golden light, which then exploded violently. With a thud, the person knelt, their head shaved clean by an unseen force.
The middle-aged man in the dragon robe flicked his sleeve, and the person by the street vanished. He then raised his head and roared furiously, “True Martial Emperor!”
His thunderous voice echoed through the high towers, “Not convinced? How about we shed these skins and settle it somewhere quiet? If you’re too scared, bring that woman along! After all, you two have been making eyes at each other for nearly a thousand years. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s already carrying your—”
Just then, someone interrupted his tirade, “Enough. Three hundred years from now, the Central Plains will be in chaos, with nine out of ten homes empty. She acted according to reason. Your inability to bear the world’s fragmentation is one thing, but division and reunification have always been part of the Heavenly Dao…”
The first man snorted, “I don’t care about the rise and fall of dynasties. But there’s someone on this street who’s desperate to use his mortal avatar to seize an eternal imperial throne, treating the mortal world as his private field, hoarding all its harvest to accumulate fortune and climb higher… And while he schemes to close the Heavenly Gate through that kid and the little Daoist from Wudang Mountain, he doesn’t want to bear the Heavenly Dao’s karma himself. Xie Xie is just a smokescreen—it’s that Chen Zhibao behind it all… Hmph! There’s no such free ride in this world, let alone the heavens. Think you can outsmart me? I’ll beat him until he’s picking his teeth off the ground!”
Xu Fengnian listened to “himself” speaking in fragments, the words unclear, but the gist was unmistakable.
And the person beside “him” was none other than “Wang Xianzhi”!
At that moment, a woman and a young man, appearing like mother and son, emerged on the street. The young man grinned brightly, clasped his fists, and bowed deeply.
Behind them stood an elderly man dressed as a servant, smiling silently.
Xu Fengnian smiled.
He didn’t recognize the woman, but the old man was unmistakably Han Shengxuan. The young man was the illegitimate son of the late Liyang Emperor, Zhao Kai.
Mortal grievances, resolved in the heavens.
At that instant, Xu Fengnian’s eyes reddened, and he began searching frantically.
A voice echoed in his heart, “Stop looking. You won’t find them. Aside from your eldest sister, Xu Zhihu, your parents will become the last batch of banished immortals to descend like rain upon the mortal world.”
“Then you can witness the spectacle of thousands of immortals falling together—a true marvel! Whether you’ll see your parents among them depends on your own fortune. Don’t worry, with my arrangements, they’ll be bound together for eternity. Even if they aren’t born on the same day in every life, it won’t be far off. As for whether they’ll share wealth or hardship, that’s beyond my control.”
“This Tantai Pingjing is a pawn of that dragon-robed man on the street, meant to target you. But since I’m here, things are different.”
“She’s harmless today, but be cautious in the future.”
“That Xu Xiao—the moment he saw me in my realm, he called me ‘son’! Damn it…”
The ensuing curses were so absurd that Xu Fengnian, fighting back laughter, pretended not to hear.
The street erupted in uproar. Even Wang Xianzhi in the high towers let out a surprised “Huh?” as his faint figure appeared at the window.
Xu Fengnian’s heart trembled, and the next moment, he lost control.
His eyes gleamed with pure golden light.
True Martial Emperor.
Yet his mind remained clear. As he turned, he saw the tip of a sword slowly piercing the heavens and earth.
From above, a voice rang out—like a dragon’s roar, a wooden fish’s knock, and a jade chime’s chime—as if delivering the final judgment on this world.
The dragon-robed man’s face darkened. He exchanged a glance with the woman on the rooftop, then both turned toward Wang Xianzhi’s position in the high towers. In an instant, all three vanished.
Tantai Pingjing disappeared as well.
The True Martial Emperor—or rather, the Great Qin Emperor—gazed sorrowfully at the young woman who seemed to trip over the threshold, stumbling into the room with her sword.
In life, he had ruled the mortal world as the Great Qin Emperor. In death, he ascended as the True Martial Emperor, presiding over the northern heavens and commanding half its armies.
Yet he carried endless guilt toward that gentle, timid woman. Though he could no longer speak of letting go, he couldn’t bring himself to ignore her.
Through Xu Fengnian’s mouth, he said to the rushing young woman, “I’m sorry.”
Jiang Ni, the little mud figure, replied with a pout, “Are you crazy?”
The golden light in his eyes instantly faded. Xu Fengnian froze, then burst into laughter on the street.
She fumed.
He grabbed her cheeks and tugged hard, “You’re still the best!”
Having endured countless hardships to shatter the Dragon Pearl and enter this place, she was about to explode in anger when he swayed and nearly collapsed.
※※※
Near Guaizhou’s battlefield, the Snow Dragon Cavalry had absorbed the five hundred Western Chu scholars and begun their march north.
A single sword’s gleam chilled the thirty provinces of the realm.
A young woman carrying a purple sandalwood sword case helped the young prince dismount from the Great Liang Sparrow, standing at the cavalry’s flank.
The army abruptly halted.
As the sword returned to its sheath, an old Xu family veteran who had survived the Spring and Autumn Wars suddenly understood. He dismounted swiftly and roared, “Snow Dragon Cavalry! Salute the Northern Liang Princess Consort!”
The few voices calling for the Emperor were drowned out by the thunderous cry for the Northern Liang Princess Consort.
Terrified, Jiang Ni hid behind Xu Fengnian.
But even Xu Fengnian couldn’t have predicted that this timid little mud figure would soon stand atop Jubei City’s walls, beating war drums to send the Northern Liang Iron Cavalry into their final, glorious charge.
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