After leaving the Tongtian River, Li Wuyang and the other two concealed their tracks and continued along the Western Journey Path. Everything they saw along the way increasingly confirmed the Heavenly Dao's "scripted" control. The timing of mountain spirits and wild monsters appearing, the depth of their cultivation, even the layouts of their caves—all seemed like carefully designed "stages." Rain and wind, clear skies and gloom, mountains and natural barriers all corresponded to the allotted number of "trials," tailored specifically for the Pilgrimage Team. The entire Western Ox Continent resembled an immense stage, where all things were actors performing a grand play whose ending had long been written.
That day, the three arrived above a vast kingdom with an imposing air, yet one that faintly exuded an eerie sense of rigid "order." Its cities were majestic and its people lived in peace, but every Buddhist temple within had fallen into ruin, while Daoist temples flourished with incense. The air was filled with dense incense Vow Power and the clear spiritual aura of the Daoist sect, yet it lacked some natural harmony and held more rigid "devotion" and "order." Three grand characters were inscribed above the city gate—Chechi Kingdom.
"Chechi Kingdom... the place where those three furred, horned fellows—Tiger Power, Deer Power, and Sheep Power—serve as state preceptors?" Primordial Father narrowed his eyes at the scene below. "Heh heh, another act of Buddhism and Daoism fighting to demonstrate Buddhism's greatness. But this place's 'stage' has been built far more... solidly than the others."
Li Wuyang activated his Chaos Eye and looked down, his heart turning cold. Above Chechi Kingdom, there were not merely sparse threads of the Heavenly Dao guiding events as elsewhere. Instead, it was shrouded in an exceptionally tight Law Net woven from Daoist talismans and the kingdom's national