Dao Heart Shattered, From Beginner to Giving Up

No meals.

Those four words, light as air, struck harder than any divine ability or spell.

To a mortal, this might be torture.

But to the tens of thousands of cultivators present, it was sheer humiliation.

They had long since transcended the need for food, subsisting on wind and dew, with immortal fruits and spiritual springs as their daily fare.

Eating was more about indulging the palate, a matter of face.

Now, this most basic need had become the penalty for failing a task.

A stir rippled through the crowd once more.

Some Inner Sect Disciples, accustomed to a life of ease, could no longer maintain their composure.

"This... what is the meaning of this? We are cultivators—how can we suffer such an insult?"

"Exactly, I'd rather go face the wall at Repentance Cliff than..."

Before the disciple could finish, the person beside him clamped a hand over his mouth.

All eyes converged on the high platform.

Chen Changsheng remained as calm and detached as ever, as if he hadn't heard the murmurs below.

But Zhao Gongming beside him stepped forward, his tiger-like eyes blazing.

"Anyone who disagrees can step forward now."

"I, Zhao Gongming, will personally send you into the Cycle Mirror to rack up a thousand 'deaths' before we even talk about meals."

His voice wasn't loud, but it carried a murderous aura forged through seas of blood and mountains of corpses.

The scene fell silent in an instant.

A thousand times.

Everyone glanced at True Lord Huoyun, still twitching on the ground, foaming at the mouth.

That image was too vivid; no one dared dwell on it.

"Since no one objects, let's begin."

Chen Changsheng announced calmly.

"Disciples on the east side of the Martial Arts Arena, first batch, Enter the Mirror."

A scroll of names appeared in Zhao Gongming's hand, and he began calling out in a loud voice.

"Li Xuantong!"

"Zhang Yuanshan!"

"Fairy Biyun!"

One by one, disciples with some renown in the inner sect were singled out.

Their faces were ashen, but they dared not defy the order, forcing themselves to line up and walk toward the Cycle Mirror, which loomed like the maw of a great beast.

The first called, Li Xuantong, was a sword cultivator, famed for the swiftness of his sword light.

He took a deep breath, clasped his fists toward the crowd, and forced a hint of pride onto his face.

"Fellow junior brothers, watch me break this illusion!"

With that, he transformed into a streak of sword light and plunged into the mirror.

On the mirror's surface, the scene of the Ten Ultimate Arrays reappeared.

Li Xuantong's figure materialized before the formation. Without a moment's hesitation, he merged man and sword into a single, heaven-piercing rainbow, shooting straight upward in an attempt to cross the array from above.

But the moment he rose a hundred zhang, the Heavenly Severance Array stirred, its black banner swaying.

A bolt of Chaos Divine Thunder, ten times faster than his sword light, crashed down from above.

"No!"

A brief, sharp cry.

That heaven-piercing rainbow was annihilated in an instant.

On the mirror, the word [Death] appeared coldly.

A collective gasp of cold air swept through the Martial Arts Arena.

The second disciple, Zhang Yuanshan, was a master of earth escape techniques.

Once inside the mirror, without a word, he dove straight into the ground, attempting to tunnel through from below.

He had barely burrowed three feet deep

when the Earth Blazing Array activated. Red sand swept across the land, and the earth itself turned into an invisible millstone.

On the mirror's surface, traces of dark red blood seeped up from the ground.

[Fallen.]

The third one, Fairy Biyun, summoned a Cloud Scarf with astonishing defensive power. It transformed into layers of mist that wrapped around her as she cautiously crept forward.

She chose to bypass all the arrays, slipping through the gaps between them.

She had taken fewer than ten steps.

Between the Golden Light Array and the Cold Ice Array, the void twisted. A stream of red water materialized out of thin air and coiled around her once.

The Cloud Scarf's immortal light dimmed. Fairy Biyun, along with her treasure, dissolved into a pool of blood.

[Fallen.]

One after another.

In less than the time it takes an incense stick to burn, a hundred inner sect elites experienced the "thrill" of instant death in a hundred different ways.

On the mirror's surface, the words [Fallen] flashed like the drumbeat of a death sentence.

Each flash drained another shade of color from the faces of the disciples watching below.

They finally understood.

This was no trial at all.

This was a one-sided, utterly senseless massacre.

In the simulated Killing Tribulation personally set by a Saint, their proud Divine Abilities, treasures, and schemes were as fragile as a joke.

"Second batch!"

Zhao Gongming's icy voice rang out again.

Panic and unrest rippled through the crowd.

No one wanted to experience the agony of having their Primordial Spirit torn apart.

"Everyone, stand your ground!"

Daoist Duobao snorted coldly. The Pressure of a Zenith Heaven Golden Immortal exploded outward, pinning every disciple firmly in place.

"Anyone who dares take a step back will face double punishment!"

With two Senior Disciple Brothers personally overseeing the field, any last shred of hope for escape was utterly crushed.

Batch after batch of disciples walked into the Cycle Mirror with faces ashen as death.

Then, the mirror's surface began to display a grotesque feast of deaths.

Some were shredded into flying bits of flesh by the gale-force winds of the Wind Roar Array.

Others were dissolved into white bones by the toxic waters of the Red Water Array.

And there were those who, refusing to believe, insisted on challenging the Blood Transformation Divine Blade, only to have their skulls split open by a single strike, their Primordial Spirits corrupted by black sand and dissipating with anguished wails.

The entire Martial Arts Arena was shrouded in sheer terror.

That enormous Cycle Mirror was no longer a treasure. It had become a nightmare that ceaselessly devoured lives.

The mirror no longer displayed the deaths of individual disciples.

Instead, a single, enormous, cold number took its place.

[Total Fallen: 1754]

[Total Fallen: 3281]

[Total Fallen: 5999]

Each time the number jumped, it struck like a heavy hammer against the hearts of every survivor.

They watched familiar figures on the mirror resurrect again and again, only to die in even more gruesome ways.

Their Dao hearts, under this extreme terror and helplessness, began to crack.

Finally, a disciple could no longer bear the mental torment.

"Ah! I can't take it anymore! I quit!"

A young disciple, looking half-mad, spun around and tried to flee the Martial Arts Arena.

He had only taken two steps.

A flash of golden light. Daoist Duobao appeared before him expressionlessly and pressed a finger to his brow.

The disciple's body stiffened, and he fell straight back, unconscious.

"Drag him away."

Duobao's voice carried not a trace of emotion.

"Those with weak resolve are unworthy of being Jie Sect disciples. When he wakes, strip him of his cultivation and send him off Golden Ao Island."

The entire field fell into dead silence.

Everyone was stunned by Daoist Duobao's iron-fisted methods.

They finally realized that the Dao Protector and the two Senior Disciple Brothers were deadly serious.

This training had no retreat.

On the high platform.

Zhao Gongming looked down at the faces twisted in fear below, and a trace of reluctance stirred in his heart.

He walked over to Chen Changsheng and spoke in a low voice.

"Dao Protector, going on like this... isn't it too much? I'm afraid their Dao hearts will shatter completely."

"Shatter?"

Chen Changsheng gazed at the endless cycle of death playing out in the mirror, his eyes calm.

"If they shatter, then we reshape them."

"If they don't break today, then one day, they will be annihilated—body and soul."

His voice was soft, yet it made Zhao Gongming's whole body tremble.

Indeed.

Today's pain was to avoid tomorrow's destruction.

He looked at Chen Changsheng's profile. This newly appointed Dao Protector, though not high in cultivation, seemed to stand taller than anyone, to see farther than anyone.

Just then.

The scene in the Cycle Mirror suddenly shifted.

All the disciples' figures vanished, leaving only one person.

It was a female immortal clad in a Golden Silk Feather Garment, with peerless beauty and a haughty demeanor.

She was none other than the foremost disciple under Holy Mother Jin Ling, who ranked just below the Three Xiāo and other direct disciples in the inner sect—Fairy Yu.

"It's Senior Sister Yu!"

"She's a Primordial Unity Golden Immortal!"

A wave of exclamations rose from the crowd.

In the mirror, Fairy Yu's brows were tightly knit, clearly startled by this sudden change.

Before her, the Ten Ultimate Arrays slowly faded, replaced by an endless sea of blood.

Above the blood sea, a bone-white lotus platform rose slowly.

A Black Robe Daoist, wielding the twin swords Yuantu and Abi, manifested his form.

Old Ancestor Minghe!

"Not good!"

Zhao Gongming's face turned pale.

"This is a simulated pursuit by a great power!"

In the mirror, Old Ancestor Minghe said nothing, simply raising his hand and striking with his sword.

A blood-colored Sword Qi, spanning heaven and earth, tore through the void and slashed down toward Fairy Yu's head.

Fairy Yu's face turned deathly white. With a shriek, a golden bell appeared above her head, instantly swelling to shield her body.

A thunderous crash.

The Golden Bell treasure was cleaved apart by a single sword strike.

Fairy Yu was instantly shredded into a mist of blood by the Sword Qi.

[Fallen].

Resurrected.

Old Ancestor Minghe struck again with his sword.

[Fallen].

Resurrected.

This time, Fairy Yu learned her lesson. She turned and fled, transforming into a beam of golden light, moving at extreme speed.

Old Ancestor Minghe sneered. The Karmic Fire Red Lotus beneath his feet flashed, and he appeared behind her in an instant, beheading her with one sword stroke.

[Fallen].

In the Martial Arts Arena, all murmuring ceased.

If the hundred deaths of True Lord Huoyun had filled them with fear before.

Then now, Fairy Yu's death filled them with despair.

Even a Primordial Unity Golden Immortal senior sister, facing a top-tier great power of the Primordial World, had no means to fight back.

What about them?

Finally, after thirty-six consecutive deaths.

With a hum.

Fairy Yu's figure was flung out of the Cycle Mirror.

Her entire body went limp, the Golden Silk Feather Garment already soaked through with cold sweat, her hair in disarray, and not a trace of her usual haughtiness remained on her face.

Her eyes were vacant as she kept repeating over and over.

"Can't escape... absolutely can't escape..."

Chen Changsheng slowly walked to the edge of the platform, looking down at the tens of thousands of dispirited disciples below.

His voice rang out clearly across the deathly silent Martial Arts Arena.

"Today's lesson ends here."

A wave of relieved gasps rose from the crowd.

But Chen Changsheng's next sentence plunged them into an icy abyss.

"All disciples who have completed the 'Hundred Deaths Achievement' may go to the cafeteria to receive a portion of Inedia Pills."

"As for those who haven't..."

He paused, revealing a warm smile.

"Continue tomorrow."

"Until it's done."