The Heaven-Connecting Path Appears

Central Capital, Wenchang Pavilion.

"Virtuous Teacher?" Chancellor of Literature Yan Baichuan looked at the message jade slip he had just received and smiled faintly. "That old bull-nose Qingwei's horizons are still too narrow. Why didn't he confer the title of Great Teacher of Virtuousness?"

Wei Yan, seated across the chessboard, chuckled ingratiatingly. "According to the records of the Daoist sect, only four Great Teachers of Virtuousness have appeared throughout history. All of them were figures who had rendered immense services to the Daoist sect. How could that brat possibly deserve the title?"

Yan Baichuan casually scattered the chess pieces and said, "I imagine the people sent to receive that brat have been detained by the Daoist sect. You'd better make the trip, Tianyi."

Wei Yan asked, "What's our plan?"

Yan Baichuan smiled faintly. "United, we both benefit; divided, we both suffer. The Daoist sect wants face, while the imperial court wants substance. I'll personally go to Xuantan Palace later and bargain with old Qingwei!"

Wei Yan nodded and rose to leave.

Watching Wei Yan's departing back, Yan Baichuan's gaze fell once more on the scattered chessboard, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

"Close one. If I hadn't used Confucianism's Divine Ability, I would've nearly lost to him..."

Little did he know that Wei Yan, who was hurrying away, was also breathing a sigh of relief.

"Close one. I nearly won against Minister Wen by accident..."

Floating Cloud Market, Money Falling Pavilion.

Under a maid's guidance, Chen Luo walked toward his new lodgings. As for the title of Virtuous Teacher, Chen Luo had not given a definite answer. He truly needed to consider it carefully. After all, as far as the Daoist sect was concerned, they believed there was only one Zhong Kui. But Chen Luo knew that within the forest of books in his dreams, there were still legends of many Daoist figures absent from this world...

For example, the Eight Immortals of the Upper Caverns; the Ten Yama Kings; the Heavenly Court; the Investiture of the Gods...

Could one title of Virtuous Teacher really be exchanged for so many things?

I need to charge extra!

As Chen Luo's thoughts ran wild, he followed the maid into a new small building, one more secluded than his previous residence.

"Perfect. I'll completely open the final meridian today." Chen Luo made arrangements in his mind. After sensing the mutation in the Red Dust Qi earlier, the speed at which he opened his meridians had increased considerably. At present, only the final section of the Yin Linking Vessel remained.

Strangely enough, the meridians in this final section seemed to be separated by an obvious membrane, costing Chen Luo quite a bit of time. Vaguely, Chen Luo felt that once he broke through this membrane and completely opened the Twelve Regular Meridians and Eight Extraordinary Vessels, something would happen.

"There's no need to bring me food." After instructing the maid, Chen Luo was about to begin cultivating when he suddenly noticed something strange about her. She showed no intention of leaving.

"Miss... sister?" Chen Luo asked tentatively. "Is there something else?"

The maid looked at Chen Luo. "This servant does indeed have something to trouble Earl with..."

When Chen Luo heard that voice, his vigilance surged. He was just about to shout when the maid exhaled toward him. In an instant, a wave of cold air enveloped Chen Luo, and frost formed over his entire body. In the blink of an eye, he was sealed inside a block of ice.

The maid's face blurred, revealing her true appearance. It was none other than the Great Yin Cold Toad—Ning Bing.

Ning Bing hurried over to Chen Luo, who had been frozen into a block of ice. She pressed one hand against the ice and raised the other, a Dao Talisman appearing in her grasp. Ning Bing sent her demonic power into the Dao Talisman. The talisman shattered, and a surge of Power of Space was born from within, enveloping Chen Luo and Ning Bing before they vanished from the spot.

Daoist sect Talisman—Thousand Mile Wind Talisman!

The instant the talisman activated, Granny Jin, who had been sitting beside Jin Guagua's bed, seemed to sense something. She glanced toward Chen Luo's residence and gently raised the bamboo staff in her hand. With a single thought, she could activate the formation of Money Falling Pavilion and suppress the spatial fluctuation. But her gaze swept over Jin Guagua, and in the end, she sighed softly before bringing the staff down hard. She did not stop Ning Bing's escape. Instead, she disrupted Dao Lord Tian Ling, who was preparing to give chase.

"Jin Sanshun!" Dao Lord Tian Ling's furious roar rang out, and a beam of light shot into the sky. It was Dao Lord Tian Ling. But before he could demand an explanation from Granny Jin, a resounding laugh came from afar—

"When friends come from afar, is that not a joy?"

"Daoist Friend Tian Ling has soared into the sky to welcome me. Wei is ashamed..."

Wei Yan had arrived!

Although Chen Luo was sealed inside a block of ice, his consciousness remained clear. He only felt the surrounding space turning upside down. After he had no idea how long, the sensation of weightlessness vanished, and he and Ning Bing appeared in a secluded mountain forest.

Ning Bing set Chen Luo down without saying a word, then immediately summoned the Soul Shaking Pagoda. After striking out several hand seals, the Soul Shaking Pagoda once again flew above Chen Luo's head as before, radiating a powerful suction force. The difference was that this time, it seemed no one would come to rescue him.

Wei Yan wore a cold expression. The Righteous Qi around him was almost tangible, shrouding the entire Money Falling Pavilion. Dao Lord Tian Ling continuously cast divinations and calculations, while Granny Jin sat in a chair with her eyes closed, seemingly regarding everything as unrelated to her.

"Master, Ning Bing is sensible. She won't harm the Virtuous Teacher's life." True Person Yuanxia tried to excuse Jin Sanshun and spoke softly.

"She'd better not dare!" Wei Yan snorted coldly. "If anything happens to that boy Chen, she can forget about keeping several centuries of cultivation!"

True Person Yuanxia frowned slightly and saluted Wei Yan. "Great Scholar Wei, your Confucianism places the greatest emphasis on human relationships. Sanshun and Ning Bing only committed this error for Guagua's sake. Taking a step back, Guagua saved Chen Luo's life, and Ning Bing merely took back what Guagua had given him. The Soul Shaking may be inappropriate, but it is still better than Soul Splitting. Otherwise, what do you suggest? Did saving someone have to result in an entire family becoming enemies?"

Wei Yan cast a sidelong glance at True Person Yuanxia. "Sophistry—seemingly reasonable, but fundamentally false. It was Jin Guagua who saved Chen Luo, and it was also Jin Guagua who merged souls with him. If Jin Guagua stood before Chen Luo and said a word, dissolving the Soul Merging, then let alone Soul Shaking—even Soul Splitting would be their own affair. If Chen Luo agreed, then even if he returned his life, no one could say anything."

"What angers this old man is that all of you are using the words of family members to hold a debt of gratitude over him, forcing him with it. Now you've even openly abducted someone, yet you're still putting on a look of being moved by heaven and earth. Is that boy Chen truly an ungrateful villain? ...Who, exactly, turned an act of saving someone into an act of making enemies?"

True Person Yuanxia moved her lips, still wanting to speak, when Granny Jin suddenly said, "Great Scholar Wei is right! Earl of Wan'an has never said anything about shirking responsibility. This was originally a matter for the younger generation, and we meddled where we had no place. There's no point saying more now. We should find Ning Bing and Earl of Wan'an as soon as possible."

At that moment, Dao Lord Tian Ling, who had been calculating all along, suddenly stopped moving his hands and looked toward Wei Yan. "I found them!"

Chen Luo seemed to have entered a void space with neither above nor below. Just as he was trying to find an exit, a sudden thunderous boom erupted in the void. The sound waves almost became tangible. Chen Luo's vision blurred, and he felt countless thoughts emerge in his mind, followed by countless others dissipating. His entire being nearly entered a state of shutdown. In that state, Chen Luo vaguely sensed something within his body loosen.

It was his divine soul!

Another thunderous boom exploded above Chen Luo's head. The loosened divine soul shook once more, as though it had fallen into a groove that had just become perfectly compatible. It fit flawlessly.

At that instant of perfect compatibility, a brief clarity appeared in Chen Luo's mind. He immediately understood that, after transmigrating through souls, a tiny barrier had still existed between his divine soul and his body. That barrier was precisely the sense of estrangement he had felt during the final part of opening his meridians. Under the Soul Shaking, it was as though his divine soul had been fine-tuned, finally achieving perfect compatibility.

Chen Luo did not know that only when a person was still in the womb, at the moment the divine soul first emerged, could it perfectly match the physical body. Once a person was born, the divine soul and body would both deviate slightly. Children who could still maintain a perfect match between soul and body after birth were called those in whom Wenqu had descended into the mortal world by the Confucian sect, Innate Dao Bodies by the Daoist sect, and Immaculate Spirit Children by the Buddhist sect.

During that brief moment of clarity, Chen Luo mobilized the Red Dust Qi within his body, which had been depleted until only the final trace remained, and sent it into the Yin Linking Vessel. The Red Dust Qi once again found the unstoppable momentum it had possessed before, breaking through the final section in one surge.

At this point, the Twelve Meridians were open!

The Eight Extraordinary Vessels were open!

The Meridian Opening Realm had been perfectly achieved!

Chen Luo sensed a vast and mighty force crossing the distance between spaces and rushing into this void, anchoring the entire expanse of nothingness.

At the same time, in the outside world, Ning Bing, who was controlling the Soul Shaking Pagoda, was also suppressed by a vast force and rendered immobile. Fine cracks began appearing on the Soul Shaking Pagoda. Ning Bing wanted to continue activating it, but she was powerless before that force. The sensation was extremely similar to what she had felt two hundred years ago, when she had witnessed Daoist Qingwei undergo his tribulation alongside Granny Jin.

Heavenly Might!

Just then, the sky let out a strange sound. It was extraordinarily peculiar, resembling both cheers and the grateful voices of countless people, with the chanting of scriptures mixed in among them.

At that very moment, whether in the Thirteen Prefectures of Great Xuan, the Barbarian Plains of the Northern Regions, the demon lands of the southern frontier, the Sea of Stars to the east, or the Western Regions Buddhist Kingdom, countless humans, demons, and barbarians were drawn to the sound and raised their heads toward the sky.

Wei Yan, Dao Lord Tian Ling, and Granny Jin were flying swiftly through the air. The instant the sound rang out, they were suppressed by Heavenly Might and fell from the sky, landing on the ground.

They raised their heads and looked toward the heavens.

In the starry night sky, black as ink, it seemed as though someone had cleaved it open. A seven-colored river of stars appeared within, stretching to the horizon. The stars dimmed, while the bright moon hid behind the dark clouds, making the rainbow colors shine even more dazzlingly against the night.

"The Heaven-Connecting Path!" Wei Yan cried out. "This is the Heaven-Connecting Path!"

Dao Lord Tian Ling could not conceal the astonishment on his face either. He muttered, "It's actually the Heaven-Connecting Path!"

Even Granny Jin, whose gaze had always been calm, now showed shock. A Heaven-Connecting Path was a path of cultivation. Since ancient times, the Heaven-Connecting Path had appeared only three times.

When a Saint lectured, blue filled the heavens, opening the Confucian sect's Heaven-Connecting Path.

When the Dao Ancestor transmitted the Dao, purple qi came from the east, opening the Daoist sect's Heaven-Connecting Path.

When the Buddha preached the Dharma, golden lotuses surged from the earth, opening the Buddhist sect's Heaven-Connecting Path.

Now, with the stars dimmed and the bright moon retreating, it was clear that a Great Sage had opened a fourth path—a seven-colored Heaven-Connecting Path!

Granny Jin focused her gaze, and her heart shook once more. She murmured, "Seniors, the place where that fortune descended seems to be where Chen Luo and Ning Bing are..."

A crane rose through the clouds beneath the clear sky, carrying the title of the book into the rankings.

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