Truth and Falsehood No Longer Mattered

In the blink of an eye, everything was settled.

The Joy Lantern Priest had not even managed to escape with his shattered Yin God, and the existence behind him had been unable to take him away either.

After Cècè tossed the Yin God into the abyss at the end of the hillside, she returned to her original form. The Abyss of Despair, which had been paused, resumed its former state, looking as though nothing had changed.

Yu Ziqing paid little attention to this. He stood where he was, eyes closed as he sensed the changes in his body.

After every explosive attack, the temporarily acquired power would not immediately dissipate once the opponent died. This brief period when it remained was what Yu Ziqing considered most crucial.

The enemies he had encountered before had been far too weak. Even when he could draw his sword and kill them instantly, the power he gained had not actually been very strong.

Yu Ziqing had made two guesses. First, perhaps the information he had received was not detailed enough and merely satisfied the minimum requirements for triggering the judgment.

Second, perhaps there was no need to use a cannon against a mosquito. Of course, Yu Ziqing felt this guess was not quite accurate. More likely, the opponent only had a hundred points of health, while his single strike could deal ten thousand damage. The opponent could only lose a hundred health points anyway, so as long as the damage overflowed by a large margin, that was enough.

The last time he had drawn his sword, it had triggered the path of Body Refining, with his Blood Essence surging like a furnace.

This time, Yu Ziqing had thought he would receive some flashy sword techniques, but in the end, what he gained was once again the power of the path of Spirit Refining, just like the Joy Lantern Priest.

Without precise control, the power of his spirit overflowed continuously. His soul grew stronger and clearer, his consciousness became exceptionally sharp, and he could see things normally invisible. At a glance, he could see through the essence of an opponent's secret technique, and the speed of his thoughts had increased considerably.

From seeing something, to relaying it to his brain, to making a judgment and responding, the time consumed by the entire process had become almost synchronized with his opponent's. His intent reached wherever his power went.

The Blood Essence surging through his body had also become exceptionally clear, and he could grasp it effortlessly with a single thought.

The power he had gained this time was fundamentally too high-level. He possessed only instinctive control and could not understand its core at all. For now, he could only do his best to familiarize himself with it, letting his body and consciousness remember and grow accustomed to this sensation.

If he walked this path from the beginning again in the future, it would be easier for him than for others. At the very least, he would instinctively know the right way forward and would not make mistakes.

If these powers were compared to a car, he was currently like someone driving one, knowing how to drive it and how to use it.

Cultivation, however, was the process of starting from nothing: beginning with all kinds of precise parts, then moving on to the operating system, and finally building a car of one's own, followed by all sorts of modifications and delicate operations.

He had never walked the path of Spirit Refining before and had not even entered its threshold. Naturally, he was completely blind. Compared with Spirit Refining cultivators who possessed the same power, he was more like someone driving a Mud Truck into his enemies and crushing them...

After letting his body and consciousness memorize that sensation, Yu Ziqing gave up on further research.

Asking someone who had not even finished first grade to study complex analysis was simply absurd. He might as well wash up and go to sleep; even his dreams might not contain it...

To avoid wasting time, Yu Ziqing focused on using the power he had gained to complete Body Refining.

It was simply far too convenient to control things with this power.

The instant the thought arose, the restless Blood Essence became like tame lambs, circulating entirely according to Yu Ziqing's will. He quickly completed the Marrow Cleansing stage, then continued opening one hundred and fifty-eight acupoints. He still had strength to spare, with almost nothing wasted and barely any expenditure.

Likewise, to avoid wasting this rare experience of having a cheat enabled, Yu Ziqing first opened the thirty-six death acupoints, then the remaining seventy-two Vital Acupoints, and finally opened all fifty unusual acupoints as well.

At that moment, a feeling of emptiness swept over him. His consciousness grew somewhat blurred, and everything before his eyes, which had been exceptionally clear, seemed covered by a layer of mist. He could no longer see clearly.

Yu Ziqing stood where he was and spent quite some time adapting before he finally adjusted again.

Nothing around him had changed. It was simply difficult to go from luxury back to frugality, and he was not accustomed to it.

Old Yang had said more than once that the one hundred and eight Vital Acupoints and the fifty unusual acupoints actually served no particularly great purpose. The one hundred and eight in particular were considered relatively dangerous. In the past, some top Body Refining experts had opened only two or three hundred acupoints during the Return to the Acupoints stage.

At this stage, it was true that the more acupoints one opened, the stronger one's Blood Essence became. However, compared with reaching the next stage, the Blood Sea Realm, this enhancement was completely insignificant.

As for the benefits, theoretically, the lethality of the death acupoints would plummet. But that was only in theory. In actual combat, with attacks coming from high above and sweeping out in broad, powerful arcs, it was not of much significance.

Yu Ziqing had not blindly believed Old Yang. He had long seen that Old Yang had once been the sort who looked down on body cultivators, and his understanding and research of body cultivation were clearly inferior to those of other subjects.

In any case, Yu Ziqing felt that if they were useless, then so be it. He would treat them as ordinary acupoints. Since he had the ability, he might as well take the opportunity to resolve the difficult parts first, then slowly work on the easier ones himself.

He refused to believe that there were clearly seven hundred and twenty acupoints, yet he could not open all of them. If so many acupoints were truly useless while also being dangerous, who had marked them out in the beginning? How had they known that opening those acupoints was dangerous?

After thinking it over, Yu Ziqing felt that, ultimately, his range of knowledge was simply too narrow.

Old Yang had probably been trying to maintain his persona and had been too embarrassed to admit that he actually knew very little about this area...

While Yu Ziqing was still pondering wildly, Er Han, who had been sent flying, charged back into the Abyss of Despair. After seeing Yu Ziqing and the Joy Lantern Priest's corpse, he hurriedly asked an utterly pointless question.

"Brother Yu, are you all right?"

"I don't know what happened just now. I couldn't get in here, and I was worried sick."

"We'll talk after we get out." Yu Ziqing replied, then immediately cupped his hands toward Cècè from afar. "Thank you, miss, for coming to our aid. We're all one household, so I won't stand on ceremony."

Cècè ignored him, still completely immersed in her little stage play and unable to pull herself out of it.

Yu Ziqing pointed at the Joy Lantern Priest's corpse.

"Clean it up. Don't dirty someone else's place. Take it out and dispose of it."

Er Han obediently dug a foot into the ground, excavating the corpse together with the soil.

When they left the Abyss of Despair, the Village Chief and Old Yang were already waiting outside, along with some villagers whose eyes were red and who were panting heavily. They seemed unable to wait any longer.

"I'm fine, and that Joy Lantern Priest is dead too." After speaking, Yu Ziqing looked back at the Abyss of Despair. "Cècè suddenly attacked. She tossed the Yin God cultivated by that Joy Lantern Priest into the abyss behind the hillside."

"Everyone, disperse." The Village Chief waved his hand, sending the crowd away.

He was not blind. At a glance, he could tell that the Joy Lantern Priest had been split in two by a sword. Yu Ziqing had not lied, but he had only told half the truth.

After everyone had dispersed, Yu Ziqing spread his hands before Old Yang and the Village Chief.

"All right, I suddenly erupted with a burst of power and cut the Joy Lantern Priest in half. But that fellow had cultivated a Yin God. His physical body was destroyed, but his Yin God remained.

"Then, some power that did not belong to him suddenly surged out from within his Yin God. Some Runes transformed into chains and tried to forcibly drag his Yin God away from Cècè's Abyss of Despair.

"Then, I don't know what happened, but Cècè suddenly attacked. She forcibly seized his Yin God and tossed it into the abyss behind the hillside. Only after that did the Abyss of Despair return to its original state."

Old Yang glanced at the Joy Lantern Priest's corpse, then pointed at the Locust tree forest for Er Han.

"Toss it into the Locust tree forest. Don't take anything on him. Throw everything in, including those white robes."

The Storage Bag on the Joy Lantern Priest looked quite high-grade, and it certainly contained plenty of good things. But Er Han had no concept of whether something was valuable or not. Upon hearing this, he immediately threw everything into the Locust tree forest.

That strange Locust tree forest accepted both meat and vegetables. Even the white robes were devoured completely.

At the edge of the Locust tree forest, new saplings began to sprout and spread. Yet, for some reason, not a single new sapling spread toward the Abyss of Despair. The saplings spreading toward the village withered the instant they emerged.

In the end, only the saplings growing toward the side began to sprout and grow. Within a few short breaths, they became towering trees.

Old Yang sighed.

"The chains you saw came from the White Sun Holy Mother they spoke of.

"It seems that this generation of White Sun Evil Sacrifice had learned from the previous lesson. They had already built up some strength before daring to come out and act. The White Sun Holy Mother of this generation had already emerged.

"It's probably going to become even more chaotic from here on.

"They definitely won't let this opportunity pass. They'll surely make a huge mess of things on the Wasteland.

"We have to make preparations as soon as possible. This place is no longer safe."

Those words left everyone somewhat silent.

Instead, they were no longer so concerned about the changes in the Abyss of Despair.

Yu Ziqing, however, had a feeling that the Abyss of Despair seemed to have been changing all along. It had grown stronger now.

High above the snow-covered Wasteland, a ball of flame streaked through the sky, with a mass of icy-blue divine light in hot pursuit.

Suddenly, more than a dozen blue-gold streams of light shot out from the icy-blue divine light. The streams curved around, their speed abruptly multiplying several times as they attacked the fiery light from all directions.

A violent explosion rang out. Countless icicles burst apart within the flames, and the ball of fire fell toward the ground.

When the radiance faded, General Gong Ze of Great Li was covered in bloody ice chunks. His armor had shattered and fallen away in large sections. Beneath him, the intact parts of his Flame Dragon Horse had transformed into a gigantic ice hedgehog, countless icicles piercing it from within outward, while most of its body had shattered into large chunks of blood-red ice.

Gong Ze spat out several pieces of blood frozen into ice. Flames roared from his body and enveloped them. Then he looked up at the ball of light descending from the sky.

"An Lan, stop pretending. Do you think that changing to a new Dharma Treasure and altering your aura slightly will let you pose as someone from Great Zhen?

"Among Great Qian, who could use the Ice Frost Secret Technique to such a level and surpass you?"

After Gong Ze finished speaking, the icy-blue light floating in midair dispersed. A cold-faced woman in a black robe appeared. A Dharma Treasure shaped like an ice spike floated beside her. The ice spikes on it continuously fell and vanished, while new ones constantly drilled out.

"As expected, it's you." Gong Ze bared his teeth and let out a cold laugh.

His opponent now possessed a new Dharma Treasure of tremendous might. Combined with the environment here, her overall strength had increased by at least thirty percent. He knew that he was no match for her.

Even after her identity was exposed, An Lan's expression did not change. She simply spoke in an indifferent voice.

"Gong Ze, you ambushed and tried to kill Chu Ye, the head of Langya Academy of Great Qian. I'll kill you here today. Even the Li Emperor won't have anything to say."

"Go to hell with that nonsense!" Gong Ze cursed furiously. He had never even seen Chu Ye's shadow, so when had he ever ambushed the head of Langya Academy?

The moment the curse left his mouth, Gong Ze understood. His opponent was merely looking for an excuse to kill him. Whether it was true or false did not matter.

As long as he died, it would become true.