Inside the hall, the Spirit Masters who had been kneeling on the floor and shouting moments ago all stood with their mouths wide open. They had lost even the ability to make a sound.
It was broken.
The divine punishment personally sent down by the Sea God had been casually shattered by a leaf!
Bibi Dong, seated in the front row, gripped the armrests of her chair tightly, her chest heaving.
Di Tian had risen to his feet. His golden pupils were filled with unprecedented fervor.
A willow leaf!
That was the power of that Charred Lightning-Struck Wood!
On the raised platform, Su Chen slowly withdrew his finger.
He glanced at Bo Saixi and the others lying motionless outside the door, then swept his gaze over the Spirit Masters kneeling in the hall before picking up the Gavel from the table.
Clack!
A sharp crack pulled everyone back from their extreme terror.
"Such a paltry trick, and you dare call yourselves gods?"
Su Chen sat back down in his grand chair and lifted his teacup.
"The storytelling continues!"
The Gavel's sharp crack rang through the hall.
Everyone immediately turned their eyes away from the doorway, straightened in their seats, and focused on the raised platform.
Outside, Bo Saixi and the seven Titled Douluo from Sea God Island still lay on the ground. No one went to help them, and no one dared even take another look.
Su Chen raised his teacup and took a sip, then gently set it down on the table.
"The storytelling continues."
His voice was calm. The fact that he had casually broken the divine punishment moments ago had stirred no emotion in him.
"Yesterday, I told you how Shi Hao reversed yin and yang in the yellow earth and remade his body. He came back to life."
"But when he awoke, he found that the Eight Regions of the Lower Realm had changed beyond recognition."
Su Chen picked up his folding fan and idly turned it over in his hand.
"The giants of the Upper Realm issued decrees and reaped the Lower Realm. The ancient traditions and mighty Venerables there had been nearly wiped out."
"The laws of heaven and earth had become incomplete, and the road to the Three Thousand Provinces of the Upper Realm had been severed completely."
"Shi Hao wanted to go to the Upper Realm. He wanted to find his parents and settle accounts with those Upper Realm traditions that regarded the people of the Lower Realm as grass."
"But the road was cut off."
The listeners in the hall listened with rapt attention.
Emperor Xue Ye leaned back in his chair, frowning slightly.
For someone bent on revenge, a severed road was the most despairing thing imaginable. It was like an ordinary person standing at the foot of a cliff, looking up at an enemy on the summit with no vines to climb.
"Shi Hao traveled throughout the Great Wilderness."
Su Chen's voice echoed through the hall.
"He went to ancient sacred mountains that had been destroyed and to the lairs of Primordial Remnants that had once been invincible."
"He searched through ruins for any ancient teleportation arrays that might have survived."
"He even crossed the vast ocean and visited remote islands where few people had ever set foot."
"But it was useless. The people of the Upper Realm had deliberately destroyed every cross-boundary formation. Even if a corner of one remained, it couldn't support a person crossing the barrier between worlds."
Dai Tianfeng sat in the front row. At this, he asked, "Mr. Su, if all the formations in the real world were destroyed, how could he still get up there? Could he fly up there on his own?"
Su Chen glanced at Dai Tianfeng and shook his head.
"An endless void of turbulent currents lies between the Upper and Lower Realms. Without an exact location and a passage, even a god who has kindled divine fire would lose his way in the void and eventually be torn apart by spatial storms."
"Since Shi Hao couldn't find a way in the real world, he turned his attention elsewhere."
Su Chen paused.
"The Void God Realm."
At the name, many people in the hall looked confused.
"The Void God Realm is a world constructed from the spirit."
Su Chen explained.
"Once their cultivation reaches a certain level, people can separate their spirits from their bodies and enter this world. Whatever happens there, and whatever insights they gain, will be reflected in their physical bodies in the real world."
"Shi Hao found a quiet place and sat cross-legged. His spirit transformed into a streak of light and entered the Void God Realm."
As Su Chen spoke, the scene slowly unfolded in midair.
Everyone saw Shi Hao's spirit arrive in a strange space.
There were ancient cities, endless mountain ranges, and many cultivators trading and sparring there.
"Shi Hao entered the Void God Realm and arrived at the Initial Grounds."
Su Chen pointed at the scene with his folding fan.
"As soon as he appeared, he ran into two familiar faces."
Two old men appeared in the scene.
One wore a ragged Daoist robe, with a bird missing all its feathers perched on his shoulder.
The bird looked listless, and the old man seemed half-asleep.
The other old man's eyes shone as he held a translucent bone coin, vigorously polishing it with his sleeve as he chuckled.
"One is called Bird Master, and the other Essence Wall Master."
Looking at the scene, Su Chen spoke with a hint of amusement.
"They're notorious old swindlers in the Initial Grounds of the Void God Realm."
"When Shi Hao first entered the Void God Realm as a child, these two old men latched onto him."
"They peddled so-called ancient treasure maps and the bones of peerless Ferocious Beasts."
"But after Shi Hao paid a fortune and took them home, he found the maps were doodled by the two of them, while the so-called peerless beast bones were just ordinary wild boar bones they'd polished."
"These two old scoundrels swindled and cheated their way around the Void God Realm, preying especially on young people who had just arrived."
"They sold fake medicine and fake maps. If they could scam someone out of money, they'd do it."
At that, the tense atmosphere in the hall instantly broke.
A Spirit Master from the Star Luo Empire couldn't help laughing aloud.
Looking at the two old men in the scene, who had none of the bearing of great masters and instead looked shifty-eyed and sly, he called out, "Aren't they just a pair of street thugs? There are swindlers like these in that so-called Perfect World, too?"
A sect elder from the Tiandou Empire beside him stroked his chin, looking disdainful.
"If these useless frauds were on our Douluo Continent, someone would've broken their legs and thrown them into the street long ago."
"Exactly."
A wandering cultivator in the back row chimed in.
"Strength rules the Soul Master World. These two old men dared to swindle young geniuses with powerful backing? They must have been courting death. They offended Shi Hao—didn't he kill them later?"
The Spirit Masters in the hall all started talking at once.
In their eyes, Shi Hao was decisive and ruthless. He dared to defy even gods—how could he tolerate two old swindlers swaggering about in front of him?
"Mr. Su, when Shi Hao entered the Void God Realm this time, did he happen to kill those two old swindlers?" Prince Xue Xing, seated beside Emperor Xue Ye, couldn't help asking.
He hated unruly commoners like these most of all.
Hearing the jeers and questions around the hall, Su Chen wasn't angry. He just found it a little amusing.
He picked up the folding fan from the table and tapped it lightly against the tabletop twice.
The hall fell silent at once.
"Kill them?"
Su Chen looked at the Spirit Masters below, their faces full of mockery, and his lips curled slightly.
"You think those two old men are weak?"
Prince Xue Xing paused, then said, "Aren't they? If they make their living by swindling people, how could they be powerful characters? True experts have no need for such despicable tricks."
Su Chen's smile faded, and his gaze gradually deepened.
"I told you just now."
"The Void God Realm is a world constructed from the spirit."
"But have you ever wondered who could have created such a vast world, one capable of holding the spirits of countless living beings?"
At the question, the people in the hall looked at one another.
Bibi Dong and Di Tian, however, grew serious.
They knew that if Su Chen was asking this, those two old men couldn't possibly be ordinary.
Su Chen slowly rose to his feet.
He looked at the two old men in the scene, still counting money and teasing the bird.
"They lost their memories of the past, and their spirits became incomplete. That's why they acted like two mischievous children, swindling people in the Initial Grounds of the Void God Realm."
"But if you trace their origins back to the immensely distant Immortal Ancient Era..."
"Back when the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths had not yet shattered, and the laws of heaven and earth were still whole..."
Su Chen's voice carried clearly through the hall.
"That old man with the bird perched on his shoulder..."
"His true form was an ancient, mutated True Dragon."
"He once contended with the greatest True Dragons for the title of the strongest under heaven. Though he was narrowly defeated, the myriad races honored him as Second Under Heaven."
Second Under Heaven!
At those four words, Di Tian shot to his feet in the corner.
He was the Black Dragon King himself, and he had an innate sensitivity to the bloodlines of dragons.
He knew just how terrifying a bloodline and combat prowess one would need to contend for the title of strongest under heaven in the form of a True Dragon.
Su Chen paid no heed to Di Tian's shock. He pointed at the old man counting money in the scene.
"And that greedy Essence Wall Master..."
"His true form was a living being born from supreme Immortal Gold endowed with a spirit."
"He was called the Immortal Gold Daoist."
"Both of them stood among the exalted ranks of the Immortal Kings."
Immortal Kings!
The air in the hall seemed to stop flowing.
The Spirit Masters who had been laughing at them as mere street thugs now stood with their mouths open, unable to utter a word.
Prince Xue Xing's face flushed red. It felt as though a wad of cotton were stuck in his throat.
Two Immortal Kings?
Two beings who stood at the pinnacle of the universe in Perfect World?
And they'd been selling fake maps in the Void God Realm?
"If they were Immortal Kings, why did they end up like this?" Dai Tianfeng couldn't help asking.
Su Chen glanced at him.
"Because, at the end of the Immortal Ancient Era, the Foreign Realm invaded."
"As the top fighters of the Nine Heavens and Ten Earths, the two of them stood on the front lines."
"That battle shattered heaven and earth."
"Their physical bodies were destroyed in battle, leaving only fragments of their spirits behind."
"But even so, they didn't leave."
Su Chen turned toward the scene in midair.
"Deep within the Void God Realm, terrifying Dark Matter and fallen beings are imprisoned."
"The two of them left their fragmented spirits here and became the two old men of the Initial Grounds."
"In truth, they were using the last of their strength to suppress the darkness deep within the Void God Realm, keeping those things from emerging and wreaking havoc upon the world."
Su Chen turned back and looked at those below who had spoken so disrespectfully.
"You said that on Douluo Continent, you would have beaten them to death long ago?"
Su Chen's tone was utterly calm.
"Even if they stood there without moving and every Spirit Master on your Douluo Continent, together with the gods you worship, hacked at them with weapons for ten thousand years..."
"You still wouldn't scratch a single hair on their spirits."
At that, not one person in the hall dared to speak.
Everyone felt their faces burning.
They had used their narrow-minded perspective to mock two supreme Immortal Kings who had once died fighting to protect the world and still suppressed the darkness to this day.
It wasn't just ignorance. It was ridiculous.
Su Chen returned to his grand chair and sat down.
"Shi Hao entered the Void God Realm and found those two old men."
"He brought out things that interested them and traded them for information."
"From them, Shi Hao finally learned of a way to reach the Upper Realm."
Su Chen picked up the Gavel from the table.
"At the end of the Void God Realm, there's a path."
"It's an abandoned ancient road, filled with all kinds of unknown dangers and ancient killing formations."
"Traveling that road to reach the Upper Realm means nine chances of death for every one of survival."
"But it was Shi Hao's only choice."
Su Chen looked at the listeners below, holding their breath.
"Shi Hao set foot on that ancient road."
"But the moment he stepped onto it, a phantom appeared ahead to block his way."
Su Chen gripped the Gavel and brought it down hard.
Smack!
"This phantom radiated the aura of a giant from the Upper Realm. He looked at Shi Hao and spoke coldly."
"Sinful Blood from the Lower Realm, and you still dream of ascending to the heavens?"
The corners of Su Chen's mouth lifted slightly.
"If you want to know who this phantom blocking the way was, and how Shi Hao would clear a path to the heavens..."
"Then..."
"We'll continue tomorrow."
As Su Chen's words rang out, the listeners in the hall first froze, then erupted into a wave of anguished wails.
"Mr. Su, you're leaving already?"
An elderly Sect Master slapped his thigh in desperation.
"Who was that phantom blocking the way? At least tell us his name!"
"Exactly! Can Shi Hao beat him? You've left us hanging like this—we won't get a wink of sleep tonight!"
The crowd in the hall pleaded desperately.
Some even pulled out a large handful of gold coins and tossed them onto the stage, begging Su Chen to tell them just half an incense stick more.
Yet faced with the crowd's fervor, Su Chen remained unmoved on the raised platform.
He casually folded his fan and tucked it into his belt.
Then, without so much as glancing at the audience, he turned and headed backstage.
"Sir, please wait..."
Xue Ye hurried forward, hoping to get another chance to make conversation.
But the Green-Clad Attendant beside him was quick to read the room. He stepped forward with impeccable politeness and held the crowd back.
"Honored guests, today's session is over. The proprietor needs to rest."
"If you wish to hear the story, please come early tomorrow."
Watching the attendant's unshakable smile, Dai Tianfeng, Bibi Dong, and the others all furrowed their brows, yet none dared make a scene.
As if!
The image of that willow leaf slicing the Sea God Trident to pieces was still fresh in their minds.
Who would dare provoke that man right now?
All they could do was sigh helplessly and leave, reluctant to go.
In the lounge on the top floor of the Listening Rain Pavilion.
Su Chen pushed open the door, walked over to the table, and poured himself a cup of cold tea.
As the crowd in the hall finally dispersed, the mechanical system prompt in his mind rang out right on cue.
[ Ding! Today's storytelling session has ended. Popularity points have been tallied! ]
[ Congratulations, host! Today's storytelling once again caused a sensation across the continent! ]
[ You successfully revealed the Immortal King's identity, shattered the Sea God's divine punishment, and shocked the Star Luo Great Emperor, Di Tian, and others! ]
[ Total popularity points gained this time: 12,000,000! ]
Hearing that figure, Su Chen nodded slightly.
Twelve million points.
As the story grew more engrossing—and with those people from Sea God Island practically lining up to get themselves killed today—the popularity points were indeed piling up at an impressive rate.
"System, open the system panel."
Su Chen did not rush to draw a reward. Instead, with a mere thought, he summoned his Unique Cave Heaven.
Buzz.
A deep black halo slowly appeared behind his head.
Su Chen gazed into the depths of the Cave Heaven.
At the very center of its dense, surging essence of creation, a giant egg belonging to a pure-blooded Green-Scaled Eagle floated quietly, its surface covered in patterns of green scales.
Compared to when he had first drawn it, the green runes on the egg had grown remarkably bright.
With each flash, it seemed to inhale and exhale the vast spiritual energy within the Cave Heaven.
Thump.
Thump.
A series of powerful heartbeats came from within the shell.
Even through the thick eggshell, Su Chen could clearly sense the primeval creature rapidly taking shape inside.
"After absorbing the aura released by the Thunder Emperor True Blood, even its bloodline has begun to mutate a little?"
Before you continue