Yun Province.
It was one of the eighteen provinces of the Great Gan Dynasty, and one of the richest in spiritual energy.
Cloud Glow Mountain was the finest blessed land in all of Yun Province.
The entire mountain range rose and fell, its peaks towering into the clouds.
Clouds and mist swirled around the summits, making them appear and disappear like a celestial paradise.
Beneath Cloud Glow Mountain lay a massive spiritual vein.
It provided an endless supply of pure spiritual energy. Martial artists below the Grandmaster level could make progress by leaps and bounds when cultivating there.
Even ordinary people benefited greatly from staying there for long, nourished by the abundant spiritual energy.
This was the fundamental reason Cloud Glow Sect had endured for a thousand years and become one of the Great Gan Dynasty's three major sects.
Cloud Glow Sect's gates stood atop Cloud Glow Mountain.
Bathed in abundant spiritual energy, the entire sect was filled with jade palaces and celestial splendor.
At that moment, in an unremarkable side hall within Cloud Glow Sect—the Life Tablet Chamber—
Wang Xiaohu, the disciple responsible for watching over the life tablets, had just woken from a deep sleep.
He yawned and stretched, then began his daily routine as usual.
The Life Tablet Chamber was one of Cloud Glow Sect's most important places.
It housed the life tablets of every inner disciple, core disciple, and elder.
When a disciple joined the sect, they bound their life to a jade tablet by dripping a drop of their blood onto it.
While a person lived, their tablet shone; when they died, it shattered.
Wang Xiaohu's job was to inspect the tablets each day and immediately report any unusual changes.
It was an easy post, after all. Cloud Glow Sect was renowned throughout the land, and who would dare provoke its disciples as they traveled the martial world?
A tablet might not shatter once in several decades.
Wang Xiaohu first checked the elders' tablets on the topmost level. Row upon row of warm, lustrous jade tablets still gleamed as brightly as ever.
Next came the core disciples' tablets. They were the most outstanding of Cloud Glow Sect's younger generation.
To become a core disciple, one had to reach at least the Martial Master realm. The standard was clearly exacting.
As usual, Wang Xiaohu gave them a lazy glance and prepared to move on to the next section.
But when his gaze swept over one spot, he suddenly froze.
In the very corner, two tablets that should have been perfectly intact had shattered!
The tablets had broken into countless tiny fragments scattered across the shelf, their light completely extinguished.
"Clatter."
The rag slipped from Wang Xiaohu's hand and fell to the floor.
His face turned deathly pale in an instant, drained of all color.
Cold sweat the size of beans dripped from his forehead.
"D-dead... Someone's dead! Two Martial Master seniors, no less!"
He scrambled out of the Life Tablet Chamber and raced with all his strength toward the elders' residences.
"Disaster! Something terrible has happened! Elder Luoxia! The tablets... two life tablets have shattered!"
Luoxia Peak was one of the twelve peaks of Cloud Glow Sect, and one of the richest in spiritual energy.
But today, this usually tranquil peak was completely enveloped by a terrifying pressure.
Grandmaster Luoxia, who had been in secluded cultivation, was roused by a disciple's shrill cries.
The moment he heard that the life tablets had shattered, he hurried to the Life Tablet Chamber.
Grandmaster Luoxia was a renowned Grandmaster of Cloud Glow Sect. He had a fiery temper and fiercely protected his own.
Overseeing the Life Tablet Chamber was one of his duties.
When he stepped inside and saw the two shattered tablets, his body jolted!
He knew exactly whose tablets had been placed there.
They belonged to Zhou Fengyu and Zhao Wuji, both of them his personal disciples.
In his entire life, he had taken only these two personal disciples, whose talents were at least respectable.
He had treated them like his own children, passing on every skill he possessed, and hoped they would one day inherit his legacy.
But now, the two disciples on whom he had pinned such high hopes had both died on the same night?!
BOOM—!
An uncontrollable, frenzied force erupted from Grandmaster Luoxia's body.
The terrifying pressure of a Grandmaster swept across the entire mountain like a tsunami.
The sea of clouds churned wildly beneath this overwhelming force.
The trees on the mountain bent low in unison under the weight of it.
Every jade tablet in the Life Tablet Chamber began to hum, as if trembling with fear.
"Who?! Who did this?!"
Grandmaster Luoxia roared in fury, his voice rolling like thunder across Cloud Glow Sect.
Wang Xiaohu, the disciple who had brought the news, had already collapsed under the pressure and fainted.
Grandmaster Luoxia paid no heed to the unconscious Wang Xiaohu. His eyes bloodshot, he strode to the shattered tablets and picked up a fragment.
He closed his eyes and infused it with a thread of true qi, sensing the last trace of his disciple's presence left within the tablet.
A moment later, he snapped his eyes open, killing intent blazing in them.
"Qing Province... This place seems to be a remote village..."
Through the tablets, he had learned the place where his two disciples had met their end.
"Whoever you are! You dared kill my disciples! I'll tear you limb from limb and make sure you never know peace, even in death!"
Grandmaster Luoxia could no longer contain his fury and bloodlust.
He blurred forward, shot out of the Life Tablet Chamber, and soared into the sky as a streak of light.
He did not even report to the Sect Master, nor did he bring any of his disciples.
He would go himself!
He would personally avenge his two disciples!
He flew through the air at lightning speed, racing toward Qing Province.
A Grandmaster's fury was about to blaze across that distant land.
Not long after Grandmaster Luoxia left, several elders hurried over one after another.
They did not know that two core disciples had fallen, but the Grandmaster's pressure just now had been impossible to mistake.
"Hm? What happened? Why was that old Luoxia fool releasing his pressure all over the place?"
"What? A core disciple's life tablet shattered? Looks like it must have been one of Luoxia's disciples. No wonder he was so furious."
"Hmph. I wonder what blind fool dared kill a core disciple of Cloud Glow Sect. He's as good as dead."
"Let's inform the Sect Master first. Losing two core disciples is a serious blow to Cloud Glow Sect."
Elsewhere, in Qing Province, Lin Hanzhou still knew nothing of what had happened within Cloud Glow Sect.
He was sitting in a southbound carriage, leisurely eating a roast chicken he had just bought.
In his last Dream World, he had been the emperor who ruled all beneath heaven in the Great Sui Dynasty.
This time, being an unhurried martial artist wandering the world had its own unique charm.
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