The Immortal Sect

Qixia Mountain.

This was where the mountain gate of the Qixia Immortal Sect stood.

The Qixia Immortal Sect had been rooted in Linyuan Prefecture for countless years.

However, before the Great You Dynasty was established, this land had undergone a cataclysmic change.

The entire continent was like a bubble that had been punctured, and the spiritual energy of heaven and earth began to dwindle beyond recovery.

The consequences of spiritual energy drying up were fatal. Cultivators' lifespans and the realms they could reach had both steadily declined along with it.

After that cataclysm, the Great You Dynasty rose from the ground, the various powers were reshuffled, and a new balance was established.

In the past, the Immortal Sects had stood high above the world, treating mortal dynasties as if their rulers held divine authority. But now, as spiritual energy continued to wane and the Immortal Sects' foundations were steadily eroded, the Great You Dynasty had grown increasingly assertive in its dealings with them.

As one side waned and the other waxed, the Qixia Immortal Sect's resources had dwindled considerably.

When resources were plentiful, the Immortal Sect had recruited large numbers of disciples with "mixed spiritual roots." But over the past century, with cultivation resources so scarce, the sect had become increasingly strict about spiritual root aptitude, accepting almost exclusively those with variant or Heavenly Spiritual Roots.

This was because, in an era when the spiritual energy of heaven and earth was in decline, people with spiritual roots were becoming rarer and rarer. Moreover, once cultivators entered the Qi Refining Realm, the higher their cultivation, the less likely they were to have children.

And if they frequently used dual cultivation techniques to have children, the backlash would harm their own cultivation.

Although the offspring of cultivators had a higher chance of possessing spiritual roots than the children of mortals, it was by no means guaranteed.

Therefore, these days, many cultivation families had one chief hope and demand for ordinary mortals in their clans who lacked spiritual roots: they wanted them to have as many children as possible, gambling on sheer numbers.

Beyond the decline in spiritual energy, the gap in the Immortal Sects' high-level combat strength was also severe.

In the cultivation world today, the legendary Nascent Soul great cultivators had long since vanished. Even Golden Core cultivators had become as rare as phoenix feathers and qilin horns.

Before the cataclysm, Foundation Establishment cultivators had to undergo the crucial process of "opening a Purple Mansion" before they could form a Golden Core. But opening a Purple Mansion consumed an astronomical amount of resources, and the conditions of the world today simply could not support it.

So cultivators of the present day had no choice but to give up on opening a Purple Mansion and forcefully form their cores. The price, however, was that without the foundation of a Purple Mansion, they would forever lose the possibility of advancing to Spirit Transformation.

In addition, according to old tales, although cultivators with mixed spiritual roots cultivated extremely slowly in the early stages, if they could endure all the way to the Nascent Soul Realm, their chances of breaking through to Spirit Transformation were far higher than those of cultivators with Heavenly or variant Spiritual Roots. But now, not only was Spirit Transformation an illusion, even forming a Golden Core was fraught with difficulty.

The advantages of Heavenly and variant Spiritual Roots—rapid early cultivation and lower resource consumption—had become even more pronounced.

These days, even if the Qixia Immortal Sect emptied most of its reserves, it might not be able to support a cultivator with mixed spiritual roots through Core Formation. More tragically, Golden Core cultivators now lived only a little over three hundred years at most, nothing like the Golden Core cultivators of before the cataclysm, who could live five or six hundred years with ease.

Faced with this general decline, the Qixia Immortal Sect could only struggle to preserve its dignity.

It should be remembered that when the Great You Dynasty had just been founded, the Qixia Immortal Sect had been the undisputed local tyrant of Linyuan Prefecture. They had even brazenly seized mortal martial artists from their territory and brought them up the mountain, using them as "materials" for cultivation or even as "potent ingredients" to aid in alchemy.

But times had changed. The Great You Dynasty Court had grown stronger by the day and established a special Bureau of Profound Mysteries. The Court strictly forbade the Immortal Sects from seizing martial artists. If any cultivator dared to do so, the Bureau's experts would show no mercy in hunting them down and suppressing them.

Of course, even with such strict rules, the extreme scarcity of cultivation resources still drove some cultivators—those nearing the end of their lifespans or trapped at a bottleneck—to take the risk in secret and reach their hands toward mortal martial artists.

The inner sect of Qixia Mountain.

Qin Wan had been a disciple of the Qixia Immortal Sect for some time now.

Only after truly entering the sect did she realize that it was nothing like the immortal paradise mortals imagined, where people lived free of worldly desires and resources were inexhaustible.

To fight over the tiny amounts of Spirit Stones and pills distributed to the disciples, fellow sect members schemed against one another with a cruelty that surpassed even the cutthroat rivalries of wealthy households in the mortal world.

In addition, while consulting the sect's records, she had finally learned what the Dao Registry was.

As it turned out, the reason the Great You Dynasty had risen on this continent and suppressed the Immortal Sects was that, at the beginning of the dynasty, a group of terrifyingly powerful cultivators had lent their strength.

These cultivators had originally held positions of great importance in various Immortal Sects and Demon Sects. Some had even been designated as their sects' heirs. But during that cataclysm, they had chosen to sever all ties with their original sects and support a mortal dynasty instead.

It was because of their betrayal that the various Immortal Sects had suffered devastating losses, allowing the Great You Dynasty to establish its rule.

In the eyes of the Immortal Sects and Demon Sects, these people were traitors who had betrayed their masters and ancestors. They were all derisively branded "Dao Traitors."

According to the records, when the Great You Dynasty was first founded, there had been thirty-six lineages of those top cultivators known as "Dao Traitors."

The Great You Dynasty had granted the descendants of those thirty-six lineages many generous privileges. One of them was the bestowal of the Dao Registry.

Not every descendant could inherit the Dao Registry, but as long as a family's bloodline continued, the Court would ensure that at least one person in each generation inherited it. However, if only women remained in a generation, the Dao Registry ended there, because it could never be passed to a different surname's bloodline.

In any case, those who possessed the Dao Registry formed the firmest foundation of the Great You Dynasty. Among the Great You nobles active in the Court and throughout the provinces, there were many who held the Dao Registry.

Qin Wan had learned from the sect's records that every Dao Registry descendant with a spiritual root could directly claim an initial allotment of cultivation resources from the Great You Imperial House's Imperial Household Department.

Among the resources she had discovered so far were a Foundation Establishment Pill and an Ascension Order.

Qin Wan did not know what the Ascension Order was for.

But by now, she deeply understood how important the Foundation Establishment Pill was to cultivators.

In recent years, the Great You Dynasty had completely monopolized the key ingredients needed to refine Foundation Establishment Pills.

Even if the Immortal Sects wanted to refine Foundation Establishment Pills themselves, it had become extremely difficult. On top of that, the Court had imposed quotas on how many Foundation Establishment Pills each sect could produce. If a sect dared to refine more in secret and the Court discovered it, it would face severe punishment.

In short, the Great You Dynasty Court was doing everything it could to weaken the Immortal Sects.

Even if the Immortal Sects sent spies to infiltrate the Court, they could easily be exposed—or simply assimilated by the Court. After all, serving the Court clearly offered better prospects and more resources, and those capable of cultivation were generally clever people who knew how to seek fortune and avoid disaster.

Originally, someone with Qin Wan's variant Spiritual Root aptitude could have advanced directly to Foundation Establishment, even without help from a Foundation Establishment Pill. But now, with the spiritual energy of heaven and earth depleted, the environment no longer allowed it.

These days, even a Heavenly Spiritual Root, one in ten thousand, needed a Foundation Establishment Pill to succeed.

Although the Qin Family was wealthy in the mortal world, at the end of the day they were merely a merchant household. They had no connections or backing within the Qixia Immortal Sect. Competition for the sect's existing Foundation Establishment Pill quota was fierce, and this round would almost certainly pass Qin Wan by.

Without a Foundation Establishment Pill, she could not achieve Foundation Establishment. And without Foundation Establishment, the brilliant immortal path she had once hoped for naturally grew dim.

But when the Immortal Sect had accepted her as a disciple, they had not mentioned this cruel truth at all. In the end, the Qin Family's information had simply been too outdated, and they knew too little about the cultivation world.

The reason Qin Wan had looked into the Dao Registry was that she had remembered the marriage contract between herself and Xia Dong. She clearly remembered that Xia Dong's household register stated that he held the Dao Registry.

Now that she had entered an Immortal Sect and learned these things, Qin Wan finally realized what she had missed when she broke off the engagement.

But Qin Wan was proud. The path had been her choice, and she could never bring herself to go back to Xia Dong now with a thick face.

What was more, the Great You laws were strict, and marriage between Dao Registry descendants and disciples of the Immortal Sects was explicitly forbidden.

If the authorities discovered the two of them had secretly gotten together, they would have broken the law. She did not know whether Xia Dong would be severely punished as a Dao Registry descendant, but as a disciple of an Immortal Sect, she would certainly face harsh punishment from the Great You authorities.

So in truth, that way out had already been blocked.

As for why Xia Dong possessed the Dao Registry, Qin Wan's father did not know either. Although Master Qin had known Xia Dong's father for a long time, he knew nothing about Xia Dong's father's background.

He only knew that Xia Dong's parents had come from the Capital City.

And that they had never returned to the Capital City during their lifetimes.

Still, there was no doubt that Xia Dong held the Dao Registry.

Master Qin had already confirmed this with an old clerk at the Linyuan Prefecture Office.

It was just that these old clerks did not know much about the Dao Registry either.

In truth, the Dao Registry was nothing more than an admission ticket. How much use it could be was still up to one's own ability and the favor of fate.

But Qin Wan knew that possessing the Dao Registry was, in itself, a sign of fate's "favor."

She was still a long way from Foundation Establishment, so if Xia Dong could have a child with a spiritual root, she might have a chance to exchange for it someday.

After all, the Foundation Establishment Pill of a Dao Registry descendant was "legal."

What was more, the Ascension Order was surely no ordinary item either.

In short, since she had already missed her chance, all she could do was try her best to make amends.

However, ever since she had last sent Xia Dong a letter and some Spirit Stones, he had not written back, so Qin Wan could not find an excuse to send him another letter.

Fortunately, her father had mentioned in his letter that Xia Dong was still working with the Qin Family.

Qin Wan had also read Tale of Liu Yi.

But after finishing it, she could not help thinking:

Actually, I'm the "Liu Yi."

But she had missed Xia Dong, her "Dragon Lady."

As expected of a Dao Registry descendant, even without a spiritual root, he had passed the county-level examination with ease.

"Forget it. I missed the chance to offer help when it was needed, so I'll just have to do more when it's no longer needed."

These past few days, Xia Dong still had not written back, so Qin Wan sent him another letter and secretly tucked in two Spirit Stones. They were the fruits of all her hard saving.

As the daughter of a merchant family, she believed that in the long run, this kind of thing would pay off.

She was still young. She could afford to wait!