Tuo Buchuan

What woke Yang Ning was the sound of rushing water.

With great effort, he opened his eyes, feeling as if his neck had been hit by a truck. Half his body had gone numb, he couldn't turn his head, and he could only see a small patch of space in front of him.

It seemed to be a cave, damp and filled with the constant drip of water. Listening to the sound of a waterfall nearby and feeling the moisture hitting his face, it was obvious—he was inside the waterfall.

He never imagined there really was a Water Curtain Cave inside a waterfall!

Before him, the flowing water gathered into a small stream, where silver fish frolicked. But as they swam, streaks of seven-colored rainbow light began to shimmer across their bodies.

"..." Yang Ning was stunned. The principle behind the birth of the Seven-Colored Rainbow Silver Fish, something countless people had failed to understand, was now unfolding right before his eyes. Were these fish originally just ordinary silver fish that transformed?

But why?

Yang Ning's eyes shifted sideways, and he spotted a bead at the source of the stream, pulsing like a breathing light, sitting in the water.

"Is it because of this thing?" Yang Ning didn't believe ordinary water could turn silver fish into Seven-Colored Rainbow Silver Fish. If that were the case, fishermen would have caught silver fish and kept them in tanks long ago—they'd have transformed by now!

"You're an Immortal Seedling from the Taiheng Sect, right? Did Lin Tianheng send you to find me?" Tuo Buchuan's voice was hoarse, carrying a strange tone.

Yang Ning remained silent. He knew the price of betrayal, and Lin Tianheng didn't seem like someone easy to deal with.

"You don't have to say it—I already know!" Tuo Buchuan slowly moved from beside Yang Ning to stand in front of him.

Only then did Yang Ning notice the man walked with a limp.

At the Body Refinement Tenth Layer, severed limbs could be regenerated without any need for magical power, let alone a mere injury. Yet his leg was still limping.

Clearly, Lin Tianheng had sealed more than just his magical power.

"Your Taiheng Sect is always like this!" Sitting down in front of Yang Ning, Tuo Buchuan chuckled lightly. "You talk about benevolence, righteousness, and morality all day, but no one acts more shamelessly than Taiheng."

Yang Ning stayed silent. He was just an Immortal Seedling—how would he know what Taiheng's conduct was like?

Still, most Taiheng disciples were princes or heirs, so it was probably normal for them to throw their weight around.

But why was he telling him all this?

After a brief exchange with Deep Blue, Yang Ning analyzed some of Tuo Buchuan's psychology and immediately decided to start putting on an act.

Nothing too over the top—just playing the part of a naive, ignorant twelve-year-old boy.

"Did he tell you that capturing me is a contribution to Taiheng, an honor for you Immortal Seedlings?" Tuo Buchuan asked again.

Yang Ning nodded blankly, a hint of clear stupidity in his eyes. "Yeah."

Tuo Buchuan laughed. "Did he also say my magical power is sealed and I'm barely a tenth of my former strength?"

Yang Ning nodded again. "Is there a problem?"

"Haha!" Tuo Buchuan slapped his thigh. "Is there a problem? There's a huge problem! Sure, my magical power is sealed, but that just means I can't use it. My Body Refinement Tenth Layer cultivation and the body strengthened by magical power are still here—how am I powerless? You might as well treat me as a Body Refinement Fourteenth Layer cultivator. Do you think you can handle that?"

"Ah?" Yang Ning looked completely lost, then his face turned pale. "Then, doesn't that mean?"

"Exactly. He's using your lives to amuse himself!" Tuo Buchuan sneered. "He could easily find me himself, but he insists on sending you to search the mountains. He could have given you a Vajra Talisman for better defense, but he only gave you a Communication Talisman!"

"You find me, make a contribution to the Taiheng Sect, and then what? You die. Was it worth it?"

Yang Ning said nothing, but his lips began to tremble, as if he couldn't accept the truth.

"Judging by your clothes, you're not an official disciple—just a bookboy, right?" Tuo Buchuan pressed on.

Yang Ning nodded.

"Do you know that the Taiheng Sect treats its disciples differently too?" Tuo Buchuan continued.

Yang Ning shook his head in confusion.

"Of course you don't. Maybe you'll die without ever knowing!" Tuo Buchuan sneered. "The Taiheng Sect has one Supreme Dao Art and seven Peerless Dao Arts, but they're only for official disciples—those princes and heirs. Disciples like you, bookboys, servants, and maids, can only learn Heaven-grade Daoist Arts."

"Ah?" Yang Ning's eyes went wide. Was that really a thing?

This time, he didn't need to act—he genuinely didn't know!

"Also, you'll never have the chance to inherit the sect leader position, not even become a Supreme Elder. Once you break through to Qi Refining, you'll be assigned to learn alchemy, artifact forging, or talisman arrays, and you'll toil for the sect your whole life. If you're lucky enough to reach Qi Refining Third Layer, the higher-ups might reward you with an External Affairs Elder position, making you grateful and devoted—and that's your life done."

"I, I..." Yang Ning blinked and asked, "What if I train hard and break through to the Golden Core?"

"Heh, don't joke around!" Tuo Buchuan sneered. "Without Peerless Dao Arts, how will you break through to Golden Core? Busy every day with alchemy and artifact forging—when would you have time to cultivate?"

Yang Ning fell silent. He realized Tuo Buchuan's words seemed to make a lot of sense.

"Why... why are you telling me all this?" Yang Ning thought for a moment and asked.

"Because I'm about to die!" Tuo Buchuan said flatly. "Even if I kill you, I won't escape. Trading my life for yours—I still think it's not worth it!"

Yang Ning was speechless. He thought he was the one losing out, but Tuo Buchuan felt the same way?

Right—a Qi Refining Fourth Layer life for a Body Refinement Second Layer life. Of course he'd think it was a loss!

"So I want to dig a pit for the Taiheng Sect!" Tuo Buchuan pointed at the bead beside him. "This is a dragon pearl, and it should contain a Dragon Clan Inheritance. I snatched it from Lin Tianheng in a secret realm in the Northern Barbarians. If you were an official disciple, I'd just kill you and bury the pearl. But since you're a bookboy, with this inheritance, you'll eventually become an enemy of the Taiheng Sect!"

"This is a dragon pearl?" Yang Ning stared at the gray, breathing-light-like bead and asked, "The color's wrong. I read in the Vast Universe Records that dragon pearls are mostly gold-white, with red, blue, and green ones too—I've never seen a gray one!"

"You actually read the Vast Universe Records, and so carefully? You really are an ambitious one!" Tuo Buchuan nodded in satisfaction. "As for why this dragon pearl is gray—it's because it's a Nightmare Dragon Pearl!"

"Nightmare Dragon?" Yang Ning paused, then immediately shook his head. "If it's a Nightmare Dragon, its pearl should have been corroded by Nightmare Qi long ago. How could it be preserved intact?"

"Then, a dragon pearl that can withstand Nightmare Qi erosion for three hundred thousand years—what kind of inheritance do you think it holds?" Tuo Buchuan countered.

"Ah, this!" Yang Ning was stunned. That's right!

Nightmare Qi erodes everything, turning animals into Nightmare Beasts and dragons into Nightmare Dragons, but this isn't a racial transformation—it's an erosive disease, a temporary condition.

If the erosion lasts long enough, the entire dragon body or beast body will be worn away by Nightmare Qi, dissolving into part of the nightmare itself.

That's why, to this day, only ruins remain, and the bodies of creatures from before the Nightmare Tribulation are rarely seen—because they've all been corroded away.

Such is the terror of the Nightmare Tribulation.

The Dragon Pearl is the essence of a dragon's cultivation. The Golden Core Method practiced by humans today evolved from the Dragon Pearl Method, meaning every dragon that possessed a Dragon Pearl had a cultivation level of at least the Golden Core Stage!

But even Dragon Pearls from Golden Core Stage dragons couldn't withstand the corrosion of Nightmare Qi.

In the early years of humanity's rise, a few could still be found, but after tens of thousands of years, not a single one remained.

Now, when Dragon Clan Inheritances are unearthed, they no longer use Dragon Pearls as their vessels.

Yet here, right before him, there was one!

To withstand thirty thousand years of Nightmare Qi erosion—what level of cultivation must the dragon that left this Dragon Pearl have reached?

Qi Refinement Peak wouldn't be enough, would it!

Divine Intent Realm? Immortal Realm?