Chapter Summaries

After the guardian defended Ye Lin’s right to bring Shangguan Wanyu and Luo Yao into the Second Region, jealous prodigies waited to target him. Inside the secret realm, Ye Lin and his companions discovered the ruins of an ancient faction and prepared to explore cautiously.

• A prodigy challenged the guardian over why a Primordial Unity Mystic Immortal and a child had been given spots, and the guardian defended the decision as proof of Ye Lin’s ability.
• The prodigies grew resentful and stayed behind, waiting for a chance to target Ye Lin.
• Ye Lin and his companions arrived at a plaza surrounded by nine pillars and the ruins of a vast palace complex.
• Ye Lin realized that the group had been targeted because he was traveling with Shangguan Wanyu and Luo Yao.
• Li Xiaoyao and Bao Xiaotou dismissed the threat, but Ye Lin urged the group to avoid fights and explore the secret realm first.

Ye Lin recognized the ruins as the Black Tortoise Holy Palace and learned that Li Xiaoyao’s opportunity lay in the Supreme Holy Palace. The group entered one of its intact halls to search for treasures, but the explorers found little before Ye Lin’s search continued.

• Ye Lin identified the ancient ruins as the Black Tortoise Holy Palace and checked Li Xiaoyao’s fate, discovering an opportunity in the Supreme Holy Palace.
• Ye Lin spotted three intact halls and led Li Xiaoyao and the others toward them.
• Li Xiaoyao struck the hall’s exterior, but it did not move, and the group entered to explore.
• Ye Lin told the group to search carefully while other prodigies explored the hall’s structures and three youths gave up trying to move the chair.
• Several prodigies concluded that the Black Tortoise Secret Realm had already been thoroughly plundered before it was opened to them.

Ye Lin left the empty meeting hall and searched the central hall, where he encountered Gu Congshuang pursuing a hidden opportunity. Gu Congshuang triggered a mechanism beneath a chair, sending them both into a secret chamber.

• The geniuses found nothing in the meeting hall and gradually left, while Ye Lin learned from the Heaven-Devouring Demon Jar that the Black Tortoise Secret Realm was unlikely to hold treasures in its first hall.
• Ye Lin entered the central hall and saw Gu Congshuang searching there; her panel revealed that a mechanism beneath the chair at the top led to a pearl.
• Ye Lin and Gu Congshuang both approached the chair and disputed who had found it first.
• Gu Congshuang examined the chair and triggered its mechanism, causing the floor and chair to plunge downward with both of them.

Ye Lin and Gu Congshuang reached the secret chamber’s ground and found a white door that neither of them could force open with ordinary attacks. Ye Lin used the Beginningless True Flame to melt it, revealing light beyond the door as they waited to see what lay behind it.

• Ye Lin and Gu Congshuang landed in a small chamber and found a large white door ahead of them.
• Ye Lin tried to push the door open, but it remained completely still.
• Gu Congshuang repeatedly struck the door with her spear, but could not leave a mark.
• Ye Lin fired a white-flamed arrow from his longbow, and the Beginningless True Flame began melting the door.
• Gu Congshuang watched the door melt as light spilled through the gaps.

Ye Lin and Gu Congshuang entered a secret chamber filled with weapons and Jade Talismans, where both wanted the azure bead at its center. Ye Lin threatened to kill Gu Congshuang if she would not leave, but she proposed taking the bead out and settling their dispute later.

• Ye Lin melted the gate with his Beginningless True Flame and entered a chamber containing treasures and an azure bead.
• Ye Lin felt drawn to the bead, and Gu Congshuang rushed to take it for herself.
• Ye Lin shot a fiery arrow at Gu Congshuang, forcing her to dodge before she could touch the bead.
• Ye Lin claimed the bead and threatened Gu Congshuang, while she argued that she had found the chamber first.
• Gu Congshuang refused to yield the bead and proposed holding onto it until they could settle their rivalry outside.

Ye Lin claimed the mysterious pearl after threatening Gu Congshuang, who took the other treasures and followed him out. They emerged into a hall crowded with dozens of hostile-looking geniuses, who began closing in on them.

• Ye Lin threatened to kill Gu Congshuang unless she let him keep the pearl, and she agreed to postpone their fight until they left.
• Ye Lin stored the pearl in his Spatial Ring while Gu Congshuang collected the remaining treasures.
• Ye Lin dismissed the other treasures as a gift and left the secret chamber, with Gu Congshuang following close behind.
• Ye Lin and Gu Congshuang entered the main hall and found dozens of figures waiting there.
• The figures surrounded Ye Lin and Gu Congshuang and demanded to know where they had come from.

Gu Congshuang and Ye Lin were confronted by prodigies seeking the treasures beneath the hall. Gu Congshuang drew most of them away, leaving Ye Lin to face three attackers as he fought back with his sword.

• The prodigies pressed Gu Congshuang and demanded she share what she had found, but she refused and warned them to back off.
• A young man tried to rally the others against Gu Congshuang, who attacked him and charged toward the hall entrance, killing anyone who blocked her.
• Ye Lin noted that Gu Congshuang had drawn away most of the prodigies and faced the three young men who remained.
• The three young men attacked Ye Lin together, and he countered with Sword Nine, Heaven-Sundering.
• The attackers dodged Ye Lin's Sword Qi and struck from three directions with Coiling Dragon Hand, Seven Kill Fist, and Long Sheng's Descent.

Ye Lin used the Time Gu to freeze three pursuers and escaped from the great hall, while they chased him, believing he had a precious treasure. Gu Congshuang also fled from a pursuing group, determined to find Ye Lin and obtain half of the pearl from him.

• Ye Lin used Time Stop to freeze three figures for three breaths, then escaped from the great hall.
• The three figures broke free, marveled at Ye Lin’s mastery of the Law of Time, and pursued him for his supposed treasure.
• Gu Congshuang regretted drawing the attackers’ attention and fought her way out of the hall.
• Ye Lin returned to the first great hall, found Bao Xiaotou and the others gone, and left while his three pursuers followed.
• Gu Congshuang cursed at the more than a dozen figures chasing her and continued fleeing, hoping to find Ye Lin and trade for half the pearl.

Ye Lin entered a strange trial ground in the Black Tortoise Ruins, where he was ordered to kill thirty third-layer Golden Immortal Demon Beasts within an hour. He attacked them with his sword, but his Sword Qi failed to harm them.

• Gu Congshuang searched the Black Tortoise Secret Realm for Ye Lin because she wanted the important bead.
• Ye Lin entered a spatial gate beside the golden gateway and arrived in a world that seemed to turn upside down.
• An emotionless voice identified Ye Lin as a third-layer Golden Immortal and announced a trial to kill thirty Demon Beasts within one hour.
• Thirty mountain-sized third-layer Golden Immortal Demon Beasts appeared and charged at Ye Lin.
• Ye Lin summoned the Blooddrinking Sword of the Fallen Emperor and unleashed Ten Thousand Swords Return to Origin, but his Sword Qi did not hurt the Demon Beasts.

Ye Lin fought the third-layer Golden Immortal Demon Beasts in the Black Tortoise Secret Realm and found a way to defeat them one at a time. He killed the two-headed beast, but twenty-nine enemies remained.

• Ye Lin charged a two-headed Demon Beast after his Sword Qi failed to pierce the beasts’ defenses.
• Ye Lin used Sword Nine, Heaven-Sundering to sever one of the beast’s heads, then evaded attacks from the others.
• Ye Lin unleashed Thunder Break from the Nine Heavens Profound Thunder Sword Art and sent a thunder dragon after the weakened beast.
• The thunder dragon crushed the two-headed Demon Beast, and Ye Lin concluded that the beasts’ lack of intelligence and suppressed strength made them manageable if he fought carefully.

Ye Lin unleashed a fused sword attack that crippled the remaining twenty-nine Demon Beasts in the trial. He then finished them with Ten Thousand Swords Return to Origin, leaving the small world strewn with corpses.

• Ye Lin assessed the Demon Beasts and prepared to cut down the twenty-nine charging creatures.
• Ye Lin fused the manifestations of his three techniques into a colossal sword.
• Ye Lin’s strike tore through the landscape and severely wounded all twenty-nine Demon Beasts.
• Ye Lin used Ten Thousand Swords Return to Origin to kill every remaining Demon Beast.

Ye Lin passed the first trial and received three Origin Transformation Pills and a Nine-Grade Sacred Lotus. He entered the second trial, where his strength was sealed and he had to cross a desert as a mortal to qualify for the third layer and earn the Starry Formula.

• Ye Lin received three Origin Transformation Pills and a Nine-Grade Sacred Lotus for finishing the first trial in the top ten.
• Ye Lin chose to continue and rested for half an hour before the second-layer trial began.
• The trial grounds transported Ye Lin to a desert and sealed his power, requiring him to cross it as a mortal.
• Ye Lin struggled with the heat and thirst but rested briefly before pressing onward through the desert.

Gu Congshuang searched the Black Tortoise Secret Realm for Ye Lin and entered a mysterious spatial gate. Ye Lin, stripped of his cultivation in a harsh trial ground, struggled to survive the desert night as the Heaven-Devouring Demon Jar told him he was on his own.

• Gu Congshuang found only disappointing treasures and failed to locate Ye Lin, concluding that he had taken the pearl and left the Black Tortoise Secret Realm.
• Gu Congshuang discovered a spatial gate guarded by Black Tortoise statues and stepped inside to investigate.
• Ye Lin endured a day of walking through the desert without food or water, then faced plunging temperatures as night fell.
• Ye Lin buried himself in a pit of warm sand to shelter from the cold.
• The Heaven-Devouring Demon Jar told Ye Lin that it could not help him and urged him to survive the trial on his own.

Ye Lin struggled to survive the desert as a mortal, enduring hunger, thirst, and extreme temperatures before collapsing from fever. He woke three days later in a carriage, where a young woman told him that her father had found and rescued him.

• Ye Lin endured a sleepless night of hunger and thirst, then continued walking through the desert at dawn.
• Ye Lin realized he had developed a fever and collapsed beneath the blazing sun.
• Ye Lin woke in a carriage after sleeping for three days and three nights.
• The young woman explained that her father had found Ye Lin in the desert and brought him along, impressed by how far he had traveled.

Ye Lin recovered after White Lotus and her merchant caravan rescued him in the Endless Desert, and he joined them on their journey across it. He met White Lotus’s father, the caravan leader, who welcomed him and asked how he was feeling.

• White Lotus gave Ye Lin water and asked his name, and he introduced himself as Blood Baleful.
• Ye Lin told White Lotus that he had fled into the desert after offending people he could not challenge, and she offered to take him across with the caravan.
• The caravan stopped for the night, and its leader ordered the travelers to camp and keep watch against wolf packs.
• White Lotus told her father, the caravan leader, that Ye Lin had awakened and shared his name.
• Ye Lin thanked White Lotus’s father for rescuing him, and the man asked whether he had recovered.

Ye Lin accepted White Wind’s offer to travel with his caravan across the Endless Desert. White Lotus brought the exhausted, hungry Ye Lin to the campfire, where a young man offered her a roasted lamb leg.

• White Wind introduced himself as White Lotus’s father and invited Ye Lin to join the caravan.
• Ye Lin accepted, recognizing he could not cross the desert alone.
• White Lotus questioned Ye Lin about his frail appearance and how he had offended someone, but Ye Lin refused to explain.
• White Lotus pulled Ye Lin over to the campfire after he smelled the meat and realized how hungry he was.
• A young man offered White Lotus a freshly roasted lamb leg.

Ye Lin accepted food from White Lotus, who defended him from Li Shou’s jealousy. After eating, Ye Lin assessed the trial’s next stage and prepared for possible dangers as he explored the camp.

• White Lotus gave Ye Lin the lamb leg Li Shou had roasted for her.
• Li Shou became angry at Ye Lin, but White Lotus ordered him to leave and he threatened Ye Lin before returning to the campfire.
• White Lotus apologized for Li Shou’s behavior, and Ye Lin said he understood why the outsider had upset him.
• After finishing the lamb leg, Ye Lin told White Lotus to eat and began looking around the camp.
• Ye Lin reasoned that the trial’s second stage would bring challenges, but believed he could handle them now that he had food and water.

After the caravan settled in for the night, Ye Lin stayed awake by the fire and was attacked by Li Shou, who was jealous of White Lotus. Ye Lin easily disarmed and subdued him, then warned him before letting him go.

• White Wind arranged watches and told the caravan to rest in shifts.
• Ye Lin declined to sleep, explaining that he had just awakened after three days and could not cultivate in the trial ground.
• Li Shou crept up behind Ye Lin and attacked him with a dagger, driven by possessiveness toward White Lotus.
• Ye Lin dodged the strike, disarmed Li Shou, and pinned him with the dagger at his throat.
• Ye Lin released Li Shou and threw the dagger into the sand, warning him that his attack had been crude.

Ye Lin joined White Wind’s caravan as it traveled through the Endless Desert, hoping to complete the trial he had failed to cross alone. After Ye Lin frightened Li Shou the previous night, Li Shou remained afraid of him as the journey resumed.

• Ye Lin warned Li Shou that he would die if he threatened him again, and Li Shou fled in terror.
• Ye Lin spent the night sitting awake by the fire, and White Wind offered him the chance to rest in a carriage during the day’s travel.
• White Lotus gave Ye Lin a flatbread and questioned his endurance, while Ye Lin explained that he might have made up for his sleep during his earlier unconsciousness.
• White Wind set out with the caravan, and Li Shou kept glancing at Ye Lin fearfully.
• Ye Lin traveled with the caravan through the Endless Desert, relying on it to help him complete the trial.

Ye Lin sensed three enormous creatures beneath the desert, and a giant scorpion called a Desert Loner burst out and attacked the caravan. Unable to pierce its armor, Ye Lin followed as it charged toward the camels, while White Wind and the others prepared to fight.

• Ye Lin stopped and felt the sand, then warned White Lotus and the caravan that three huge creatures were beneath them.
• A Desert Loner erupted from the desert, and White Wind ordered the caravan to secure the camels and prepare for battle.
• Ye Lin dodged the scorpion and struck its armor, but his sword failed to damage it.
• Ye Lin realized the scorpion was charging toward the camels and pursued it, while White Wind drew his broadsword to confront it.