"You brat, you're quite the actor. Come to the City Lord's Mansion!"
The sudden voice transmission startled no one else, but it exploded directly inside Zhao Hao's mind.
A Golden Core patriarch!
Only a mighty cultivator at the Golden Core stage could wield such overwhelming power!
Zhao Hao reined in every emotion, not daring to hesitate. Tucking away the sixty thousand spirit stones he had just received, he headed anxiously toward the city center under countless complicated gazes from the Ten Thousand Immortal Gambling House.
The center of Ten Thousand Immortal City.
An enormous palace complex stood halfway up the mountain, with white jade steps stretching from its mountain gate all the way to the foot of the slope. Its grandeur was extraordinary.
This was the City Lord's Mansion.
Zhao Hao climbed the steps, each footfall feeling as though he were treading on the tips of blades.
Before the gates, two cultivators clad in dark gold heavy armor stood like statues, their long halberds radiating icy killing intent.
Both were cultivators in the Foundation Establishment Realm!
Foundation Establishment cultivators qualified to serve as executive elders in the Extreme Yin Sect were merely gatekeepers here.
Zhao Hao stepped forward and presented his identity token. The guard on the left scanned it with a magical disc and coldly spat out a few words. "Wait here."
A moment later, a cultivator in blue robes emerged from the mansion, his steps soundless and his aura deep and steady.
"Fellow Daoist Zhao? I'm Fan Qingfeng." The blue-robed cultivator cupped his hands politely. "Old Ancestor Guo wishes to see you. Please follow me."
Zhao Hao returned the salute and followed him across the heavy threshold.
The moment he stepped inside, heaven and earth spun around him.
The surrounding air seemed to turn instantly into viscous liquid. Spiritual energy so dense it was almost tangible poured madly into his pores!
The Fire Spiritual Root within him, enhanced to supreme quality, stirred at once like a ferocious beast that had gone hungry for ten days catching the scent of blood. It greedily devoured the pure, unclaimed energy.
Every blue stone slab beneath his feet was engraved with intricate array patterns, shimmering with flowing light.
Walking ahead, Fan Qingfeng explained without looking back, "The Heavenly Cycle Star Rotation Array is installed within the City Lord's Mansion. It draws down stellar power from the nine heavens and converts it into pure spiritual energy. How does your first visit feel, fellow Daoist?"
"As expected of the City Lord's Mansion. This is truly an undertaking on a grand scale," Zhao Hao answered briefly, suppressing his shock.
How was this an ordinary City Lord's Mansion? It was clearly an artificially created blessed grotto-heaven!
After passing through three corridors, Fan Qingfeng stopped outside a side hall.
"Go in."
The hall doors opened slowly, and Zhao Hao stepped inside.
The hall was spacious and empty. A figure resembling a middle-aged scholar stood with his back to Zhao Hao, hands clasped behind him as he admired an ink painting on the wall.
The instant Zhao Hao's foot settled fully onto the hall's blue bricks-
A terrifying, invisible pressure came crashing down, blotting out heaven and earth!
It was not the pressure of spiritual energy, but the crushing force of pure divine sense.
Zhao Hao felt as though an invisible hand had seized his soul in a death grip. Every bone in his body groaned beneath the unbearable weight. His knees buckled, and he nearly fell to the floor.
He did not summon spiritual power to resist. That would have been a mantis raising its arms against a chariot.
Instead, he yielded to the force, bending sharply at the waist into a deep bow, his voice hoarse.
"This junior, Zhao Hao, pays his respects to Old Ancestor Guo."
The middle-aged scholar did not turn around, but the pressure that had nearly crushed Zhao Hao vanished without a trace.
Zhao Hao slowly straightened. The back of his enchanted robe was already soaked, clinging coldly to his skin.
Too strong!
If this old monster wanted to kill him, it really would take no more than a thought.
"That little performance at the Ten Thousand Immortal Pavilion today was well acted."
Old Ancestor Guo's voice was quiet, yet it seemed to carry an echo that reverberated through the empty hall.
"Was it amusing, making monkeys of every alchemist in the city?"
Zhao Hao kept his head lowered, his mind racing as he answered steadily, "This junior would never dare. I have only just found my way to the threshold of second-tier pill refinement. My technique is clumsy, and successfully forming pills depends entirely on luck. I certainly had no intention of deceiving you, Old Ancestor."
Lying was instinctive for a demonic cultivator. Never mind saying it aloud-even if he were asked to swear a great heart-demon oath right then, he would not have blinked.
"Luck?"
The middle-aged scholar turned around.
His face was as flawless as polished jade, his temples touched with frost, yet his unfathomably deep eyes seemed to hold the stars.
Those eyes merely swept lightly over Zhao Hao, and he felt naked, as though he had been seen through completely, inside and out.
"Interesting."
A faint, amused smile played at the corners of Old Ancestor Guo's lips.
"You used blood essence to stimulate the growth of flesh and forcibly alter your physique?" He spoke one word at a time, each striking Zhao Hao's heart like a heavy hammer. "But your bone age cannot deceive anyone. Foundation Establishment before twenty-the younger generation truly deserves respect!"
The blood within Zhao Hao surged, and the muscles in his arms tensed instantly.
It was over!
This was his greatest trump card for severing his past and concealing his identity! Before this old monster, it offered less protection than a sheet of window paper!
Before he could react, Old Ancestor Guo took another step forward, his voice turning eerie.
"What surprises me even more is the karmic retribution covering you. It is so dense that it has almost congealed, yet the cultivation method you practice is a perfectly legitimate righteous-path method."
He circled Zhao Hao, as though admiring a rare treasure.
"To accumulate karmic burdens of this magnitude, you would probably have to slaughter a hundred thousand people with your own hands. Yet the strange thing is that not a trace of bloody baleful aura clings to you. How peculiar."
Cold sweat ran down Zhao Hao's chin, dripping onto the polished blue bricks, one drop after another.
He had been stripped bare, right down to his underwear!
Escape? The thought had barely surfaced before he snuffed it out himself.
"Enough."
Old Ancestor Guo flicked his sleeve and sat in the large chair at the head of the hall, as though everything he had just said were merely idle conversation.
"Ten Thousand Immortal City does not ask where you came from or care whether you follow the righteous or demonic path. I have no interest in your secrets. Your pill-refining method, however-even my Li Fire Bright Void Pupil cannot see through it. Now that is a rarity."
He abruptly changed tack. "Do you know why Ten Thousand Immortal City is paying such an enormous price to hold this Alchemy Grand Assembly?"
Zhao Hao forcibly suppressed his distracting thoughts and replied with a dry throat, "This junior does not know."
The old ancestor did not answer. Instead, he steered the conversation back again.
"Is the cultivation method you practice the ancient Li Fire Sect's Li Fire Imperial Spirit Canon?"
Zhao Hao's heart shook violently. Was there anything this old monster did not know? He could only nod stiffly.
"Then it all fits." Old Ancestor Guo tapped the armrest. "You are practicing only the Foundation Establishment volume, and the path beyond it is cut off, correct? Let me tell you: the City Lord's Mansion has the Golden Core volume of that method. The City Lord even knows exactly where the Nascent Soul and Spirit Transformation volumes are."
The first bargaining chip landed with crushing weight.
Zhao Hao remained silent. He knew that behind this grand promise dangled a hook steeped in deadly poison.
"You are covered in karmic burdens. Unless you remove them, heart demons will swarm you and heavenly lightning will strike when you face your Golden Core tribulation. You will certainly die."
Old Ancestor Guo leaned forward slightly, his tone taking on a hint of temptation.
"But you practice the Li Fire Imperial Spirit Canon. What a fortunate coincidence. That method happens to contain an unparalleled secret art that was lost long ago."
"This secret art can extract the power of all things in the world and refine it into a divine ability seed. The karmic burdens ordinary people cannot flee quickly enough would, for you, become an immense stroke of fortune!"
He paused, and each word exploded beside Zhao Hao's ear like a devil's whisper.
"With this method, you might just condense a supreme lesser divine ability that would make even a Nascent Soul True Lord green with envy-Crimson Li Karma Fire!
"And perhaps it could even grow into a true divine ability in the future-Red Lotus Karmic Fire."