Exhausting the Red Dust, Draining Confucian Arts

Hm?

What was this about?

Zhuang Wanqing stepped out from the crowd in Confucian robes, her supremely graceful, regal face set. A steely resolve showed between her brows and in every measured movement.

Liu Dongqing raised an eyebrow in surprise.

Even after all the time they had spent building an understanding, Liu Dongqing could not quite tell what Zhuang Wanqing intended.

Did she truly want that reserve of fortune?

That reserve of Chaos's natural fortune was plainly meant for cultivators ready to refine their bonded Nascent Soul treasures.

By Liu Dongqing's reckoning, Zhuang Wanqing had mastered all six arts and brought her Dao domain into harmony, but her bonded Nascent Soul treasure still lacked one kind of magic flame. It was nowhere near ready to be nurtured.

What use would winning the reserve of fortune be to her now?

Unless she wanted to stage a fight.

Honestly,

with Liu Dongqing's prestige now so dazzling, defeating another prodigy of his generation whose Dao domain was equally complete and harmonious would scarcely add another flower to the brocade.

Even if

that prodigy was the senior sister of the Moral Immortal Sect's Red Dust Dao.

And if their staged fight went the other way?

Times had changed.

Ever since the affair at the Hanging World Great Wall, Liu Dongqing had raised his blazing demonic might too quickly.

For one thing,

even if some prodigy of his generation truly defeated him now,

when countless cultivators looked on, their first thought would probably not be how formidable that prodigy was. They would instinctively question everything they knew.

Then they would question whether the fight was real.

You defeated Mystic Yang Old Devil, a man who frightens even me? What kind of path did you take to get there?

Even if the victor was Jade Mystic