A Plot in the Shadows

Humble Medicine Garden.

Fang Qing sat cross-legged, his fingers poised as though twirling a thread of Causality.

"[Heart Demon] Divine Ability—Face-to-Face Birth?"

That Jiao Dazuo was, at the very least, heir to a top demonic lineage. He might even be an old devil hiding his true strength. Who knew what wondrous art he had used to conceal his cultivation and enter Mount Shu?

Under the influence of this Divine Ability, scenes of Causality appeared before Fang Qing once more.

Among them were Sword Immortals dueling beneath a sky filled with swords, and mountains and seas sinking as all things returned to ruin—

In the end, they all became threads of many colors that fell across his fingers.

This, too, was [Causality]. After Sowing Subtle Causes came Silken Causality Bind—ten thousand threads of Causality wound around one's body, until escape was all but impossible—

"Since I entered Mount Shu, these threads of Causality have only grown more tangled..."

It was like someone reborn into the past: the more events he intervened in, and the greater their scale, the more easily he changed the future, until everything sank into chaos—

Silken Causality Bind could even let him glimpse those bound to the threads of Causality and sense their condition—

Fang Qing's eyes turned utterly black, without a trace of white, as he took a thread of Causality between his fingers.

Then his sight rose, and a cave dwelling shrouded in white mist appeared before him.

Jiao Dazuo was alone inside, apparently seated in meditation and cultivating qi.

Yet all manner of complicated, secretive thoughts seemed to be surfacing in his mind—

"Once I gather all four Divine Abilities embodying [Causality], I might even attain the [Causality] Golden Seat directly and become a True Lord."

Fang Qing smiled faintly. "I wonder how I