While the Black Treasure Mountain was being surrounded and devoured by the various races of the Divine Gift Mountains and Seas, the Saint Origin Continent's grandest holiday, the Spring Festival, finally arrived.
Every household hung lanterns and colorful decorations, put up spring couplets, and stocked up on holiday supplies. Across the land, people began preparing their different Spring Festival delicacies.
Yet on this day of universal celebration, some homes were not particularly festive.
The families of the Great Scholars in the Burial Saint Valley kept everything simple on New Year's Eve, devoting more time to prayer than celebration.
On this day, the liveliest place in the entire human race was neither densely populated Kong City nor the capitals of the Ten Kingdoms, but the place that had been renamed Yueyang from Baling.
On the tenth day of the first lunar month, a grand Saint Apricot Literary Assembly would be held there.
The Saint Origin Continent was vast, and its regions lay far apart. This time, without the dragon race mobilizing the Sea Eyes, scholars from every region had set out many days in advance.
Thus, carriages and horses streamed through Yueyang City, and crowds flowed like threads through a loom. All were awaiting the Saint Apricot Literary Assembly, hoping to claim a share of the Sacred Apricot's blessings and advance along the Sacred Way.
For most scholars, the Saint Apricot Literary Assembly was more important than any other literary assembly.
Guildhalls for the various kingdoms had long since been established in Yueyang City. Scholars whose families were far away could not enjoy a reunion, so literary assemblies sprang up throughout the city to dispel the sorrow of homesickness.
The Qing Kingdom had three guildhalls in Yueyang City. The one established by the Zong Family was actually the smallest, but its