Gu You, Bone You

Gu You, Bone You

Back in Sacred City.

Han Feng looked at the little girl before him and smiled gently. Turning to the Heavenly Serpent Palace's accompanying Grand Elder, he said, "Grand Elder, you have traveled a long way and must be exhausted. Qing Lin's future cultivation will depend on your careful guidance."

Hearing this, the six-star Dou Ancestor was overwhelmed with flattery and hurriedly bowed. "I wouldn't dare! I wouldn't dare! Being able to guide Her Highness the Saintess in cultivation is this old woman's honor!"

She kept her posture exceedingly humble. This young Lord of Sacred City was someone even the Supreme Elders treated with respectful bows. How could she dare show the slightest negligence?

"Brother Han Feng..." Qing Lin tugged at Han Feng's sleeve, her emerald eyes full of reluctance.

Han Feng understood her thoughts. Smiling, he rubbed the top of her head and promised, "Go on. Cultivate the Jade-Eyed Serpent-Commanding Heart Scripture properly. Once you can completely open the world within your eyes, I'll give you thirty sixth-tier serpent magical beasts as the first members of your Saintess Guard."

"Really?!" Qing Lin's eyes lit up at once, her little face brimming with delight.

Thirty sixth-tier magical beasts! That was equivalent to thirty Dou Emperor experts!

"When have I ever lied to you?" Han Feng said with a smile.

After receiving his confirmation, Qing Lin was immediately filled with motivation. She nodded hard, then pulled the still somewhat reserved Grand Elder along like a little hostess and said excitedly, "Grand Elder, I'll show you around our Sacred City! It's so much fun here!"

Seeing the girl's lively appearance, Han Feng's eyes were full of gratification.

He liked this feeling—pulling up, one by one, those lives that should have been struggling in the mud, then watching them bloom with their own light.

Qing Lin led the Grand Elder through Sacred City's broad streets like a cheerful lark.

"Grand Elder, look! That's Sacred City's Enforcement Corps. They're amazing! No one in the city dares cause trouble!"

"And over there is the Elixir Hall. It has so many rare pills that even our Heavenly Serpent Palace has never seen!"

"Oh, right, right! I'll take you to meet my friends!"

Following behind Qing Lin, the Grand Elder looked at this steel metropolis, orderly yet brimming with life, and felt utterly shaken. At last, she understood why the Supreme Elder had made that decision. Attaching themselves to a force with such boundless potential truly was a tremendous opportunity for the Heavenly Serpent Palace.

Before long, Qing Lin pulled her to a vast training ground at the center of the city.

On the training ground, a youth in black carried an enormous black ruler utterly mismatched to his frame and trained until sweat poured down his body. Every leap and every punch seemed to use all his strength, and the bluestone slabs beneath his feet had long since been soaked with sweat.

On the stone steps not far away, a cool and aloof girl in a moon-white dress sat quietly, absorbed in a thick tome on poison arts. Another breathtakingly beautiful girl in a pale purple dress, with an ethereal air about her, rested her chin on her hand and watched the sweat-drenched figure in the field without blinking, tenderness like water in her eyes.

"Brother Xiao Yan! Sister Yaoxin! Sister Xun'er!"

Qing Lin waved and shouted from afar.

The three of them turned toward her voice.

"Qing Lin? You're back!" Xiao Yan stopped training, wiped away his sweat, and broke into a hearty smile.

Yaoxin also closed her poison tome, a hint of gentle warmth appearing on her cool face.

The four quickly gathered together and began chattering away.

"Qing Lin, did you learn any powerful moves during your trip to the Heavenly Serpent Palace?"

"Mhm! Grandma taught me so many things! I'm already an eight-star Dou Practitioner now!"

"Wow! That fast?"

"Sister Yaoxin, I missed you so much. I feel like you've gotten stronger again!"

"Not at all. I've merely made a little progress."

At the side, the Heavenly Serpent Palace's Grand Elder watched these young but astonishingly talented and powerful boys and girls, and a tempest surged in her heart.

She could sense that the youth named Xiao Yan possessed a foundation terrifyingly solid. At such a young age, he was already a Dou Master. As for the white-haired girl named Yaoxin, she left her even more amazed—a Dou Wang in her teens. Why did the Heavenly Serpent Palace not have talents like these?

Sacred City... truly harbored hidden dragons and crouching tigers!

While the youths laughed and played, Han Feng had already appeared at the Soul-Gathering Hall where Yao Chen was staying.

The moment he entered, he saw that besides his teacher, there was another familiar figure in the hall.

It was Venerable Feng, Feng Xian.

"Uncle Feng? What brings you here?" Han Feng asked in surprise.

"You brat, you still remember to come back!" Seeing him, Feng Xian rose with a smile and handed him a cup of hot tea that had long been prepared.

Han Feng did not stand on ceremony. He accepted it and drained it in one gulp before sitting down beside the stone table.

"He arrived long ago, all fired up. I have no idea what urgent matter he has," Yao Chen said with a smile as he stroked his beard.

Feng Xian's smile faded, and his expression turned solemn. From his robes, he took out a scroll made of special material and covered in dense restrictions, then handed it to Han Feng.

"There are results for the matter you asked me to investigate."

Han Feng's heart sank sharply.

He took the secret scroll, undid its restrictions, and swept it with his spiritual sense. All the intelligence flooded into his mind.

There was not much written on the secret scroll, but every word seemed to carry bone-piercing coldness.

Gu You, the chief culprit who had ambushed Yao Chen and caused the fall of his physical body years ago, was now Bone You the Venerable, ranked second among the Soul Hall's Nine Heavenly Venerables. He remained stationed year-round at a branch hall established by the Soul Hall in the Western Region. His movements were mysterious, and his strength unfathomable.

"Gu You... Bone You... Second Heavenly Venerable..."

Han Feng quietly rolled those words over his tongue. The traces of warmth in his eyes vanished in an instant, replaced by chilling killing intent!

"There's more," Feng Xian said in an even lower voice. "Not long ago, our spies in the Soul Hall sent an urgent secret report."

Feng Xian's expression grew even graver. "Bone You has recently made unusual moves. He seems to be personally heading to an ancient secret realm called the Soulfall Abyss, supposedly to retrieve something extremely important to the Soul Hall."

"Soulfall Abyss?" Han Feng's gaze instantly sharpened. "Where is it? When does he depart?"

"At the border between the Black-Corner Region and the Central Plains, in a forbidden place shrouded by spatial storms year-round," Feng Xian answered gravely. "By my calculations, he should arrive there in three days."

"Three days..." Han Feng slowly rose to his feet. The temperature in the study seemed to plummet to freezing point at that very moment.

"Very good."

He walked to the window and looked at the cold moon hanging over Sacred City, his voice terrifyingly calm.

"Uncle Feng, leave Sacred City's affairs to you and Mo Shan for the time being. I'll be back soon."

"You're going personally?" Feng Xian was startled.

Han Feng did not answer. He gazed at the cold moon, his voice terrifyingly calm.

"Teacher's debt must be repaid."

"I'll keep my own eye on that beast."

Before his words had even faded, the space before him silently tore apart.

Han Feng stepped into it, and his figure vanished into the endless darkness.