Time slipped by, years flying like arrows.
In the cultivation world, time always slipped through the fingers like sand. To mighty Purple Abode cultivators with long lifespans, three years were no more than an instant spent in seclusion.
But for the Heavenly Abyss District, newly incorporated into the Great Zhou Immortal Dynasty and struggling to emerge from its chrysalis, those three years had brought an earth-shaking rebirth—nothing short of a miracle.
Through three cycles of spring and autumn, the Great Zhou Immortal Dynasty beyond its borders had grown increasingly turbulent under the dark current of the "demon resurgence." Minor demon disasters and evil disturbances erupted across its provinces, leaving people fearful.
Yet on this hundred-thousand-year Wasteland, once called a place where ten entered and none survived, prosperity blazed like oil poured onto a fire—a sight utterly unlike the world beyond.
Heavenly Abyss City, the steel Divine City Chu Bai had raised from the ruins of Soul-Severing Ridge by moving mountains and seas with his Purple Abode might, had become the brightest jewel in the eastern Great Zhou Immortal Dynasty.
At dawn, when the first sunlight struck its six-hundred-meter walls of Profound Black Divine Iron, the eight white-jade avenues outside Heavenly Abyss City, each three hundred meters wide, were already packed with vast caravans from every direction, even from all Nine Provinces of Great Zhou.
In the sky, giant interprovincial spirit ships flew the banners of leading merchant guilds and even the Divine Capital Imperial House's trading firms. They lined up to land at Heavenly Abyss City's outer air harbor.
"Look! That's the Divine Capital Royal Trading Firm's Nine Heavens Voyager! I heard they brought ten whole shiploads of Great Zhou's finest Spirit Rice and heaven-grade ores, all to trade for one chest of High-Purity Soul Crystals from the Heavenly Abyss