The jade lake churned.
Countless flood dragons, serpents, whales, and giant salamanders swam out of the boundless lake and vanished. Its once mirrorlike surface began to twist and ripple, and a vast whirlpool appeared at its center, drawing in the water until the entire lake dried up at a visible pace.
The scene on the lakebed gradually emerged: an expanse of bronze.
Countless rust-covered bronze pillars and markers stood densely packed across the lakebed, gold mingling with green. At their very center stood an exceedingly strange gateway, also cast from bronze, inscribed with the character Xu and patterned with mystic lotuses. It stood open now, seemingly connected to the boundless Great Void, reflecting all manner of strange sights.
Immortal peaches formed forests, golden blessing became steps, and auspicious clouds hung as curtains. An endless sense of peace and enduring tranquility seemed to pour out, only to be gathered within white lines like compasses and squares. Faint scenes of officials attending court and a sovereign observing the rites appeared. Everything was swiftly returning to order.
At the very center of these myriad visions was an extraordinarily wondrous pitch-black lotus, trembling like a flame.
A secret realm.
It was even a secret realm passed down since the Zhou era, built upon the secret arts of supreme rites and supplemented with virtue qi-profoundly wondrous. Though Xu Ming beside him was young, he had heard of such things, and curiosity crept into his eyes.
"This is the [Virtue Gate], a secret realm refined by descendants of Zhou. The ancestor of the Xu clan was Duke Xu Ping, Xu Ning. He cultivated ultimate fire and earned merit by subduing the Qiang people, allowing him to branch off from the Jiang clan and establish a state of his own at the edge of Yue Land."
Baoqiu