"Rumble..."
The heavy black coffin lid slowly lifted, and a figure rose upright within.
It was a thin old man with graying temples and a pale face. His eyes tightly closed, he floated upright out of the black peachwood coffin, as though sunk in slumber.
He wore a purple Daoist robe with an eight trigrams design on its back and carried an ancient copper-coin sword on his back, dressed like a man of the Daoist sects.
At that moment, deathly silence filled the Underground Palace, and everyone stared fixedly at the figure.
Among the crowd, Zhang Xiaoyun studied the old man's appearance for a moment. She froze, then could not help crying out in surprise.
"Celestial Master!"
That quiet cry broke the silence in the Underground Palace, and everyone turned toward her in astonishment.
Gu Chenfeng was somewhat surprised as well.
"Miss Zhang, is this the Zhengyi Sect's Celestial Master?"
Zhang Xiaoyun nodded firmly. "This is the last Celestial Master of our Zhengyi Sect, Zhang Shouzhen.
"I once saw a statue of the Celestial Master in the Zhengyi Sect's ancestral grounds. He looks exactly the same."
As she watched the old man hovering motionlessly in the air, excitement filled Zhang Xiaoyun's eyes.
"The Celestial Master suddenly disappeared all those years ago. So he was here suppressing Xiahou Che all along?"
Nearby, Daoist Qingxuan looked at Celestial Master Zhang in the air and could not help asking nervously.
"Miss Zhang, is your sect's Celestial Master dead or alive?"
He had barely finished speaking.
Suddenly, under everyone's horrified gazes, the Daoist Celestial Master's body moved.
He slowly extended a pale, withered hand and seized the Eight Trigrams Mirror.
"Hum!"
The instant Celestial Master Zhang grasped the Eight Trigrams Mirror, whose azure light had been soaring skyward, it trembled, and its azure light