Beiwu of the Immortal Alliance

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Chapter 1: Beiwu of the Immortal Alliance

Year 24520 of the Immortal Alliance, Shouhe No. 2 Middle School, Far Sky County.

The great sun hung overhead like a luminous pearl of heaven and earth, illuminating the majestic teaching buildings, their stories arranged in an elegant, staggered pattern.

By a classroom window, a slender, lustrous hand held a black pen, sweeping freely across an exam paper.

[10. A Ninth Layer of Qi Refining cultivator has been bitten on the arm by a Red-Striped Scorching Fire Serpent and injected with a large quantity of venom. What is the correct treatment? ()]

A. Sever the arm promptly and take a Poison-Warding Pill.

B. Immediately report the precise location of the Red-Striped Scorching Fire Serpent to the Immortal Alliance.

C. Seal the Spirit Gate acupoint around the wound and repeatedly flush the wound with magical power.

D. Without using any magical power, cut the wound open to let it bleed and suck out the poisoned blood.

Chen Beiwu glanced at the question and filled in B without hesitation.

This multiple-choice question was far from easy. The knowledge it tested lay outside the high school curriculum and could stump almost everyone in the class, but not him. He had thoroughly studied Three Years of Qi Refining Mock Exams, Five Years of College Entrance Exams, Ten Years of Foundation Establishment, and Confidential Beast Examination Papers on Heavenly Gang and Earthly Sha.

The Red-Striped Scorching Fire Serpent was a treasure beast whose venom ranked among the top ten on the Earthly Sha List. Also known as the Three-Breath Treasure Serpent, its venom was so potent that even a Golden Core True Person would perish within three breaths of being poisoned, let alone an ordinary cultivator at the Ninth Layer of Qi Refining.

If a cultivator was unlucky enough to encounter a Red-Striped Scorching Fire Serpent and get bitten, the best course of action was to report the information to the Immortal Alliance immediately to prevent further casualties, while also leaving a proper will so their family could receive the Immortal Alliance's enormous reward.

Among the bounties published by the Immortal Alliance, information on an unclaimed Earthly Sha treasure beast was worth at least ten high-grade spirit stones, equivalent to a hundred thousand low-grade spirit stones.

What did a hundred thousand spirit stones mean in the Immortal Alliance?

Such a vast quantity of spirit stones could probably build a Foundation Establishment Lineage through sheer resources alone. With sufficient connections, one might even exchange them for a Calamity-Breaking Golden Elixir, something Foundation Establishment Rogue Persons yearned for but could never obtain.

Unfortunately, ordinary Qi Refining cultivators had no chance of encountering a Red-Striped Scorching Fire Serpent within the Immortal Alliance's jurisdiction.

"Thump, thump, thump!"

"Thump, thump, thump...!"

That was the sound of Chen Beiwu's heart pounding rapidly.

A spiritual intuition stirred within him, and he followed the sensation from the Nine-Breath Chaos in his heart to look out the window.

Boom!

High in the firmament, a golden sun hung like a brilliant pearl upon a divine king's throne, radiating seven-colored splendor that illuminated the universe, as though an eternal being had descended with a thunderous crash.

What is that? Chen Beiwu's mind went blank.

To mortal eyes, the spiritual power radiating from the great sun was gentle and warm, capable of granting all things vibrant life. But in Chen Beiwu's eyes at that moment, the sun had undergone a terrifying transformation.

Its aura had become incomparably domineering, like an eternal deity gazing down upon heaven and earth, capable of annihilating any ant that looked directly at it as effortlessly as crushing rotten wood.

I'll die!

If I keep looking, I'll definitely die! A realization rose in Chen Beiwu's heart.

At that very moment, his organs, bones, flesh, and even his cells were groaning beneath an unbearable burden. Even his consciousness was like a candle flame in a raging gale, liable to go out at any instant. Yet Chen Beiwu still could not look away.

"Buzz!"

Fortunately, at the critical moment, the treasure dwelling in Chen Beiwu's heart suddenly exerted its power.

A mysterious force, utterly unlike magical power or cultivation, forcibly intercepted a wisp of the great sun's radiance and began healing the exhaustion emanating from the depths of Chen Beiwu's soul.

"Hah... hah..."

Coming back to his senses, Chen Beiwu was drenched in sweat, his body trembling uncontrollably.

That was close. I nearly died!

What exactly caused the sun's sudden transformation? Did I inadvertently glimpse one of the Immortal Alliance's taboos, or did my earlier orange luck trigger a fortuitous encounter...?

Chen Beiwu's mind was a muddle. He dared not think further, much less look at the great sun outside the window again.

"Are you all right? Are you feeling unwell? Why don't you go to the infirmary for a checkup?" Having noticed Chen Beiwu's unusual condition, the invigilator took the initiative to ask after him.

Chen Beiwu wiped away his sweat and forcibly suppressed the terror in his heart. "Teacher Lei, I'm fine. I just happened to gain an insight into the Ten Thousand Beasts Art."

;psme&;psme&

With that, he shifted his attention to the exam paper on his desk, picked up his black pen, and continued answering the questions.

Only a few days had passed since the start of term, and today was the school's assessment exam.

Whether or not the Great Sun Mutation had been an orange fortuitous encounter, he needed to answer the questions seriously now. He needed something else—concentrating on the exam—to restore his mind to calm.

Besides, the results of this assessment were very important to Chen Beiwu, determining how many spirit stones the school would subsequently grant him.

At his words, Teacher Lei gave Chen Beiwu a long look, but said nothing more and continued patrolling the classroom.

Several minutes soon passed. Seemingly tired, Teacher Lei sat down on the other side of the classroom, though his peripheral gaze kept drifting seemingly casually over Chen Beiwu's face and exam paper.

Feeling a grogginess welling up from deep within his mind, Chen Beiwu forced himself to focus. While practicing Great Mystery Guarding the One, the visualization method he had cultivated since childhood, he turned over his exam paper,

and looked at the final long-answer question.

[Faced with an adult Iron Calamity Bear less than a hundred meters away, how should an ordinary fifth-level Qi Refining cultivator holding a Swift Movement Talisman, a Lesser Thunder-Summoning Talisman, and a small sword case escape safely?]

This long-answer question is rather difficult, Chen Beiwu thought.

Heaven and earth possessed spiritual energy, and all things could draw in the Spirit Power of heaven and earth to nurture magical power and cultivation, gathering the mighty power of heaven and earth into themselves. Such beings were respectfully called immortal cultivators by humanity.

In the Primordial Era, however, humanity had been weak. Great demons, blessed by nature, could ravage heaven and earth using nothing more than the bloodline Divine Abilities flowing within them. Even the immortal cultivators whom countless humans looked up to were no match for them.

In the eyes of all great demons back then, humans were mere ants they could annihilate with a casual gesture. In human eyes, great demons were unstoppable natural disasters.

To survive and reproduce in such a hostile environment, some humans had gone so far as to offer blood sacrifices in exchange for the protection of great demons.

Yet some human forebears had refused to submit to the great demons' rule. Overcoming countless hardships across long ages, they had gradually pioneered a supreme path to immortality through borrowing the power of beasts. Thus, they gained power surpassing the great demons and opened a new world for humanity.

By the present day, the Immortal Alliance had established a glorious cultivation civilization. Its flourishing grandeur could be summed up in a single sentence: wherever the sun and moon shone, wherever rivers flowed, all lands belonged to the Immortal Alliance.

Meanwhile, the Demon Race that had once dominated the Heavenly Abyss Star had been relegated to a remote corner, banished by the Immortal Alliance to the bottom of the Creek-Cavern Earth Abyss to eke out its remaining existence.

The members of the Demon Race now living within the Immortal Alliance's lands were no longer simply demons, but demonic beasts. According to their bloodline grades and potential ceilings, they were classified as exotic beasts, spirit beasts, treasure beasts, and profound beasts, corresponding respectively to cultivators at the Qi Refining, Foundation Establishment, Golden Core, and Nascent Soul stages.

As for demonic beasts above profound beasts, that information was entirely beyond Chen Beiwu's reach.

The Iron Calamity Bear in the long-answer question was a relatively obscure third-tier treasure beast recorded in the Ten Thousand Beasts Manual. In theory, it could possess over five hundred years of cultivation, equivalent to a Golden Core True Person among immortal cultivators. A casual swipe of its paw could crush a whole group of ordinary Qi Refining cultivators to death.

With this in mind, Chen Beiwu organized his thoughts and wrote his answer directly on the paper.

"The ordinary cultivator should discard the talismans and sword case, lie motionless where they are, and play dead to escape safely."

Seeing Chen Beiwu's answer, Teacher Lei frowned slightly.

What nonsense is this?

Following the current leads to mortality; defying it leads to immortality. We cultivators should bear an unyielding will, climb the steps of the nine heavens, and break the shackles of our lifespans. How could we lie down and play dead!

Admittedly, the Iron Calamity Bear had a temperament similar to certain feline treasure beasts. It enjoyed tormenting its prey to death and fed on fear.

The more its prey struggled during that process, the more excited the Iron Calamity Bear became.

Conversely, when faced with prey that had abandoned resistance, the Iron Calamity Bear would most likely lose interest in feeding, except when extremely hungry.

But the correct answer to this long-answer question should have been: the ordinary cultivator must embrace the resolve to find life by placing themselves at death's door and use the Lesser Thunder-Summoning Talisman on themselves.

The Iron Calamity Bear was a yin-aligned treasure beast with an innate aversion to lightning. In its eyes, the lightning summoned by a Lesser Thunder-Summoning Talisman was like filth that humans avoided at all costs. It could not get away fast enough, let alone willingly swallow it.

However, the trap in this question was that if an ordinary cultivator dared to attack it directly with the Lesser Thunder-Summoning Talisman, they would most likely provoke the Iron Calamity Bear's ferocity and die an exceedingly miserable death.

After all, no person could tolerate the insult of an opponent flinging shit at them, much less a vicious, brutal Iron Calamity Bear.

(End of chapter)