"No wonder so many people fought over heavenly treasures. Breaking through in one go with a vast surge of true qi felt amazing."
Martial artists pursued strength, and internal power was its foundation.
The moment their internal power soared, it was like a gourmand tasting a delicacy or a drunkard savoring fine wine. The pleasure radiated from within, exquisite beyond compare.
Cao Jinxing opened his eyes to a blanket of frost. The entire cellar had become an icehouse.
Xuan Yuan Fourteen sat nearby, watching him anxiously. When Cao Jinxing opened his eyes again, Fourteen brightened, shrank, and leaped into his arms.
"A little heavier."
Fourteen's shrinking ability worked much like bone contraction: the shape changed, but the mass stayed the same. An ordinary person really could not have carried Fourteen.
Holding Fourteen, Cao Jinxing opened the iron door and returned to the room aboveground. He ate his fill, then slept until broad daylight.
There was no need to arrive at the Imperial Prison on time. If anything went wrong, they would send a signal, and his lightness skill would get him there quickly.
Opportunities like this were rare. If he did not seize the chance to slack off now, all his earlier overtime would have been for nothing.
As usual, he bought some food on his way to work and ate as he walked. By the time he arrived, Su Yunsheng and Sun Lang were already practicing on the first level.
"Sir."
Su Yunsheng came over and saluted. "Lord Shen said to find him on the third level once you arrived."
"Mm."
Eating a meat bun, Cao Jinxing nodded. "You two carry on. I'll go down and take a look."
The Imperial Prison had nine levels.
The first held convicted officials without martial skills and serious bandits below Xiantian; the second held master thieves at the Xiantian realm; the third and below housed notorious bandit chiefs and demonic overlords.
At present, the most formidable prisoner on the entire third level was Xiang Qianli, the Bright Sect's Left Envoy of Light, who had reached the peak of Tongyou.
But he had suffered a severe injury. Meng Chong, a brush-wielding eunuch of the Directorate of Ceremonial, had drained his right arm with the Great Soul-Seizing Hand. Stripped of all its vital essence, the entire arm had become skin and bone. His cultivation had plummeted, leaving him with strength around the fifth level of Tongyou, which was why he was confined on the third level.
The farther down one went, the more sinister it became.
The third level was already heavy with dampness. The ground was bone-chillingly cold, and the frigid subterranean chill seeped through the floor and boots into the feet. Without a foundation in internal cultivation, a person would be ruined within days.
"You're here."
As he descended the last step, he saw two people standing at the entrance. Besides Shen Xiang, there was an old man in gray-white cloth robes. His back was hunched, yet sword qi surged around him, shooting straight toward the heavens!
A master!
Shen Xiang said, "Jinxing, let me introduce you. This is Senior Xu Quan, the third level's prison guardian. His ancestor was Xu Yan, a musician of Great Ji. His family's Dream-Maze Swordplay is ranked fifth grade. His exceptional swordsmanship is renowned throughout Jiangnan."
The so-called Ji fiddle was the erhu.
Xu Yan had been a Northern Song musician, a great performer who could play normally on a single string. Even more memorable was the unique art he had created: the lower fifth-grade Dream-Maze Swordplay.
When choosing a fifth-grade art, Cao Jinxing had browsed many martial techniques and learned the basics of quite a few from their descriptions. Dream-Maze Swordplay happened to be one of them.
The reviewer had praised this sword art to the skies.
"Endlessly changing, as illusory as a dream!"
It was a rare flexible-sword art. The sword was concealed on the body, and its moves were swift and elusive, dazzling the eye.
"My apologies for not recognizing you."
Cao Jinxing cupped his hands.
Xu Quan smiled. "To possess such cultivation at your age, Lord Cao... it is this old man who should offer his respects."
"Exactly."
Shen Xiang looked Cao Jinxing up and down in amazement. "One night apart, and your cultivation has shot up. Been sneaking some treats, have you?"
"By a stroke of luck, I got hold of a Jade Flat Peach."
There was no need to hide it from them-he had already eaten it, anyway.
Besides, a direct disciple of a major sect like Shen Xiang did not lack heavenly treasures.
"You certainly are lucky."
Shen Xiang made the casual remark and moved straight to the matter at hand. "Yesterday, I showed you the second level. Today, we'll look at the third and stop by the central secret chamber to see the main defensive mechanisms. Broaden your horizons. That way, your trip here won't have been wasted."
The entire Imperial Prison was also a vast mechanical formation.
Each level had its own control room, which operated that level's mechanisms to counter escaping prisoners.
At present, Shen Xiang controlled the central hubs for all three upper levels. Yesterday, he had intended to hand the first two over to Cao Jinxing, but Cao Jinxing had refused.
I'm here on vacation, and you're finding me more work?
Cao Jinxing had no interest whatsoever in what others saw as the power to decide life and death.
Xu Quan said, "Then this old man will return to the secret chamber and await you both."
"Please go ahead, Senior."
Once he had left, Shen Xiang transmitted his voice to Cao Jinxing. "There are many prison guardians like him throughout the Imperial Prison. Most want something from the Pacification Commission, such as martial arts or divine weapons. Xu Quan volunteered to spend five years here for his ancestral fifth-grade divine weapon, the [Violet Star Soft Sword]."
Violet Star Soft Sword...
Cao Jinxing's mouth twitched. Here we go again. That lazy game designer was at it again!
"Isn't that risky?"
After thinking it over, Cao Jinxing asked, "Aren't you worried someone with ill intentions might slip in?"
"It's nowhere near that simple."
Shen Xiang led the way, smiling. "Do you think just anyone can get in? Never mind the prison guardians-even the jailers delivering food must have clean records going back three generations. How much stricter do you think it is for them? One of the many conditions for entering the Imperial Prison is bringing their families to the capital, right under the Embroidered Uniform Guard's watch. At the slightest sign of treachery, their families will be wiped out in an instant!"
"Mm..."
Cao Jinxing nodded. That was more like the Embroidered Uniform Guard's style.
He looked around. The defenses on the third level were visibly stronger, and the cells' iron doors were huge and thick.
Each door had only a small hatch near the floor, measuring less than fifteen centimeters on either side.
At that moment, a jailer was pushing a cart along, placing bowls of food through the hatches one by one.
"The doors are cast from cold iron. Breaking them would require the ability to boil iron and melt gold. Not only are such abilities extremely rare, even if these men possessed them, they couldn't use them."
Shen Xiang pointed out the cells one by one. "Ten Thousand Miles of Rainbow Clouds at Dawn, Iron-Armed Dragon King Xue Cheng, Thousand-Hand Butcher Murong Jun, Wheel King Shao Changgeng... which of them wasn't once a notorious bandit or fiend? Which lacked extraordinary skills? And what did it get them? Their shoulder blades were pierced. They still have their cultivation, but no way to use it. Now all they can do is hold out until their time to die... His Majesty is refining pills and needs condemned prisoners to test them. Martial experts like these can endure a few extra trials."
"..."
How ruthless!
Cao Jinxing inwardly marveled. With defenses this tight, breaking out from within was practically impossible. Their only option was to wait for someone to rescue them.
But the Imperial Prison was heavily guarded and riddled with mechanisms. A frontal assault was suicide, and infiltrating it alone would end just as badly!
No wonder people said entering the Imperial Prison meant having one foot in the gates of hell.
Cao Jinxing asked curiously, "Has anyone ever escaped successfully?"
"...Only one."
Shen Xiang's expression grew more solemn than Cao Jinxing had ever seen it. "And he escaped from the ninth level... He is the man who now unites the Three Sects of the Demon Gate and commands all the demons under heaven: the leader of the Demon Cult, Li Shengtian!"
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