The middle-aged scholar cupped his fists and bowed to Du Yuan the cripple. "I, too, have come to bid you farewell, senior..."
Du Yuan said, "What? After guarding Two Realms Village through so many bitter years, today Two Realms Village, the Wild Spirit Land, and Guardian City have joined forces to slay that immortal. We cultivators of the Human Race can finally hold our heads high... yet all of you are leaving?"
The middle-aged man wore a scholar's robe washed pale with age. At those words, he lowered his head without speaking... then looked up at Du Yuan and said, "I lingered on Two-World Mountain for a long time, never able to make up my mind to enter the Wild Spirit Land... not because I lacked the strength to protect myself there, but because I still could not work out what I ought to do inside."
"And now?"
"Now I understand... the cultivators in the courts and governments of the mortal world will not listen to mortal reason, and it seems the people in the Wild Spirit Land will not listen either. So I might as well venture out and see whether the people in some remote, desolate places might listen to a little of it..."
Du Yuan broke into an amused laugh and said to the middle-aged scholar, "Are you heading out to sea, Master?"
"No, I wish to travel northwest and see the customs and people of Western Liang..."
"Western Liang is bitterly cold, its spiritual energy thin and its soil barren. Cultivators are few, and its people fierce... are you not afraid of encountering unreasonable bandits, Master?"
"It is all right. I still have a Disciplinary Ruler passed down by my teacher... if they refuse to see reason, I shall punish them!"
The old scholar bowed toward the Land God Temple, then shouldered his bundle and left at an unhurried pace.
Du Yuan had never been able to see through the cultivation of this old scholar, who seldom ventured outside. Now, however, he was utterly astonished.
Old Skeleton spat inside the Land God Temple and cursed, "Were you all blind? Did even that old blind man Mingxin fail to realize that this useless Confucian was actually a genuine ninth-realm cultivator?"
Du Yuan stood stunned for a long while before saying, "Who would have thought! Who would have thought that among the cultivators from the central lands stationed in Two Realms Village, he would have the highest cultivation..."
"There are plenty of things you would never think of! A pack of good-for-nothing fools..."
Old Skeleton rolled over, closed his eyes, and lay motionless.
In the courtyard, Lü Bufan held the books the old scholar, whom he had met only a handful of times, had just given him.
"Child, getting into Two Realms Village was no easy feat. You must walk your own road. I had intended to speak to Master Ming in a little while... and teach you to read myself... now it seems we were not destined for that."
"Read more books... then you will not be at a loss when trouble comes your way. Life's road is short, but the road of understanding is long... we shall meet again if fate allows!"
Lü Bufan put away the books and bowed toward the middle-aged scholar, who had long since gone into the distance...
Jinhu Immortal Abode, in the Capital City of Great Jin.
Master Ming brought Huang Jiu through the Immortal Abode's Restraining Formation and rushed onto Immortal Abode Island, where Jinhu Immortal Abode stood.
Master Ming looked at the newly built, lavish wooden tower and said, "Shameless died here?"
Huang Jiu smiled coldly. "Then let's do it again..."
Master Ming sighed. "This time... it is that bastard immortal's turn to die!"
Huang Jiu exclaimed in surprise, "What? Have you gone mad? That is a damned immortal... the equivalent of a tenth-realm, Heaven-and-Earth Realm cultivator in the mortal world! How many years has it been since a tenth-realm cultivator appeared in the mortal world... even burying him beneath a sea of people would be hopeless! Don't tell me... don't tell me..."
Master Ming nodded. "That's right. Someone contacted the Wild Spirit Land this time... with them and some cultivators from the Southern Borderlands working together, the two Guardian Cities will be thrown into chaos! The Three-Origin Immortal-Severing Array will stop for the time it takes three sticks of incense to burn... Big Black will have a chance to act!"
"Heavens... Big Black makes a move, and then what? As long as the immortal lives and the Immortal-Severing Array remains undisturbed... the Upper Realm will not make any major moves. But if we kill that bastard immortal, won't someone descend to hunt Big Black down?"
"The people at Two-World Mountain have already found us a hiding place..."
Master Ming stared blankly at the wooden tower before him. Two white-robed boys stood trembling outside its doors, one holding a fly whisk and the other a ruyi scepter.
"Y-you, who are you? How dare you trespass in an immortal's residence... leave at once, and do not defile the immortal's place of secluded cultivation... ah!"
With a scream, the boy holding the fly whisk stared in utter horror at the slender length of a Purple-Gold Candelabrum protruding from his chest...
Blood dripped from the candelabrum in streams. The boy staggered a step, then collapsed to the ground with a thud.
The other boy turned and ran, only to be pierced and killed on the spot by another Purple-Gold Candelabrum shot from inside the wooden tower!
Huang Jiu sneered, then turned and sent out several streaks of sword light, driving back a few Great Jin cultivators struggling to cross Koi Lake's Restraining Formation...
Master Ming watched the stunning woman slowly emerge from Jinhu Immortal Abode, her expression desolate... "Heh, isn't this Liu Xian'er's mother, from the Liu Clan of Mount Zhlin?"
The stunning woman stared blankly at the two men before her and said in a hoarse voice, "Do not be fooled. Those two were no innocent children... they were catamites and immortal servants that immortal had kept for over twenty years, each more filthy and vicious than the other!"
Master Ming curled his lip. "Filthy and vicious? Are you talking about that fine daughter of yours?"
The stunning woman smiled miserably. "She wronged Wei Wuchen, and our Liu Clan owes his Wei Family... but do you think the immortal ever treated the Liu Clan as human beings?"
Master Ming examined the woman from head to toe... "Mm, you, Fu Yuhua, have fifth-realm cultivation and the art to preserve your youth. Born with seductive beauty, you make a fine cauldron for dual cultivation... so mother and daughter went into battle together and coaxed the immortal into the heights of delight?"
Liu Xian'er's mother, Fu Yuhua, gave a bitter smile. "What? Even a Great Cultivator from Two Realms Village would mock a wretched woman like me?"
Master Ming waved a hand. "You suffer? Your entire family has not suffered as much as Shameless alone... if you find it so bitter, why keep living?"
"Hahaha... I wanted to die, but could I? What would happen to my child? My birth family? My husband?"
Master Ming stepped forward, brushing past her... "Go die somewhere else..."
The woman nodded. "Very well! Thank you... had you not come, I would not even have had an excuse to die! I would not have dared..."
Master Ming turned his head and said, "That is no problem. Die whenever you please! Someone in the south is plotting to slay that bastard immortal. The Great Jin Dynasty will be in turmoil for a while... no one will care whether you women live or die!"
"Is that... true?" A glimmer flashed in the woman's eyes...
Master Ming smiled. "It is!"
The woman relaxed at once... "I understand. I suppose Two Realms Village will not spare the Liu Clan?"
Master Ming smiled, turned, and climbed the stairs.
The woman looked down at her gauzy robe and skirt, thin as a cicada's wings and almost transparent, then shook her head. "I cannot go back. There is nowhere I can return to... then it is time to go..."
Master Ming strode up into the wooden tower and raised a finger to touch a wooden door!
Restraining Formation runes flashed and rose into view. Master Ming traced one door-opening formation pattern after another, unraveling them in turn... no longer caring in the slightest whether the immortal a thousand miles away might sense it and rush back to kill him.
With one kick, he smashed the wooden door and entered the treasury.
Spiritual artifacts and magical treasures glittered with spiritual light. The wooden cabinets were filled with naturally grown spirit medicines brimming with vitality. There were also pieces of refined ore awaiting further work...
"Not bad. I'll save up a little marriage money for that young disciple of mine, who's too poor to afford trousers!"
Master Ming sighed, took out a Mustard-Seed Object pouch, and stripped the entire treasury bare.
A faint smell of smoke drifted up. Master Ming looked down and curled his lip. "The woman still had a little spirit in her after all. Has she set herself on fire?"
Downstairs, fierce flames surged upward...
Liu Xian'er's mother, Fu Yuhua, had changed into a thick black dress and sat peacefully amid the blazing flames... her eyes closed as she awaited death. The spiritual power of her cultivation dispersed in all directions... then transformed within the flames into dazzling streams of light that flashed and vanished.
Master Ming stepped out and drifted lightly down onto the white jade steps before the wooden tower, glancing back at the stunning woman perishing in the flames...
Beside him, Huang Jiu nodded. "Was there anything strange upstairs?"
Master Ming shook his head. "No. Where is the Dustless Sword?"
Full of anticipation, Huang Jiu took two pieces of a broken sword from the Mustard-Seed Object in his robes...
Master Ming reached out, held the two broken pieces, and carefully sensed them...
Huang Jiu asked nervously, "Well? Is there any trace of Shameless?"
Master Ming opened his clouded eyes and pondered for a moment. "Hard to say. There is indeed a strange kind of spiritual power inside... but it does not seem like a remnant soul left by a person. The Great Jin Dynasty's Inner Court Attendants have come out... let's leave first..."
Huang Jiu fell silent in disappointment for a moment, then nodded... he reached out and grabbed Master Ming's collar. Sword light flashed, and the two vanished from Immortal Abode Island.
The fire burned ever fiercer... a magnificent nanmu wood tower, ethereal and wreathed in an immortal air, was swiftly swallowed by a sea of flames.
Jinhu Immortal Abode descended into chaos...
On Mount Yuekong, south of Great Jin's Capital City, a band of cultivators and Martial Warriors wielding unusual weapons and magical artifacts slaughtered all the Immortal Armor Soldiers and several cultivators of the Liu Clan of Mount Zhlin guarding the stele... then silently watched the giant man standing before the Immortal Sect Investiture Stele.
The giant man panted heavily. Behind him lay the mangled corpses of three sixth-realm Attendants of the Liu Clan.
The Gang Qi of a Martial Warrior at the peak of the eighth realm had shattered the cultivators' protective magical treasures, smashing and punching through them like chickens and dogs... leaving only torn, battered corpses.
Han Wu raised his head, gasping violently...
A stream of blood flowed from his fist like a little brook!
"Hehehe... Shameless, I was the one who fulfilled one of your wishes after all! In the end, I knocked a chunk off this damned piece-of-shit stele..."
Every bone in Han Wu's right arm was shattered... its flesh a bloody ruin!
This incomparably hard Suppressing Stele, imbued with the power of the Immortals' investiture, had actually had a notch smashed into it by Han Wu's bare fist...
Several fragments of stone on the ground gave off faint wisps of immortal power.
Han Wu looked back, his bloodshot eyes fixed on a silent group of black-clad figures.
The black-clad figure at their head cupped his fists in salute. They all turned into streaks of light and swiftly vanished from Mount Yuekong...
"A bunch of bastards, always hiding their heads while showing their tails..."
Han Wu dropped onto the ground and sat there panting.