First Path

They lay there on the grass, eyes vacant, watching the dawn sky gradually turn from pitch black to dark blue, and then to white.

With the nearby Spirit Vein providing nourishment, everyone finally recovered from their exhausted and numb state.

It has to be said, this kind of work is really demanding.

I can't even imagine how much manpower, resources, and time it would take for an ordinary person to do something like this.

But when everyone turned their heads and looked at the winding and orderly stone steps on the distant mountain, faintly visible among the trees under the gradually brightening sky, they suddenly felt very satisfied.

This is the result of their tremendous effort.

Once the entire mountain is completed, everyone in their sect will be able to travel through it every day using this mountain path.

Near the mountain path are the terraced fields that Lin Xiao had previously worked on.

Because of the array formation within the spirit field, it is currently still a lush and flourishing field.

From a distance, it presents a beautiful scene where nature and human effort are harmoniously intertwined.

Xiaoluan and Tuantuan, a chicken and a cat respectively, each controlled several large banana leaves to fan the crowd as a gesture of cooling them off.

They often saw several elderly people doing this under the shade of trees, holding a palm-leaf fan.

Therefore, people learn by example.

Because of its low cultivation level, Big Peach couldn't control objects like that yet, so it used its short legs to walk around the group, blowing air on each person in turn.

Sun Yigao came to help after finishing his afternoon classes and is now lying among the crowd, enjoying this moment of peace and comfort.

It wasn't time for class yet.

However, when the students came to give him New Year's gifts a few days ago, they all asked him to start classes earlier.

So he had to start classes a few days earlier, only to have a day off on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month.

Today is the fifteenth day of the first lunar month.

It was a day of holiday for Sun Yigao's private school.

After today, Qin Jianghe will take his Mother Qin and Tietou's Mother back to Songyang County.

As dawn broke, everyone felt they had rested enough and relaxed enough, and gradually sat up from the ground.

Liao Pantu admired the mountain path nestled among the distant mountain walls and forests.

This was the first time in his more than five hundred years of cultivation that he had personally built something piece by piece.

Previously, almost everything in his cave abode was purchased.

Many of the sect's basic facilities had already been built when he arrived.

For over five hundred years, he has either been cultivating or making money by entering secret realms, buying and selling goods online.

That's why I became enemies with Yin Xuanzi back then.

On one occasion, when Liao Pantu was still in the Golden Core stage, the two of them entered a secret realm together and then got separated.

Later, Liao Pantu mistakenly took a very valuable treasure that Yin Xuanzi had left there as a precaution, thinking it was unclaimed property, and even sold it.

It is said that it was left to Yin Xuanzi by his deceased wife.

As a result, Yin Xuanzi, who was preparing to break through in the secret realm, almost Qi Deviation.

The first thing they did upon emerging was to search for the whereabouts of the treasure.

As it turned out, the black market that Liao Pantu found was incredibly reliable; it was impossible to trace the buyer's information or whereabouts.

Thus began Yin Xuanzi's long journey of hunting Liao Pantu.

And so they went back and forth, their feud growing ever deeper.

Because they were from the same school and had Heavenly Mandate Oath never to kill each other, Yin Xuanzi worked hard to improve his cultivation and devised various schemes in order to punish Liao Pantu, who was of similar strength to him at the time.

At that time, Liao Pantu over 160 years old, while Yin Xuanzi was over 300 years old. Originally, he had no hope of advancing to the Nascent Soul, but he insisted on getting revenge and, after taking many longevity pills, he broke through to the Nascent Soul in his lifetime.

Just as he was about to cause trouble for Liao Pantu, Liao Pantu went into seclusion to begin his breakthrough to the Nascent Soul.

Liao Pantu didn't want his cultivation life to be disrupted by his troubles, so he avoided him as much as possible.

The two of them, in a state of frequent seclusion, interacted like cats playing with mice.

But Yin Xuanzi did not give up.

Finally, perseverance paid off.

More than three hundred years later.

Once, Liao Pantu heard that a long-lost Pill Formula had appeared in a certain place, so he went to find it. In the end, he fell into the Heavenly Net and Earthly Snare set by Yin Xuanzi and was then dismembered.

Liao Pantu felt quite sad whenever he thought about this.

Little did he know that the thing casually placed on the ground was put there by that dimwit Yin Xuanzi, and it didn't even have his name engraved on it.

Moreover, this guy is usually very stingy; he never takes out any of his treasures to show him. Who would have thought that something he randomly encountered in the secret realm would be his?

The past is too painful to recall.

Liao Pantu snapped out of his thoughts, looked at the mountain path in the distance, thought for a moment, and then took out a large stone that looked as if it had been handled for decades.

Its shape is not very regular, but it has an indescribable beauty.

Its surface is as smooth as water.

Liao Pantu carried the large rock to the mountain path, then placed it heavily on the side of the path, burying it three-tenths of an inch into the ground.

Then he turned and shouted towards the small mountain spring's Spirit Vein:

"Sect Leader! Come and name it!"

Seeing this, Lin Xiao rushed over and asked, looking at the beautiful large rock in front of him:

"Senior Liao, this stone must be something extraordinary, right?"

Liao Pantu his hand and said:

"This stone is called the Mountain-Stabilizing Stone. It can stabilize the mountain and prevent landslides or unstable foundations. It's not very useful, so don't be shy. Hurry up and think of a name, and I'll write it down."

It wasn't that Liao Pantu, but rather that the three characters ' Lingxian Sect Sect' on the stone tablet next to the thatched shed at the sect entrance were rather indescribable, and he really didn't want his Mountain-Stabilizing Stone to be an eyesore because of Lin Xiao's handwriting.

However, he didn't know that the character wasn't written by Lin Xiao, but rather upgraded based on the sect's development level.

The characters are actually quite good now; if it were the original thatched hut, they would have been crooked and even more unsightly.

Lin Xiao didn't have any particular thoughts on this.

He had seen Senior Liao's calligraphy before; it was exceptionally well-written, exuding a grand and majestic aura.

His inscription signifies his high status.

At this moment, the others who were resting by the mountain Spirit Vein also came over to watch, admiring the Mountain-Stabilizing Stone.

Looking up at the mountain path that they had all built with their own hands, Lin Xiao pondered for a moment before speaking to him:

"What do you think of calling it ' First Path '?"

Upon hearing this, Liao Pantu nodded and said:

"Not bad, concise enough. Confirmed?"

Lin Xiao then asked everyone:

Does anyone have any thoughts or opinions?

Everyone shook their heads.

"No objection, you can decide on the name Brother Xiao."

"Yes, yes, yes, you decide what name Brother Xiao should have."

"The name chosen by the sect leader is naturally good."

Everyone chimed in, supporting Lin Xiao's choice of name.

Seeing this, Liao Pantu drew the peach wood sword given to him by the sect, condensed his qi into the blade, and with a movement that left afterimages, it appeared to everyone as if he was slowly carving the two characters 'First Path' on the Mountain-Stabilizing Stone.