Ten Thousand Swords Return to One

Lin Yun was utterly astonished when he saw the towering building in the distance!

On this rarely visited mountainside, such a colossal structure had appeared out of nowhere, and no one knew when!

Yes, a colossal structure.

A building on the scale of Lingxian Hall was already an exceptionally grand sight for Xiushui Village.

Drawn by Lin Yun's exclamation, the others followed his gaze.

Then everyone let out an exclamation in perfect unison: "Wow!"

The next moment, their gazes all snapped toward Lin Xiao.

Even their toes could have figured out that the great building that had suddenly appeared was most likely his handiwork!

Lin Xiao rubbed his nose and gave a light cough.

"Well, this is our sect's main hall. How about I take you inside?"

At that, everyone nodded eagerly.

"Yes, yes!"

And so Lin Xiao led everyone toward the sect's main hall.

When they reached it, everyone raised their heads as one to look at the plaque hanging high above.

"Ah! I recognize the first three characters!" Hu Liang shouted.

But Qin Jianghe had already beaten him to it.

"The first two are Lingxian! Just like on the stone stele! The next one means 'great'! Am I right, Brother Sun?"

He had turned to ask Sun Yigao that last question.

Sun Yigao, standing nearby, smiled faintly and nodded, then gave everyone an impromptu lesson.

"This last character is pronounced 'dian.' You can understand it to mean a tall, grand building. As for our Lingxian Hall, I imagine it is intended for discussing sect affairs."

His recent pupils all nodded repeatedly, then hurriedly took a few more looks at the character for "hall," as though they wanted to imprint it on their minds at once.

Lin Xiao raised a hand and pressed it against the main doors.

The wooden doors felt immensely heavy. Lin Xiao exerted a little strength and pushed them open in one motion.

The current of air stirred up by the heavy doors lifted everyone's clothes and the ends of their hair before letting them fall again.

The sun was setting, and the light had already begun to fade.

Yet all anyone could see inside the hall was brightness!

A closer look revealed many glowing fragments embedded in the surrounding walls and pillars. Their arrangement was somewhat disorderly, yet it also seemed to conceal some kind of pattern.

At the very front of the hall stood a raised platform, reached by a flight of steps.

The rest of the hall was completely empty.

The platform was presumably where whoever held the power to speak would stand.

The remaining open space was probably where those who had voting rights in discussions would stand.

Lin Xiao lifted his foot and was the first to step over the high threshold and enter.

Everyone from the Lingxian Sect followed close behind.

The moment they entered, a solemn, majestic stillness washed over them, and their minds and bodies seemed to settle under its weight.

Lin Xiao was no exception.

Standing at the foot of the steps before the platform, he looked at the three deep-black characters shimmering with color on the wall, his feelings complicated.

Lingxian Sect.

He really had built a cultivation sect in an utterly unfamiliar ancient era, in a tiny village tucked away in a mountain corner.

Even though they, its members, were still very weak.

Even though their sect still had everything to build and nothing it needed, so poor it seemed like a fake cultivation sect.

Even so, it was all something they had worked toward, bit by bit, over the past few days.

Standing behind Lin Xiao, everyone looked at the magnificent hall before them-magnificent to them, at least-and felt their hearts surge.

This was their sect!

[Ding-congratulations, host! Your sect's members' loyalty has burst through the scale, reaching a full 200%! You have been awarded the Heaven Rank formation "Ten Thousand Swords Return to One." Please claim it.

Friendly reminder: As this is a Heaven Rank formation, a practitioner must be at least at the Golden Core Stage to cultivate and establish it. Otherwise, the practitioner will die while cultivating the formation. Please proceed with caution.]

!

Heaven Rank!

The system jolted Lin Xiao out of his thoughts. He had only just seen the words "Heaven Rank" and had no time to rejoice before he saw the Golden Core cultivation requirement that followed.

Well, even if their whole group's cultivation levels were added together, they still wouldn't have enough to make up a single Golden Core Stage cultivator.

It was a good thing, but it had appeared at the wrong time.

Lin Xiao could only toss the Ten Thousand Swords Return to One formation, which was as useless as a chicken rib for now, into his private inventory to gather dust.

Everyone had seen the sect's main hall, and Lin Xiao had gained a surge of loyalty that burst through the scale and a Heaven Rank formation manual. Delighted, he waved his hand grandly and told everyone to go home early for dinner.

Lin Xiao returned to the old Lin family home with Lin Yun.

In the courtyard beneath the setting sun, two dining tables had already been pushed together, with a stack of clean bowls and chopsticks on top.

Lin Ying, who was sitting by the courtyard gate playing at braiding straw rope, spotted Lin Yun and Lin Xiao. She immediately dragged the rope into the courtyard and called to the adults chatting in the main room.

"Grandpa, Grandma, Dad, Mom, Little Uncle! Eldest Cousin and Second Cousin are back!"

Old Madam Lin, who was sitting on the kang, engrossed in listening to Lin Dashan boast, was the first to react. She nimbly got off the kang, put on her shoes, and hurried toward the kitchen.

"Oh, Erlang and Sanlang are back. We need to bring the dishes out quickly. Eldest son's wife, come give me a hand-"

Eldest Uncle Lin's Wife followed her into the kitchen.

The men remaining in the main room also stopped talking and got up one after another to go into the courtyard.

Lin Yan, who had been tucked away in her room sewing clothes, folded the tattered garment in her hands and put it aside to continue mending tomorrow, then came out.

Lin Yan and Lin Ying were both daughters of the eldest branch of the Lin family, born to Lin Dashan and Eldest Uncle Lin's Wife, Lady Qin.

Lin Yan was thirteen this year, and Lin Ying was six.

By the time everyone had come out, Lin Yun and Lin Xiao had just reached the courtyard gate.

Old Madam Lin and Eldest Uncle Lin's Wife had already brought several enormous bowls of food to the table.

There were five enormous bowls, each bigger than a person's face and filled to the brim. Although only one dish contained meat, every dish gleamed with oil, showing that plenty had been used. The steamed buns, moreover, were made of proper three-grain flour, without any bran or the like mixed in. Each was white and plump and a delightful sight.

Seeing that everyone in the courtyard had gathered, Old Master Lin swept a satisfied gaze over their faces one by one, then sat down first.

Everyone followed and took their seats in turn.

Old Master Lin's face was rosy as he picked up his bowl and declared in a robust voice:

"Let's eat!"

Everyone picked up the bowls and chopsticks before them and began digging in with gusto!

Once they had taken the edge off their hunger, they began to eat more leisurely.

Old Master Lin picked his teeth, then took a small bite of food with his chopsticks and chewed it before saying to Lin Xiao:

"Sanlang, you made a fortune today! From what your eldest uncle and father said... this cultivation of yours... is it really true?"

Copying his grandfather, Lin Xiao picked up a bite of food with his chopsticks and chewed it, then answered with a look of contentment:

"Yes, Grandpa, my cultivation really is real. Would you like to give it a try with me? Look how old you are already. If you cultivate with me, you might even live a longer life!"