The bonfire in the courtyard dimmed. Xu Junlan picked up a wine jar—empty. She grabbed another—still empty.
White frost had formed on the lotus leaves, and even the despised chicken ribs were now being picked clean with careful nibbles.
The laughter and chatter quieted, though no one wanted to mention leaving.
"Master," Xu Junlan slurred, her drunken eyes hazy as she clung to Master Lingxue, rambling incessantly, "Don't go, Master. Stay, please? Just stay."
Master Lingxue sighed. "Where would I even go?"
"Then—then don’t blame Luo Luo either," Xu Junlan blurted, her words thick with intoxication. "Even I think—think she had a good reason for stealing Yu Fusheng this time!"
"That’s right, Elder! Even I can tell something’s off about the senior disciple! If it were me, I’d test him too!"
"The Sect Leader must investigate thoroughly… but wait, don’t go alone! Take us with you!"
"Exactly!" Luo Luo nodded solemnly. "In all the stories, elders who uncover secrets by themselves always end up dead."
She had always worried for her master.
Master Lingxue rubbed her temples. "...What nonsense are you all spouting?"
Their minds were filled with such frivolity—utterly neglecting their duties.
Just beyond the wall.
Qing Xu narrowed his eyes. "Who are you?"
In his own nightmare realm, someone had reversed time—now that was a true nightmare.
For now, he dared not act rashly, feigning calm as he probed with quiet words.
No response came.
The swarm of mosquitoes buzzed near the hall’s entrance, as ordinary as any other insects.
Click. Click. Click.
A soft, eerie sound came from behind.
Qing Xu turned slowly.
A set of fish teeth clacked open and shut, crawling toward him across the ground.
"..."
What kind of cursed nightmare was this?
The teeth climbed the threshold, then stopped, motionless.
Flutter—
Birds arrived one after another, perching along the roof ridge.
Every insect, every creature—their eyes gleamed with the faint glow of soulblood.
Qing Xu’s eyes sharpened. "Luo Luo’s soulblood… You’re Li Zhaoye—no. You’re not. You’re the true Divine Sovereign."
He knew he was right, yet still, no answer came.
The Sovereign did not care.
Qing Xu’s gaze flickered toward the courtyard—what the Sovereign did care about.
The joyous voices within grated on his ears.
None of this matched his expectations.
Tonight was supposed to be Luo Luo’s darkest hour, yet she was far from alone.
Qing Xu sneered. "Is this pitiful affection enough to move you? What kind of Divine Sovereign has a heart so soft?"
Before the words fully left his lips, he felt it—a gaze.
As indifferent as one might regard the wind, clouds, trees, or flowers—the Sovereign looked at him.
"You envy them," the voice said, so faint it was almost imperceptible.
Qing Xu stiffened, then burst into laughter. "Envy? Envy what? A pack of weaklings? A dead man?"
"You could have joined them."
"Joined?" Qing Xu doubled over, laughing until he had to brace himself on his knees. "Why would I want that? What value does such a thing hold?"
Beyond the threshold, the scenes inside and outside the courtyard were worlds apart.
The bonfire had died, yet the group remained huddled in a warm, misty glow.
No light or warmth spilled beyond the hall.
The Sovereign’s tone remained detached. "The sincerity between them pains you."
Qing Xu’s laughter faded into a low, bitter chuckle. "Sincerity? In this world? When it comes to life and death, who isn’t selfish? Who doesn’t betray?"
As he spoke, the surroundings began to twist and warp.
This was his nightmare realm. He gathered all his strength, preparing to strike against this intruding Sovereign.
Whoosh—
Qing Xu stepped back, his form dissolving like ink into the mountains behind him.
In the courtyard.
"Ugh—someone help me up, quick." Zhao Yu swayed unsteadily. "Did I drink fake wine? Why am I seeing Mount Laojun?"
He squinted at the eaves above.
There, a mountain was rising at an alarming speed—its familiar furnace-like shape unmistakable.
Mount Laojun… was tilting toward the main peak!
Zhao Yu gaped, sucking in sharp breaths.
"If the mountain won’t come to me, I’ll go to the mountain—wait, no, that’s not right!" A senior disciple giggled, swaying. "Marvelous! Truly marvelous!"
Zhao Yu groaned. "Marvelous my foot."
Luo Luo followed his gaze and froze.
The sky above the courtyard was now choked with peaks. To the west, a pair of horn-like summits erupted, tiny pavilions perched atop them.
"Even Mirror Twin Peaks is here?!" Luo Luo gasped.
Shadows piled upon shadows as the mountains pressed closer, their weight bearing down on Qingnv Hall.
"Something feels… off," Zhao Yu muttered nervously.
Xu Junlan sprang to her feet. "You idiot, you don’t need to feel it to know that!"
The light dimmed further. Looking up, there was nothing but mountains.
All thirteen peaks of the Tai Xuan Sect leaned inward, as if a giant hand were closing around Qingnv Hall, ready to crush it.
Luo Luo staggered upright, arms outstretched for balance.
The ground beneath her had turned soft.
The world had become a painting—mountains, trees, halls—all melting into swirling ink and pigment.
Crash!
A wall suddenly twisted like a rolled-up rug, snapping into the air and swallowing a flock of birds and insects.
The disciples rubbed their eyes, disbelief warring with horror.
"Elder… does your Qingnv Hall usually… swat mosquitoes by itself?" Zhao Yu asked weakly.
Master Lingxue didn’t answer.
Luo Luo’s heart lurched. She turned—only to see Master Lingxue’s body dissolving into the landscape, her form merging with the mountains like a shard of translucent jade.
"Elder!"
Before she could react, the ground liquefied, dragging Luo Luo under.
She opened her mouth to scream, but no sound came.
None of this made sense.
They had fallen into a vat of paint—or a dyer’s vat. Around them, colors still held vague shapes of halls, trees, corridors… all bleeding into one another.
A carved vermilion bird dripped past Luo Luo’s hand. She touched it—and it collapsed into murky water, vanishing into the walls.
"Grab the rope! Quick!"
A lasso meant for spirit chickens whistled overhead, useless against the chaos.
She instinctively reached up to grab it, turning her head to see several senior disciples from Qingyu Peak vigorously swinging lassos, pulling everyone together.
Luo Luo exclaimed, "Now we're truly grasshoppers tied to the same string!"
Xu Junlan snapped, "Shut your crow's beak!"
In the blink of an eye, the group "drifted" out of the Qingnü Hall, carried downstream by the current.
"N-n-no good!" Zhao Yu panicked, shouting, "W-w-waterfall!"
The mountain peak rose abruptly from the ground, twisting into the sky.
Ahead lay a vast, bottomless abyss.
Like ants caught in a raging torrent, they were helplessly swept toward the waterfall, with no room to maneuver.
Winter Ridge.
"Xu, my disciple!"
Xu Junzhu turned to see Master Fuling rushing toward her, panting heavily.
"Master Fuling."
Master Fuling waved a hand, still catching his breath. "The mist—it's poisonous. Many have already collapsed. Quick, I have Clear Spirit Pills here. Distribute them to everyone!"
Xu Junzhu nodded. "Thank you, Master."
"No need for formalities." Master Fuling handed her the medicine bottle, rambling on, "Take one yourself first, just in case."
Xu Junzhu made a perfunctory gesture of swallowing a pill.
"I’ll get to work, then," she said.
Li Zhaoye had warned her—someone among them was colluding with Qing Xu. She had to find the traitor quickly.
Master Fuling smiled warmly and waved. "Go on, go on."
Xu Junzhu took two steps forward before suddenly freezing—a faint peach-blossom mist had begun swirling around her.
She whirled around, fixing her gaze on Master Fuling.
He was just tucking his sleeves back into place.
Caught off guard by her sudden turn, he gave an awkward chuckle. "Xu, my disciple? Is something wrong?"
Xu Junzhu stared intently at the mist now lingering between them.
She finally realized what was amiss.
"Bai Yi said Soul-Severing is contagious," Xu Junzhu said, her voice turning icy. "Anyone nearby would be poisoned."
Master Fuling nodded. "Exactly! That’s why we must act fast. Hurry, save as many as you can."
"You’re a master healer. When disaster struck, they would’ve sought you first," Xu Junzhu countered. "Care to explain why you’re still standing here unharmed?"
Their eyes locked.
After a pause, Master Fuling sighed. "You’ve already taken the pill. What’s the point of asking now?"
Xu Junzhu’s expression darkened. "The pill you gave me—it’s tainted?"
Master Fuling admitted without hesitation, "Yes."
With the truth laid bare, he saw no reason to hide. "The peach-blossom mist is just the trigger. The real poison was in the Qi-Replenishing Pills I gave you all earlier—including the one in your hand now."
Xu Junzhu closed her eyes briefly.
"Sleep. There’s nothing to fear," Master Fuling said. "Senior Qing Xu means no harm. He merely guides lost souls back to the right path."
When Xu Junzhu opened her eyes again, her gaze was glacial.
The peach-blossom mist thickened around her, yet she remained standing, advancing step by step toward Master Fuling.
Realization dawned on him. "...You didn’t take the pill? You suspected me and tricked me?"
Xu Junzhu studied him for a moment before shaking her head with a sorrowful smile. "Master Fuling, I didn’t suspect you. I didn’t suspect anyone."
She raised her hand, revealing the pill still resting in her palm.
Master Fuling’s face darkened. "Pretty words. If you didn’t distrust me, why refuse the medicine?"
Xu Junzhu sighed. "Because I knew your pills were precious, I wanted to save them for those who needed them more."
She hadn’t taken the earlier Qi-Replenishing Pills for the same reason.
Her sister, Xu Junlan, had taken a double dose—and thus was the first to fall.
"You refuse kindness? Then don’t blame me for being ruthless!" Master Fuling snarled.
Clang!
A gleaming emerald dagger materialized in his hand.
All medicine carried some toxicity—and as Master Fuling’s poisoned blade flashed, the very air grew heavy.
Xu Junzhu met his gaze coldly. "Did you ever wonder why I was so confident refusing your antidote?"
The dagger shot toward her.
Ting.
Out of thin air, a crystalline frost-flower bloomed.
Ting. Ting. Ting.
Frost crept up the blade, freezing the venomous liquid into suspended droplets, like frozen serpent’s venom.
Master Fuling’s face paled. He spun to flee—
Thud!
His body collided with an invisible wall of ice.
Clang!
He darted sideways, only to hit another barrier.
The ice was transparent, seamless—no escape in sight.
"You’ve reached Divine Transformation?!" Master Fuling gasped.
In over a century, only three in the Tai Xuan Sect had achieved it—Master Lingxue, Qing Xu, and Yuan.
How could a junior like her—?
Xu Junzhu stepped forward, walking on air.
Beneath her feet, frost-flowers bloomed and vanished.
Master Fuling swayed, dizzy.
The sword Frostless hovered at Xu Junzhu’s shoulder, radiating cold.
For a fleeting moment, Master Fuling felt the same oppressive aura from her as he had from Master Lingxue.
He whispered, "Sect Leader..."
Xu Junzhu’s voice was icy steel. "Free them from their nightmares. Redeem yourself, and I might spare you."
At Winter Ridge, the towering monument stood like a pillar between heaven and earth.
Its carved surface resembled a window, revealing veins of translucent jade beneath.
Li Zhaoye lounged lazily at the monument’s base, eyeing the group before him.
The Holy Maiden, Wu Xie, stood half a step behind seven elders, her head bowed as she spoke softly to them.
The elders wore pristine white robes embroidered in gold, their skin unnaturally pale as if untouched by sunlight. Their movements were stiff, yet their spiritual pressure was overwhelming.
These were the seven Grand Elders who maintained the Golden Light Array in the Divine Mountains.
Wu Xie straightened slightly, lifting her gaze to meet Li Zhaoye’s.
"Calling for backup, huh?" Li Zhaoye smirked.
Wu Xie intoned, "We humbly invite the Divine Master to return to his rightful place."
Li Zhaoye grinned wider. "Calling for their deaths, you mean."
Their eyes locked—Wu Xie’s flickered almost imperceptibly.
Before Li Zhaoye could speak again, she interjected, "The jade in this monument is quite vividly green."
Li Zhaoye: "?"
"The Holy Maiden speaks true," a nearby attendant chimed in. "With the Divine Master standing beneath it, his entire head looks green!"
Li Zhaoye: "..."
Personal insults were unacceptable.
"All at once. I’m in a hurry."
With a flick of his wrist, he unraveled a seal—emerald light flashed, and the ground beneath the Divine Palace’s forces disintegrated into dust.
Wu Xie leaped back, shouting, "Elders, beware! He’s grown stronger!"
As their figures blurred past each other, Li Zhaoye cast her a sidelong glance.
His lips curled.
‘Trying to use me to kill your enemies?’
‘You’ll join them in death.’
Luo Luo and the others tumbled toward the abyss, caught in the violent current.
They flailed desperately, paddling backward.
With every movement, the vivid colors around them—azure pillars, gray tiles, white walls—blurred into a murky, muddled haze.
The entire landscape was collapsing into the chasm. Without their spiritual power, they were like drowning ants, relying on the strongest swimmers among them to stay afloat.
The lassos meant for spirit-chickens groaned under the strain.
The group struggled on the brink of the abyss, teetering between life and death.
Suddenly, an ink-wash mountain peak toppled down—"Whoosh!"
A surge of dark emerald flooded the scene like a colossal wave crashing overhead, violently thrusting everyone forward.
The senior brother closest to the waterfall was lifted by the torrent and plummeted with a thunderous roar!
"Quick! Grab the rope, hold tight!"
Luo Luo instinctively clenched the rope, desperate to pull him back.
First, the weight in her hands grew heavier—then abruptly lighter.
She froze, unable to process what had just happened, her heart sinking like a stone.
"Did he let go?" Xu Junlan murmured nearby.
No one answered.
The severed rope swayed limply at the waterfall's edge.
The senior brother had clearly prepared for this—letting go as he fell, refusing to drag others down with him.
Before grief could take hold, another peak collapsed.
The raging current flung the nearest few into the air, hurling them toward the abyss with a deafening crash.
"Thud—thud—thud."
One after another, the tied-together "grasshoppers" tumbled down.
"Aaaaaah—!"
Weightlessness seized Luo Luo as her limbs floated upward while her body plunged downward.
Before her stretched a vast, multicolored "waterfall."
She glanced below—far, far beneath, the ground bristled with jagged black spikes of mountain rock.
The first to fall, the senior brother, was moments away from impalement.
"Old Zhang—!" His fellow disciple's eyes nearly burst from their sockets.
As Old Zhang neared the deadly rocks, many shut their eyes in horror.
"Don’t worry, we’ll join him soon," Zhao Yu joked grimly.
Before the words faded, his 300-pound body flickered, turning translucent before vanishing entirely.
"Wait, how did he—?"
Xu Junlan shuddered next, disappearing just as abruptly.
"Whoosh—whoosh—whoosh."
One by one, the falling figures turned transparent and blinked out of existence.
Luo Luo stared blankly. "This feels like a dream..."
"Thunk."
A dreadful sound rose from below.
Luo Luo’s breath hitched. Peering down, she saw sharp stone spears pierce Old Zhang’s body.
"Guh!"
His pained cry echoed as he, too, vanished.
Only Luo Luo remained.
She hurtled toward the rocks, the deadly spikes rushing closer.
"Gah!"
Old Zhang clutched his side, leaping three feet in the air.
"Hurt hurt hurt HURT!"
Blinking, he scanned his surroundings.
His fellow "falling comrades" sat dazed on the grand hall floor.
"Was that... an illusion?"
"If it means eating chicken with the sect master, I’ll jump off a cliff again."
"Wait—!" Old Zhang’s voice turned urgent. "Where’s Little Junior Sister? She was still falling when I got out!"
As he spoke, he coughed up a mouthful of blood, still gripping his injured side.
"That could’ve killed us for real!"
The group gasped in unison.
Luo Luo realized she wasn’t disappearing like the others.
The jagged rocks loomed closer, their tips so near she could almost feel them pierce her skin—her body screaming its final warning.
"Whoooosh—"
Suddenly, Qing Xu’s face appeared before her.
The distorted cliffs, collapsing peaks, and melting landscape twisted into his monstrous visage.
The nightmarish Qing Xu slowly rolled his eyes, his maw gaping like a ravenous beast as he inhaled—
"Boom—boom—BOOM!"
The world trembled. A vortex of terrifying suction erupted.
To her amazement, the colossal Qing Xu seemed to be chasing after a swarm of birds and insects.
"Li Zhaoye..."
A crystal-clear thought struck her: Li Zhaoye shattered into a thousand pieces, crawling back to me, piece by piece.
"GOD—SLAYER!"
Qing Xu’s voice exploded like thunder, shaking the very fabric of the nightmare.
"PERISH—"
The echoes multiplied:
"—DIE—"
"—IE—"
Amid the cacophony, a calm, detached voice cut through.
"You carry Hong Meng’s aura." The voice paused, thoughtful. "In that case, we share a bond. Come."
With those words, an invisible force slammed into the mountain face.
"CRASH!"
Qing Xu’s monstrous visage shuddered, chunks of distorted color breaking away.
"CRASH!"
Another impact.
Luo Luo’s back prickled with cold dread—her ribs and shoulder blades screaming as the rocks rushed closer.
She was about to be skewered!
As the nightmare face crumbled, her mind cleared.
She remembered now.
She’d been meditating in Luo Luo Pavilion, attempting her Divine Transformation breakthrough, when she was yanked into this illusion—Qing Xu’s Great Nightmare Art.
He aimed to shatter her spirit, to break her completely.
Wait, Luo Luo, focus!
The rocks were right there.
What to do, what to do, what to DO?
Her life flashed before her eyes.
No, no—not yet!
Memories whirled past.
In less than a breath, she relived her entire existence.
One scene froze in her mind:
The day she cornered Chen Xuanyi on Qingyun Platform.
Back then... back then... Chen Xuanyi had only one escape: a forced Divine Transformation breakthrough.
Body sanctified, flesh and spirit united.
A Divine Transformation cultivator’s body merged perfectly with spiritual energy—nearly indestructible. She might survive the fall!
Luo Luo marveled: So this is why dying people see their lives flash by—to find a way out.
Before the nightmare, she’d already been pushing her limits under Xu Junzhu’s guidance.
Now, with death inches away, she had no choice.
Breakthrough or be broken.
Ignoring the nightmare’s suppression of her powers, she stilled her mind mid-fall, circulating her cultivation technique—and shattered her Golden Core!
"BOOM!"
For an instant, she became fire itself.
"THUD!"
Her body slammed into the stone spikes.
At the same moment, the Qing Xu-faced cliff disintegrated into murky streams.
Luo Luo felt herself shatter too.
The nightmare world collapsed, revealing a surreal vision.
A sage’s power swept her and Qing Xu back—into his ancient era.
Luo Luo gaped at the sky-piercing Seal God Palace, utterly awestruck.
"Bzzz..."
Luo Luo: "???"
What was that sound?
Startled, she flinched—and shot high into the air.
A strikingly handsome face appeared before her.
The Sage.
Why was he so huge?
The thought barely formed before her body zipped around him in a full circle.
Blinking, she finally looked down at herself.
And stiffened in shock.
The Sage hadn’t grown—she’d shrunk. She was now a mosquito, buzzing around him.
Luo Luo: "..."
That last impact must’ve shattered her.
And like Li Zhaoye, she’d reconstituted herself—as a bug.
With that thought, her mind felt at ease.
She fluttered her four new legs (she originally had two, making six in total now) and hovered obliquely around him before settling comfortably on his shoulder.
She had spent enough time with this man to know he wouldn’t swat a mosquito.
What a strange sense of security.
