Chapter 133: Zi Ning Bows Her Head, Chen Changsheng Explores the Xuehai
Chapter 133 – Zi Ning Bows Her Head, Chen Changsheng Explores the Xuehai
Having absorbed Zi Ning’s introduction, Gongsun Huaiyu vibrated with an impatience she could scarcely contain.
“The rules are clear. Where do I go to claim these tasks?”
“Within the Heavenly Secrets Pavilion we just passed. There, you can claim tasks or post bounties of your own.”
“Furthermore, accepting a task grants you a foundation of intelligence. However, peering into the deeper secrets requires spending your merit tallies.”
Ascertaining the location, Gongsun Huaiyu turned her gaze toward Chen Changsheng, her eyes burning with predatory hunger.
Meeting her gaze, Chen Changsheng offered a faint smile and waved his hand. “Go, if your heart desires it.”
Granted his permission, Gongsun Huaiyu immediately turned and swept out of the room, bringing Su Tian and the others along with her.
Once they had departed, Zi Ning turned her attention to Chen Changsheng, a saccharine smile playing on her lips.
“My esteemed Saint Son, Gongsun Huaiyu and the rest have scurried off to chase merits. What path do you intend to walk next?”
“Should you require it, this humble maiden is willing to serve with every ounce of her strength.”
Chen Changsheng ignored her thinly veiled sarcasm, his mind detached and calculating.
“My endeavors require no aid from you. Rather, it is you who must act.”
“Since Gongsun Huaiyu has gone to claim tasks, you shall do the same.”
“If your completed tallies exceed hers by the time I conclude my business, the new cultivation arts I promised shall remain yours.”
Hearing this, a sharp light instantly pierced through Zi Ning’s languid demeanor.
Long before the Heavenly Talent Assembly, Chen Changsheng had forged a pact with her.
Should she stand her ground and not flee the assembly, he would impart upon her a supreme cultivation method.
Yet, her disgraceful display at the spirit ore vein had stripped away her face, leaving her too ashamed to invoke the pact.
Now, with Chen Changsheng offering a second chance, her blood surged with undeniable excitement.
“You would truly bestow those arts upon me?”
“The path Gongsun Huaiyu walks is no orthodox Dao. Your terror at the ore vein was only a natural response.”
Observing the irrepressible joy burning in Zi Ning’s eyes, Chen Changsheng smiled—a sovereign gazing upon a useful pawn.
“Our prior wager was not born of mockery. It was forged to carve a simple truth into your marrow: beyond the heavens, there are higher heavens; beyond geniuses, there are true monsters.”
“Having bled for this lesson, I trust it is etched deeply into your Dao heart.”
“You and Gongsun Huaiyu are hailed among the three supreme beauties of the Middle Heavens. Your foundations and fates are tightly entwined.”
“Should you fail to eclipse her this time, then perhaps you truly lack the qualifications to bare your fangs in this chaotic age.”
A fierce pride flared in Zi Ning. She clenched her fists, her knuckles turning white.
“I concede that Gongsun Huaiyu walks a half-step ahead on the Dao, but I shall ultimately grind her beneath my heel.”
“Maintain that killing intent. Now, go.”
“I will. Just watch me.”
With those words, Zi Ning spun around and marched toward the Heavenly Secrets Pavilion. Halfway across the courtyard, she abruptly froze.
“Wait, this isn’t right!”
“You are a Saint Son, and I am the Saintess. By the laws of the sect, we stand as equals. Why am I submitting to your orders?”
Turning back to face her indignant glare, Chen Changsheng offered a smile as cold as a poised blade.
“Our titles are indeed equal. I hold no formal authority to command your steps.”
“You are free to deafen your ears to my words. I could even surrender the vanguard to you. The question is—do you dare bear the weight of command?”
“Or perhaps you intend to summon the Elders of the Purple Mansion Holy Land, to squabble and debate over who rightfully holds the reins?”
Staring into Chen Changsheng’s bottomless, calculating smile, Zi Ning’s face instantly darkened.
Though her pride chafed under his absolute authority, her Dao heart recognized the terrifying precision of his stratagems.
Furthermore, reading the unspoken currents between her master and the Elders, they had already quietly surrendered the immediate fate of the Purple Mansion Holy Land into his hands.
“My sovereign Saint Son, I comprehend your terrifying might. I will obey, alright?”
“Next time, speak your truths plainly. Spare me these winding games designed to mock my intellect.”
Biting down her indignation and resigning herself to his shadow, Zi Ning blurred into a streak of light, vanishing toward the pavilion.
Observing her retreating silhouette, a genuine, albeit chilling, smile touched Chen Changsheng’s lips.
The girl possessed a tempestuous temper, but her core recognized the immutable laws of survival. Once committed, her blade was never dulled by mortal emotion.
Tempered in the right fires, she would forge into an exceptionally lethal instrument.
Locking away his evaluation of her worth, Chen Changsheng rose and swept his intent toward the Xuehai of the Purple Mansion Holy Land.
The Xuehai—the Sea of Learning—was the primordial vault where the sect hoarded its Daoist scriptures and supreme arts.
It was a tomb of knowledge spanning countless epochs. Even Nalan Jing, the sovereign Holy Master, would not dare claim to have plumbed its uttermost depths.
Regarding the karmic weight of bearing the Heaven’s Mandate, numerous shadows still clouded Chen Changsheng’s spiritual sense.
To sever these doubts and deduce the true path, immersing himself in the Xuehai was absolute necessity.
……
The Xuehai Pavilion.
After his aura was weighed and verified, the colossal stone gates groaned, parting to reveal the void within.
An ocean of densely packed jade slips met his gaze. Even channeling his divine intent, Chen Changsheng could not pierce the absolute boundaries of the pavilion.
Sweeping his spiritual sense over the peripheral scriptures, his predatory focus inevitably locked onto a singular stone pillar reigning over the center.
Forged from mundane, coarse rock, it bore the weight of a grotesque, blood-colored stone at its zenith.
Beneath the suffocating gloom, the faint silhouette of a human figure lay entombed within the crimson mineral.
Shrewdly weighing the fated paths, Chen Changsheng instantly recognized this macabre entity as the primordial foundation of the Purple Mansion Holy Land.
The Xuehai was sacred ground; to leave the very lifeblood of the sect unguarded would invite heavenly wrath. A sovereign guardian was absolute.
Bending his spine in a calculated show of reverence toward the blood-stone, Chen Changsheng bypassed it, his steps carrying him into the crushing depths of the Xuehai Pavilion.
The forbidden records detailing the Heaven’s Mandate were buried in the pavilion’s most suffocating abyss.
Scrolls of such apocalyptic weight were forbidden to all but the Holy Master and a handful of the most decrepit Elders.
To bypass these karmic locks, Chen Changsheng had leveraged his worth to wrest a command token from the Great Elder.
Navigating the labyrinthine spiritual markers, Chen Changsheng paced with predatory patience.
Yet, this single descent consumed three full hours of unbroken silence.
……
“Tsk tsk!”
“To gut three primordial mountains and carve a labyrinth stretching over five hundred miles beneath the earth… A Holy Land truly sits upon an ocean of resources.”
Detachedly assessing the sect’s terrifying scale, Chen Changsheng raised the Great Elder’s token, his voice cutting through the stillness.
“Chen Changsheng, newly crowned Saint Son of the Purple Mansion Holy Land, bears the Great Elder’s seal to behold the ancient scriptures.”
His voice rippled violently through the Xuehai Pavilion, swallowed whole by an absolute, deathly silence.
Unfazed, Chen Changsheng stowed the token and bowed deeply toward a massive blood-stone the size of a meditation chamber. “My thanks, Senior!”
Straightening his spine, he thrust his palms against a narrow, unassuming stone door.
It gave way to a claustrophobic chamber, suffocating beneath centuries of undisturbed dust.
While to mortal eyes it was a mere tomb of rock, Chen Changsheng’s mastery of Formations instantly perceived the labyrinth of golden Dao Patterns pulsing beneath the grim surface.
The sole reason his flesh had not been instantly vaporized was that an unseen hand had suspended the Formation’s annihilating laws.
Sweeping his spiritual sense over the stagnant expanse of the chamber, Chen Changsheng seized a heavy tome bound in coarse, archaic beast skin.
Casually swiping away the rot of ages, Chen Changsheng peeled back the first page of the primordial text.