Chen Shi jumped down from the rock, cautiously studying the woman without approaching her.
For so reason the woman had been gravely injured and lay motionless on the ground, her clothes soaked bright red with her own blood. She lay on her side, only half her face visible, yet even that half made Chen Shi’s heart thump twice, as if a string inside him had been plucked, an odd sensation rising up.
But he cald quickly, picked up a small stone, and tossed it at her.
No reaction.
Chen Shi grabbed a fist-sized stone and threw it, still no reaction.
He selected a rock larger than a human head, then thought better of it and didn’t throw it. He told himself, “She’s probably truly unconscious.”
He set the rock down, then turned and hoisted the big boulder that had earlier knocked the woman out—sothing in the ten- to twenty-thousand-pound range—raising it high, thinking, “I’m in the third stage of the tropolitan exams, the bout between provincial graduates. That explains it, this woman must be a provincial graduate!”
He had been muddled over the past two days, his mind full of the Wind-Thunder Variation, Water-Fire Variation and the other Ghost-and-God Domain changes; his perception of the outside world had beco cloudy, he only vaguely rembered participating in the martial bout.
Before the bout started, an examiner had explained the rules: though you could strike to kill, higher evaluations favored fighters who actually killed their opponent. They had even said that deaths on the fighting grounds wouldn’t count as true deaths, and so would be acceptable.
“Miss, I’ll help you pass on!”
Chen Shi slamd the boulder down on the woman’s head with a heavy thud, the stone cracking and splitting in two.
The woman lay on the ground, utterly still; even her scalp hadn’t split open.
Chen Shi jumped back in fear. “Such a formidable body? She must have cultivated the Diamond Indestructible Body. Could she be a provincial graduate from the Buddhist Sect? Her physique is far stronger than Saintess Xuan’s.”
He frowned; the woman was gravely wounded yet would not die—she could not be resurrected by this Immortal Bridge Blessed Land, leaving her to endure extra tornt for no reason.
“One good deed a day, I’ll send a Buddha to the West, to guide this lady on her way!”
Chen Shi activated the Wind-Thunder Variation he had just grasped; an area of roughly one and seven tenths acres transford into his Wind-Thunder Ghost-and-God Domain!
Within this domain gale-force winds howled as lightning cracked and thunder rolled.
The blood-soaked woman involuntarily floated up. In an instant bolts of thunder struck her forehead again and again, crackling relentlessly!
These were not ordinary bolts but thunder mixed with Xun Wind; wind accompanied the lightning into the body, corroding a cultivator’s limbs and organs, scattering the viscera, dissolving the qi and blood, weakening flesh and muscles, making bones fragile and shattering on contact!
Chen Shi’s Wind-Thunder Variation even carried a hint of evil spirit influence, a force that defied comprehension!
Yet the woman floated within the Wind-Thunder field, subjected to countless strikes, and still not a single additional wound appeared on her body!
Chen Shi felt disheartened. He ford a Sword Seal with his hands, stepped the cosmic footwork, and urged out sword qi—whoosh whoosh whoosh—sending blade energies at her!
Unexpectedly, his supposedly unstoppable sword qi vanished on contact, not injuring her in the slightest!
Chen Shi shifted his Wind-Thunder into the Water-Fire Variation; water and fire forces scoured and burned, pooling water dissolving bone, fla burning the Primordial Spirit, consuming essence and attacking the Dao root!
He was confident that once his Water-Fire Variation unfurled, this woman would be certainly beyond any chance of survival.
Yet she remained perfectly unscathed inside his Water-Fire domain; not even a drop of blood was washed away.
Chen Shi’s eye twitched violently. He changed Water-Fire into the Mountain-Marsh Variation; with his palm rising and falling, mountains fell from the sky, crushing down on the woman!
He clapped his hands hard; the surrounding mountains pressed in, squeezing the woman into the center!
He stopped and looked, expecting to see results, but the woman remained unchanged, as untouched as before, not injured in the least!
Chen Shi leapt forward in a single bound: Double Dragons Seize the Pearl, stabbing at the woman’s eyes; half-closed tiger claw smashed into her throat; right elbow hit the heart; left fist struck the solar plexus; left knee ramd into the lower abdon; sweeping step, right knee crashed into the groin; a turning whip-punch struck the back of the head; then he twisted his waist and hips to co around behind her, hands clamping wind and thunder, and slamd them hard onto her ears!
He completed the form, but the woman did not move an inch.
After a mont, Chen Shi knelt on the ground, eyes vacant, utterly devastated.
“This top scholar title—what a joke. I’m done. I can’t even kill soone who’s rely unconscious from injury. How could I compete with the Young Master...”
He thought of the Wind-Thunder, Water-Fire, and Mountain-Marsh Variations he had so painfully learned; none had even brushed a hair on this woman’s body. Their power felt laughably weak.
It must be him—he had miscomprehended them.
Thoughts of his father, who expected much of him, attending court daily and training him tirelessly every night, filled him with guilt.
He rembered Grandpa waiting in the underworld, hoping Chen Shi would score top scholar so Grandpa could be offered a few young lives; guilt pressed even harder.
He thought of Granny Sha, Blue Goat Uncle, and Uncle Hu’s hopeful faces; of the boasts he’d made in front of Hu Feifei and Tian Yue’e; of the threats he’d thrown at the Young Master and Zhang You—he felt utterly ashad.
Even the blows from Chen Tang had stung less than today’s humiliation.
Chen Tang had used cultivation a level above him to spar; losing a few tis didn’t shake Chen Shi’s Dao heart. But this woman—she was a provincial graduate. After being wounded by soone, he had poured everything into defeating her, yet had not even managed to scratch her. That blow was too much!
Moreover, whoever had wounded her must be even more powerful.
While he wallowed in self-pity, footsteps approached and a voice reached his ear: “You are Chen Shi, Provincial Graduate Chen? You’re alive? You still couldn’t leave the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land?”
Chen Shi raised his head and glanced toward the voice. It was a Daoist whose vital energy coalesced behind him into the phantom shape of a treasured sword.
From that cultivation thod Chen Shi recognized it at a glance as the Flying Immortal Sword Scripture, another sword scripture among the Ten Books of Cultivation, of the sa rank as the Mysterious Subtle Sword Scripture.
He had seen this sword-bearing Daoist before; it was Daoist Jin Lu, a Daoist Son of Tai Shang Hao Yuan Palace.
In the past Chen Shi would have been curious to test Jin Lu’s Flying Immortal Sword Scripture and asure his strength, but today he had no fight left in him. He only spared Jin Lu a glance and looked away, ignoring him.
Jin Lu stepped forward, glanced at the unconscious woman on the ground, then withdrew his gaze and said, “Do you know why that cataclysm happened and why neither you nor I died? It’s because the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land’s heaven-and-earth underwent a variety of changes, manifesting myriad phenona. On the ground the mountains and marshes changed, in the sky the sun and moon shifted, and the stars outside altered, dissipating the force of that cataclysm and the impacts. That’s what saved our lives.”
Chen Shi stirred at Jin Lu’s words.
Cataclysm? Impact?
What cataclysm? What impact?
He stood and scanned the surroundings, surprise on his face. Only now did he notice the surrounding mountains were shattered; in the distance entire ridgelines collapsed like sand.
In the sky, two suns were dimming; one of the suns had split in two.
A moon hung in the sky alongside the suns, but the moon appeared struck in its center, showing signs of fragnting and collapse!
Additionally, a stellar river poured down from the sky, stars dropping along it and smashing into the earth!
Jin Lu ca past him to the Immortal Bridge’s edge and said, “But now the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land cannot withstand that battle and the impacts. The mountains, rivers, sun, moon, and stars within this Blessed Land will likely all be annihilated.”
Chen Shi sprang up and hurried to his side. “So you an, if soone dies inside the Blessed Land now, the land cannot resurrect them?”
Jin Lu nodded and said, “The Immortal Bridge Blessed Land is destroyed, in the early stage of annihilation. If you die inside, then you truly die.”
Just then another voice called out, “Provincial Graduate Chen, Brother Jin Lu, you are here too!”
It was Guo Daoist’s voice. The boy-faced Daoist hurried over, still visibly shaken. He glanced at the unconscious woman, then looked away and said, “You ca to the Immortal Bridge hoping to return to the living world? Just as I thought! Your wisdom is not inferior to mine!”
Chen Shi’s heart moved; he asked, “Do you know what happened? Where did the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land collide?”
“Provincial Graduate Chen doesn’t know?” Guo Daoist was astonished, exclaiming, “The elders of the Thirteen Great Clans besieged the White-Robed Fairy of Qixia Temple. Such a commotion that the semi-immortal realm’s heavenly and earthly phenona changed without end. The Thirteen Great Clans’ elders were overwheld and severely wounded, attracting the attention of the Nine Halls of the Western Capital, who suppressed that female immortal.”
He roughly laid out the cause and effect and said, “Where the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land has struck, we inside don’t know. But the Blessed Land flew a long way before the shockwave arrived; it might be leaving the Western Ox New Continent!”
At these words Jin Lu’s face grew grave. “The Immortal Bridge Blessed Land is a semi-immortal’s Realm of Emptiness, it can’t take such turmoil. We should board the bridge and leave quickly!”
He walked toward the Immortal Bridge.
The soldiers of the Five Armies had all departed from the bridge to leave the Blessed Land, so Jin Lu thought there must be an exit there to return to the living world.
He had only taken a couple of steps on the bridge when the path connecting the two worlds dissolved like dust.
Jin Lu hastily stepped back and avoided falling into the Morning-and-Evening River.
“The path is gone; we can’t return to the living world!”
His face pale, Jin Lu looked up at the sky.
The sky was burning, as if paper had been set alight in the middle and flas spread outward.
Soon the sky was completely consud by the flas!
A vast pall of yin energy surged in, the surrounding heaven-and-earth dimming and growing unclear.
“This aura…” Jin Lu’s face grew even paler, “we’ve fallen into the underworld.”
The burned-out sky revealed massive mountain ridges standing like eternal bulwarks in the gloom, colossal and oppressive.
Mountains like that rose in every direction, shadowy and looming.
The Immortal Bridge Blessed Land had apparently fallen into the underworld, drifted a long way, and co to rest where they now stood.
“The underworld is full of danger! We must leave as soon as possible!”
Chen Shi’s spirits bolstered. He shouted loudly, “All provincial graduates in the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land, listen! I am Provincial Graduate Chen from Xinxiang. We have fallen into the underworld where countless ghost gods gather! When the Blessed Land fell, the commotion will attract many ghost gods! Follow toward that firelight!”
He waved his hand and sent a column of flare into the sky, flying for hundreds of li and hanging there for a long ti.
“Listen to my orders!”
Chen Shi’s voice hid thunder, rumbling through the Blessed Land, “The tropolitan exam is over! It is over! Do not attack other provincial graduates! Take the wounded and move together toward the firelight!”
Jin Lu hurriedly tried to stop him, shaking his head, “Do not leave! The Western Capital will surely send experts to search for us. The underworld is vast; if we leave the Blessed Land, they won’t be able to find us!”
Chen Shi shook his head. “Many cultivators know soul-summoning thods. With a summoning they can pinpoint our location. You have not seen underworld ghost gods, but I have. If we stay we will die; we must leave!”
He called out loudly again, sending word to everyone in the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land, and once more he waved. Another firelight shot out and remained for a long ti to show everyone the way.
Jin Lu frowned.
Chen Shi lifted the unconscious woman and, after thinking, decided to use the small temple on his nape. He took her into the shrine.
For this tropolitan martial exam he had carried no spirit dicines, no dicinal pills, no talisman objects. All he could do now was place her on the shrine’s deity platform and use his cultivation to suppress her injuries.
When her wounds might heal he could not say.
Inside the little temple only Chen Shi’s Nascent Soul sat on the shrine; Stone Ji Your Ladyship was not there. Chen Shi placed the fainted woman on the deity platform where Stone Ji sat and circulated his qi slightly. He found his qi and blood circulating around her several tis beca exceptionally pure.
Chen Shi was greatly surprised but could not dwell on it. He followed the direction his flare indicated and set out from the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land.
Guo Daoist hurried alongside him, smiling, “I’ll go with Provincial Graduate Chen! Brother Jin Lu, what about you?”
Jin Lu hesitated, “I’ll stay here and await imperial rescue!”
Guo Daoist had no choice but to accept it.
“Master Instructor!”
They soon t the first wave of provincial graduates—over ten n and won, spaced out from each other, likely because the exam had turned into a killing ground and trust was gone.
A few of them brightened when they saw Chen Shi and hurried forward to bow.
These were the provincial graduates who had traveled west to the capital with Chen Shi before. Chen Shi had taught them rituals, spells, formations, and talismans; to them he was a teaching master and they trusted him completely.
The other provincial graduates ca forward too, bowing, “Greetings, Provincial Graduate Chen!”
One of them even called him Child Prodigy. Chen Shi asked, “Have we t before?”
The man shook his head, smiling, “I’d heard your story. I thought you died back in Xinxiang. Never expected you to rise again.”
Chen Shi laughed, “A Dao embryo is rely a divine gift; without one it doesn’t matter. Even without a Dao embryo, I’m still Child Prodigy!”
They moved on, and gradually dozens more provincial graduates joined, forming a group of several dozen.
Guo Daoist looked at Chen Shi in surprise, thinking, “This man is so affable; unlike the Young Master’s calculated persona. He treats people like he pours his heart out from his stomach—pure, dazzling sincerity.”
“Brothers over there, we shouldn’t linger here!”
Chen Shi shouted to six or seven provincial graduates ahead, “The underworld ghost gods will track our traces. Follow ! I’ll lead you out!”
Those n shook their heads, “This is the underworld; ghost gods roam everywhere outside. We’ll stay and wait for imperial rescue!”
Chen Shi did not press them. He continued onward, and before long more than two hundred people had joined his group.
When they left the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land and checked the footprints, it appeared a group had gone out before them. From the number of prints, that group was also over a hundred people.
Beside the prints was a fox paw mark.
“That’s Sister Feifei.”
Chen Shi exhaled, thinking, “So she led those provincial graduates.”
Hu Feifei had experience fleeing during a demonic transformation, strong survival skills; she could lead the provincial graduates to avoid so dangers.
“Master Instructor, there should be over a hundred people still inside.”
Hu Guanghan ca to Chen Shi and whispered, “So left earlier but distrustful ones went alone.”
Chen Shi shook his head. “Let each follow his fate; no need to ddle. We did our best. From now on, preserving our lives is the first priority… Ghost gods are coming!”
A chill ran through everyone. Mist rolled up in the distance, surging toward the Immortal Bridge Blessed Land, only a few li away.
Soon the mist swallowed the Blessed Land.
Chen Shi’s eye twitched. “No use watching—those inside are dood. Move! Follow , don’t lag behind!”
Silently, the group quickened their pace.
Darkness hung all around; vision did not reach far. Only vague, shadowy mountain silhouettes could be seen looming in the gloom, towering.
After a long while Chen Shi followed Hu Feifei’s fox prints to the first huge mountain.
They were still eight or nine li from the mountain and could barely make out its full shape.
“That mountain… looks like a Great Buddha,” soone said softly.
Chen Shi looked up and for the first ti realized it truly resembled a seated Buddha.
The Great Buddha sat cross-legged, one hand raised as if illuminating the world.
“How could the underworld hold such an enormous Buddha?” he wondered.
They walked on, and the distant ranges ca into view. Those were not re mountains but colossal Buddhas, standing from earth to sky, seated in the gray underworld, covered in dust and ash.
From afar they looked like a chain of undulating mountains.
They passed among the Buddhas. Pairs of red eyes on their bodies glowed faintly, watching them.
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