293 RI

"Wake up, wake up, kid!"

Peng Da groaned and barely opened his eyes to see a bearded uncle, slapping him in the face with a rough palm.

Peng Da was in a trance, and it was only then that he recognized the man in front of him.

"Uncle Mo Li." He called out: "Wasn't I sleeping on the camel?"

Peng Da looked around, he could not help but be stunned once more.

There was sand everywhere, the caravan was nowhere to be seen, leaving only him and Mo Li, both were in a messy state.

"Ouch." Peng Da groaned as he realized he had bruises all over his body.

Uncle Mo Li looked at Peng Da and sighed: "You kid, I don't know what to say about you, you are so lucky! Many Gu Masters fled desperately, they all died. You were deeply asleep but survived. However, if I hadn't discovered your faint breath in time and dug you out, I'm afraid you would have been buried alive."

"Uncle Mo Li, you've saved me once again." Peng Da grabbed both of Mo Li's hands, saying gratefully: "But what in the world had happened?"

"It's a natural disaster, I've never seen it before." Uncle Mo Li let out a heavy sigh.

"So... what about our caravan?"

"Sigh, it's just the two of us now."

What?! Peng Da could not help but stare with wide eyes and scream in his heart: "How can this world be so vicious, there was a natural disaster with no warning! I just slept for a bit and almost died again! My lord, what kind of world have I come to. It is simply a brutal and terrible place to live!"

"At least we're still alive." Mo Li knocked Peng Da on the head: "Kid, you don't look satisfied? To be alive after a natural disaster like that is the greatest of all blessings!"

"Look at me." Mo Li pointed his finger at his chest: "I've worked hard most of my life to own such a caravan. And now it's all gone! Look on the bright side, otherwise we won't survive until tomorrow. Sigh, it would be great if I could become an immortal!"

"Immortal? There are immortals in this world?"

Mo Li looked at Peng Da: "Did you forget everything?! You forgot even immortals? Sigh, I'll explain in the future, let's leave first."

Peng Da followed Mo Li as they left, heading towards the closest oasis.

Peng Da followed behind Mo Li and asked with caution: "Are there many disasters like this?"

"Of course!" Mo Li said in a vicarious tone: "It's not easy for us to make a living in the desert. Sandstorms are the killers that visit often. Sometimes there are also flying blade hurricanes, and each gust of wind can condense into a huge wind blade that cuts everything wherever it goes. In addition to natural disasters, there are also vicious beasts. For example, we are in wolf desert, desert wolves are most plentiful here."

Howl—!

As Mo Li was saying that, a group of desert wolves suddenly emerged from under the desert.

"Wolves, wolves!" Peng Da jumped up in fright: "Oh heaven, they're coming out from under the sand! So many heads, what do we do, uncle?!"

Mo Li looked pale and cursed out loud: "Damn it! Why weren't these desert wolves wiped out by the natural disaster?"

It was not strange.

The qi tides were the phenomenon of fusing heaven and earth qi, it originated from the Heavenly Dao. But the Heavenly Dao would not wipe out all life, there was a chance of survival in every situation. Mo Li and Peng Da were able to survive, other lifeforms naturally had such an opportunity as well.

The desert wolves emerged from everywhere, but strangely enough, although they spotted Peng Da and Mo Li, they did not come to attack, instead they quickly assembled, howling and staring at the desert ground.

Rustle rustle....

With a series of moving sand sounds, golden scorpions emerged from the ground. These golden scorpions were all the size of a millstone, Peng Da watched with chills in his heart.

The golden scorpion group and the desert wolf group were engaged in a brutal fight.

Whenever a desert wolf was stung by a golden scorpion's needle, it would immediately foam saliva at the mouth, fall to the ground, and eventually die. On the other hand, the golden scorpions could not fight against the desert wolves' claws and teeth, and were often torn apart by the wolves' claws.

The two groups of beasts fought, because they were weak in intelligence, they paid no attention to Mo Li and Peng Da who were close by.

Peng Da looked frightened and pale. This world was too dangerous, no matter which beast group won, they would surely still end up attacking the humans.

"We must break out!" Mo Li gritted his teeth with a firm expression.

"But uncle, we're surrounded by golden scorpions and desert wolves." Peng Da wanted to cry.

"Do you want to wait to be eaten?" Mo Li said, about to move: "Kid, can you fight?"

"Huh? I, I can't, I have amnesia."

"These desert wolves and golden scorpions don't care if you have amnesia. Stay close to me and do your best to save yourself. There is at least hope for breaking out." Mo Li said and laughed, "If breaking out fails, you'll have to go fill the bellies of the beasts. But don't worry, you won't die alone, there's still me."

Peng Da could not help but roll his eyes, rather than dying like this, he would prefer to be buried alive!

Mo Li started to break out and Peng Da yelled: "Uncle, wait for me!"

He could only desperately follow behind Mo Li.

It was fine when they were still, but when they moved, they alerted the scorpion and wolf groups.

Almost at the same time, there were several golden scorpions and desert wolves, one left and one right, attacking them.

Mo Li grunted and activated his mortal Gu, but he only managed to repel two of the beasts before they got encircled by the groups.

"Breaking out has failed!" Mo Li sighed and gave up the fight.

Peng Da clutched his head and fell into despair, he stuttered: "Am... am I going to die?!"

Inside the sovereign immortal aperture.

At this moment, be they the mini five regions or the mini nine heavens, chaos was everywhere, the entire place was in a commotion.

Mini Southern Border's mountains collapsed, the terrain became disorganized, Mini Central Continent's river channels changed paths and caused torrential floods, Mini Western Desert had sandstorms everywhere that devoured cities and oases.

Mini Northern Plains.

An intense snowstorm was blowing, a pure white flame, fluttering in the blizzard, attached itself to wherever it burned.

This was the special fire immortal material — frost ice flame.

In places where the ice and snow path dao marks were dense, there would be a certain degree of probability that this special flame would be produced. Most of this flame was filled with ice and snow path dao marks, but the heart of the flame had dense fire path dao marks.

"We cannot let this frost ice flame spread everywhere!" Snowman Gu Immortal Xue Er was in charge of the situation, she tried to salvage it.

She was tasked by Fang Yuan to manage Triple Sacred Mountain, she controlled the snow crystal formation and focused on the growth of the snowman tribe's expansion.

Frost ice flames started to spread on triple sacred mountain, once the flames grew to a certain size, be they snowmen or snow monsters, they were burnt to death while crying in agony.

The snowmen were in chaos, they escaped and trampled on each other, causing unnecessary deaths.

Amidst the raging chaos, only a handful of snowman Gu Masters were trying to maintain order. But unfortunately, even with their cultivation, it was difficult to do anything against the immortal material frost ice flame.

"Oh no, the frost ice flame has reached the ice path crystal essence!" Xue Er's face turned pale, she became anxious.

She had just now tried to save more of the snowmen, and as a result, she had lost sight of this, allowing the frost ice flame to appear in the snow crystal formation.

The ice path crystal essence was the core of the snow crystal formation, Fang Yuan used the formation to spread out the frost energy created by the ice path crystal essence, that would constantly alter the environment inch by inch, creating a living habitat that suited the snowmen.

Xue Er felt deep regret as she watched the frost ice flame burn the ice path crystal essence, while being helpless against it.

Xue Er could not help but tear up and blame herself. The snow crystal formation was entrusted to her by Fang Yuan, it was the foundation for the snowman tribe's growth, but it was actually going to be destroyed because of her mistake.

She felt that she had let down the snowmen, she had let down Fang Yuan.

But at this moment, a figure suddenly appeared.

"Fang Yuan!" Xue Er was stunned before happiness appeared on her face.

Fang Yuan grabbed the empty space in front of him, all of the frost ice flames within the formation were drawn away.

Fang Yuan suddenly grunted as his body shook, pale white traces appeared around his body all of a sudden.

From these pale white traces, Xue Er felt a vast power that surged in heaven and earth!

"These are... heaven path dao marks! Oh heavens, there are so many heaven path dao marks, he must have at least a thousand!" Xue Er covered her mouth in surprise.

"I will leave the rest to you." Fang Yuan smiled at Xue Er as he brought the frost ice flame away with him and vanished on the spot.

Xue Er felt relaxed but worry soon appeared in her heart: "My dear fiance has so many heaven path dao marks, no wonder he went into seclusion after the fate war and rarely fought. Sigh, I am so useless, I could not help him at all. I could not even defend this snow crystal formation!"

Fang Yuan appeared to help Xue Er alleviate the crisis of the snowmen in Mini Northern Plains, he immediately went back to his secret room to continue his closed cultivation.

When he was refining fate Gu, Fang Yuan had the best position, because he was doing his best to absorb the heaven path dao marks, he had more than three thousand heaven path dao marks on his body, they were all complete and intact dao marks!

One could say that he was the biggest winner in this plan that Red Lotus created.

But this benefit was too great, he could not process it in the meantime. The sovereign immortal body had non-conflicting dao marks, with the addition of heaven path dao marks, that also meant that Sovereign grotto-heaven gained three thousand heaven path dao marks all of a sudden.

These heaven path dao marks created a huge impact on Sovereign grotto-heaven.

The impact was in many different aspects and had varying effects. They could be as large as mountains and rivers shifting, but also small like a changing tributary channel.

"The way of heaven is to take away surpluses while replenishing deficits. It focuses on the balance of living beings, they limit each other. Even in an extreme environment like the snow crystal formation, the Heavenly Dao could alter it and create fire path dao marks within the ice and snow path dao marks, once the frost ice flame spreads its destruction, Mini Northern Plains would be completely altered beyond recognition."

"Of course, if we ignore it, my Sovereign grotto-heaven will benefit from this, we will create a complete ecosystem that has balance and good prospects in the future.

"However, this method consumes too much of my foundation, it is also what Red Lotus Demon Venerable wants to see!"

Fang Yuan smiled coldly.

Fate Gu was destroyed, Red Lotus Demon Venerable's plan succeeded, Fang Yuan no longer had any value to him. Thus, Red Lotus Demon Venerable schemed and used the heaven path dao marks to restrict Fang Yuan, to limit his growth speed.

However, even though Fang Yuan saw through this, he had to take the bait. It was because Fang Yuan noticed that sovereign immortal fetus Gu was tampered by Spectral Soul, he needed the heaven path dao marks to counter Spectral Soul's arrangements.

Red Lotus Demon Venerable had been making use of Fang Yuan, it was evident from the rank seven future self killer move. But Fang Yuan also made use of Red Lotus, he used this Demon Venerable's plan to destroy fate Gu, which was his biggest problem, he used Red Lotus' million year plan to escape from the clutches of Spectral Soul's arrangement.

Zhao Lian Yun allowed the heaven path dao marks to make the alterations but Fang Yuan decided to interfere with them.

The heaven path dao marks altered the sovereign immortal aperture, he actively participated, resisting and cooperating with the alterations to preserve his immortal aperture's foundation.

This cooperation and resistance gave Fang Yuan a lot of insight.

Heaven path was merciless and impartial, human path was putting up a resistance, these two intertwined in Fang Yuan's heart, shining in different radiance.

"Time is about right." A while later, Fang Yuan moved again.

This time, he stored the sovereign immortal aperture, his main body arrived in the world of the five regions.

He stood in Western Desert as he looked at a tree in front of him.

This tree was not even eight feet tall, the branches were short, thin and twisted like monstrous claws, making it look extremely ugly. But the strange thing was, it had an enormous shadow of light. This shadow of light was extremely large, reaching five or six hundred feet. The shadow of light was like a flourishing tree with many branches and leaves. The tree branches were white as snow, the flowers were pink like cherries. There were clusters of small fruits among the floral leaves that had yet to ripen, with all sorts of colors.

It was the thousand wish tree.

Around the thousand wish tree was Fang Yuan's immortal formation.

Right now, he stored the immortal formation and took the thousand wish tree along with him, they were all sent into the sovereign immortal aperture.

This action caused a storm to surge, a vast air current spread out to the surroundings.

Fang Yuan did not care about this, he turned into a flash of light and flew into the sky.

The air currents rampaged in the surrounding deserts, causing loud sounds to be emitted.

Peng Da and Mo Li failed to breakout, they were surrounded by desert wolves, right when they were about to die, the air currents arrived.

The desert wolf group went into chaos as they scattered and escaped.

Peng Da jolted: "Another disaster!"

Mo Li stared with wide eyes as he looked and laughed: "Haha, we are saved! This is not a disaster, it is merely a normal hurricane. Let's go!"

-x-X-x-

After the qi tide passed, clouds were sparse in the sky, it was a refreshing sight.

A yellow cloud flew high in the sky, sprinkling light sand behind it along the way.

There was a female immortal sitting on the yellow cloud. She had a corpulent body, her belly was bulging, her entire body resembled a water vat, she was a member of Mo clan, a super force in Western Desert. There was a title for her in Western Desert's Gu Immortal world — Plump Lady.

Plump Lady did not dislike this title at all. She felt beautiful for being fat, and upon learning of this title, she liked it so much that she publicly called herself this from then on. In time, even her original name was forgotten in place of this title.

"Huh?" As the yellow cloud flew, Plump Lady suddenly had a change of expression, sensing something unusual.

Thus, the yellow cloud slightly contracted and flew down diagonally, changing its course slightly before suspending in mid-air.

Plump Lady stood up from the yellow cloud and looked down at the giant pit beneath her feet.

This giant pit was partially hidden by the wind blowing yellow sand and covering it, but Plump Lady was a native of Western Desert, she was all too familiar with the landscape of the sand pit.

"This isn't a naturally formed sand pit, but rather an empty space left behind after something in it was drawn away."

"This aura... it's the aura of an ancient desolate plant!"

Plump Lady's eyes shined with bright light, she immediately understood: a Gu Immortal had secretly made a move to steal an ancient desolate plant from here.

Plump Lady snorted coldly as anger rose in her heart. Although she did not know what this ancient desolate plant was, this place was wolf desert, the territory of Mo clan. Stealing this ancient desolate plant was the same as stealing the Mo clan.

"This ancient desolate plant must be quite valuable since it is able to hide and conceal itself from the detection of our clan. I'm afraid that it has already been discovered by some people long ago but they just did not take it. Now that qi tides is causing disasters, this person who stole the ancient desolate plant must have been worried that they would endanger this ancient desolate plant, and that's why they took it."

Plump Lady secretly analyzed the scene and carefully examined it.

The thief's actions were very clean, no obvious clues were left behind. Feeling disappointed, she had to use an information path Gu worm to inform the Mo clan, hoping that the clan would send good investigators to track down and capture this damned thief!

And finally, Plump Lady used information path Gu worms to record the scene before leaving. She had a mission right now, she could not waste time here.

As she flew along, she saw an oasis. The oasis was vast, and there was a stone city at the center. The city walls were short, but the overall length was long, there were a huge number of mortals living in the city, it was Sand Wolf City.

Sand Wolf City was one of the main cities of Mo clan.

Plump Lady did not cover her tracks and flew directly from high in the sky to the City Lord Manor.

There were already people at the City Lord Manor who were ready to receive her, when they saw the arrival of Plump Lady, they all fell to their knees and shouted: "We pay our respects to revered immortal!"

"Get up." Plump Lady stored the yellow cloud and stepped on the ground in front of everyone.

"Revered immortal, the arrival banquet has been prepared. It contains the best wine and delicacies of Sand Wolf City, as well as fresh fruits that were just picked today." The city lord spoke.

Plump Lady, however, waved her hand, she was not interested, she only said: "Prepare a secret room for me to undergo closed cultivation. Also, I asked you to gather Gu Masters with aptitude and loyalty, how is it going?"

"It's almost done. The vast majority of the city's Gu Masters have already been screened." The city lord replied quickly.

"Very well. After three days, I will take them away. Now, you can go and attend to your own matters."

"Yes, I will do my best to complete this task to the best of my ability." The city lord promised in succession.

The door of the secret room closed slowly, Plump Lady activated the formation here with a wave of her hand.

She looked exhausted as her divine sense probed into her immortal aperture, when she saw the scene inside the immortal aperture, she inevitably let out another deep sigh.

Her immortal aperture was originally a land of yellow sand and it was flat. At the heart of the desert, Plump Lady had carefully laid out more than six thousand acres of sand farms.

Her sand farms mainly produced two types of immortal materials, they were light sand and cold-warm flowing sand. They were the main sources of goods that Plump Lady produced for a long time.

But after the fate war, Plump Lady absorbed five heaven path dao marks, her immortal aperture started to change. The landscape became uneven, more and more sand dunes were created. Furthermore, there was a trench, as if a knife had come straight down across the center of the desert, splitting the entire desert, thousands of acres of sand farms were lost.

"I don't have wisdom path methods to make deductions and restrain this kind of natural development. Unless I hire a wisdom path Gu Immortal to take action, but my assets are not enough, I can't afford it. I might as well save this expense in case of future mishaps." Plump Lady lamented in her heart.

Mo clan had Gu Immortals that cultivated wisdom path, but they were not close to Plump Lady. In fact, even if the relationship was close, the wisdom path deductions would still cost Immortal essence, they could not work for Plump Lady for nothing, right? Therefore, there had to be a reward.

"Furthermore, I recently absorbed heaven and earth qi, my immortal aperture is unstable."

Right now, the five regional walls were gone, the five regions' heaven and earth qi had no obstruction and started to fuse. Western Desert's heaven and earth qi was changing gradually, this caused the foundation of Western Desert Gu Immortals' immortal apertures to start differing from the heaven and earth qi of the outer world.

When Gu Immortals absorb this heaven and earth qi, their immortal aperture would be unstable, there would be tremors.

The best way to deal with it was to cooperate with the change and continue absorbing and releasing heaven and earth qi. If one keeps themselves in closed cultivation, after the heaven and earth qi changes drastically, when they open the immortal aperture entrance to absorb heaven and earth qi, the tremors would be huge, the immortal aperture would suffer even more damage.

"If I had qi path attainment, I would be able to reduce the losses caused by the heaven and earth qi to a great extent."

Wisdom path was a difficult path while qi path had been declining for years, there were few qi path Gu Immortals left.

Plump Lady was only having dreams that were not realistic. In the end, she consoled herself: Even though she did not have wisdom path or qi path methods, other Gu Immortals were like her. Thus, she was not left behind in the dust by the majority of them.

But Plump Lady still felt intense danger in her heart.

This was something that all of the five regions' Gu Immortals were feeling.

The five regions were unified, everyone knew that life was no longer going to be peaceful anymore. Be they lone cultivators or super forces, they were making preparations for the huge battles in the future.

This time, Plump Lady was tasked to go to Sand Wolf City and bring back Gu Immortal seeds for Mo clan to nurture.

In fact, Mo clan or Western Desert were not the only ones, all of the forces in the five regions and two heavens were making preparations now.

In the past, the five regions and two heavens were quite peaceful, super forces nurtured Gu Immortals while considering the provision of resources and their storage.

But now, everyone was preparing for war, they were going to mobilize these resources!

Thus, all of the forces focused on nurturing Gu Immortals than keeping resources. There was a common view: If they did not nurture enough Gu Immortals, their enemies would get all of their resources if they were wiped out in the future. If they did not use up those resources beforehand, that would be too wasteful.

Plump Lady looked at her sand farms in the immortal aperture while feeling heartache. She could not discard these farms, they were her only sources of revenue, they were her biggest financial support pillar.

Plump Lady had to preserve them.

The future was uncertain, she did not know how long the qi tides would continue, but she had to salvage them regardless.

"In the current world, I'm afraid only Fang Yuan will know how long these qi tides would last, he has Spring Autumn Cicada and can rebirth from the future after all." Plump Lady felt deep envy and admiration regarding this.

Plump Lady rebuilt the sand farms in her immortal aperture, fixing the Gu formations inside.

The area where the Earth Trench appeared could not be fixed. Thus, her six thousand acre sand farm was split into two.

"If only I had an immortal Gu formation." Plump Lady felt a bit of regret, Mo clan also had formation path Gu Immortals, when she created the sand farm, Mo clan's formation path Gu Immortal had asked her if she needed help.

But Plump Lady rejected him.

On one hand, she did not want to expose her immortal aperture, on the other hand, she wanted to save cost.

After all, creating an immortal formation would use one of her Immortal Gu as the core. Plump Lady only had two rank six Immortal Gu herself.

Also, the payment of hiring the formation path Gu Immortal was not cheap.

"If I had created an immortal formation back then, my losses would be much lower. Sigh, how can anyone expect their own immortal aperture to be unsafe?"

Plump Lady thought of this and felt some envy towards the formation path Gu Immortal. During this period of time, he had been extremely popular with everyone, they were looking for him to create immortal Gu formations around their immortal aperture's resource points to protect them.

Plump Lady felt a little bitterness towards the earth path she cultivated, earth path was skilled at changing terrain, but Western Desert had the most number of earth path Gu Immortals. Plump Lady's earth path inheritance was also quite ordinary.

As for cultivating a second path?

Plump Lady did not even dare to think about such an absurd idea.

She was already facing problems cultivating just earth path in terms of time and finances.

Trying to juggle another path was courting death!

Moreover, only those rare and exceptional inheritances could allow one to dual cultivate. For example, an inheritance left by Thunder Ghost True Monarch or Duke Long.

After repairing her immortal aperture's sand farm, Plump Lady still had to buy some fertile sand.

Sand farms nurtured sand using sand, without enough sand-type immortal materials, the production would fall greatly.

Plump Lady took out her Gu worms and connected to treasure yellow heaven.

Treasure yellow heaven had all sorts of news, a large number of wills were conversing as they interacted.

Because of the huge change in the world, Gu Immortals could not move around now, on one hand, they had to absorb and release heaven and earth qi continuously to adapt to the main world, on the other hand, they also had to take care of their immortal apertures and repair them continuously like Plump Lady. Cases like Zhao Lian Yun who ignored the damage caused were quite rare.

Thus, Gu Immortals needed immortal materials or the help of Gu Immortals of other paths, treasure yellow heaven became a very popular destination for them.

"Another qi tide happened over here, a lot of deaths occurred."

"When are these qi tides going to end! Damn it, my fisheries have all been destroyed."

"I hate the fact that we cannot move around, the stronger the immortal aperture foundation, the longer we need to adapt to the heaven and earth qi and keep up with the five regions' transformation."

The Gu Immortals sighed as they talked about the news of these qi tides.

Other than that, there was Fang Yuan's arrest warrant!

A mysterious force described Fang Yuan's circumstances, they were willing to pay a huge sum for his latest information.

Fang Yuan had the sovereign immortal aperture, his sovereign immortal body had non-conflicting dao marks. More terrifyingly, he could annex people's apertures to skip calamities and tribulations, increasing his cultivation level. But now, Fang Yuan obtained too many heaven path dao marks, his strength had hit an all-time low. Whoever discovered his location would get a huge reward!

The sovereign immortal fetus Gu's secret was completely exposed, this was not Heavenly Court's doing. Fairy Zi Wei and Old Man Zheng Yuan had released the arrest warrant due to Spectral Soul's orders.

"Too strong! This sovereign immortal body is too terrifying, it can cultivate all paths."

"I finally understand why Fang Yuan's cultivation level rose so quickly! In the blink of an eye, he became a rank eight great expert."

"Who can have such a great fortuitous encounter?"

"Why does heaven favor this otherworldly demon! If I had his fortuitous encounters, I could achieve such great accomplishments as well."

The Gu Immortals were filled with jealousy and hatred.

"We cannot let him grow further, he can annex apertures, he is the enemy of all Gu Immortals."

"Let those experts handle him. I am just a minor character, why would I ever encounter Fang Yuan?"

"The reward is a huge amount of immortal materials, I wonder which lucky person will get them."

"Lucky person? Exposing the great demon Fang Yuan's location would be offending him, you call that lucky? We have all seen Fang Yuan's battle strength ourselves, even if he is at his weakest, how weak can that be? No matter how weak a person is, killing an ant is extremely easy regardless. Even if I find his location, I will not dare to expose him."

Plump Lady heard these discussions, she felt conflicting emotions within her.

The information had been released in treasure yellow heaven several days ago. It had received huge attention, it was the hot topic currently, without showing signs of dying down.

Everyone in the world had seen the fate war. Fang Yuan's performance was shockingly terrifying. The world knew about his pseudo venerable battle strength, the title of the number one demon in the world belonged to him, nobody dared to contest this!

"Hopefully, I never meet such a person in my life. No matter how fat I am, my size cannot compare to such a huge demon. If I get involved in his matters, I will die without doubt."

Plump Lady was quite aware of her situation, she was only enjoying the show as a spectator.

But she did not know that she had once fought against Fang Yuan. In fact, the ancient desolate plant that was stolen earlier was taken by Fang Yuan!

While Plump Lady entered closed cultivation, two figures in sorry states supported each other as they moved towards Sand Wolf City step by step.

The city guards did not chase them away, they could tell that these two were Gu Masters.

The guard walked towards them and extended his hand: "Entry fee of one primeval stone per person."

"There's still an entry fee?" One of the downcast Gu Masters started with wide eyes, he was Peng Da.

The middle aged Gu Master that he was supporting was naturally Mo Li.

The two of them were saved by the air currents generated when Fang Yuan took the thousand wish tree, after exerting effort, they finally reached Sand Wolf City.

"I have them." Mo Li was already prepared, he took out two primeval stones and handed them to the guard.

Peng Da took a look at these two primeval stones.

Along the way, he was taught by Mo Li, he could now inspect his aperture, he found that he had three Gu worms. He even understood the value of primeval stones, it was used as currency but also as a way to replenish a Gu Master's precious primeval essence!

"Two primeval stones to enter a city." Peng Da sighed: "Uncle Mo Li, I will return this sum to you."

Mo Li patted his shoulder: "Let's go kid. No matter how poor I am, I can still afford this fee. During this period, you should stay at my home, you are penniless and have no memory of this city, how can you live alone?"

Mo Li had guided Peng Da along the way, after finding that he knew nothing about Gu Master cultivation, he believed the words that he was amnesiac.

"Uncle, thank you so much. You saved my life and even helped me this much..."

"Don't say that!" Mo Li interrupted Peng Da and brought him into the city.

Mo Li's house was at the central area of Sand Wolf City, it was a huge house with a garden that had flowers growing in it.

"I am back!" Mo Li knocked on the door as his wife opened the door.

"You are finally back!" Mo Li's wife was a rank two Gu Master, seeing her husband, she was happy and surprised: "I heard the qi tide appeared, I thought you..."

"I was lucky and lived, but my caravan is completely ruined, only the two of us survived. Sigh!" Mo Li sighed deeply.

"Being alive is the greatest blessing!" Mo Li's wife turned her eyes.

"Auntie." Peng Da greeted after their conversation.

Mo Li's wife chuckled: "Little lad, thank you for taking care of my husband along the way."

Peng Da's face turned red as he said: "I am ashamed, it was uncle who took care of me during this journey, without his help, I would have died in the desert."

"As travelers outside, helping each other is necessary. Quickly come in." Mo Li's wife was very welcoming.

Mo Li and Peng Da had a rough journey, but they were finally safe now.

After showering in Mo Li's house, the two of them went to bed and fell sound asleep.

After sleeping from noon to night time, Peng Da was woken up by Mo Li for a scrumptious dinner.

After dinner, Mo Li said to his wife: "We still have some money left, even though my caravan was destroyed, as long as I am alive, I can rebuild a new caravan!"

But his wife had a hesitant look: "I haven't told you this, I was hesitating, thankfully, you returned alive."

"What is it?" Mo Li was curious as he asked.

"After you left, the city lord sent orders that they would select Gu Masters that had A grade aptitude and were loyal to Mo clan. Supposedly, this is an order from the higher-ups, they want to nurture Gu Masters to become Gu Immortals."

"Oh? There is such a thing?" Mo Li hesitated: "The city lord put up a public notice? I went past the city gates quickly, I did not see it."

Mo Li's wife continued: "Our son heard the news and wanted to sign up."

Mo Li laughed unconsciously: "To think our son would have such aspirations, but he only has B grade aptitude."

Mo Li's wife laughed: "Aptitude is not too important, loyalty to Mo clan is most important. If we show enough loyalty, our son might be selected."

Mo Li realized at once, asking:" How much?"

Mo Li's wife said a number, Peng Da's mouth became wide open.

Mo Li's wife was very troubled: "Even if we use all our remaining savings, it will not be enough. Husband, the decision is up to you."

Mo Li was silent for a moment before he resolved himself: "I will borrow! It is rare that our son is no longer lazy and wants to improve himself, this is a good thing. I will go and borrow shamelessly, I am sure we will gather enough funds."

"Husband..." Mo Li's wife was touched but felt worried as well: "But our caravan was destroyed, I am afraid..."

Mo Li smiled as he patted his chest, feeling confident: "Don't worry, I am a rank three Gu Master, my body is strong and my strength is intact. Everyone knows that I only need time, as long as my luck is not bad, I can recover from this loss!"

-x-X-x-

The sky was light purple in color, gathered in mid-air was a large area of grey clouds resembling thick fog, making the view of Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven quite unclear.

But the layout of this place was good, even Spectral Soul could not help but praise it.

He had disguised as a soul beast, he successfully infiltrated the grotto-heaven, after many days, he finally found out a lot of information about Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven.

This was a soul path grotto-heaven, there were a lot of soul path cultivation resources here, it had at least ten giant resource points! In history, it had once produced two rank eight soul path immortals at the same point in time, it was a very rare situation.

The biggest trait of Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven was that it had a soul pacifying immortal killer move that influenced all lifeforms in this grotto-heaven. This killer move could pacify soul beasts and bring peace to Gu Immortals' souls, it had a huge supplementary effect in soul cultivation.

There were three aspects in soul path cultivation, strengthening, refining, and pacifying the soul.

The most effective method to pacify the soul was using the water of Bewitching Lake, it was known as pacifying soul soup, the most delicious wine in the world. This was recorded in \u003c\u003cThe Legends of Ren Zu\u003e\u003e.

The soul pacifying killer move in Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven was created by mimicking the pacifying soul soup. Even Spectral Soul thought that the effect of this move was good.

Within Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, soul beasts were the most plentiful of beasts.

It had raised soul beasts to begin with, now that Fate was destroyed and the five regions unified, in order to prepare for war, the Gu Immortals of Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven went outside to hunt and store more soul beasts.

But the higher-ups with Lady Cold Ash as the leader still did not think this was enough, they sent even more Gu Immortals outside to search for even more soul beasts.

Thanks to the soul pacifying killer move, even if immemorial soul beasts went into Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, they would remain peaceful and would not rampage.

After An Xun returned to the grotto-heaven to rest for a few days, he received orders to go out and hunt soul beasts again.

"I am letting you command three thousand soul beasts with one immemorial soul beast as the guardian, do your best." Before leaving, Lady Cold Ash called for him.

An Xun was the tall and skinny Gu Immortal from earlier, he was the nephew of Lady Cold Ash, and also the Gu Immortal with the best prospects to go beyond rank seven in Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven.

"Thank you for the concern, aunt." An Xun said with difficulty: "But such a huge soul beast group, I do not have the ability to command them."

Lady Cold Ash waved her hand: "My killer move can allow you to command this soul beast group with ease for twenty days."

An Xun was overjoyed, he quickly thanked her.

He understood that his aunt was helping in secret and taking care of him. Even though Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven did not lack resources and had deep foundation, when nurturing Gu Immortals, seniority mattered.

Lady Cold Ash helped An Xun secretly, hoping that he would emerge victorious in the contest against An Chong and become the rank seven Gu Immortal who received the most support.

She was his aunt after all!

An Xun led the soul beast army and left Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, heading to black heaven for his hunt.

For the next few days, his gains were little, he became a little anxious.

"Logically speaking, after the qi tide passes, there would be many dead lifeforms, their souls would be left behind and form more soul beasts." An Xun could not understand why this was not happening.

Along the way, he did not meet many soul beasts, but he gathered a lot of qi path immortal materials, he did not know whether to laugh or cry.

Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven was a soul path grotto-heaven, these qi path immortal materials were almost unusable, they could only be traded away.

An Xun could not understand why, but Spectral Soul knew: "It seems that after the qi tide passes, qi path dao marks flood the area, causing other paths to be suppressed. Soul path is no exception, it is hard to form new soul beasts. In contrast, qi path immortal materials are going to increase in numbers, they will be at an absurd number in the future."

Spectral Soul saw the trend and felt a little strange internally: "To think that qi path would regain its former glory!"

Qi path had been declining, but with the current situation where qi path immortal materials get produced widely in the five regions and two heavens, the abundance of resources would lower the cost of cultivation. It would create a trend of numerous qi path cultivators.

Spectral Soul turned into an ancient soul beast and secretly followed An Xun, he left Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven for his own objectives.

He had already inspected Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, but he could not take action inside. Outside, it was a different story.

However, Spectral Soul did not act immediately, he patiently waited for a chance.

As expected, after more than ten days, An Xun encountered a group of soul beasts that numbered to more than a thousand.

"I finally met some." An Xun was overjoyed, he quickly manipulated the soul beast army to attack.

A huge battle began.

Initially, An Xun had the advantage, but soon, he found that an immemorial soul beast appeared in the enemy's group.

He quickly let out his guardian, it was also an immemorial soul beast.

The two immemorial soul beasts fought intensely, creating a small battlefield for themselves.

The enemy immemorial soul beast was much stronger than An Xun had expected, his immemorial soul beast quickly fell into a disadvantage, about to be defeated.

An Xun was shocked, he quickly acted to help out his immemorial soul beast.

Eventually, An Xun paid a huge price of suffering injuries to exterminate the enemy immemorial soul beast.

An Xun felt regret that he could not capture the wild immemorial soul beast, he had tried many methods to subdue it but he failed, he had no choice but to kill it in the end.

After the battle, An Xun counted his gains and losses, despite his heavy injuries, he gained eight hundred soul beasts overall, among which were many ancient soul beasts.

"This should be enough." An Xun let out a sigh of relief, these gains were sufficient, he did not let down Lady Cold Ash and her expectations.

But right when An Xun relaxed his mind, Spectral Soul struck at lightning speed, flying into An Xun's body.

An Xun's face distorted as he shook intensely, after a while, he returned to normal.

Spectral Soul came out of his body as An Xun knelt down: "I pay respects to master!"

"Mm." Spectral Soul nodded with a tired expression.

He had an ability to enter a life form's soul and forcefully modify it so that they would obey Spectral Soul from the depths of their soul with absolute loyalty.

But there were many limitations to this, he could not use it casually.

Back then, Spectral Soul subdued Fairy Zi Wei and Old Man Zheng Yuan when they were at their weakest. Fairy Zi Wei and Old Man Zheng Yuan were in poor conditions then, while she had also been subconsciously influenced by him over time.

Thus, in order to deal with An Xun, Spectral Soul had to wait until he was at his weakest.

The reason he caused this huge soul beast battle instead of directly attacking because he needed to deceive Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven. An Xun was a rank seven Gu Immortal, it was not easy for him to explore black heaven, there were investigative methods used on him. If anything happened to him, Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven would react to it rapidly.

"After subduing An Xun, I have an opening in Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, is Lady Cold Ash still far from my grasp? Hehe." Spectral Soul chuckled.

Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven had the most suitable cultivation resources for Spectral Soul, he could take control of it and use it to interfere in the world affairs to accomplish his goals.

"I have already created my opening here, it is far better than hunting soul beasts myself! I wonder what breakthrough Fairy Zi Wei has made already."

At the same time, in a certain Central Continent valley.

"Fang Yuan, you cannot escape." Fairy Zi Wei called out, using a purple meteor attack.

The purple meteor landed on Fang Yuan as it pierced his chest, creating a gaping hole.

Fang Yuan stared at Fairy Zi Wei, he fell with a loud sound and scattered into smoke.

"Another clone!" Even though Fairy Zi Wei was prepared for it, she still felt tired seeing this.

Fairy Zi Wei and Old Man Zheng Yuan had already killed hundreds of Fang Yuan's clones.

She immediately captured and stored the smoke that the myriad self clone turned into.

Next, she took out a sealed clone of Fang Yuan from her aperture.

She instilled the smoke of the destroyed myriad self clone into the sealed clone.

Soon, the white smoke was absorbed by the clone, its cultivation level rose again.

These myriad self clones were summoned by Fang Yuan during the battle in Heavenly Court, Fairy Zi Wei had used the transportation formation to send them all over Central Continent.

Fairy Zi Wei was ordered by Spectral Soul to find Fang Yuan, after putting up the arrest warrant, all the information she received involved these clones.

Fairy Zi Wei had no choice but to pay them the reward as they had provided information. But she also went around laboriously to capture the Fang Yuan myriad self clones all over the continent.

If she left them unattended to, these clones would be the best concealment for Fang Yuan's main body. Fairy Zi Wei also had another idea, what if Fang Yuan was hiding among these clones?

This was not impossible.

"Thankfully, these myriad self clones can sense each other, when I capture one, I can use the connection to find the next clone."

"But..."

Fairy Zi Wei watched as the sealed clone of Fang Yuan rose in cultivation level, she felt worried: "Fang Yuan's human path attainment level is so high. These clones can actually devour each other and show such autonomy..."

"Fang Yuan's strength is low because because of two reasons. Firstly, the heaven and earth qi are converging and forming qi tides, immortal apertures are becoming unstable, secondly, the heaven path dao marks he absorbed are also like a seal."

"Among the different paths, human path is the most suitable for dealing with heaven path. Who knows how many heaven path dao marks Fang Yuan gained, how long can they suppress him for?"

Inside the sovereign immortal aperture.

The thousand wish tree was planted in Mini Central Continent.

An immortal formation with the thousand wish tree as the core was already set up, it started to activate now.

Due to the influence of the heaven path dao marks, Sovereign grotto-heaven had been encountering disasters and calamities endlessly, but even in this situation, Fang Yuan still spent effort to create and defend this formation.

"Good." After observing for a while, Fang Yuan smiled as he saw the formation working normally.

This was a human path formation, the thousand wish tree was a human path ancient desolate plant, with his formation path and human path attainment levels, Fang Yuan finally made such progress.

The formation in Mini Central Continent was the main formation, there was going to be four more human path sub-formations created in the other mini regions.

"I am trying to use human path to restrict heaven path, let's see how well it works!" Fang Yuan held high expectations for this plan.

-x-X-x-

Immemorial black heaven.

"They're here!" An Xun shouted excitedly.

Under his silent supervision, a soul beast army of a thousand charged towards his ambush.

Once they entered his range, An Xun activated his ambushing soul beasts, attacking all of the wild soul beasts from all sides.

While An Xun controlled the soul beast army, he activated Immortal Gu and unleashed all sorts of immortal killer moves.

As his killer moves landed on them, the soul beasts on his side gained a boost in battle strength, speed, and defense to some degree.

This battle lasted for several minutes, An Xun successfully killed four hundred wild soul beasts while the rest were captured.

"Master!" An Xun gathered a pile of soul cores and offered them to Spectral Soul.

Spectral Soul opened his mouth and absorbed all of these soul cores into his body, starting to digest them.

After last time when he secretly followed An Xun and enslaved him, Spectral Soul managed to get his plan started.

He secretly passed the profundities of soul path cultivation to An Xun, according to the soul path Immortal Gu that An Xun had, he personally created soul path killer moves for him.

An Xun's strength continued to rise, he took many missions to capture soul beasts.

For this purpose, Spectral Soul created two methods, one could find out the location of wild soul beasts, the other was a simplified immortal formation that could lure soul beasts after it was set up.

With these two methods, An Xun captured wild soul beasts with much higher efficiency, each mission was completed to a high degree.

Lady Cold Ash saw that her nephew did not let down her expectations but even went beyond that and shined brightly, she was very happy about it.

Within Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, Lady Cold Ash was the only rank eight, she was naturally their leader.

Below her were An Chong and An Xun. Last time, when Ice Crystal Immortal Monarch opened his grotto-heaven and invited them, Lady Cold Ash brought the two of them with her, she wanted to let them gain some experience, and also let them meet up with others to become acquainted with other Gu Immortals.

When Lady Cold Ash was in the meeting in the grotto-heaven, An Chong and An Xun stayed outside the grotto-heaven and talked with the other rank seven elites of other grotto-heavens.

But Lady Cold Ash did not know that An Xun was already turned into Spectral Soul's slave. In fact, the entire Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, including herself, was currently targeted by Spectral Soul, their future was bleak.

The more missions he completed, and the higher the completion rate, the more advantage An Xun would have in this competition.

Lady Cold Ash could see this, the other Gu Immortals in the grotto-heaven also noticed this.

One day, Lady Cold Ash summoned An Chong as she instructed: "Since the last time Ice Crystal Immortal Monarch called for us to have a meeting, he was very active in asking the grotto-heavens to work together. But in Central Continent's black heaven, there are many variant humans but only two rank eight humans including me. Thankfully, I have already contacted Granny Skeleton, she is a rank eight Gu Immortal of Eastern Sea's black heaven. In this journey to Eastern Sea, you are representing Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, you will meet with Granny Skeleton and show our sincerity to cooperate."

"Yes." An Chong replied, feeling bitter inside.

He knew Lady Cold Ash's intention.

By sending him on this mission, she was helping An Xun to claim victory, he was going to become the nurturing target of Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven.

If An Xun performed similarly to himself, An Chong would feel unresigned and angry. But An Xun did really well, far better than him, even An Chong felt that he had no chance to win.

He accepted this mission, he took some immortal materials from Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven's inventory as a meeting gift.

After leaving Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven, he passed the heavenly wind qi wall and arrived in the five regions.

He concealed his traces and went from Central Continent to Eastern Sea. Next, he went through the heavenly wind qi wall in Eastern Sea and to Granny Skeleton's area.

When the regional walls existed, Gu Immortals had a lot of trouble crossing regions. Many strong Gu Immortals would choose to travel using the two heavens.

But now that the regional walls had vanished, even a black heaven Gu Immortal like An Chong could travel through the five regions.

Black heaven had a dangerous environment, it would be troublesome if one met an immemorial desolate beast. Even though An Chong had an immemorial soul beast hiding in his immortal aperture, he only had rank seven cultivation level after all. Especially now when the qi tides were rampaging, the five regions Gu Immortals had to recuperate, they rarely moved around. Thus, it was easy for An Chong to travel.

Along the way, An Chong found that the five regions were facing huge disasters, the qi tides had caused much destruction.

Regardless, he did not meet with any unexpected mishaps, he successfully arrived in Eastern Sea and went up to immemorial black heaven. According to the communication method left by Lady Cold Ash, he successfully went into Shattered Bone grotto-heaven and met with Granny Skeleton.

"Fate has been destroyed, the qi tides are surging. With the current changing world, if we do not cooperate, the future will be uncertain. We are all humans, we should work together and stay united." Granny Skeleton did not create problems for An Chong, she agreed immediately.

Granny Skeleton continued: "However, in Eastern Sea's black heaven, variant human forces are more dominant. Lady Cold Ash wants us to cooperate, why would Ice Crystal Immortal Monarch do nothing? He must be gathering the variant human forces of the other regions' black heaven as well."

An Chong knew that Granny Skeleton would not say unimportant things, he quickly asked: "Senior, what insight might you have?"

Granny Skeleton said: "Since we are uniting the humans of immemorial black heaven, why don't we include white heaven as well? I will not hide it from you, I have contacted many people already, the response is quite good. Among them, there is one key person, we need your help to persuade them."

Granny Skeleton paused and continued: "This person is a rank eight Gu Immortal, he is known as Old Immortal Hua Yu, he controls Profound Literature grotto-heaven. He has quite the reputation in Eastern Sea's white heaven, if we can ally with this person, it will definitely bring along a number of white heaven Gu Immortals, we will save a lot of effort."

An Chong heard this and thought: Going to meet Old Immortal Hua Yu was not part of his mission, but if he could accomplish this feat, he would have a chance to compete with An Xun again.

Thinking of this, An Chong made his decision, saying to Granny Skeleton: "Since senior has already planned this, junior will set out for Profound Literature grotto-heaven."

Granny Skeleton praised: "Good, as expected of a member of Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven. Old Immortal Hua Yu does not like to fight or kill, that is why he has little interest in an alliance. If you can succeed in this trip, I will reward you greatly!"

An Chong left Shattered Bone grotto-heaven and went to immemorial white heaven, meeting with Old Immortal Hua Yu.

Even though Old Immortal Hua Yu had little interest in an alliance, An Chong was representing Lady Cold Ash in this trip. The other party was also a rank eight Gu Immortal, Old Immortal Hua Yu did not dare to ignore them, he opened the door and invited An Chong in.

After seeing Old Immortal Hua Yu, An Chong gave the speech that he thought up along the way but Old Immortal Hua Yu was unmoved.

"My Profound Literature grotto-heaven does not involve itself in worldly affairs, we are a neutral party. Even though we do not want to make an alliance, the two of us can still exchange resources."

Soul Pacifying grotto-heaven produced soul path resources, it was quite useful for Profound Literature grotto-heaven.

Seeing that he could not convince Old Immortal Hua Yu, An Chong thought that this transaction was at least better than nothing. This was the first time they were interacting, after several transactions, wouldn't they get closer?

With a deeper relationship, requesting for an alliance would be much better hopes.

After saying goodbye to Old Immortal Hua Yu, An Chong was asked to stay by another Gu Immortal.

Gu Immortal Hua Song attended to him, he said: "You have traveled a long journey to come here, you should stay for a few days. During this period, the mortal imperial court is holding a world poetry competition, many beautiful poems will be created and recited then, it is quite interesting to watch."

An Chong had already heard from Granny Skeleton about the poetry culture of Profound Literature grotto-heaven. All of their Gu Immortals were scholarly and preferred literature works over beautiful women or wine.

An Chong wanted to improve his relationship with Profound Literature grotto-heaven, even though he had no interest in poetry or recital, he could not refuse their kind invitation, he agreed to stay.

The world poetry competition commenced.

This was an unprecedented event, Profound Literature grotto-heaven had never held such a huge competition before. Thus, all sorts of talents gathered from all over Profound Literature grotto-heaven.

Other than the talented scholars who wanted to display their abilities in the poetry competition, many people came here to watch the grand event.

Thus, the capital city that was holding the world poetry competition became filled with people since a month ago.

People moved on the bustling streets, Li Xiao Bai and Teacher Jiang walked side by side.

"The world poetry competition has eighteen rounds, Xiao Bai, if you want to change your circumstances, this is the best chance. I understand your talent, you can pass the first ten rounds, but the latter eight will depend on your luck. Sigh, teacher cannot help you this time, we might even end up as opponents." Teacher Jiang sighed.

This was a grand event, Teacher Jiang also wanted to participate and compete with the other talented scholars!

After Li Xiao Bai heard this, he held down the urge to roll his eyes as he thought: "I am almost certain now that you will end up as my opponent, dear teacher."

Li Xiao Bai was Fang Yuan's clone, he was sent into Profound Literature grotto-heaven as a pawn to take over this grotto-heaven.

Initially, Li Xiao Bai had a smooth sailing journey, he even received the affection of Su clan's young miss, Su Qi Han. As a result, Li Xiao Bai became one of the ten great scholars, he had a chance to become Su clan's son-in-law.

Next, while Li Xiao Bai was on his way to the capital city, the world shook as mountains collapsed and rivers flooded. The people in Li Xiao Bai's group got injured while some died, they were trapped in the valley for months before Li Xiao Bai managed to escape for his life.

Because of this, he missed the opportunity and did not meet with the emperor. Without the emperor's decree, his ten great scholar title was conferred to others.

Li Xiao Bai wanted to contact Su Qi Han but found that after hearing about his situation, she went to look for him and went missing as a result, even now, she had not returned yet.

After arriving in the capital city, Li Xiao Bai encountered many setbacks, people tried to target him secretly, he offended officials or royalty without knowing it, he had a tough time. If not for Teacher Jiang's help, he would have ended up on the streets as a beggar.

But he knew why.

"Even though my main body destroyed fate Gu, our strong luck was almost completely expended in this battle. The result is that I as a clone also became really unlucky."

"This world poetry competition is the event created by Profound Literature grotto-heaven to choose new Gu Immortal seeds. Even though teacher does not know the details, he still chose to join, he is going to become my obstacle."

"I am so unlucky now, I will definitely face him. If I defeat him, this teacher might hate me for life. But this chance is too rare, if I do not use it to deal with the difficulties ahead, I will meet with more problems in the future!"

-x-X-x-

"Lord Gu Masters, please come in!" The waiter bent his back as he invited Hua Song and An Chong into the shop.

"This is a famous teahouse of the capital city, it is very crowded, I have come here many times in the past." Hua Song transmitted as he explained to An Chong.

The two had disguised as Gu Masters as they came to the capital city of Profound Literature grotto-heaven.

An Chong was more willing to observe the capital city from above the clouds. But since Hua Song had such interests, he could only accompany the person who invited him.

"I want a table on the fifth floor." Hua Song was very familiar with this place.

The two came to the fifth floor, they entered the room and saw through the windows that the streets were bustling with people outside, the street with the bronze gate where the first round of the competition was held was completely packed with people.

"These are the current generation scholars of my Profound Literature grotto-heaven, they are the hope of our future as well. Please observe." Hua Song sighed as he handed a rank five investigative Gu worm to An Chong, it could observe the target's talent qi.

An Chong took a look and used it immediately, his field of vision changing immediately. He could now see the talent qi above the heads of countless scholars. These talent qi had all sorts of colors, some were taller than others, they all had different forms, it was an eye-opener.

"Since you have such a Gu worm to observe talent qi, what is the point of holding this competition?" An Chong asked.

Hua Song chuckled: "You might not know, talent qi is like cultivation level, even if one possesses a larger talent qi, they might not be able to use it properly in actual competition. Furthermore, this competition requires them to make poems on the spot, they cannot cheat. We want to test the upbringing of these scholars, some who have abundant talent qi might not have sufficient inspiration to create the highest quality poems."

An Chong nodded: "I see that the formations here are interlinked, they are able to amplify the creative thinking of the scholars?"

Hua Song nodded: "Indeed, you are very perceptive! Within the immortal formation, scholars are able to display greater abilities than usual, they will make full use of their talents."

As they spoke, the door was knocked.

After getting Hua Song's permission, the waiter brought over an array of dishes and wine.

"Eight treasure duck, golden thread crispy sparrow, panda crab meat, they are all signature dishes of our teahouse, please enjoy the food." The waiter said.

Hua Song gave the waiter one primeval stone as a tip before he left the room.

Hua Song explained to An Chong: "Envoy, even though the tea here is mortal tea, it was created by Lord Hua Yu in his youth, when he was still a rank four Gu Master, he became the top scholar and thus this tea was named by him as the top scholar tea."

"Oh?" An Chong became interested now, this was the creation of a rank eight Gu Immortal in his youth.

"Then I will have to savor this well." An Chong drank it, he shut his eyes as he tasted the tea, in a daze, he felt a rush of excitement in his heart, it was as if he had attained success after decades of hard work, he finally gained the reputation and fame that he deserved, life was at its peak!

"Good tea, good tea." An Chong praised sincerely: "Even though this is a mortal tea, it has a trace of human path ingenuity within it!"

During the fate war, Central Continent's Heavenly Court used multiple human path killer moves with shocking power, the entire world knew about it. Thus, human path became renowned in the world, everyone knew about it.

While the two immortals were enjoying their tea, the bronze gate of the first competition ground opened slowly.

The crowd of people waiting before the gate erupted into a huge commotion.

"It's opening, it's opening!"

"Don't squeeze."

"Quickly let me in."

The crowds charged through the gate.

Li Xiao Bai was among them, but he was at the back instead.

He moved along with the people as he analyzed the rules of this competition.

"The world poetry competition has eighteen rounds, each one has a question, everyone has to answer it, regardless of how many people, their final product will be assessed and only half will be able to pass."

"Towards the later rounds, the numbers will continue being halved. Like this, once someone passes all eighteen rounds, they will fulfill the condition."

"If someone fails once, they will have to return to the previous round. If they keep losing and fall out of the first round, they will be out."

"However, this poetry competition will last for seven days. Everyone has three opportunities to try even if they get kicked out of the first round."

"This way, Profound Literature grotto-heaven will be able to pick the most eligible Gu Immortal seeds. Even if someone makes a mistake, they will have a chance to try again. But if any scholar fails to perform throughout the seven days, it will mean that they are not up to standard, they are not qualified to receive the grotto-heaven's help to become an immortal."

Li Xiao Bai retracted his thoughts, he had already arrived at the first arena.

The arena was large but packed with scholars.

There were males and females, young and old, the number of people exceeded the thousands.

This was just the first day.

Li Xiao Bai waited for another fifteen minutes in the arena before all of the scholars had joined the first round.

There was truly a sea of people, the liveliness was overwhelming.

Thankfully, the first arena was an immortal formation space, it could expand casually and hold so many scholars without problems.

Bang... bang... bang!

As the drums rolled, a voice was transmitted into the scholars' minds: "World poetry competition, first question — Spring, the time limit is five minutes."

After saying that, the voice vanished.

"The first question is spring?"

Many scholars frowned while many scholars showed happy expressions.

Li Xiao Bai thought to himself: "There are simply too many spring poems in existence, this question seems really easy. After all, most scholars would have some sort of verses related to this theme. Even though the world poetry competition requires the creation of poems on the spot, a person can easily modify existing verses to create their own new poems."

"But in reality, this question is quite the tough one." Li Xiao Bai had an expression of deep thought.

He knew that his poem was going to compete against the surrounding people. As long as he was stronger than half of them, he would progress to the next stage.

Many scholars noticed this as well.

Many people started to think, some sat down on the ground while others paced around with their arms behind their backs, some lowered their heads, muttering softly to themselves.

Li Xiao Bai's thought was: "Which poem do I use, or steal?"

There were many spring related poems in his memory, they were all amazing classics.

But using a legendary classic from the start was not good, this would not allow Li Xiao Bai to explain himself in the future. He did not have top tier talent qi, if he took out a shocking poem now, he would attract suspicion.

If his luck was good now, Li Xiao Bai might take slight risks. But now that he was having bad luck, Li Xiao Bai decided to play safe.

While Li Xiao Bai was thinking about it, many scholars already started to make their poems.

Thus, all kinds of lights shining in all colors, weak or strong, appeared. Whenever the light fades from a scholar's body, they would have some gains.

Some gained Gu worms, some gained a rise in cultivation level, some recovered primeval essence, while others recovered from fatigue.

This was the killer move known as assisting literary talents.

Profound Literature grotto-heaven's creator, its original owner, had used this move before his death. Because of assisting literary talents, more and more scholars were encouraged to study, it eventually created the environment of Profound Literature grotto-heaven where most people were scholars.

Li Xiao Bai decided on his poem.

He coughed lightly before starting his recital.

"A moonlit night[1]."

"Deep into the night the moon shines on half a cottage, across the sky the Big Dipper lies, the Little Dipper tilts an incline."

"The warmth of spring is readily felt tonight, through the green window screen, insects buzz and hum."

After Li Xiao Bai finished his recital, a light buzzing noise could be heard around him, his entire body shined in an intense green light.

Whoosh.

The scholars around Li Xiao Bai felt an invisible pressure as the green light forced them to move aside, a huge empty space was created with Li Xiao Bai at the center.

"Such, such a strong light!"

"A famed poem has appeared!"

"To think that a famed poem would appear so quickly. I wonder who created it?"

Many scholars lost their train of thought, they all looked towards Li Xiao Bai with admiration and suspicion.

Li Xiao Bai had a calm expression but he was a little conflicted inside: "Sigh, I went overboard a little, the effect was so eye-catching, I gained too much attention."

He looked around, hoping someone would step up and take the attention away from him.

As the green light entered his aperture, his cultivation level rose.

"Oh! A famed poem has appeared, let me go read it." At the teahouse, Hua Song had a sensation.

After reading Li Xiao Bai's work, Hua Song nodded in satisfaction: "Brilliant, brilliant! This Li Xiao Bai is very young but his poems are very mature."

"Normally, spring poems would use verses involving greenery or peach blossoms. But this poem uses another train of thought, using the night scene to conceal the spring light, it is quite interesting."

"The final verse must be created using Li Xiao Bai's personal experiences. It has a refreshing, happy, and lively feeling."

"Poems take after the creator, this Li Xiao Bai has a superb mindset!"

Hua Song praised it for a while, as if he had just eaten a delicacy of the world. He looked at An Chong as he smiled: "I wonder what envoy thinks of this poem?"

An Chong felt a headache as he thought: "If you didn't tell me, I wouldn't know what's so good about this poem. Sigh, he wants me to critique it, what should I say?"

-x-X-x-

Li Xiao Bai's expectations were not disappointed.

After his recital, three more people stepped up.

One was a strong man wearing a golden mask, he was shining in a glaring golden light.

There was an old man wearing a cone hat, he was holding a cane as a green light moved around him.

There was also a woman, she had a slim body and wore a pink dress, her face was covered by a veil, after her recital, butterflies flew around her, it was a beautiful sight.

These three had created famed poems on the same level as Li Xiao Bai's moonlit night.

Li Xiao Bai let out a sigh of relief: "This world has Gu worms to assist with poem creation. Gu Masters are also able to extend their lifespan and gain more experience in life. Thus, famed poems are more likely to appear than on Earth."

On Earth, moonlit night was a rare creation. But in Profound Literature grotto-heaven, it would not be unmatched.

Including Li Xiao Bai, the four of them had their own territory as they looked at each other.

The strong man, old man, and woman placed their gazes on Li Xiao Bai.

They knew each other, they had some sort of understanding towards their works, but Li Xiao Bai was a newcomer.

"Who is this young man?"

"His talent qi is not dense, how can he create such a famed poem?"

"Hehe, interesting guy."

Li Xiao Bai's teacher, Teacher Jiang, also saw his student's performance. He nodded in satisfaction: "Very good, Li Xiao Bai, it seems you are performing well today. Continue working hard."

In the end, no accidents happened, Li Xiao Bai moved to the next round and was teleported away.

After he regained his senses, he arrived in another arena.

"This is the fifth round, scholars, please wait patiently." Li Xiao Bai heard a voice in his mind.

Li Xiao Bai understood at once: "So the advancement has differences as well. The poem I made is enough to pass three rounds and directly reach the fifth round."

"This is quite a logical rule."

"But this means that the Gu Masters who reached this round are all people who created famed poems. Only half of these people can pass, the pressure has intensified now."

Li Xiao Bai looked around, he found two familiar faces.

It was the strong man and the woman from earlier.

After noticing Li Xiao Bai's gaze, the woman nodded at him, she seemed to be smiling under the veil. Meanwhile, the strong man had an air of arrogance, after giving Li Xiao Bai a glance, he started to shut his eyes and meditate.

In the fifth round, there was only the three of them now.

"I wonder which round that old man went to."

"I should pretend to rest now."

When scholars made poems, they had to think with all their effort, but he only had to select a suitable poem for his use. This was too easy, he had to conceal the fact.

After waiting for several minutes in the fifth round arena, the second competition began.

He had more than twenty competitors, Li Xiao Bai felt a certain level of pressure in his heart.

The theme of the second competition was out — Travel, the time limit was the same as before.

"Travel? This question is the same as spring, it is so broad and easy to write, but creating a famed poem will be very hard!" The strong man sighed to himself.

The woman was thinking: "I am not well versed in this, what should I do?"

Li Xiao Bai was also contemplating: "Which poem do I copy?"

After thinking for a while, he felt that he could not use a classic poem, the effect would be too overwhelming, but he could not use a bad poem. Otherwise, he would fail to advance and be kicked back to the previous round.

Li Xiao Bai was a little troubled, it was not easy to gauge this situation.

He knew his own ability, but he did not know about others, he did not know what sort of poem to use to win but not gain too much attention.

"In the first round, I went overboard. I should not try for first place now." Li Xiao Bai told himself.

He waited patiently.

After a few minutes, some scholars already created their poems. After that, a few more started to recite their poems, colorful lights appeared.

Li Xiao Bai sighed to himself, thinking: "It seems that famed poems are not easy to create, these people did well in the first round but currently, they are only performing at an average level."

Li Xiao Bai soon had an idea of the situation but he did not start working, he was still waiting.

As the time limit was about to be up, he finally saw some famed poems.

One from the strong man.

He recited a poem with great battle intent, resembling the march of horses and spears, his entire body was flickering with golden light, one could hear the clash of spears and blades.

The second famed poem came from the woman.

She created a gentle poem, describing a young lady looking outside her room's window, listening to the stories of travelers outside, imagining her own travel journey, it was quite impressive.

"Alright, it is my turn now." Li Xiao Bai coughed as he recited:

Date flowers fall on the villagers' clothes,

The sound of reeling carts heard from every household,

Old men dressed in simple clothes sell cucumbers under the willow tree.

Feeling drunk and drowsy from the long journey,

The bright sun makes my throat dry, I thirst for a refreshing drink,

I knock on the door of a mortal house, hoping to request for some tea.

He had copied Su Shi's Silk-washing Stream.

After the recital, be it the strong man or the woman, they were evidently moved as they analyzed the poem.

"Good poem! This poem starts with description of the scenery and actions at the back, with the fusion of both, one can feel interested in the event."

"Even though he is writing about a scenery, he uses his voice to create an image, compared to normal descriptions, this is very vivid. The emotional part is also very interesting. This kid might be a Gu Master but he is very polite and courteous, he does not barge into a mortal's house, he is truly a gentleman and has incomparable elegance."

"Reading his poem shows his nature. This young scholar is really promising!"

The surrounding scholars looked at Li Xiao Bai with a different gaze now.

Li Xiao Bai let out a breath of air, pretending that he was extremely exhausted.

"After this round, I should be able to advance. Not just that, my performance was really good, I did not gain too much attention but I also did not show inability."

Li Xiao Bai was quite satisfied with himself, after waiting for a while, the time limit was up.

He became stunned.

Most scholars failed to create a poem.

"This is the world poetry competition, I need to display my best abilities. If I use any inferior work, it will be too shameful."

"I did my best but could not create a satisfactory poem, even if I fail, I will not regret it!"

"This trip was worth my time, I got to hear three famed poems."

"Haha, in the worst case scenario, I might fall to the first round, so what? Goodbye!"

Those scholars that did not create a poem left in a carefree manner, while those scholars who made inferior poems showed shameful expressions.

Li Xiao Bai was calm on the outside but internally flummoxed: "How can you guys act so graciously?"

Even though he advanced, he had gained too much attention again. Earlier, he was quite satisfied with the situation, but to think these scholars would be so useless.

"Hmph, I had overestimated them." Li Xiao Bai thought.

There was nothing to say, he successfully advanced to the ninth round.

After patiently waiting for a while, the people gathered. This time, there was less than ten of them.

Many of them were famous scholars, they knew each other and greeted politely, they were calm and elegant on the outside, but were all feeling nervous internally.

At this point, the pressure of these competitors intensified again.

"I need to be stable, I cannot create a commotion again!" Li Xiao Bai clenched his fists, he kept reminding himself.

But this time, his opponents all performed well, more than half of the Gu Masters created famed poems.

Li Xiao Bai was the last one left.

Li Xiao Bai had a nervous expression but he was calm internally, he recited the poem that he had already prepared in advance.

With some flickering light, his cultivation level rose to rank four, he gained a new Gu worm.

This time, he planned meticulously, the poem he created was just borderline in the middle, he managed to advance successfully but he was at the bottom of the batch.

Right when Li Xiao Bai was feeling happy.

Cough!

Someone coughed out a mouthful of blood.

Ugh.

Someone fainted on the ground.

The strong man shook as he sat down with difficulty. The woman coughed for a long time with a pale expression.

Only Li Xiao Bai was left standing on the spot, unaffected.

At once, everyone's gazes were on him again.

"This young man is very strong! Currently speaking, he has already created three famed poems."

"He did not get injured at all, it seems that he had not gone all out when he made his poem earlier."

"Impressive! After this competition, I need to befriend him!"

Li Xiao Bai: "..."

He was speechless.

Oh heavens, why did everyone overexert themselves?!

Wasn't it just a poem competition, why were they risking their lives?

He wanted to pretend to cough blood too but it was too late now, he could not disguise himself anymore.

Li Xiao Bai had to continue moving to the next round with a plain expression.