In the sky, two shuttles of sword qi darted back and forth among the mountains and rivers of the new territory, shimmering with brilliant hues whenever they caught the sunlight. Suddenly, one of the sword qi shuttles soared straight up into the heavens, carved an elegant arc across the sky, and landed atop Yuan Qi's massive head.
The sword qi vanished at once.
Yuan Weiyang stood there, her chest heaving violently, her cheeks flushed with excitement.
She was somewhat out of breath. After all, this was her first time flying by sword, and the toll had been immense. Even with her formidable cultivation, she was thoroughly exhausted.
Yuan Weiyang was stronger in divine sense, but her vital qi was not as profound as Xu Ying's. While she could guide a sword with divine sense to execute far more intricate and ever-changing sword moves, her lack of deep vital qi meant she could not sustain them for long.
Xu Ying was superior in vital qi, though inferior to Yuan Weiyang in divine sense. Just as he was about to stop as well, the sword casket on his back suddenly moved on its own without anyone touching it. Within the casket, sword qi gave a cheerful hum, seeming to leap with excitement, eager to burst forth.
Stirred by this, Xu Ying recalled how he had contemplated the sword intent of Shuikou Temple alongside the sword qi within the casket. He immediately mobilized his divine sense to make contact with the sword qi inside.
The instant his divine sense brushed against the sword qi in the casket, the sword qi leaped out by latching onto his divine sense. In the next moment, the sword qi swirling around Xu Ying's body surged violently!
*Whoosh!*
His vision went black. His speed had increased so drastically that blood drained from his head down to the soles of his feet, leaving his brain starved of oxygen.
Xu Ying hastily surged his vital qi and blood, finally restoring his vision. Immediately, his scalp tingled with dread. In that brief instant of blackout, he had flown seven or eight li and was hurtling straight toward a massive mountain!
He was moving far too fast now—four or five times faster than before. His sword qi tore through the air, trailing snow-white plumes of turbulence in his wake!
Behind him, Yuan Weiyang and Yuan Qi cried out in alarm. They saw the sword qi around Xu Ying erupt, thundering through the sky and trailing a radiant stream of sword light as he charged straight at the mountain peak!
Xu Ying did everything he could to control the sword qi with his divine sense and steer his course, yet he still brushed right against the mountain peak!
*Cra-cra-crack!*
A series of ear-splitting screeches rang out as massive boulders were cleaved from the mountainside by the sword qi encasing Xu Ying, flying in all directions!
Xu Ying's heart leaped into his throat. Yet seeing that the sword qi had sliced through the mountain while leaving him completely unharmed, he was filled with equal parts shock and delight.
*Senior Yuan Tiangang's sword casket truly is extraordinary!*
As he moved faster and faster, he felt his vital qi depleting at an alarming rate. He urgently called out, "Stop! Stop! Stop!"
He exerted all his strength to harness the sword qi from the casket. The restless sword qi vibrated ceaselessly, but gradually he stabilized it. Xu Ying finally felt a sense of control over the sword qi and slowed down.
However, the sword qi remained restless, threatening to surge wildly from time to time; he still needed more practice wielding it before it would obey him like his own limbs.
A moment later, Yuan Qi saw a sphere of sword qi over a zhang across flying toward him. Terrified out of his wits, he hurriedly yelled, "Ah Ying, be careful not to carve a giant crater into my skull!"
Xu Ying spread his arms, surrounded by leaping sword qi, and slowly descended.
Suddenly, the sword qi pulled inward sharply, flowing like rippling water as it retracted entirely into the sword casket on his back and vanished.
"What a fine sword!"
Xu Ying praised, then remarked, "Senior Yuan Tiangang was such a good-natured man, so why was the sword qi he nurtured so irascible? Could it be that he actually refined his own temper into the sword qi so that he could remain calm and peaceful?"
Unable to see his own forehead, Yuan Qi frantically asked, "How's my head? Is it still there? Lord Bell, Lord Bell, tap my head so I can hear a ring... Alright, stop tapping, I'm getting dizzy!"
In high spirits, Xu Ying and Yuan Weiyang sat down once more to discuss their findings in depth, going over the difficulties they had encountered during flight and refining the original sword flight incantation.
Before they knew it, the sun was setting in the west. The dragon carriage had yet to exit the new territory, and Yongzhou City was nowhere in sight, let alone Lingling. It seemed even Zhou Qiyun had lost his way.
The four divine dragons grew weary from pulling the carriage, so Zhou Qiyun brought the vehicle to a halt to let them rest.
Yuan Qi was finally able to step out of the dragon carriage to stretch and get some fresh air, which delighted him immensely.
They were resting by a great lake fringed by clear, shallow marshes. Yuan Qi swam into the water, sending ripples across the surface and startling the large fish in the lake into leaping repeatedly into the air.
The giant serpent took the opportunity to fill his belly.
Xu Ying surveyed his surroundings. The area was surrounded by mountains on three sides, with a small knoll in the center that stood completely isolated from the other ridges.
The knoll was not high—only thirty to forty zhang—nor was it very large. Yet the hill was covered with ancient trees whose bark grew in dragon-scale patterns; some of the trees looked as though they had lived for ten thousand years.
Xu Ying walked to the foot of the hill and saw stone statues perched among the trees. The statues were not tall; the larger ones were the height of a person, while the smaller ones were only the size of a fist.
He walked around the base of the hill. The place was densely packed with these stone statues—there had to be tens of thousands of them at least.
He lifted his foot, intending to climb up and take a closer look, when strange murmurs suddenly reached his ears, like someone whispering right beside him.
The bronze bell immediately tensed up and rang out with a loud *clang*, refining away the noise in Xu Ying's mind, and barked, "Ah Ying, don't move! Remember that big fellow I pinned down at the bottom of the well? That kind of thing is here!"
Xu Ying instantly remembered what had happened on Little Stone Mountain. Back then, when the Nai River encroached and he had been trapped in the ruined temple with his pursuers, he had spotted the chains by the well and peered inside, catching sight of a giant eye at the bottom!
Back then, he had heard this exact kind of bizarre whispering, which had bewitched his mind!
"There isn't just one big fellow here!"
The bronze bell was terribly anxious and muttered, "I sense thousands upon thousands of big fellows... How can there be so many? Even at my peak, I couldn't hold out against this..."
Hearing this, Xu Ying immediately channeled his divine sense into the mirror to look toward the hill.
At that exact moment, the Heavenly Eye mirror within his Realm of Xiyi shattered with a crash! An inexplicable power invaded his Realm of Xiyi—evil yet sacred, ancient, mighty, and bizarre—seeking to obliterate his divine sense entirely!
This power was different from the power of ghosts and gods, different from the power of Nuo masters; it was not a worldly force, but seemed to hail from another world!
In just an instant, Xu Ying's Heavenly Eye was destroyed, and his divine sense was on the verge of collapse!
In this critical moment, the bronze bell descended from Xu Ying's mind into the Realm of Xiyi, tolling furiously along the way to ward off the encroaching evil and immense power!
Within Xu Ying's Realm of Xiyi, the flame of the Pure Yang anomalous fire flared up suddenly, blazing across the void and burning the invading power until it hissed and crackled!
The tolling of the bronze bell reverberated continuously, traveling from Xu Ying's sun-and-moon eyes across the Divine Bridge, over the Jade Pool, and down the Twelve-Storied Tower, chiming back and forth!
It then flew over the immortal mountains of Xu Ying's five viscera, refining away the abnormal power that had seeped into his organs.
The Pure Yang anomalous fire also blazed back and forth through the air, refining and neutralizing the bizarre power pouring from the hill.
Xu Ying's consciousness was still dazed and muddled, nearly half of his divine sense wiped out. Seeing that his complexion was off, Yuan Weiyang reached out with a finger and gently pressed it against his glabella.
Xu Ying felt a soothing chill at his brow. His chaotic divine sense gradually reassembled and stabilized, and he thanked Yuan Weiyang.
Puzzled, Yuan Weiyang asked, "Demon King Xu, why did your divine sense suddenly disintegrate?"
The bronze bell said in a solemn voice, "Disintegrated? If not for me and the anomalous fire inside him, he would have lost his life! Ah Ying, what on earth did you see? How did you provoke an invasion of such abnormal power?"
Xu Ying looked at the low knoll before him in shock and bewilderment. "Just now, I saw a sea of divine light. The brilliance emanated from these little stone statues, every beam shooting straight into the heavens as if connecting to another space-time. And then..."
He shook his head and murmured, "And then, I saw that they were watching me... watching me from another world..."
"'They'?"
Yuan Weiyang was perplexed. "Who are they?"
Xu Ying shook his head and asked, "Lord Bell, besides the maiden in the coffin, what was the other colossus you pinned down in the well on Little Stone Mountain?"
The bronze bell went silent for a moment, then replied, "A heavenly god who descended to the mortal realm to commit evil. Now that I am heavily wounded and no longer suppressing the ancient well of Little Stone Mountain, that heavenly god has likely escaped as well, just like that demonic girl. Once I recover from my injuries, I will definitely capture both of them and stuff them right back into the well!"
Xu Ying fell silent. Heavenly gods—deities of the Heavenly Dao world.
The Plague God he had driven away with his whip was also a heavenly god from the Heavenly Dao world.
Yet just now, when he had used his Heavenly Eye to observe the stone statues on this knoll, he had been observed in return. In that moment, tens of thousands of eyes had turned their gaze upon him; otherwise, his divine sense would not have been shattered in an instant!
But where did so many heavenly gods come from?
And what connection did these heavenly gods have to the stone statues on this knoll?
Xu Ying glanced at Zhou Qiyun, who was resting with his eyes closed, and thought to himself, *Since Old Ancestor Zhou came here and chose this place to stop, he surely has an aim in mind. Could this place be related to the Nether Court?*
Before long, the sun sank beneath the mountains, and darkness fell.
Yet this small, desolate knoll gradually began to glow, shining brighter and brighter. Its light was like candlelight, yet it pierced straight into the clouds, seeming capable of illuminating another world!
Yuan Weiyang, Uncle Xiao, and Yuan Qi had never seen such a spectacle and raised their heads to look in wonder, while what Xu Ying had witnessed earlier through his Heavenly Eye was ten thousand times more magnificent!
"The imperial annals of Emperor Zhidao Dasheng Mingxiao record: 'The Emperor, accompanied by a servant or two, traveled to Cangwu and entered the Netherworld via Guizai Ridge.'"
Xu Ying turned around and saw that Zhou Qiyun had risen at some point and walked up behind them, also looking up at the desolate knoll. Yet at this moment, the knoll seemed to have grown unimaginably towering, dwarfing every other peak in the vicinity!
"Emperor Zhidao Dasheng entered the Netherworld from this very place, found the Nether Heavenly Court, and conversed with the Son of Heaven of the Nether Court, forging a pact that united divine right and imperial power in the mortal realm. In his twilight years, Emperor Zhidao Dasheng grew muddled and foolish, causing the golden age to collapse overnight. Taking advantage of the chaos, the Nether Court tore up the pact and began interfering in the mortal realm."
Zhou Qiyun stepped forward into the mountains, saying, "Today, following the example of Emperor Zhidao Dasheng, I shall visit the Nether Court. You may follow me."
Xu Ying followed close behind him and asked, "Is Old Ancestor Zhou following Emperor Zhidao Dasheng's example to forge a new pact with the Son of Heaven of the Nether Court uniting divine right and imperial power?"
Zhou Qiyun said leisurely, "If I were the emperor, I would march into the Netherworld to renew the pact for the sake of the people and the realm. But I am not. Emperor Shengshen Zhangwu currently sits upon the throne. As a subject of the court, how could I overstep my authority? Would that not be treason?"
He paused, then added, "I have come here solely for myself."
He did not hide his selfish motives in the slightest.
Xu Ying turned the matter over in his mind, unsure whether Zhou Qiyun had come to the Nether Heavenly Court to keep the Netherworld from interfering with his plans to usurp the throne, or to drive the Netherworld away and safeguard Yongzhou.
Zhou Qiyun led them into the increasingly towering mountain. The candlelight in the sky grew ever brighter. As they climbed step by step, boundless divine light suddenly poured down from above like an inverted torrent.
At this moment, both Xu Ying and Yuan Weiyang felt the immense will and abnormal power from another world descending wave after wave, pouring into the stone statues of every size!
With booming rumbles, the stone statues grew taller and larger, radiating divine light. Standing thousands of ren high, they sat perched upon ancient trees that rivaled even the giant locust tree in size.
They sat perched upon the branches of the ancient trees like birds, their gaze devoid of all emotion as they looked down at Xu Ying and the others.
Xu Ying looked up. As the divine radiance shone in the sky, tens of thousands of light beams converged into the vaulted ceiling of a grand hall—yet the sheer vastness of this palace was inconceivable, defying imagination!
"These are projections of the heavenly gods!"
The bronze bell's tone hummed faintly, clearly stunned by this incredible sight as well. It murmured in a low voice, "In my master's era, no one had ever heard of such a place. What in the world happened to the land of Shenzhou over these past three thousand years? Why did the Qi Refiners vanish? Why are there so many heavenly gods gathered here to form a grand palace?"
It had hung upon Little Stone Mountain for far too long, detached from the mortal world for three millennia; now it realized it had lived those three thousand years in utter ignorance.
"The imperial annals state that this place is called the Palace of Heavenly Gods, the path leading to the Nether Court," said Zhou Qiyun as he walked before them. "Ordinary people cannot set foot here. Influenced by the majesty of the heavenly gods, they would fall into madness and slaughter one another. With me shielding you, you will be spared the gods' influence."
His cultivation was unfathomable, repelling the psychic intrusion of tens of thousands of heavenly gods all at once.
Yuan Weiyang whispered, "I fear he is a fraction stronger even than Emperor Zhidao Dasheng was back then. In the historical records, Emperor Zhidao Dasheng was not this powerful."
Following Zhou Qiyun, Xu Ying saw sheer cliffs on both sides of the path. Below crawled countless writhing skeletons—bones warped by the will of the heavenly gods, still clambering upward, oblivious to how long ago they had died!
A shiver ran down his spine. Suddenly remembering something, a cold bead of sweat broke out on his forehead: *Since this is the Palace of Heavenly Gods, could the Plague God be here? Does the Plague God still remember me whipping him?*
Right at that moment, the stone statue of a heavenly god perched upon a tree slowly turned its head and looked at him.
Chapter 58