The feeble voice was scattered in an instant by the howling wind. Xu Yuan subconsciously glanced toward Tianye, seeking her thoughts, but what met his eyes was her calm profile, looking as composed as ever.
Her three thousand strands of unpinned black hair danced in the wind, a wisp brushed by the gale against the corner of her faintly smiling lips—alluring and bewitching.
She looked as though she hadn't heard a thing.
After a moment's hesitation, Xu Yuan spoke up, "Just now, it sounded like someone down below was calling you via voice transmission."
Tianye turned her head back with evident delight, her gaze clear and questioning. "Hmm? Nope~"
Xu Yuan stared at her in silence for several seconds. "Nonsense!"
Tianye pouted with slight displeasure. "How am I talking nonsense? That person called for Tianyan, not me."
Xu Yuan rolled his eyes and asked in a low voice, "What cultivation level was the person who sent the voice transmission?"
Tianye looked out across the rolling hills and gravel desert rushing past below, answering casually, "Tianyan's cultivation can't sense it, so at the very least, they're in the Transcendent Realm, I'd say."
"..." The corner of Xu Yuan's eye twitched.
To avoid unnecessary trouble, the two of them had deliberately masked their auras while traveling these past few days, and flying low and close to the ground further obstructed the spread of their qi dynamic.
Combined, as long as there were a few li of distance, even a Saint wouldn't be able to detect the stray qi dynamic dissipating from their flight.
Such a coincidence...
A warm desert breeze swirled dry yellow sand past the tips of their hair, accompanied by the girl's teasing words:
"Do you want to go down and have a look?"
Xu Yuan pondered for a moment, then murmured, "Let Tianyan out. I'll ask her first who sent the voice transmission."
"No way."
Tianye refused cleanly and crisply, crossing her arms over her chest as she stepped back two paces. Her eyes fluttered as she looked at him, acting pitiful. "I had such a hard time coming out; I'm not going back."
*Wait, you're over twenty thousand years old, and you're still acting cute?*
Xu Yuan suppressed the urge to complain internally, took a breath, and said, "In that case, let's head down."
Tianye gave a light shrug of her delicate shoulders, her expression carrying a meaningful hint. "With that unlucky streak of yours, Brother Changtian, are you sure you want to invite unnecessary complications at a time like this?"
Hearing this, Xu Yuan's brow twitched slightly. "Since when did you start believing in luck?"
"When did I ever say I didn't believe in it?"
Tianye's red lips curved as she rested her hands across her chest. "Compared to luck, I still prefer the term 'karmic fortune.' And as for something like karmic fortune, the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion actually explored it quite some time ago."
As she spoke, the girl coiled a strand of hair around the tip of her finger, her voice gentle with reminiscence. "Before the great catastrophe arrived, aside from certain Unfathomables, the Heaven-Deducing Art could deduce almost an entire person's life in its entirety. And as long as certain figures or factions crossed the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion's red line, the contemporary Pavilion Master would immediately place them under surveillance.
"Over tens of thousands of years, across that massive sea of dossiers on historical figures, several hundred exceptional cases naturally emerged. Among them, some enjoyed boundless fortune with endless opportunities throughout their lives, while others spent their entire existence struggling along the brink of life and death...
"Tell me, if that isn't karmic fortune, what is?"
"Why doesn't Tianyan know about this?" Xu Yuan suddenly interrupted.
"A historical gap, of course."
Tianye smiled calmly without even thinking. "Ten thousand years ago, wasn't the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion destroyed once? That kind of top-secret information would definitely have been purged."
Xu Yuan looked at Tianye, half-believing and half-doubting, and asked, "Then regarding karmic fortune, did the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion..."
"Made zero progress."
Tianye spread her hands, answering straightforwardly. "Drawing upon dossiers accumulated over tens of thousands of years, the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion inferred and argued for its probable existence, but there was never any direct proof, let alone any cultivation technique capable of harnessing it.
"However, according to those arguments, karmic fortune might not be limited solely to individuals. A clan, a sect, or even your present-day imperial dynasty would have its own karmic fortune."
This demoness usually loved to torment people, but when it came to spilling top-secret intelligence about her former backer, she didn't hold back in the slightest.
"Still, state fortune is even more nebulous than an individual's karmic fortune, though there are still plenty of cases demonstrating its existence.
"There are many unfortunates whose lives were plagued with peril from birth, yet after joining a certain faction, their bad luck came to an abrupt halt. There are also many favored children of fortune who could stumble off a cliff and pick up an ancient legacy, yet upon joining a certain faction, found every step fraught with hardship..."
"All right, all right."
Xu Yuan roughly understood what Tianye was describing and cut her off with a light laugh. "This deduction by your Overseeing Heaven Pavilion is a bit overgeneralized.
"According to the theory of karmic fortune your Overseeing Heaven Pavilion deduced, my Chancellor's Manor was able to expand to its current scale in just a few decades, which should count as boundless fortune. Why, then, am I, the legitimate son, still so unlucky?"
Tianye drew her slender index finger along her chin. The warm wind stirred the tips of her dark hair, yet her golden eyes showed no embarrassment at having her theory poked full of holes; instead, they flickered with a peculiar gleam.
Xu Yuan's heart sank inexplicably. He furrowed his brows and said nothing more.
After several seconds of silent gazing,
Tianye suddenly smiled faintly, her voice chillingly quiet:
"Who told you... that a rapidly expanding faction must possess boundless fortune?"
"..."
Subconsciously, Xu Yuan thought of the Chancellor's Manor's ending in *Cangyuan*.
His heart beat slightly faster, his voice turning somewhat low. "What do you mean by that?"
Tianye blinked at him suggestively. "I already told you just now."
Xu Yuan was slightly taken aback. After a brief moment of thought, his pupils shrank.
"The reason people blessed with karmic fortune had their fortunes severed?"
"Yes."
Tianye nodded, spreading her hands slightly. Her crescent-like, crystalline eyes seemed capable of devouring one's soul. "People blessed with karmic fortune lead smooth and successful lives. The factions they choose to join are often the ones at the absolute zenith of their power at that time. Conversely, those whose karmic fortune is depleted are already struggling on the line between life and death; if a faction is willing to take them in, they're already grateful enough—how could they afford to be picky?
"According to the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion's deduction, the manifestation of state fortune differs from personal karmic fortune. At the very least, its cycle is much longer, often using a century as a baseline unit."
At this point, Tianye tilted her head toward Xu Yuan and smiled. "If I recall correctly, your Chancellor's Manor hasn't even existed for a hundred years yet, has it?"
"..."
"..."
Tianye hadn't spelled it out explicitly, yet she had said everything.
According to the theory of karmic fortune deduced by the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion,
there was only one reason Xu Yuan's fortune was unaffected by the Chancellor's Manor:
the Chancellor's Manor's "state fortune" had also withered to rock bottom, unable to feed back into him, the legitimate son, and would meet an untimely collapse in the future.
This information perfectly aligned with the Chancellor's Manor's ending in *Cangyuan*.
More importantly,
according to this theory of karmic fortune,
everything Xu Yuan had done since transmigrating, even though it had further strengthened the Chancellor's Manor's power, seemed to have produced no fundamental change in the manor's karmic fortune.
Because he was still an unlucky bastard right now, having received no feedback whatsoever from the manor's karmic fortune.
Silence swallowed the two of them in midair like an abyss.
Beneath the blowing of the warm sand-laden wind, a peculiar look gradually surfaced in Tianye's eyes.
She looked at him, sensing an incongruity.
Based on her impression of Xu Yuan, this information shouldn't have left him this dejected.
After all, this discourse on karmic fortune was merely a speculation by the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion from back then.
Yet looking at Xu Yuan's expression, Tianye inexplicably felt that he seemed to know something about the future.
If she wanted to know, she asked.
That had always been Tianye's nature.
Without the slightest hesitation, she suddenly flashed right before Xu Yuan, staring into his eyes at close range.
Startled by the demoness's sudden move, Xu Yuan frowned slightly and leaned back. "What are you doing?"
Tianye pressed in close, giving him no opportunity to pull away. "You know that the Chancellor's Manor will decline?"
"..."
The caught-off-guard question gave Xu Yuan a sharp jolt inside.
Yet it lasted only a split second.
A consummate actor himself, Xu Yuan revealed not a single hint of suspicion on his face, glaring at the woman. "Decline? Your family is the one that'll decline."
"Why would you curse yourself like that?"
Tianye clung to his body, whispering with a light laugh, "I'm homeless right now and can only follow you, Brother Changtian, so my home is your home."
Just as Xu Yuan was about to snap back, the girl's index finger pressed against his lips.
Her eyes held deep curiosity as she pouted, speaking softly and slowly:
"Brother, you seem to know certain things about the future. Can you tell me?
"Don't deny it. I saw through you, and I believe Tianyan did too.
"If you don't want Sister Tianyan to know about these things, you can wait until I reclaim my physical body and tell me privately.
"After all, she is still the Saintess of the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion in the end, while the only person in this world I, Tianye, care about is you~"
With those words finished,
the demoness gave Xu Yuan no chance to argue, directly dragging him as she sped toward the origin of that voice transmission earlier.
Landing on the ground, a cave came into Xu Yuan's view.
A cavern situated on a gravel hill, bearing faint residual traces of Source Qi—evidently excavated by someone using a technique quite recently.
Probing the cave's internal structure with spiritual vision, he received no feedback whatsoever.
The interior of the cavern seemed to have been sealed with some extremely powerful isolation technique.
Seeing this, Xu Yuan thought that since the other party had actively sent a voice transmission, they would surely receive them upon seeing them arrive.
Rather than taking the risk of entering directly, it would be better to wait outside the cave.
Taking advantage of this opportunity, he could also continue discussing that theory of karmic fortune with Tianye.
Having reigned as hegemon over the fourteen provinces of the Central Lands for tens of thousands of years, the Overseeing Heaven Pavilion possessed an astonishingly deep foundation.
He wanted to know whether there was any chance of changing this thing called karmic fortune.
Or rather,
he wanted to know whether anyone in history had ever successfully accomplished it—
yielding half a move to the heavens, yet triumphing over the will of heaven.
However, a demoness was a demoness; Tianye's actions could never be predicted by common logic.
The moment their feet touched the ground, the woman strode directly into the unknown cave before them.
Left with no choice, Xu Yuan could only brace himself and follow her inside.
Unless there were more than three Saints nesting inside, or a world-boss-level Saint like the White Emperor, Tianye's ten-breath transformation duration would be enough to get him out.
The instant he stepped into the cave, the Source Qi circulating inside Xu Yuan immediately felt a sluggish drag, as if sinking into a quagmire.
A formation array?
Or a technique?
No, if a technique like this invaded his body, it should be deconstructed by his black Source Qi.
"This is a Dao domain."
Just as he was pondering, Tianye's airy voice drifted over. Walking forward, she murmured, "No need to be too nervous. If the person inside harbored hostility, the instant we stepped into the cave, we wouldn't have been able to use any techniques at all."
"Huh?"
The corner of Xu Yuan's eye twitched as he transmitted his voice: "What kind of damn Dao domain is that?"
He had seen his fair share of Dao domains, but a formidable Dao domain that directly "silenced magic" upon entry was a first for him.
"How would I know?"
Tianye rolled her eyes at him, then curled her lips in a look of praise. "It should count among the strongest batch of Dao domains in terms of combat power, though. If the person inside manages to break through and become a Saint, even I would be sealed by him directly if I were caught off guard."
Hearing this, the space between Xu Yuan's brows began to throb again.
What kind of monumental bad luck was this?
Tomorrow, he ought to go kick a stray dog by the roadside and see if he could manage to kick an ancient Linlang of the Great Desert.
The cave wasn't very deep. Grumbling inwardly about his rotten luck, Xu Yuan followed Tianye to the deepest part, where he caught sight of a man clad in a heavy straw raincoat.
And the moment he saw the man's attire, Xu Yuan immediately realized who he was.
The mysterious man who had once rescued Tianyan from the clutches of Madame Wan's Saint Tier yin ghost.
He should be a friend, not a foe.
The straw-raincoat man sat leaning against the rocky wall of the cave, his lowered head causing the conical bamboo hat to conceal his face.
Even so, with just a glance, Xu Yuan could tell that his condition was extremely bad.
He had lost an arm and a leg, which had only been given rudimentary bandages, and the large pool of blood that had spilled out beneath him had already congealed.
A heavily wounded Transcendent.
After a moment of silence,
amid the darkness of the cavern, the straw-raincoat man slowly raised his head to look at the two of them. It was a middle-aged face, looking somewhat weathered, with his scruffy, stubbled chin still stained with uncleansed dried blood.
His feeble, clouded gaze lingered on Tianye for several seconds. The straw-raincoat man's lips parted slightly. "You don't seem to be the Saintess, but it doesn't matter anymore."
Tianye raised a brow, just about to speak, when Xu Yuan covered her mouth with one hand.
Stepping forward and rubbing his Sumeru ring, he said in a low voice, "This is due to the Saintess's cultivation technique. May I ask why you summoned us here, sir?"
"..."
The straw-raincoat man's lips twitched as though he wanted to smile, but his body, weakened to the extreme, made even this simple motion difficult. His voice was as faint as a thread: "Over by the Evil Ghost Gorge, three little girls told me that I might run into Her Eminence the Saintess along this path. I have a matter for which I need her help."
Hearing this, Xu Yuan felt a surge of surprise.
Sent over by the Treasure Hunt Chick—that made sense, then.
After a brief contemplation, Xu Yuan retrieved a jade bottle from his Sumeru ring and walked forward. "If we are able to assist, I certainly won't refuse."
With that,
Xu Yuan offered the jade bottle to the straw-raincoat man before him.
The straw-raincoat man cast a downward glance at the medicinal pill offered by the young master in brocade robes, his brow twitching slightly in mild surprise. "A Seven Wonders Spring-Returning Pill?"
"You once stepped in to save Tianyan,"
Xu Yuan answered straightforwardly. "A worldly possession like this is nothing to us."
The straw-raincoat man did not take it. Seeing this, Xu Yuan simply set it on the ground beside him.
He didn't believe the man had the strength to maintain a Dao domain yet lacked the strength to lift his hand.
Taking a few slow steps back and putting Tianye in front of him as a shield, Xu Yuan continued softly, "Uncle, you can tell us the main business now."
Hearing this, the straw-raincoat man fell silent for a short while, then said:
"What I am about to say may sound somewhat sensational, but I ask that you believe me."
Xu Yuan's eyes flickered. He felt that the injuries sustained by this Transcendent expert of unknown identity likely involved grave secrets.
"Speak freely."
The straw-raincoat man took a deep breath, then said slowly:
"In as short as three days, or as long as seven, three Saints will launch an attack on Zhenxi Prefectural City."
Chapter 609