The sensation of solid ground beneath her feet was jarring, as if she had returned from another world entirely. Having been wrapped in that transformative golden thunder for what felt like an eternity, her senses had been dulled, her existence reduced to a dreamlike state of pure agony and integration. A faint, unbidden flush warmed her cheeks at the memory of the violating, all-consuming pain, but she quickly shook her head, dispelling the lingering vulnerability.
"Next step… forging the artifact to counter that old witch. But I have completely reduced that island to ruins."
Scratching her head a little awkwardly, Su Min acknowledged her warped sense of time within that strange, thunder-infused realm. Still, she was confident she had time to spare. She had officially stepped into the Golden Core Realm now, and in terms of raw cultivation level, she stood equal to the Demon Queen.
More than that, she wielded the Mastery of the Five Thunders, but she couldn't afford arrogance. That wretched old hag had severed both her foundation and her cultivation, yet still retained the divine abilities and insights from her original Golden Core stage. Divine abilities came in many forms. Su Min's own power stemmed from righteous and balanced heavenly principles. It wasn't something that would launch her to overwhelming, immediate dominance, but it was profoundly stable, without any obvious flaws or backlashes.
The Demon Queen, however, practiced something far more sinister. Her ability was steeped in foul, corrupted energy, in curses and soul hexes. Even cultivators with deeper roots than hers could fall prey to a single, careless mistake against her. Yet the very nature of such evil arts meant they were inherently unbalanced and easily countered by pure, targeted tools. Because of this, practitioners like her tended to strike sparingly and from the shadows, afraid their specific weaknesses might be discovered and exploited.
Unfortunately for her, Su Min remembered exactly what the witch's divine ability was. She had faced her shadow and her techniques before, after all. And now, she finally had the cultivation level and the resources required to forge the one artifact capable of completely suppressing her.
Moments later, a flying sword materialized at Su Min's feet. At the Golden Core stage, cultivators could truly ride upon spiritual objects, traversing the skies. For a sword immortal, it was a long-cherished dream made reality.
"My anchor marks are still intact. Good, they have not faded."
The sea was vast and ever-changing, its spiritual currents unpredictable. Even Golden Core cultivators could perish if they traveled carelessly without guidance. Before she'd left, Su Min had planted several hidden spiritual anchors along the coastline, a prudent precaution in case she needed to beat a hasty retreat.
Now, they lit up in her enhanced divine sense like a chain of lighthouses on a dark sea, guiding her safely and swiftly back. By the following day, her feet once more touched the solid, familiar earth of the continent. She kept a low profile, avoiding contact with others, and made her way into a remote, desolate valley untouched by human hands.
"Now that I have reached Golden Core, it feels as if even the heavens themselves are turning against me," she murmured to the silent rocks. "Breaking through further, at least anytime soon, is near impossible. But even within the early Golden Core stage, there are vast differences in power."
Along her journey, she'd felt it keenly, the subtle but constant shift in the world's spiritual pressure. Once one reached the Golden Core stage, the heavens themselves would begin to weigh down on you, resisting any further rapid advancement. Progress became a monumental task of accumulation and comprehension.
There were only two possible paths forward on a grand scale, one was to wait over two centuries for the legendary Golden Core Avenue to manifest. The other was to survive long enough for the world itself to reset and the prophesied Ten Thousand States to Merge, a cosmic event predicted in over three hundred years.
Either option spelled despair for most cultivators. Foundation Establishment cultivators would likely never live to see that day. Even those in the Golden Core realm, while they might survive long enough to witness it, would often already be weakened, their blood and essence withered by the passage of time.
But Su Min wasn't like the others. Her chosen talent, her very reason for being on this path, ensured that her blood and vitality would never decay, that she would meet that future in her prime.
She glanced down at the piece of First Rank Mysticwood in her hand, its grain pulsing with a faint, resilient light.
"I do not know how long this refinement will take… but without this artifact, my chances against the old hag are unacceptably slim."
As fire burst to life in her palm, she recalled the nature of her heavenly flame inheritance. It wasn't the full, untamed power of the primordial Nanming Lihuo, which was far too overwhelming for any vessel. Not even her current Golden Core body could withstand its complete form. Instead, the flame she wielded was a blessed seed that scaled with her cultivation, growing stronger and more potent as she herself advanced.
Now, she could finally attempt to craft a true low grade Mystic tier artifact. The only limitation was the heartbreaking scarcity of supreme materials in this decaying spiritual world.
[Eight Wood Soul Bell (Earth Grade, Low Tier): When activated, creates a resonant field that absorbs and neutralizes all curse based attacks directed at the bearer.]
The effect was simple, almost brutally so, but it was perfectly tailored to counter the demoness. All of her most feared powers revolved around curses and soul corruption. Once stripped of that primary advantage, she would be no more threatening than a toothless tiger. The artifact's core component, however, was notoriously difficult to forge. It required a specific type of wood known as Threefold Mystic Netherwood, which naturally resisted all fire due to its extreme yin nature.
That was the true, unspoken reason Su Min had once clashed so fiercely with the Demon Crown Prince over that very material in the Xuantian Mansion. He hadn't known what it was specifically for, but he instinctively sensed its inherent power would counter his mother's techniques. Unfortunately for him, everyone he brought along had perished, and the secret of their conflict died with them.
Back then, Su Min had no way of properly refining the wood, not without the sustained power and spiritual control of the Golden Core realm. Now, things were fundamentally different. After a full week of continuous, focused smelting with her scaled up Nanming Lihuo, the stubborn wood finally began to change, its yin resistance slowly yielding to the heavenly flame's persistence. It was only the beginning, many more intricate preparations and enchantments remained.
Three months passed in isolated seclusion within the valley.
At last, a pitch black artifact, intricately carved and strung with several delicately balanced bells, emerged coolly in Su Min's palm.
She exhaled slowly, a tangible weight lifting from her heart. This was the final piece, the last crucial preparation needed to confidently challenge the demoness on her own turf.
"It is time to return to Prince Yong's Manor and have them mobilize the army," she said quietly to herself. "No matter how strong I am personally, numbers and strategy still matter. Charging into the imperial capital alone and getting surrounded by her lackeys and the imperial guard is too great a risk."
This was not a game where bosses stayed patiently in their lairs. If things escalated into a full scale war, the entire region could rise against her. If the Demon Queen had not secretly suppressed her own cultivation to survive the Heavenly Decay, Su Min could have fought with less restraint. But that woman's Hehuan Sect techniques were treacherous. They enforced a strict hierarchy. Higher ranked practitioners could forcibly strip the souls and cultivation of those beneath them to empower themselves in an instant. And if the Demon Queen panicked during their fight and tried to consume all her underlings' souls at once, Su Min did not dare imagine what kind of monstrous power she might temporarily unleash.
Yongzhou City
Su Min once again stood at the foot of the great, fortified city of Yongzhou. A strange, complex expression crossed her face as she took in the sight.
Along the road, the lands of the Great Wei had starkly split into two different worlds. The Emperor's territory was barren and desolate, villages abandoned, ghosts and malevolent spirits wandering freely. But just across the border, Prince Yong's domain was lively, orderly, and prosperous. Sometimes, merely crossing a mountain pass or a river revealed a completely different reality, a tale of two kingdoms under one crumbling dynasty.
In any normal kingdom, this glaring disparity would have already led to widespread revolt. But this was not a normal kingdom. Here, a single supreme cultivator could suppress all resistance, keeping the rotten dynasty alive through sheer, terrifying force. This uneasy, artificial peace revealed a grim truth, both sides were merely stalling for time.
The Emperor was waiting for the Demon Queen to recover more of her strength. Once she did, her early Golden Core cultivation, even if flawed, would allow her to crush everything in her path.
Meanwhile, Prince Yong and his allies… were waiting for Su Min. She was the only one who could stand against that monstrous woman. That was why the entire empire had fallen into this strange, quiet tension, a peaceful calm that teetered on the edge of shattering into total war.
Now, with her return, the balance was about to be obliterated. She would be the hammer that broke the stillness. And since everything was finally ready, there was no need to delay a moment longer.
Su Min said nothing more. With her Golden Core cultivation, entering the heavily guarded city was effortless, a mere blur of motion. She sensed a familiar presence almost immediately, Cao Yuanmu.
On the rear training mountain stood a stern, imposing middle aged man, a long sword gleaming coldly in his hand. Below him, dozens of seventeen or eighteen year old youths stood in rigid, disciplined rows, watching him with a mix of raw awe and healthy fear.
This man was the oldest surviving generation within the Cao family, and also their strongest pillar. He had already reached the mid to late stages of Foundation Establishment, placing him firmly among the top cultivators in the entire martial world. Compared to him, even Sect Leader Mo would fall slightly short. Their raw power was similar, but Cao Yuanmu was younger, his vitality more robust. If a duel dragged on, he would inevitably outlast his older opponent.
"Listen well, you little brats," he barked, his voice echoing across the training grounds. "The annual Martial Gathering is almost here. This is our sacred covenant with the martial world. The one who claims the first victory will be rewarded with a precious Qi Gathering Pill."
Su Min had been gone for more than a decade. And the Prince Yong's Manor, which had inherited part of her legacy and notes, had finally, painstakingly, cultivated its own alchemist capable of crafting the basic Qi Gathering Pill. Once her own stockpiled pills had run out, this man became their only supplier. Still, he was no Su Min.
Where she could reliably produce three to four pills in a single batch, he considered himself lucky to craft one successful pill after two full, exhausting attempts. Even so, martial sects across the land hungered for his creations. To maintain their alliances with the martial world and draw in potential new talents, Prince Yong's Manor hosted this annual tournament. Only Body Refining cultivators under the age of twenty were allowed to participate, and the winner would receive a single Qi Gathering Pill.
It was the only chance most minor sects and independent cultivators had to obtain one. After all, the pill's ingredients were rare, and the refinement process was grueling and prone to failure. Two or three successful pills per year was considered an excellent yield.
And as for more advanced pills like Qi Inducing Pills or the legendary Foundation Establishment Pills, Su Min remained the sole cultivator in the entire province capable of crafting them.
Cao Yuanmu knew the immense value of this event and treated it with the utmost seriousness. The pills came from his household's resources and efforts. Naturally, he wanted the prize to remain within his family or their closest allies.
"Understood!"
The youths shouted in unison, their young eyes gleaming with fierce determination. Those who had the qualifications to join the tournament knew, this was more than mere glory or a title. This was their one, precious chance to step onto the path of true cultivation.
But just as Cao Yuanmu finished his stern speech,
A playfully mocking, yet intimately familiar female voice rang out from seemingly nowhere. "My, my, you have grown even more impressive over the years, Yuanmu."
"Who's there?!"
Several guardian figures, all at least at the Qi Refining Stage and one even at the Foundation Establishment level, immediately sprang into action, their spiritual senses flaring as they scanned the area for the intruder.
This was Prince Yong Mansion's most restricted training grounds, filled with the young elites of their faction and decades worth of accumulated martial secrets.
"Stand down. All of you."
But unlike the others, whose faces were etched with alarm, Cao Yuanmu's face lit up with pure, unadulterated joy at the sound of that voice. With a sharp wave of his hand, he dismissed the agitated guards and flashed to a nearby mountaintop in an instant. There, he saw a woman in pristine white robes, standing as if she had always been there.
"Junior pays respects to Lady Su." His voice trembled with barely contained excitement. "You… you have broken through?"
Su Min had been gone for over a decade. Though they knew she was attempting the perilous Golden Core breakthrough, a deep seated fear had lingered that she might have fallen to the heavenly tribulation. Prince Yong Mansion had sent countless scouts and spent considerable resources trying to find her tribulation site, but she had vanished from the world without a trace.
Even their strongest allied expert, the revered Monk Hui Ming, had admitted he would not dare attempt the Golden Core Tribulation for at least another fifty years. If the Demon Queen recovered her full power first, the Prince Yong faction would be the first to be purged. Now, their long, anxious wait was over. And to his profound astonishment, Su Min had not just survived, she had succeeded.
"Yes," Su Min replied, her tone as calm as a still lake. "The time has come to settle all grudges. Mobilize your forces. Ensure no one interferes in my fight with the Demon Queen. And the emperor… I will deal with him personally."
"Understood."
Cao Yuanmu did not hesitate. The Prince Yong faction's ultimate goal was the throne itself. Su Min's demands were more than reasonable, they were the culmination of their shared purpose. As for letting her execute the emperor, that was perfectly fine by them. After all, she had a blood feud with him, he had personally ordered the extermination of her entire clan.
"Please, accompany me to meet Prince Yong. Give us two weeks to prepare. We can mobilize all our forces, including our allies in the martial world. Over the past decade, several overconfident fools have launched attacks on the imperial capital, only to die ignobly beneath its walls."
"Idiots," Su Min spat, rubbing her temples in frustration.
Those reckless attacks had done nothing but feed the emperor's vile, soul consuming secret techniques, making him stronger.
"Exactly. We cannot afford such wasteful losses. We need every advantage, every soldier."
Seeing her understanding and shared frustration, Cao Yuanmu knew she grasped the high stakes perfectly.
"Go. The longer we wait, the more dangerous the Demon Queen becomes."
Now that she had reached the Golden Core Stage, time was ironically on the Demon Queen's side, as the witch continued her slow recovery. The sooner they struck, the better.
Prince Yong Mansion's Main Hall
"You are the new Prince Yong?"
Su Min's tone was steady, but her gaze lingered on the man bowing deeply before her, as if she were peering through more than just the present moment. A strange, disorienting sense of temporal whiplash curled through her chest.
This was the third Prince Yong she had met. The first… wasn't even supposed to survive.
Back then, in the immediate, bloody aftermath of the failed rebellion, the Yong faction had been gutted. Its main royal line was nearly wiped out, the same political purge that had led to her own Su Clan's destruction. Only one heir remained, an obscure, distant collateral descendant, tucked away in the countryside under a false identity. He had been no one's first choice, until he was the only one left.
But he hadn't been unprepared. His father, a man of foresight, had seen the coming storm and raised him in secret, grooming him from childhood as the true successor. When he finally stepped into the ruins of Yongzhou, he had nothing, no army, no allies, no public legitimacy, only a fierce, unyielding will. Su Min, still in the Qi Refining stage at the time, had seen potential in his eyes, and perhaps a reflection of her own desolation. She lent him her strength, and he, piece by piece, rebuilt their shattered power base.
Then came the Grassland War. Victory bought them precious time and territory, but not lasting peace. Su Min had retreated into deep seclusion afterward, focused entirely on her Foundation Establishment breakthrough. Twenty years passed in a blink.
When she emerged, reforged and powerful, the first Prince Yong was already ten years in his grave.
The second had taken his place, Cao Yuanming, the younger brother of Cao Yuanmu. She still remembered how he had looked then, a stabilizer, not a reformer. A good, decent man, perhaps too mortal, too gentle for the brutal storms that perpetually brewed beyond the capital walls.
She'd gone into seclusion once more after that, chasing the elusive precipice of Golden Core.
Fifteen years passed.
Now here stood the third, Cao Yuanming's son. Another generation. Another face.
Su Min gazed at him, this middle aged man already draped in the authority he had grown into. His manners were correct, his posture trained by a lifetime of expectation, his deference genuine. And yet his face was new. His story had only just begun to be written. She could see the fresh, untempered steel in him, but also the rawness of a leader who had not yet been fully hardened by the crown.
Three Princes Yong. Three distinct eras. And her, standing here, unchanged. Eternal, while the world turned over like soil, season after season.
"No wonder the heavenly courts forbade immortals from romancing mortals," she thought, not for the first time. It wasn't merely for fear of cosmic imbalance, but for the inevitable, crushing heartbreak.
To a cultivator nearing the threshold of the divine, even a Foundation Establishment cultivator's life burned fast and bright, like a festival lantern. Mortals? They flickered out in a breath, before she could even finish memorizing the lines of their faces.
"There will only be more of this in the future…"
The thought echoed, hollow and heavy, in her chest. She let out a breath, so soft it was almost a sigh, laden with a resignation that was centuries in the making.
It wasn't bitterness. It was mourning.
Once, she had shared wine and laughter with the first Prince Yong under snow laden pine trees, discussing grand, impossible plans. Now, his name lived only in memorial tablets and the lineage of this man standing before her.
The more she lived, the more she lost. The longer her path, the lonelier it became.
Perhaps that was why, without ever consciously meaning to, she had drawn so deeply inward. Each new face was a reminder of those who had already faded. Each ally who bowed today might become a gravestone she would visit tomorrow. She did not close herself off out of pride or coldness, but because she could no longer bear the echoing silence left behind by those she had let in.
Even now, as the third Prince Yong looked up at her with reverence and hope, she met his eyes only briefly, then let her gaze drift past him, toward the sunlit corridor where empty air seemed to hold the ghosts of conversations long past. Some essential part of her had stopped reaching for connection. Not because she was cold, but because she still remembered the warmth, and knew the exact, precise cost of losing it.
"My father passed away two years ago due to organ failure," the middle aged man said, his voice respectful but steady, pulling her back to the present. "So I inherited the title. Of course, it was only with Uncle Mu's unwavering support that I could stabilize the faction and secure the succession."
Unlike ordinary kingdoms, even as the new, rightful prince, he had to respect the power and wisdom of the clan elders. Cao Yuanmu remained their true, unshakable pillar, his reputation and strength stretching across half a century. And above even him, like an ancestral banner raised high over their entire cause, stood Su Min.
She hadn't just been their hidden trump card, she had been their origin point. The faction's very rise from the ashes had been shaped around her existence. Her decisions had preserved them. Her long silences had protected them. And her ultimate survival had kept their hope alive through the darkest years.
They had waited, patiently and impatiently, for over fifty years for this moment.
Now, she had finally crossed that elusive, legendary threshold. Golden Core.
And the world, at long last, would have to change.
"Enough formalities," Su Min said, her voice suddenly sharpening, cutting through the hall's solemn air like unsheathed steel. "As the future emperor, you must act like one. Mobilize your armies and gather your forces, we move soon."
The words dropped with the weight of final command, no longer disguised as suggestion or diplomacy. There was no need for such pretense anymore. She no longer had to pretend. The aloofness she had worn for decades like a suit of armor, the carefully cultivated indifference, the cool smiles, the distant gazes, had never been her true nature. It had simply been a mask, one of many she had learned to wear.
But at the Golden Core stage, such masks became burdensome, unnecessary weight.
She had stepped too far beyond the world of mortals to need their approval, and too far into her own power to hide behind soft words and folded fans. If she still deigned to play the game of courtly subtleties, it was only because she chose to, for strategy's sake, not from any need.
She had always been alone. Even when surrounded by allies and well wishers, she had stood apart because she knew, with chilling certainty, that none of them would still be there in a hundred years, perhaps not even in twenty.
It wasn't arrogance that kept her distant. It was survival. Connection made you bleed. Attachment slowed your steps. And when you walked a path that stretched into eternity, a path no one else could follow for long, it was simply easier to keep your heart sealed shut from the start.
She had loved before, in small ways, in quiet moments. She had mourned, too. But she knew exactly how this story always ended. She no longer pretended otherwise.
"Understood," the third Prince Yong said, straightening his back with newfound conviction.
His eyes gleamed at the word emperor, a glint of fire and ambition that had been passed down from his grandfather, to his father, and now to him. Three generations of waiting. Three lifetimes of struggle and sacrifice. And now, the moment had finally arrived.
"Summon three armies of 100,000 each. Issue a martial decree, cancel the annual tournament, and gather all allied heroes. Once we seize the empire, I will award a Foundation Establishment Pill to the one with the greatest contributions!"
"Bold."
Su Min smirked, a genuine expression of approval. A Foundation Establishment Pill was incredibly valuable, a treasure she knew they possessed in very limited numbers. She had left them a few before departing for her tribulation, and it seemed they had hoarded them carefully for a moment like this. Or perhaps the new prince had been saving one for himself, as he was only at the mid stage of Qi Refining. Either way, giving one up was a huge, symbolic sacrifice.
"In that case, I will add a Foundation Spirit Pill to the bounty," Su Min declared, her voice carrying through the hall. "It can raise a Foundation Establishment cultivator by one minor stage. Let us not let the martial world think I am stingy."
"Gulp."
Even the unflappable Cao Yuanmu, standing to the side, swallowed hard. He was one single, stubborn step away from the late stage of Foundation Establishment, but that step could take decades of effort, or even centuries. By then, his life force would have naturally decayed, making the subsequent Golden Core tribulation near impossible. This pill was incredibly, personally tempting to him. Su Min's offer was a clear incentive for absolute, unwavering effort, no slacking would be tolerated.
"Understood!"
The Prince Yong's eyes widened, shining with fervor. He knew exactly how astronomically valuable this pill was. Whoever obtained it could potentially dominate the martial world for decades to come.
Su Min, of course, was excluded from such considerations. She was already considered transcendent, a being beyond the martial world's rankings and their mortal struggles for power.