In Linh Khư, cultivation began by drawing in the essence of heaven and earth, refining it in the body's inner furnace until it crystallized into Chi Pearls. These pearls stored pure chi. In combat, they unleashed it into the meridians, letting cultivators defy natural law: flying through skies, vanishing into mist, cleaving mountains, or bending rivers to their will.
Refining the first Chi Pearl marked a cultivator's first step into the Dao: the Initiation Realm.
Reaching a hundred Chi Pearls earned the title of Adept.
At three hundred, one was called a Master - capable of founding a sect, guiding disciples, and teaching the mysteries of the Dao.
At five hundred, one became an Awakened. Cultivators at this level had the strength to dominate provinces. People called them Venerated, and when they spoke, others listened.
Crossing six hundred Chi Pearls meant stepping into the Sovereign Realm. Sovereigns were pillars of great factions - their presence alone could define the rise or fall of a dynasty. The size of a sect's territory often depended on how many Sovereigns, how many "Kings," it commanded.
Seven hundred? That was the realm of the Imperial—a cultivator-emperor. Barring the Four Great Sects and the Eight Grand Schools, few could stand against one. Imperials could traverse the continents of Jambudvīpa and Aparagodānī freely, their will as law.
If someone broke past eight hundred Chi Pearls, they ascended to the realm of Saints. With a thought, a Saint could raze a thousand miles to ash. At this level, they no longer wielded chi - they wielded nature itself. Armies were meaningless before them.
Among ancient sects with legacies spanning ten thousand years, it was the presence of Saints that formed their true foundation.
Nine hundred Chi Pearls marked the final realm: the Heaventreaders. Those who stepped onto the stairway of divinity. No longer counted among mortals. No longer bound by the tiers of power.
Whether any such beings still lived in Linh Khư, not even Lạc Trần or Tô Mạc Tà could say.
Tô Mạc Tà estimated the village chief of Phù Trúc was likely a peak Sovereign - possibly brushing the threshold of the Imperial.
Lạc Trần didn't know how they were supposed to survive that.
Sure, they had a cripple with celestial fire, and a prodigy-level Venerated on their side. But even if they convinced the Gold and Silver Horn Taoists to join, a peak Sovereign could still wipe them out with a flick of the sleeve.
As for an Imperial? They wouldn't need to lift a finger. A single fart might be enough to blast them all to paste.
He didn't know the cripple's real cultivation. Only that the man had never once acted.
All he knew was - he was fast.
Maybe, if the cripple showed up now, they could escape. Back to the Village of Sickos, in a single breath.
But dusk had fallen.
And the cripple was nowhere in sight.
Lạc Trần began to despair.
Fast was one thing. But fast enough to outrun the Dry Sea's night with two passengers?
---the separator line went home exhausted---
Time moved on.
No matter how much fear weighed in Lạc Trần's iron heart, night arrived as always.
And the Dry Sea darkened.
At the border of Phù Trúc, the village ward began to glow. The Soul Calling ritual had begun.
"The chief invites our honored guests to the divine bamboo, to witness the ceremony."
Two children arrived - one boy, one girl - dressed in ceremonial robes. Lạc Trần didn't recall seeing them earlier, but their eyes held naked contempt for him and the Saintess of Floral Valley.
Tô Mạc Tà remained serene.
She stood and followed the children to the village center.
Behind them, Lạc Trần noticed Kim Giác Tử and Ngân Giác Tử were watching him, fingers twitching.
He coughed. "You two seriously thinking of dragging me into the Dry Sea? Be real - cherish your lives. I can resist the darkness. You can't."
"We could skin you and wear it."
"Motherf—don't you know the story of killing the chicken for its egg?"
"Heard it. We were the one who killed that chicken."
"…You have my respect."
The banter was half-hearted. The Taoists weren't stupid. They wouldn't risk it.
The three trailed after Tô Mạc Tà.
---the separator line partner was not satisfied with its performance in bed---
The Soul Calling was held by the pond.
The bamboo stalk that had floated earlier now sat on a silver tray draped in red silk. The village chief took it and planted it into a shallow pit.
Lạc Trần remembered that pit.
He and Tô Mạc Tà had seen it that afternoon while villagers were netting fish. Back then, blood had been poured into it. Villagers said it was a failed post - every bridge built over it collapsed. A wandering mystic once said it was a cursed point. The pond stayed untouched thereafter.
Now, the bamboo rooted instantly.
It grew. Fast.
In seconds, it was taller than a man, its leaves dark green, veins tinged red like blood threads.
The chief hung a strip of animal hide on its branch, then stepped onto the pavilion and began to chant:
"O soul, O soul,Wandering past control.Lost in the veils of dream,We call through bamboo green.Return to the fold, O soul.
O soul, O soul,By name, Đặng Bất Phàm whole.Phù Trúc is your place,Why not return with grace?Has home lost its face?Do you scorn your base?
Come home, come home."
The villagers danced. One hand held high as if bearing fruit, the other pressed to their hip, they swayed like that drowned corpse of the beggar on the surface of the Star Fell Lake.
The bamboo radiated silver light, cold and gleaming like moon on water.
From the pond, a human head surfaced.
It was the beggar.
The same one who went to the temple in the middle of Star Fell Lake, the one whose corpse danced on the Clear Spring river that night.
The chief called out:
"Present the offering!"
"Present the offering!" the crowd echoed.
Four men rushed forward with a stretcher - on it lay the cripple, body torn open, pierced by bamboo leaves like blades. He looked around, gave a weary smile, and shook his head.
"Present the offering!"
At the command, they hurled him into the pond.
The beggar lunged. Water exploded. Silver light burst upward. Blood frothed red.
"Cripple!"
Lạc Trần leapt forward - but a boy cracked his shin with a bamboo staff, dropping him mid-sprint.
"If you want to live, then fight!"
Tô Mạc Tà's expression turned cold.
Even she hadn't expected the villagers to capture the cripple.
Caught off-guard, she shouted to the Taoists for help.
They didn't hesitate.
Kim Giác Tử drew his talisman-bound blade. Golden chi erupted into a blade of light. With one hand forming seals and the other slashing, he tore through the crowd.
Ngân Giác Tử opened his banana leave fan. Gusts knocked back knife-wielding aunties like leaves in a storm.
They didn't touch the village chief.
That task fell to Tô Mạc Tà.
She wasn't surprised. They were enemies, cooperating only out of need. That they hadn't stabbed her in the back was courtesy enough.
The village chief smiled thinly.
"Little girl, care to spar with this old man?"
"If I say no, will you let us leave?"
"The divine bamboo has spoken. Your death is ordained. I cannot disobey."
"Then I have nothing more to say."
Tô Mạc Tà raised her palm. Five hundred Chi Pearls ignited.
Chi surged through her body, forming snow-white battle armor.
Armour of the Awakened.
Steady. Solid. The signature move of a Venerated.
Then the old man moved.
Chi exploded like a volcano. Bamboo leaves spiraled from thin air, forming a glowing green crown atop his head.
Crown of the Sovereign.
If the Armour of the Awakened marked a cultivator ascension to Awakened Realm, then the crown was the heavens' decree for a Sovereign.
Pressure rolled outward. Her armor cracked.
Still, she lunged. A spinning palm strike blossomed into hundreds of spectral flowers.
The chief sneered and snapped forward - two fingers aiming for her wrist like venomous fangs.
If that strike connected, her chi would rupture - cut off at the source. The blow she'd been preparing all this time would collapse in an instant.
But she was faster.
Her wrist gave the barest twitch. The bronze bells hanging from her sleeves shimmered, releasing a soundless flash.
Chi surged - wild, fluid, untamed. In the blink of an eye, an arrow materialized, forged of pure light and killing intent. It screamed through the air, aimed square at the old man's brow.
He snapped backward - barely dodging. The arrow clipped his bamboo crown with a ringing chime.
"Good. Very good." His voice dropped an octave, each word scraped raw from his throat. "So the little outsider isn't all bark no bite after all."
His bloodshot eyes gleamed with fury, his molars clenched tight.
His pride bled profusely.
The strike hadn't harmed him - his Crown of the Sovereign could regenerate on command - but before all eyes, he'd been pushed back. His pride had been torn open, exposed for a moment to the cold wind.
Tô Mạc Tà gave him no breath.
She pressed in, chi crackling with every step.
Her palm sliced. A lotus bloomed from the air - soft pink, burning with inner fire.
She knew the truth. Her earlier success was a fluke - granted only because the village chief had been toying with her, suppressing his power to the Awaken Realm.
A cat stretching out its paw before sinking its claws.
If she hesitated now - if she gave him even a heartbeat to gather his full strength - she would lose.
The chief dodged. Featherlight. Mid-spin, he lashed out - a kick to her temple.
It connected. Her helm cracked. Hair flew loose. Blood ran from her ear.
But she didn't falter.
Spinning mid-air, she countered. A carving strike - clean and cold.
Caught off guard, the chief raised an arm to block.
Though he still held himself to the Awaken Realm's limit, his rage poured into the strike.
The air warped around his fist.
Tô Mạc Tà couldn't dodge. She threw everything into reinforcing her armor, preparing to trade pain for pain.
A pink flash cut across the air. Her hand carved a deep gash along the chief's arm - bone deep.
A crimson spray followed, and in the space between them shimmered the fleeting image of a translucent blade.
But she paid the price.
The chief's fist collided with her gut. She shot backward like a broken arrow, crashing through two, no, three houses before tumbling to a halt.
She clutched her abdomen, barely stifling a groan.
Her Armour of the Awakened had caved in; her robes torn apart. A deep violet bruise bloomed across her waist in the shape of a clenched fist.
Had she not reinforced her midsection in time, she would've been unconscious or worse.
"Damn it... I underestimated him. A peak Crowned Sovereign's physique is no joke."
She spat a mouthful of blood, mind still reeling.
Cultivators who refined Chi Pearls transformed not just their energy, but their bodies.
Though the village chief had limited himself to Venerated power, his body still belonged to a Sovereign - a mountain of muscle and force.
Even without his armor, he was leagues beyond her.
And now... High above, the village chief hovered, arms clasped behind his back, gazing down with condescension thick as storm clouds.
Behind him loomed a throne - not carved of jade or gold, but bamboo.
Regal, imperious, flickering between real and illusion. A single breath away from fully manifesting.
The Imperial Throne.
The mark of one on the cusp of stepping into the Imperial Realm.