Hidden within the dimensional void, Jing Qian quietly observed the exchange between the three great cultivators, gleaning yet more crucial information.
The "pasturing" scheme plotted between the human race and the sea demons.
Yang Jia's reaction once he learned of the Governor's death.
And the rivalry between Ling Mingji and Zhu Shou for the vacant governorship.
These undercurrents flowed beneath Hunzhou's waters, secrets beyond the reach of ordinary cultivators. Yet by sheer chance, Jing Qian had caught a glimpse of them.
He buried the knowledge deep within his heart, showing no outward reaction. For him, the real business at hand was continuing his visits to his "good friends," the yin ghosts.
The Yin Year was already half over. He needed to use the remaining time to hunt as many yin ghosts as possible. Once this window closed, he would have to wait years for the next Yin Year.
Whether it was for his Life Furnace or the Dao Book, the demand for yin ghosts was immense. He had no choice but to keep striving.
So began a new journey.
Jing Qian roamed the seas, seeking out yin ghosts and yin corpses, harvesting them with ease.
The Yin Pearls he collected were all fed into the Void Furnace.
The spirits of the yin ghosts were shredded without resistance, their essence transformed into Dao Book glyphs, broken down and consumed by the power of Worldly Insight.
This was a journey of steadily thickening his foundation. Every bit of strength drawn from the yin ghosts was fuel for an eventual breakthrough that would mean a leap in quality.
Beyond this, each day Jing Qian set aside one hour to use the Void Furnace to hammer out a few sword blanks, reforging the Sword Fang again and again.
At present, he lacked for nothing in terms of metallic resources. Accelerating the consumption of materials not only sharpened Sword Fang but also freed up space for storing the endless pile of Yin Bones.
The mountains of treasure filling the Void Realm were the bedrock of his power.
Jing Qian relished this feeling of overflowing wealth.
And just like that, three more months slipped by.
Over this span, Jing Qian hunted down 1,049 yin ghosts. He could confidently say that his harvest this Yin Year surpassed that of every other cultivator across Hunzhou's territory.
Yet for all his efforts, one fact became unmistakably clear: in this vast ocean, something was fundamentally wrong. He had not encountered a single Eighth-Rank Azure Wing creature!
Meanwhile, in his undersea volcanic palace, Yang Jia lounged in molten rock, rolling through magma and enjoying a comfortable hot bath.
Only then did he produce a conch horn, pressing it to his lips to sound a low, resonant call.
The mournful notes, imbued with his power, spread far through the sea, reaching the ears of select listeners.
Within half a day, a Seventh-Rank Blueblood great demon arrived in a streak of light, a tiger shark.
Over the following three days, more great demons came one after another: a giant turtle, a colossal shrimp, a massive squid, a starry ray, a sea serpent.
Finally, a sky-darkening island whale descended. In all, seven Blueblood great demons assembled at Yang Jia's summons.
Once they were gathered, Yang Jia declared:
"This Yin Year, I will begin the herding early."
"You will not be stingy; release eighty percent of your stock. Give the humans of Hunzhou a real flood this time."
"Furthermore, this round of herding, our Sea Clan will not interfere with the harvest. You need only release the stock into Hunzhou's waters and let the human cultivators suffer the consequences."
The assembled demons exchanged uncertain looks, unsure how to respond.
At last, the giant lobster of a slightly nobler bloodline than the rest ventured to speak:
"Lord Jia, eighty percent of our stock means losing at least thirty percent of our gains. If we hand that over to the humans, aren't all our years of effort wasted?"
Yang Jia laughed uproariously and replied:
"Luo Yaozhi must be in trouble; he may already be dead. If we don't push the humans hard, how will we ever know what we can shake loose from them?"
"Besides, just because you won't be handling the harvest doesn't mean you'll be idle. Watch from beyond the pasture. If things unfold as I suspect, this time Hunzhou will bleed well and truly."
The few great sea demons present felt their blood surge, their eyes glinting with greed. They had long despised the human race, but the Divine Court's might had kept them from stirring up trouble too easily.
Yet if the humans truly showed weakness because of their scheme, then none of them would hesitate to strike!
"Go!"
At Yang Jia's command, the seven great demons dispersed, each returning to its own domain.
One of them, a Seventh-Rank sea star, sped back to the waters it guarded. It traveled half a day before diving into a lightless abyssal trench.
There, it busied itself with some unknown task, shaking the trench with violent quakes. Only the next day did the sea star emerge again, dragging up from the depths a massive iron chain, which it then hauled toward Hunzhou.
The chain stretched longer and longer, trailing a vast tail behind it. And strung upon its links, dragged into the open one after another, were sea demons, every one of them at the Eighth-Rank Azure Wing level.
The truth became clear: the endless seas had not lacked Eighth-Rank sea demons at all. From the very moment of their birth, they had simply been suppressed and bound by their clan's overlords.
...
Meanwhile, Ling Mingji and Zhu Shou returned in succession to the prefectural seat.
The two immediately convened all mid- and upper-ranking officials from the Three Offices and Two Bureaus, and together proclaimed the highest state of mobilization, one that encompassed every Fate Island under Hunzhou's domain.
The war engine of Hunzhou began to turn in earnest.
A storm was coming, and no one would remain untouched.
...
As for Jing Qian, he neither knew nor cared about these external changes.
He simply kept to his own rhythm, building up his cultivation step by steady step.
More and more yin ghosts fell beneath his sword.
Only after another month did his relentless slaughter, four months in the making, pause at last.
Within the Void Realm, Jing Qian devoured his thousandth sword blank. At that moment, his Sword Fang life pattern reached a critical transformation.
The weight of one thousand reforgings unleashed Sword Fang's full potential.
This spirit-treasure life pattern formally advanced into the Violet-Eyed rank.
When Jing Qian summoned the reborn Sword Fang, the little tiger-fang blade had become a violet jade longsword.
As a Violet-Eyed spirit-treasure life pattern, a weapon honed for pure slaughter, its killing edge had grown sharper still.
Exiting the Void Realm, Jing Qian tested it at sea. With a single swing, Sword Fang became an unmatched sword-light, a flowing halo circling a hundred feet around him, flexible and alive.
This advancement multiplied its attack range more than tenfold. Within a hundred feet, his sword struck wherever he willed; everything within reach was doomed to be cut.
For most cultivators, reforging a life pattern a thousand times was simply impossible. Just refining a thousand Ninth-Rank sword blanks alone required a fortune of over ten thousand gold, enough to buy the lives of dozens of Ninth-Rank cultivators.
Even for Jing Qian, reaching a thousand reforgings had been no simple feat.
But the result was a rare and priceless opportunity.
He focused his mind upon the Fate Stele, carefully examining the entry for Sword Fang:
Sword Fang (Violet – Limit)
A lower-tier life pattern, pushed to its very limit. No longer able to be strengthened through the Life-Casting Opportunity, nor advanced into a Golden Root life pattern.
But this outcome was one Jing Qian had both anticipated and eagerly awaited.
Placing his right hand upon the Sumeru Great Dao Stele, he closed his eyes and began to sense deeply.
Since he had fused three Sumeru patterns and awakened the Heaven's Mandate Dao Lineage, the black stele had itself undergone a profound transformation.
And with it, a new power had been born.
Now, at last, Jing Qian had fulfilled all the conditions to awaken it. Without hesitation, he unleashed its force.
This was the Knowledge of Heaven's Mandate.
At once, Jing Qian felt his lifespan flowing away like running water, a full sixty years siphoned off by the Sumeru Great Dao Stele.
An unforeseen transformation erupted.
A torrent of boundless Dao essence surged out from the stele, pouring into his sea of consciousness and merging with the Sword Fang life pattern.
The life pattern convulsed violently as if remade from its very roots. Jing Qian felt his very soul and will gathering within the Sword Fang, staining and reshaping it with his own spirit.
Sword Fang had always been nothing more than a White Fang–grade life pattern, its foundation too shallow, its frame too small to bear such immense power.
But now, it was being reconstructed at the deepest level.
On the stele, the entry that once recorded "Sword Fang" blurred and faded. In its place appeared a new line:
Qingping's End · Jing Qian
Rank: Heaven's Mandate – Unique
"The Qingping gathers sword-qi,
Starfire tempers the dragon's cry;
With one thrust, the doom of slaughter rises,
Its edge cleaves the clouds of Nine Heavens."
One thousand reforgings had pushed Sword Fang to the pinnacle. Now, with sixty years of lifespan burned away, it was reforged into a Heaven's Mandate.
It was utterly transformed, surpassing even the Golden Root tier, becoming a true life pattern at the absolute limit.
This world had never known a Qingping's End yet, but because of Jing Qian, it now existed.
This was the true, defiant power of the stele's Knowledge of Heaven's Mandate.
...
When Jing Qian looked upon the stele again, his information had changed once more:
Host: Jing Qian
Lifespan: 139 years
Life Essence: 131.43 (White Fang)
Heaven's Mandates: Sumeru, Qingping's End
Life Patterns: Worldly Insight (Gold), Doushuai Furnace (Gold), Tidal Wawe (Violet 1.36/10), Soulweaver (Blue 1.01/10), Longevity (Azure, 4 hours 1 quarter)
Fate-Techniques: Dragonswimming, Rune Imprinting, Lotus-Planting
Life Furnace: Void Furnace
Life-Casting Opportunities: 27
He had gained a second Heaven's Mandate, and this one was forged by his own hand, carrying a meaning unlike any other.
As Qingping's End took shape, Jing Qian felt a fullness swell through his soul, almost to bursting. And at once, he understood: at the Ninth Rank of Fatebinding, a soul could hold only two Heaven's Mandates at most.
His accumulation was complete. He could now pursue advancement into the Dragon-Elephant Realm!
Since his crossing into this world, he had raced against time without pause. Finally, he had reaped a reward beyond compare.
If Sumeru was his most solid foundation, his immovable shield, then Qingping's End was his pen to rewrite destiny, his sword to cut through every shackle.
Together, the two made his life pattern system whole, no longer weak in attack but balanced, coordinated, complete.
...
He turned to face the crowd of spirit incarnations outside the Safe Zone.
After the events on She Dizang Island, his "rations" were plentiful once more: the spirit imprints of Prefect Luo Yaozhi, the two Longevity High Monks, and Chi Ling, all surrounded by a mass of lesser yin ghosts.
Casually flicking dozens of Soulweaver threads, he swept away the lesser shades, leaving the battlefield to the four great cultivators.
This would be his chance to test Qingping's End.
Closing his eyes, Jing Qian slowly attuned his spirit to this new Heaven's Mandate, probing its essence bit by bit.
Unlike Sword Fang, Qingping's End was not bound to a simple spirit-treasure. It carried the qualities of both spirit-treasure and ghost-pattern, alive with a sharp, fluid mystery.
He raised a finger like a sword. A hair-thin arc of sword-qi lashed out toward Chi Ling.
In the blink of an eye, it pierced her brow, severing her Dharma Manifestation in a single strike.
The genius scion of Pure Yang Ruins, a Dragon-Elephant master of immense background, could not withstand even one sword.
From this day forth, with Heaven's Mandate devoted to killing, Jing Qian could slay across realms as easily as drinking water.
Yet Qingping's End demanded a staggering price. His reserve of 131 White Fang essence was drained to nothing by just one strike.
Its consumption was a hundred times greater than Sword Fang's.
And even that did not unleash its full power, he was still a pony harnessed to drag a war chariot.
Still, the surge of strength left him exultant.
He stepped out from the Safe Zone, casually kicked Luo Yaozhi, and was promptly slain by the Prefect's sweeping Dharma river.
Moments later, reborn in peak condition, he unleashed Qingping's End again.
This time, with the aid of Worldly Insight, he pinpointed a flaw in the Longevity High Monk's defenses and drove his sword-qi straight in.
Again, Qingping's End delivered: piercing the Dharma Manifestation, cutting deep into the monk's body itself.
Jing Qian could not help but be enthralled.
This was a true-life pattern of slaughter and might!
All the hardship he had endured, the endless grinding of his teeth in forging it, had not been in vain. The result was more than worth it.
Once again, he charged in, died once more, and returned in peak condition. Then, facing his strongest "ration," the Spirit-Subduing-realm master Luo Yaozhi, Jing Qian struck with Qingping's End.
In response, a golden-armored divine general manifested, shielding Luo and holding back the Heaven's Mandate sword-qi through sheer force of his own cultivation.
Against a Spirit-Subduing-realm grandmaster, Jing Qian still had no solution; his own essence simply capped out there.
Yet even so, the outcome had surpassed his wildest expectations.
Here in Hunzhou, his strength had at last broken into the first echelon. Apart from Yang Jia and the Longevity masters who wielded Spiritual Constructs, he needed to fear almost no one.
This gave him a profound sense of safety.
Strictly speaking, he no longer needed to push himself so ruthlessly.
But since his rhythm of cultivation was so steady and fruitful, why break it?
So Jing Qian slipped back into the Void Realm and returned to his hunt for yin ghosts.
Only now, freed from the time-consuming work of reforging Sword Fang, he poured all that energy into the Stele-space instead.
There, with Qingping's End newly forged, he needed time to hone his mastery.
The four human grandmasters perfect sparring dummies served as his daily training partners, clashing against him again and again.
He roamed across a hundred thousand li, while the months turned.
By the tenth month of the Yin Year, Jing Qian was on the verge of surviving his very first Yin Year.
...
Meanwhile, Hunzhou Island was shrouded in a martial atmosphere.
The once-bustling sea market had fallen silent, utterly shut down.
Every cultivator of the Ninth Rank and above was mustered.
The Prefecture broke down the divisions between its three Houses and two Bureaus, reorganizing everything around the twenty-four "legitimate shops" families, who now each raised their own battle-squad.
Bound together by bloodlines and economic interest, these squads were far deadlier than the Prefecture's loose bureaucracy had ever been.
Each received its assignment.
The newly ascendant Qian family, having replaced the Jing clan among the twenty-four shops, also rallied its forces under Qian Yuan's lead.
For the Qian clan, this was their first true test.
Relying on his maritime bureau connections, Qian Yuan had seized hold of an Eighth-Rank treasure ship. With that alone, his clan could at least hope to escape intact even before a Seventh-Rank great demon.
That day, Ling Mingji struck the war drums. Two Seventh-Rank warships, leading twenty-four treasure ships, streamed out of the Hun River.
Atop the flagship, the Hunyi, crouched a six-life golden toad the size of a hill.
When the fleet entered the open sea, one resonant croak burst forth, and within ten li, the towering Yin-Year waves fell flat.
The tide itself was suppressed by grand-cultivator power. The fleet could sail unimpeded, waves broken before them.
At the same time, fleets set out from the other thirteen Fate Islands as well.
All the backbone cultivators of the human race converged upon a single, fateful sea region.
...
But Jing Qian, immersed in his own little world, knew nothing of any of this.
Lost in the joy of his harvest, he spared not a thought for the outside world.
For in that moment, when he at last destroyed the final imprint of Chi Ling, a unique memory came into his possession.
It was so important that he dropped everything, sat down cross-legged in the Void Realm, and devoted himself to absorbing it.
Through the Worldly Insight, he unraveled and dissected every detail, drawing it wholly into himself.
And in that memory, a new gate of cultivation opened before him.
He saw a dilapidated Daoist temple, where Chi Ling, having just set her fate, sat raptly listening to an old swordsman tell his tales.
She hung on every word, fearful of missing even a single syllable.
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