Wang Ping sped forward and soon spotted the location of the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】. Hidden among the towering mountains and steep ridges, it was shrouded deep within a hazy white mist.
However, the next second, he gradually slowed his pace.
"...Something's not right."
Wang Ping's expression turned grave as he looked up at the dark clouds above. The spell battle between Daoist Nun You and that mysterious true legacy hadn't ended; the heavy rain was still torrential.
Yet compared to the beginning, the curtain of rain had actually become much sparser. This wasn't because the battle between Daoist Nun You and the mysterious true legacy was nearing its end—in fact, both sides were still fighting fiercely. But the presented result was that the closer he got to the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】, the lighter the rain seemed to become.
What was this?
"It's almost as if there's a mastermind behind the scenes using this heavy rain as a whip, lashing me and driving me toward the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】."
At this thought, Wang Ping simply stopped walking.
The rainwater crackled as it landed on him, striking like hacking blades and slashing swords. However, compared to the beginning, the weakened curtain of rain no longer posed a threat to him.
If the real Pingjiang Zi were here, he probably still wouldn't be able to withstand it.
But I am different from Pingjiang Zi. Not only have I mastered 【Circulatory Breathing】 and possess a higher cultivation than him, but I also dual-cultivate a full body-tempering martial arts.
Wang Ping sat cross-legged. Billowing vitality surged within his body like a rushing river, finally manifesting as a layer of brilliant golden, lustrous treasured light on his skin.
A bronze head and an iron forehead, arms capable of lifting thousands of pounds, standing firm like a Vajra.
A hundred-step divine fist, splitting monuments and cracking stones, stepping on land and piercing through steel.
Elbows heavy as mountains, knees like copper walls, a belly hard as armor.
Fingers piercing metal and stone, a throat locking steel blades, the golden spear never falling.
Bones of iron and sinews of steel.
A full thirteen signature techniques bolstered him, linking and integrating with one another, finally forming an entirely new signature technique that covered him like an inverted golden bell.
【Indestructible Vajra Body】!
At the same time, dense raindrops smashed down, mixed with spiritual qi. Every drop was like a miniaturized boulder, containing massive weight.
However, Wang Ping paid no mind to this. Instead, he opened his mind, listening to the sound of rain and thunder echoing between heaven and earth. To better endure the impact of the rainwater, he began attempting to adjust his body.
Instead of just taking the hits head-on, he used the technique of dissolving force, borrowing strength to counter strength, and deflecting the rainwater crashing onto him.
This was a wondrous process.
At first, he had to use his martial artist's divine intent to perceive the threat level of each raindrop, then allocate the corresponding physical strength to deal with it.
Yet as time passed...
Gradually, he stopped deliberately responding. The natural movements of his body slowly synchronized with the torrential rain and the rolling thunder in the sky.
The flow of his vitality sounded like the patter of rain.
The movement of his sinews and bones roared like thunder.
Wang Ping's mind was completely immersed within it, forgetting heaven and earth. If nothing unexpected happened, he could easily hold out like this until the cooldown ended.
In another two days, the 【Otherworldly Heavenly Demon】 should be ready.
However, if Wang Ping had learned any lesson or gained any experience from his three entries into the immortal sect, it was understanding that in this blasted place, the absence of the unexpected was impossible.
...
The 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】.
Rather than a 【Valley】, this place was more like a 【Pit】. Surrounded by towering mountains on all four sides, the center was sunken. But what filled it wasn't sand, dirt, or rocks.
It was skeletal remains.
Countless skeletons, almost all retaining a complete human form, spread outward in a ring, collectively guarding a three-meter-high altar.
Sitting upright on the altar was a white-haired, ancient man. His appearance, however, was incredibly eerie. One half of his body had lifelike flesh and blood, with clear textures; the other half was a stark white skeleton, with green ghost fire burning in the eye socket. The slender skeletal fingers of his skeletal hand tapped out a highly rhythmic, gentle beat.
Meanwhile, in the valley below.
Mingled among the countless skeletons were over a dozen living people. Their cultivations varied from high to low, and they were all struggling desperately. Among them was Fairy Yuerou.
In addition to her, there was also a handsome young man.
Among the living people, his cultivation was the highest, and his aura the strongest. Correspondingly, the skeletons surrounding him were also the most numerous.
"Senior Brother Guo, there is no need to struggle."
The old man chuckled softly: "【Fate】 has long revealed the outcome. From the moment you stepped into this 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】, it was already destined that you would not escape this tribulation."
"How is this possible..."
Hearing this, Senior Brother Guo gritted his teeth, his face full of disbelief: "Master of the Soul-Descending Abode, a mere master of a blessed land with a rogue cultivator background—what gives you the right to defeat me?"
With that, he intended to stand up and struggle.
However, the moment he moved, the world in his spiritual sense vision instantly changed. In a daze, he felt as if he had been placed in a pitch-black prison.
Heavy shackles and chains fell upon him.
This made his every movement incredibly arduous, and his breathing grew weak. But upon retracting his spiritual sense, the prison scene vanished.
Everything seemed like an illusion, yet it genuinely existed.
"Just what kind of spiritual art is this!?"
"Spiritual art?"
The voice of the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode drifted over hauntingly: "Senior Brother misunderstands. This is no spiritual art... Didn't I just say? This is 【Fate】."
"I can roughly guess what you saw. Allow me to tell you... that prison is your end. It is the end of your 【Fate】. There is no longer any possibility for you, as a human sacrifice, to advance further. I am not deliberately being vague, but truthfully stating the facts."
"There are no possibilities, only outcomes."
"【Guo Huan dies here】 is already a destined outcome. Therefore, even if you are stronger than me, here and now, you will definitely suffer a crushing defeat at my hands."
"Do you understand?"
Guo Huan naturally didn't understand, but the old man's mystical rambling gave him a clue: "You... are a rogue cultivator originally from the 【Profound Change Immortal Peak】?"
The immortal sect had a total of eight immortal peaks.
Every immortal peak possessed a unique Dao lineage. For example, the 【Blissful Immortal Peak】 focused primarily on dual cultivation, while the 【Profound Change Immortal Peak】 focused primarily on divination and omen.
What they constantly preached about the most was 【Fate】.
"Is it a cursing art?"
Guo Huan's thoughts raced, guessing: "You knew all along that I would move against you, so you secretly cast a curse, set a trap, and waited for me to walk right into it?"
"Senior Brother thinks too highly of me."
The Master of the Soul-Descending Abode shook his head: "As a mere rogue cultivator, although I know a bit of divination to calculate good and ill fortune, how could I possibly curse Senior Brother?"
"It is a Dharma Treasure."
The Master of the Soul-Descending Abode raised the hand that only had bones left and smiled: "The 【Fate-Scrying Mirror】 has long revealed the 【Fate】 of Senior Brother and these Bandit Cultivators."
"A Dharma Treasure?"
Guo Huan was taken aback upon hearing this, then sneered: "A rogue cultivator is just a rogue cultivator; too little experience. Dharma Treasure this, Dharma Treasure that—without spiritual power, how can you wield a Dharma Treasure?"
"If this item truly is a Dharma Treasure, yet it can be using by a mere rogue cultivator like you, it only means the price this item exacts is even higher than spiritual power. And you, a rogue cultivator, what do you have that a Dharma Treasure would covet? Probably only this worthless life of yours. Look at it this way, you are the one whose death is truly imminent."
As his voice fell, the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode's face instantly darkened.
"Absurd! Trying to mess with my Dao heart?"
With that, the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode immediately formed a hand seal. Countless skeletons swarmed forward, rapidly submerging Guo Huan, and the entire 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】 returned to tranquility.
Seeing this scene, the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode finally calmed down. He resumed tapping his skeletal fingers, prepared to slowly bide his time and thoroughly refine everyone into human sacrifices.
However, right at that moment, the tapping abruptly paused.
Immediately after, the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode raised his eyebrows slightly: "What's going on? We're still short one... Impossible. How could the 【Fate-Scrying Mirror】 miscalculate?"
Refusing to believe it, he resumed tapping his skeletal fingers.
But the result did not change.
So he injected his spiritual sense, switching to divine the missing person. Soon, that half-skeleton body whispered the answer by his ear:
"Pingjiang Zi?"
The Master of the Soul-Descending Abode blanked for a moment: "That rogue cultivator I fired, he's among them? That's not right. One look at that guy and you know his life is worthless."
"Why is he missing?"
【Fate】 was not mandatory. It was a vast ocean formed by the convergence of countless turbulent currents. People struggling within it mostly just drifted with the flow.
However, there were always some profound methods that could alter the direction of the turbulent currents, causing the flow of certain people and events to converge at a destined node. This process was a person's 【Destiny】. Those with a "hard" destiny were difficult to alter; those with a "cheap" or "worthless" destiny were very easy to alter.
And in the eyes of the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode, Pingjiang Zi undoubtedly possessed a worthless destiny.
But right now, even Guo Huan, who had the highest cultivation and the hardest destiny, had followed the flow and walked into the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】. Why could a mere Pingjiang Zi be missing?
This was illogical!
"...No, I must get him here."
The Master of the Soul-Descending Abode frowned deeply. Within the torrent of 【Fate】, even a tiny change in flow direction could potentially lead to a vastly different outcome.
He couldn't be certain whether the originally destined outcome would encounter variables after missing Pingjiang Zi's flow of fate, and he didn't want any variables to appear.
At this thought, the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode immediately took a deep breath. He then circulated his spiritual sense, driving the 【Fate-Scrying Mirror】 that occupied half his body. Using his stark white skeletal fingers, he slowly formed a seal, then tapped lightly, like a hand plunging into water and stirring up ripples.
...
Boom!
The thunder exploding in the firmament above startled Wang Ping awake. Looking up at the sky, he found that the originally thinning curtain of rain had suddenly intensified.
The thunder grew louder. The heavy rain grew more torrential.
This series of sudden changes instantly knocked Wang Ping out of his near "unity of heaven and man" mental state, making it impossible to continue maintaining his insights.
"Just... as I thought!"
Under the torrential rain and thunder, Wang Ping opened his eyes. A sharp pain shot from his shoulder. The rainwater had smashed through his 【Indestructible Vajra Body】, drawing a dazzling splash of crimson red.
The freezing rainwater tore his skin, the pain piercing to the bone.
However, what was even colder than this was the truth Wang Ping perceived from it: This heavy rain... is not a coincidence. It's premeditated; someone is pulling the strings!
When he halted his advance in front of the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】, the originally sparse heavy rain intensified again.
How could there be such a coincidence in the world!
Yet he had no way of knowing who the mastermind behind the scenes was.
He also couldn't fathom who could cause two true legacies of the immortal sect to engage in a life-and-death battle, merely to drive him, a lowly cultivator, toward a certain location.
But he knew one other thing. And that was:
I must stall.
Facing the bone-chilling rainwater, Wang Ping gritted his teeth and stubbornly remained seated. Although this heavy rain had grown strong enough to injure him, it still couldn't kill him.
Since that was the case, there was still room to maneuver.
Wang Ping endured the agony of the rainwater washing over his flesh, an agony akin to death by a thousand cuts, while circulating 【Qi Ward】 to rapidly heal his injuries. He refused to move a single step.
He knew this was waiting for death, but he was determined to stall!
Soon, time flew by.
This unexpected turn of events left the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode inside the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】 increasingly shocked: "Impossible. I've even increased the sacrifice, and I still can't summon a rogue cultivator?"
Although the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode was technically a rogue cultivator himself, in his eyes, as the master of a blessed land just one step away from surviving the Human Tribulation and condensing spiritual power, he could no longer be considered a rogue cultivator. His spirit had already reached the realm of an immortal sect disciple; his cultivation was just lacking that final kick.
Therefore, he was also the most furious at this moment.
"A mere rogue cultivator..." The Master of the Soul-Descending Abode took a deep breath, then poured his spiritual sense in once more, stirring up even larger ripples in the torrent of 【Fate】.
Simultaneously, Wang Ping felt it even more distinctly.
Before long, the thunderstorm grew even more intense. Moreover, a few other cultivators seeking shelter from the rain appeared. Before entering the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】, they didn't forget to call out to him:
"Daoist, why are you hiding outside?"
"There's no rain inside, come on in."
As they spoke, the cultivators sheltering from the rain even moved back and forth between the inside and outside of the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】 a few times, remaining genuinely unharmed. Yet Wang Ping turned a deaf ear to this.
Until the sun set in the west, the heavy rain only grew more violent.
Exposed to the rainwater, Wang Ping was riddled with holes from head to toe, blood flowing like a river. His life was like a candle in the wind... Yet he remained as unmoving as a mountain.
The second day.
Sunrise, morning, mid-morning, noon, afternoon, evening, dusk... Time ticked away just like the rainwater. Wang Ping was devoid of all signs of life.
At the moment of life and death, the flashback of his life gradually began to surface in Wang Ping's mind. Past memories emerged in his heart—but the moment this thought arose, a sequence of memories leaped up in his sea of consciousness, beating him to the punch. It wasn't his, but "Pingjiang Zi's" memories, erupting abruptly like a flash flood!
Something's wrong!
Wang Ping was horrified inwardly: I have cultivated a martial artist's divine intent, subdued the mind and bound the will. Even if I am about to die, it is impossible for me to have a life flashback.
It's that mastermind behind the scenes again!
Seeing physical methods aren't working, they're resorting to mental attacks?
Right in the center of his sea of consciousness, Wang Ping faced it coldly. He quietly watched the "Pingjiang Zi's" life flashback flash by. The cycling memories gradually gave birth to a thought.
【Live】.
Pingjiang Zi didn't want to die. Driven by the budding desire to survive, Wang Ping's body finally moved. Stumbling with every step, he walked toward the direction of the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】.
Wherever he passed, the heavy rain was torrential.
The rainwater flowed beneath his feet. Every drop, mixed with spiritual qi, was as heavy as a mountain. Pressing down on his shoulders and back, it left him nowhere to escape, forcing him to drift with the current.
Just like that, step by step, following the flow, he walked into the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】.
Almost simultaneously, the Master of the Soul-Descending Abode on the altar in the 【Valley of Myriad Spirits】 stood up. Shaking off a layer of flesh and blood, two-thirds of his body had already turned into a skeleton.
This was the price he paid to summon Wang Ping.
Yet he felt not a shred of regret for this. Instead, his heart was full of joy. After all, though the price was high, the flow directions necessary to guide 【Fate】 were finally complete.
"Good, very good!"
The Master of the Soul-Descending Abode let out a loud laugh, stepping down from the altar: "The conditions are ripe. It seems today is the serendipitous moment for me to survive the Human Tribulation and condense spiritual power!"
Pingjiang Zi looked bewildered upon hearing this, seemingly still immersed in his life flashback and unable to extricate himself.
However, Wang Ping, who had been passively watching all this play out, finally breathed a sigh of relief. With a thought, his consciousness instantly dropped into the space of 【The Taiping Classic】.
On the towering book, the scripture scroll marked 【Otherworldly Heavenly Demon】 was currently gleaming brightly.
The cooldown had ended.
(End of Chapter)