Chapter Sixty-Nine: The Hidden Realm

Chance!

The instant he laid eyes on the divine realm atop the water, this word flashed through his mind with unprecedented speed.

Clang, clang!

A succession of bell chimes rang out.

Xu Zhong turned sharply, only to see Xie Zhi striking the bell.

Immediately, Xie Zhi’s voice swept in all directions. “A gap has opened in the city. If you wish to seek your fortune, please proceed from there.”

No sooner had he finished speaking than a fissure appeared in the divine light outside Tianyuan City, transforming into a gateway. Though only a foot wide, it stretched thirty yards long.

Endless seawater surged through the opening, flooding into Tianyuan City, but was promptly stilled by a Water-Stabilizing Pearl.

“Chance?” Xie Zhi’s words stirred the crowd into greater uproar.

“Let’s go, to seek our fortune!” someone shouted, raising an arm and leading the charge. Shadows followed; in an instant, over a thousand people flew out through the opening in Tianyuan City.

The moment they exited, they summoned vessels large and small. Amid the tumultuous waves, these ships were mere leaves adrift, ever at risk of capsizing.

Before Xu Zhong, too, a flying boat awaited.

“Xu Zhong, do you wish to take a risk?” Yun Yong stood atop the flying vessel. Nearby, another flying boat carried Li Feiyu, Tang Yuan, and Fang Yuan. They had worried for Xu Zhong’s safety, trailing him all the way and waiting near the Drunken Immortal Pavilion until the divine realm appeared atop the water.

“Let’s go!” Xu Zhong didn’t hesitate; with a leap, he landed on Yun Yong’s flying boat.

They turned their course and sped out of Tianyuan City.

The river surged, waves rising three or four yards high, obscuring their vision.

Within the waves swam sea fish, turtles, sea snakes, and a host of aquatic demons.

As these water demons surged forward, Xu Zhong’s thoughts stirred. Sword lights wove together, forming a tapestry akin to a landscape painting, shielding him from the creatures ahead.

He gripped the Cloud-Swallowing Sword.

Yun Yong glanced at his blade, his mouth twitching slightly.

“So this is the treasured sword you forged, Brother Xu?”

Xu Zhong nodded.

Yun Yong scrutinized Cloud-Swallowing for a while. “The sword blank is excellent.”

Though not a sword cultivator himself, Yun Yong could see Xu Zhong possessed a fine sword blank—otherwise, how could it yield the energies of Geng Metal and Xin Metal?

He did not know that Xu Zhong’s sword blank was itself forged from Geng Metal and Xin Metal.

“But this sword has never been honed; its edge is blunt, its power surely diminished,” Yun Yong mused. “I have a treatise on sword cultivation that is useless to me; let me gift it to you, Brother Xu.”

A jade scroll drifted lightly into Xu Zhong’s hand. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, Yun Yong added, “Should you gain anything in that secret realm, I hope you’ll trade with me first. Consider this a down payment.”

Xu Zhong swallowed his words, sighing inwardly, “Not only am I poor, I lack foundation.”

Just then, a tremendous crash resounded.

A fierce flood dragon, as thick as a human waist and nearly fifteen yards long, erupted from the water.

This beast had already taken on a dragon’s form; once it grew horns, it would become a true flood dragon.

Stirring wind and rain, it lashed its tail against the water, churning up a massive whirlpool and spraying water everywhere.

It roared, spewing a powerful stench.

A flash of white light—Cloud-Swallowing Sword pierced its palate, emerging from the crown of its head, then hovered behind Xu Zhong.

The beast collapsed onto the water, its blood staining the surrounding sea.

Xu Zhong summoned his flying sword again, stripping its skin and sinews, and even brought back some flesh.

Yun Yong looked at him, and Xu Zhong scratched his head, embarrassed. “I’m used to poverty—can’t help it.”

The distance to the secret realm atop the water was still far.

Looking ahead, they saw not only humans, but cultivators of all kinds piloting strange flying shuttles across the waves, heading for the secret realm—some from Tianyuan City, others from the endless sea.

For humans, it was a chance; for non-human cultivators, it was as well.

A contest—cultivators competed in the waters.

Suddenly, a huge shadow burst from the surface.

A vicious shark appeared—enormous, its dorsal fin refined into a magical treasure sharper than any blade, radiating the essence of Geng Metal.

It opened its maw, intent on swallowing Xu Zhong and his companions.

Xu Zhong summoned his flying sword, but the shark spat out a radiant glow, severing the connection between him and Cloud-Swallowing Sword.

From afar, it retrieved the sword.

At that moment, Yun Yong stood behind Xu Zhong, raised his hand and intoned, “Soul Capture!”

He reached forward, and a mysterious force, manifesting as a spectral hand, grasped the shark. Instantly, its spirit was pulled out.

A white banner flew from Yun Yong’s storage pouch.

He sealed the spirit inside.

Then Xu Zhong dug out the shark’s golden core, wiped it clean, and stowed it away.

For some cultivators, fortune lay within the secret realm.

For others, it was found on the sea, within their flying boats.

Xu Zhong and his companions could be considered fortune themselves to some cultivators.

The shark demon died, but greed did not.

Whoosh!

A golden light shot out from behind Xu Zhong, striking him.

The Profound Yuan True Water Shield was dented, the size of a finger.

Xu Zhong spun around; he saw a woman in golden robes wielding a hairpin, her face frustrated—she had not expected Xu Zhong to possess a protective treasure!

Xu Zhong’s thought stirred, and star-light from three hundred miles above cascaded into a sword beam, slashing toward her alongside Cloud-Swallowing Sword.

Alarmed, she tried to flee as a golden light, but Xu Zhong’s sword was faster—she was cleaved in two, innards falling into the water, her body swallowed by the waves, leaving only her storage pouch, which Xu Zhong summoned onto the boat.

Such occurrences happened often.

Most were peer-level hunts; rarely did higher realms hunt those below—it simply wasn’t worth it.

“Let us soar to the clouds!”

As they neared the secret realm, Yun Yong piloted the flying boat high above the water, ascending dozens of yards in a breath. Soon, the boat entered the secret realm.

No sooner had they entered than the flying boat lost control, plummeting from the sky—some unseen law bound them, preventing passage above the secret realm.

Yun Yong stowed the boat, then, imitating Xu Zhong, walked step by step on the wind toward the atoll below.

“Li Feiyu and the others seem to have landed on this island too. Let’s look for them and regroup,” Xu Zhong suggested as soon as they touched down.

Yun Yong nodded. “This atoll isn’t too large; finding them shouldn’t be hard. Once we’re together, we’ll act as one.”

The rocks of the atoll were a strange yellow-brown, eerie in appearance.

The island was desolate, save for a patch of dense forest by the water, damp and gloomy.

Mosquitoes and ants swarmed in clusters the size of keyboards, and between the rocks crawled blood-sucking worms as thick as fingers. Poisonous snakes and spiders, many times larger than normal, slithered across the rocks, enough to make one’s scalp crawl.

These venomous creatures targeted the newcomers, spitting toxic mist as they attacked.

Xu Zhong summoned a strong wind.

The wind swept up the poisonous creatures, spinning them into countless shadowy forms, blending together, then cast them into the waters beyond the atoll.

The commotion drew attention.

Soon, Li Feiyu and the other two found them.

“We’re all here, and unharmed.” Li Feiyu looked at them. “Now, what are your plans?”

Xu Zhong looked to Yun Yong; he had no experience exploring secret realms, having always been led by others into caves and outer realms.

“Individual strength is too weak, and this secret realm seems to have no restriction on cultivators’ power,” Yun Yong said slowly. “Only by banding together can we hope for fortune—or even survival.”

Li Feiyu’s face lit up. “That’s my thought as well.”

He continued, “But where should we go now?”

Xu Zhong considered, and drew a map he’d copied onto a snakeskin.

Comparing their location to the map, the group was surprised to find themselves in a basin, flanked by symmetrical mountains.

Xu Zhong marked a route leading to the nearest exit—a canyon, it seemed.

“Let’s head south.”

The others agreed.

First they circled south, then deployed their flying boat at the water’s edge, setting out.

“I wonder what fortune this secret realm holds?” Li Feiyu and the others pondered.

Meanwhile, Xu Zhong studied the sword cultivation treatise from Yun Yong.

As his understanding grew, trouble arose.

“Back again?” Xu Zhong stared at the atoll before him in astonishment.

They’d sailed south for an hour, only to circle back to their starting point.

“Could it be a problem with direction?”

The five split into two groups.

Xu Zhong and Yun Yong set out south, while Li Feiyu and the others went north.

In the end, they regrouped, still trapped.

“Perhaps it’s a formation!” Fang Yuan proposed.

She spent a day searching the atoll for formation flags and cores, finding nothing.

“Maybe some special force binds us here,” Li Feiyu mused after a long silence. “Since we’re here, let’s make the best of it. Surely there’s a way out.”

He did not finish his thought.

The second half was tinged with pessimism, and naturally left unsaid.

“Perhaps, if we can grasp that special force, we can escape this place!”