At a quiet corner table behind the noisy crowd, a young man—no, a young master—sat alone. He wore elegant robes of violet and white, the fabric fine enough to mark him as someone of wealth and status. His long black hair was tied back with an ancient-style hairpiece, intricate and beautiful, like something passed down through generations.
He sipped his tea slowly, deliberately, yet no one seemed to notice him. Not because he lacked presence, but because he had concealed it.
Unlike Su Chen's outsider aura that makes his excitance vivid, and this young master cloaked himself in illusion. His illusion technique, coms from his physique, and it bent perception around him like light through water. Even standing beside him, most wouldn't realize he was there.
Then, without warning, he opened his eyes.
A faint swish of spiritual power stirred the air. His irises shimmered with a deep violet hue, but that wasn't the most startling part—within one of his eyes, two pupils overlapped unnaturally, like twin moons orbiting the same sky.
It wasn't a defect. It was a mark of power. The Ancient Dual Pupils—a mythical physique said to rival even the Ancient Sacred body.
And right now, he was using its illusion techniques to listen in on everything.
He had heard it all: the discussion about someone entering the sect through the back door, backed by an inner disciple.
His lips curled slightly—not in amusement, but in cold disdain.
"Courting death."
That was his only thought.
With a calm, frigid gaze, he looked toward the group that had sparked the conversation. To him, they were like ants. He could crush them at any moment, and the idea wouldn't trouble his conscience in the slightest.
It wasn't righteousness that made him despise these people. It wasn't about rules or justice.
He simply believed that those without talent—those who didn't deserve to dream—shouldn't be allowed to.
This young master's name is Zhao Wushen, and he is the personal disciple of Elder Zhang Gufei from Thousand Peak Pavilion, the stern and highly respected Law Enforcement Elder of the sect.
Their story began over a decade ago, when Elder Zhang encountered a six-year-old boy wandering alone near the border of the sect's territory. Malnourished, silent, and dressed in tattered rags, the boy had no name, no background, and no apparent family. Believing him to be an abandoned orphan, Elder Zhang took him in on a whim—perhaps out of pity, or perhaps due to a faint, inexplicable intuition.
To the elder's surprise, the child broke through to the Qi Refining Realm within a month of guided cultivation. Intrigued, Elder Zhang personally tested the boy's spiritual foundation—specifically, the number of opened meditation channels.
What he discovered nearly made his heart stop.
Ten open meditation channels.
According to the sect's ancestral records, preserved within the library pavilion, even their most legendary ancestor—who had ascended to the Upper Realm—had only opened eight. The implications were staggering.
But the surprises didn't end there.
As Zhao Wushen matured, Elder Zhang began to notice strange phenomena surrounding the boy's gaze. His pupils would occasionally flicker with a purple hue, and his perception of battle formations, spiritual techniques, and enemy flaws bordered on the unnatural.
After careful observation and countless experiments, Elder Zhang came to a tentative conclusion: the boy possessed an extremely rare ocular inheritance—something unheard of in the Lower Realm. Its full nature remained a mystery.
On that day, he officially announced that he was accepting a personal disciple and would dedicate his own resources to nurturing him.
Later, when Zhao Wushen broke through to the Foundation Building Realm at the age of ten, Elder Zhang was once again surprised. After that, he sent him out for training beyond the sect.
And now, today, Zhao Wushen had suddenly received a call from his master—and so, he was returning.
He glanced once more at the group—Chen Dazhu among them. In his eyes, they were nothing more than bugs clinging to grand dreams. Yet, he didn't say a word or lift a hand against them. Instead, he calmly took out a low-grade spiritual stone and placed it on the table—payment for the tea.
"Hmph... Master," he muttered under his breath, before turning to walk outside.
A moment later, his figure rose into the sky and vanished toward the direction of Thousand Peak Pavilion.
Meanwhile, in the Brightfire Expanse.
Middle Region.
A colossal black mountain loomed in the heart of the expanse, its jagged peak lost amidst thick, roiling storm clouds. Rain poured endlessly from the heavens, a relentless downpour that drummed against the rocks like war drums. Thunder rumbled in the distance, and now and then, a ghostly howl echoed through the rain—low and mournful, impossible to tell whether it came from a beast or something far worse.
The entire mountain was veiled in an ancient formation. Invisible to the naked eye, it repelled intruders and cloaked the true nature of what lay within. But deeper inside, past the winding stone paths and through a narrow cave entrance, the darkness began to thin.
And then—light.
As the oppressive shadows gave way, a completely different world revealed itself.
An endless grassland stretched across the interior, lush and vibrant. Towering ancient trees, each spanning several kilometers in height, rose like silent guardians. Flowers bloomed in wild profusion, their petals glittering faintly with spiritual energy. Strange vines hung lazily from tree canopies, and luminous plants pulsed softly like breathing life.
Above, a vast blue sky spread overhead, complete with drifting clouds and a radiant sun that cast warm light across the land. It was almost indistinguishable from the outside world—except this paradise was hidden entirely within the mountain.
It defied common sense. A whole ecosystem, complete with its own sky and sun, sealed away beneath layers of rock and illusion. It wasn't just a secret realm. It was a hidden world.
As we shift our gaze to the left, several dozen miles away, a disturbance had erupted deep within an ancient forest.
The signs of chaos were unmistakable—sword slashes carved into trees, shattered remnants of palm and fist imprints embedded into the earth, and the heavy stench of blood lingering in the air. The entire area was stained with violence and death, as though a brutal battle had taken place not long ago.
Amidst the devastation stood a cave mansion, half-concealed behind a rough stone door. At first glance, it seemed ordinary, even crude. But anyone with the slightest sense could tell—there was once a great opportunity hidden within.
More unsettling, however, was the blood pond that had formed near the entrance. Its dark, thick surface shimmered ominously, and the partially open stone door made one thing painfully clear: whatever treasure had been sealed inside had already been claimed.
And the price for opening it? Countless lives.