The moment the bronze door of the Mystic Realm opened with a resounding clang, seventy-two restrictions activated simultaneously, blasting the few Peak Lords who rushed to the front backward. Countless illusory ancient texts swirled in the air, seemingly intending to test their knowledge of various schools of thought.
"Too many troublesome rules!" The Peak Lord of Bugong Peak swung his heavy profound iron sword, and a hundred-zhang sword qi split the mountains, causing them to tremble. However, the heavenly gate remained unmoved, reflecting all the sword qi and leveling the Sword-Testing Platform three miles away.
If we had known they would test us on such pedantic prose, why would we have bothered coming to the Beast Taming Sect to suffer?
"We might as well have joined the Dao Sect directly back then."
"Clang!"
Dozens of colossal bronze blades, imbued with the power of thunder, tore through the air and slashed down, each sword qi like a thousand-ton mountain pressing down.
Several hot-tempered elders from Bugong Peak were the first to strike, each with Spirit Transformation Realm cultivation or higher.
This lineage specialized in the way of the heavy sword, advocating absolute power and suppressing opponents with sheer might. The power of their sword formation, unleashed with full force, would force even a Dongxuan Realm Grand Completion cultivator to retreat three paces.
Who knew that the seemingly illusory light gate suddenly glowed with bronze patterns, and the violent sword qi that struck it vanished like a mud ox entering the sea.
Ancient dragon patterns appeared on the surface of the light screen, and the Recoil Force transformed into tangible energy waves, sending seven or eight reckless sword cultivators flying backward, with several blood blossoms blooming in the air.
"Nonsense!" Mu Zhengting rose on a cloud, flicking out seven flowing cloud ropes from his sleeve to entangle his fellow disciples.
Once everyone landed, healing green light had already condensed in his palm. He only exhaled in relief after carefully examining everyone's meridians.
Yang Jing, the Chief of Bugong Peak, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth. His heavy profound iron sword plowed a three-zhang gully in the ground before he stabilized his figure: "Thank you, Sect Leader Martial Brother, for saving me, but this damned Grotto-Heaven is truly too deceitful."
"It's about time you learned your lesson." Mu Zhengting flicked away the bronze fragments remaining in his palm, the dragon patterns moving on the surface of the light gate startling him, "How can the inheritance ground of Ao Pan Dragon Emperor be broken by brute force alone? Do you think this is a sword-testing stone in the back mountain?"
"Cultivation should inherently point directly to one's true heart." A bare-chested elder suddenly erupted from the side, his chest still bleeding from a hideous sword wound, "Making us roughnecks compose poetry and couplets is worse than telling our brothers to self-destruct on the spot."
These words caused dozens of heavy swords to hum simultaneously, and the shattered stones on the ground floated in mid-air amidst the surging sword qi.
The disciples from the other six peaks watching lowered their heads, trying to stifle their laughter. Who didn't know that Bugong Peak was full of straightforward martial arts fanatics? They cultivated the "Brutal Sword Dao," believing "if the sword isn't big enough, just train until it is." The ancient texts in their scripture pavilion had accumulated three feet of dust.
Seeing these brutes suffer a setback, although the Chiefs of each peak showed no expression on their faces, they had secretly started a betting game, wagering how many incense sticks Bugong Peak could last before giving up.
Yang Jing looked at the incomplete chapters of "Heavenly Questions" gradually appearing on the light gate, and with a darkened face, led his group away. His profound iron boots crushed three green bricks, leaving a trail of smoking footprints.
Seeing this, the other six peaks immediately had disciples holding "The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons" and "Collection of Yuefu Poems" to quickly review, fearing they would miss this once-in-a-millennium opportunity.
As dusk deepened, several sword lights streaked across the sky one after another, and the Chiefs of each peak successively departed on their swords.
Wei Yun Zhenjun's fingertips rubbed his sword tassel, and he scoffed as he looked at the scholarly test jade slip suspended in mid-air: "Sect Leader Martial Brother, our Beast Taming Sect is full of hidden talents; why bother letting these boors make a fool of themselves here?
Martial Brother Junlin has meticulously studied ancient texts for twenty years; wouldn't deciphering these ancient steles be a piece of cake for him?"
Mu Zhengting's hand beneath his wide sleeve suddenly clenched, the profound iron sword hilt leaving deep imprints.
The Luo imperial bloodline hung over his heart like a poisoned dagger, and the three thousand Dragon Soaring Guards raised by the Great Liang Dynasty were stationed thirty miles outside the mountain gate. This surname itself was a hot potato.
He turned to gaze at the Chief of Tai'a Peak: "Martial Brother Xia, can the Profound Heaven Sword Formation discern any weaknesses?"
Xia Yu Zhenjun pointed two fingers like a sword, outlining a golden hexagram in the air: "The Nine Bends Formation secretly aligns with the Innate Eight Trigrams, and the formation's eye is hidden in the Kun position. This formation is a profound mystery of nine bends, requiring sixty-four cycles of celestial stars to break."
With a wave of his sleeve, tens of thousands of sword qi condensed into a formation disk, "For every person who falls, a crack will appear in the formation gate."
Dao Lord Zisu's jade hairpin suddenly trembled, and her pupils constricted slightly when her divine sense swept over Xiao Yao Peak.
The Seven-Aperture Exquisite Tree, which was soul-bound to Qing Feng, now had not a single trace of aura fluctuation.
Qin Yue saw the frost forming on her Master's fingertips, and the transmission jade slip in her sleeve had already grown warm. Could it be that mysterious aura in the Mystic Realm...
Deep within the surging sea of clouds in the Mystic Realm, myriad rays of light held up a white jade profound palace, slowly rotating.
The palace walls, cast from thousand-year profound ice marrow, reflected the inverted image of the Milky Way, and the eighty-one ever-burning lamps hanging from the eaves had lamp oil that was actually soul crystals refined by West Sea merfolk.
And in the shadow of this priceless mausoleum, two intertwined figures were rewriting the fate of the entire cultivation world.
Mu Zhengting's hand gesture for deduction suddenly froze: "Sixty-four people? Since Yun Qingrao is already inside..."
"Not so," Xia Yu's sword-finger swept across the illusory star map, "Besides the Saintess of Yixian Palace, there is still an unknown variable within the formation."
Among the sixty-three floating light points, a faint blue star was quietly absorbing the surrounding qi.
The star-studded stones inlaid in the ancient tomb's dome emitted a faint blue glow, making Qing Feng's shadow stretch and shrink erratically.
He rubbed his face, which had a red mark from sleeping, and his fingers brushed over the mottled dragon scale patterns on the murals. The merman oil lamp held by the bronze lamp slave suddenly crackled and popped.
"Don't tell me the old Dragon Emperor is turning over in his coffin?"
Qing Feng muttered to the swimming dragon shadow in the mural, his waist jade pendant suddenly grew hot, revealing the ice-crack patterns left by the Nine Heavens Profound Maiden. This was even hotter than any treasure in the tomb.
The Eight Trigram array on the mural secretly corresponded to the operation of the Twenty-Eight Mansions, with the inverted scale of the Yinglong appearing in the Qian position corresponding to the position of Wei Yue Yan.
Qing Feng took out three Kaiyuan Tongbao coins and tossed them on the ground. The coins strangely floated into a Three Talents formation, projecting the mural as a three-dimensional star map.
When the spell for strengthening the barrier was drawn to its seventh layer, the unique sound of Yun Qingrao's ice crystals falling to the ground suddenly came from outside the tomb chamber.
Qing Feng hastily stuffed the half-eaten fruit core into the lamp slave's hand, pretending to study the murals, but then he heard the sound of mechanisms turning mixed with the echo of a yawn?
"Breaking formations? I'm too lazy to even break the formation at the cafeteria's food serving window."
He gestured at the illusory Dragon Emperor: "See this jade pendant? It's a guaranteed admission given by the Profound Maiden herself. You can keep these amateurish mechanisms of yours for the 'kings of effort' to play with."
Dragon blood-like cinnabar suddenly seeped from the stone wall, and the hairs on the back of Qing Feng's neck stood on end. This was not a trial of inheritance at all; the entire ancient tomb was alive. The Nine Heavens Profound Maiden's pendant suddenly let out a phoenix cry, shattering the bronze chains attempting to entangle his ankles into dust.
At the entrance of the Hidden Dragon Abyss Mystic Realm, Qing Feng was lying with crossed legs inside the Grand Evolution Heavenly Stellar Array.
His profound green sword box was propped behind his head, and he was chewing on a Seven-Star Grass, mumbling as he looked at the rotating stellar array patterns above him:
"Top immortal sect disciples should have this kind of prestige. When trouble arises, don't panic, call for help first. If you can't handle it, find Master. If Master can't solve it, there's still the Ancestor. Is our Beast Taming Sect's eight-hundred-year foundation just for show?"
From outside the array came the roar of the Grotto-Heaven collapsing. Qing Feng rolled over and pulled out a tortoise shell divination plate: "Zhen position, Li Fire... This broken array can last two or three hundred years without a problem."
Saying that, he pulled out a copy of "Heavenly Stellar Array Explanations" and placed it over his face, "When this young master wakes up and breaks through to the Mahayana stage, what Mystic Realm restrictions won't be broken with a flick of a finger?"