"It smells like clove and orchid," Su Yan said, sniffing again. "With a milky sweetness."
Yuan Qi gagged. "Disgusting."
Su Yan apologized to Veyon. "I haven't thanked you for helping me on the road, and now I've dragged you into this. I'm sorry."
"You came to find me. Helping was the only choice." Veyon pulled his hand free. "I stayed because I was curious about the temple's transformation. You warned me. Bad luck, that's all."
"Still, we can dig mud-loaches together. You ever caught shrimp? You have to move slow, then strike fast, or they jump right in your face."
Elder Xiao's jaw tightened. Veyon's eyes sparkled with interest.
"Wretched brat," the old servant muttered. But with Zhou Qiyun present, he dared nothing.
Soon, auspicious clouds gathered. Dragons wound through them—four dragon-gods pulling a treasure carriage, thick with incense smoke. Stone or wood, long worshipped, now given flight.
Zhou Qiyun boarded. Su Yan and Veyon followed. The interior was vast; Yuan Qi slithered in with room to spare.
"Some kind of artifact?" Yuan Qi wondered.
The four dragons soared through mist and cloud. Su Yan opened a window. Damp air flooded in. The dragon-statues dripped constantly, and lightning struck them now and then, filling the carriage with the scent of incense.
They broke through the clouds. A magnificent mountain range rose before them—peaks ten thousand ren high, sheer as blades. Something within roared, sending visible shockwaves through the air.
Zhou Qiyun hummed. Thunder answered in the valley below. The roar cut off instantly.
"That white-browed old ancestor is fierce," Yuan Qi praised. "My grandfather lost to him fair and square."
The carriage passed between two colossal peaks. Below, a silver river glittered like a ribbon. Fish-dragons leaped from its surface.
They flew for leagues without seeing a city. Su Yan's unease grew. "How large is the New Territory?"
No Lingling. No Xiao-Xiang River. No Yongzhou city. Only endless mountains scraping the sky.
"When I entered, the New Territory had grown eight hundred li along the Nai River's banks," Zhou Qiyun said. "Who knows how much larger it is now."
A single tree dominated the horizon—a pagoda tree whose canopy topped the mountains, clouds drifting beneath its branches. The Nai River bent around it, forced to change course.
"A pagoda tree!" Yuan Qi pressed his massive head to the window. "I've never seen one so huge."
"Trees are natural immortals," Zhou Qiyun said. "If the trunk doesn't rot and roots aren't eaten, they live forever. This one has grown since before memory. We call it Great Huai. In the underworld, it's the most yang thing alive—ghosts cannot approach it. Sense its spirit."
Su Yan extended his divine sense. An ancient consciousness stirred within the tree—heavy, slow, vast. No language, only being.
Golden pagoda flowers hung in clusters, not yet fully open, but their fragrance already permeated the air. Su Yan breathed it in and felt his primal qi rise on its own.
"This is a cultivation paradise. When the flowers bloom, the heaven-and-earth qi will be overwhelming."
The carriage descended toward the tree. Beneath it stood ancient palace halls with Zhou disciples coming and going. Su Yan read the archaic bird-seal script above the gate.
"Huaihua Palace Blessed Land," he thought, keeping silent. Not even the great bell knew this script.
The place had been abandoned. Now, with the New Territory emerging, Zhou experts had claimed it as a forward base.
"Why was it deserted?" Su Yan wondered. "The qi here is rich. It should be contested ground."
They landed. The palace gates opened. The four dragon-statues led the carriage inside.
Zhou Qiyun disembarked. "Buyi, take Young Master Su and Young Master Yuan to examine the Tuo Scripture."
An old servant bowed. "This way, young masters."
Elder Xiao studied him. This was Zhou Buyi, the Zhou inner-court steward—deeply unfathomable.
Su Yan activated the Grand Unity Daoyin Art. Fragrance rolled from the sky, rich with qi, forming an acre-sized Dao field above his head. Dao seeds flew into his body. Yuan Qi did the same with the Great Sun Daoyin Art.
"Other places, we can only cultivate at dawn," Yuan Qi thought. "Here, day and night. Even half a month equals a year outside."
Zhou Buyi sneered inwardly. Yao trash.
Veyon studied Su Yan's Dao field with surprise. "Su Demon King, your technique is extraordinary. It's different from other yao cultivation—another path entirely."
"It's called Dao-planting. I stumbled onto it. I can teach you if you want."
"I must ask my mother first."
Su Yan blinked. Why did learning a technique require parental permission?
Elder Xiao's heart jumped. 'Asking the matriarch' meant exchanging clan techniques! Only something that significant required her approval. What kind of technique could rival the Yuan family's heritage?
They entered a great hall. Inside, men and women, young and old, stood, sat, and reclined in every posture imaginable. One had three heads and six arms, neck stretched long, reading three books simultaneously. Another had eyes on his forehead and palms, studying floating scriptures from impossible angles. One snored loudly while his primordial spirit sat in thought-bubbles, testing techniques. Another had eighteen arms, buried in mountains of texts.
Some laughed madly. "I understand! I understand!" Then spat blood and got slapped awake.
Golden pages floated in the air, glowing with a woman's delicate handwriting. Everyone could see them.
"The Tuo Scripture," Zhou Buyi said.
Su Yan looked up. The scripture began with basic Daoyin breathing, then progressed through Qi-Gathering, Gate-Breaking, Dual Refinement, Second Gate-Breaking, Tower-Scaling, Jade Pool, Spirit-Bridge, Third Gate-Breaking, and finally Ascension.
A complete yao cultivation method.
"What's there to decipher?" Su Yan was baffled. The steps were crystal clear. Follow them and you'd advance without issue.
Yet the Zhou prodigies agonized over it, consulting endless texts.
"It's a female cultivation method," Su Yan realized after a quick scan. "A man who practices it would lose his masculine essence and become... altered."
For women, it would be perfect. But something was missing—incomplete.
"The true scripture isn't these pages," Su Yan thought. He noticed thirteen white-haired elders in the center, staring not at the floating texts but at a jade bamboo on the altar.
A green jade slip. One chi long, translucent as jade, like a fresh bamboo shoot. The faint scent of bamboo lingered.
Bird-seal script ran down its length.
Su Yan's heart hammered. "This is the real scripture. No—not the Tuo Scripture. This says: Grand Yin Origin-Nurturing Art."