Yuan Qi's Mud Pill Secret was unlike anyone else's.
Most cultivators who opened the Mud Pill had it done by a major nuo master. The first grotto-heaven lay outside their control. Su Yan had taken a different path, using sword qi to open his own—a masterstroke.
But Yuan Qi had botched his first attempt, creating a half-formed洞天. Su Yan had then sacrificed him, channeled both their power, and blasted open a second.
These two grotto-heavens—one dragon, one serpent—coiled together. Their combined fishing speed for longevity vitality exceeded even Su Yan's.
Yuan Qi's foundation was now absurdly solid. No second example existed in the world.
The only drawback: his Mud Pill Secret still carried traces of Su Yan's power.
Su Yan confirmed Yuan Qi was in no danger. The great bell rang softly, helping the serpent reorganize his scattered spiritual sense. When Yuan Qi woke, he felt mostly terror.
But since he hadn't died and had actually gained something, a new thought bloomed. "I must be heaven's chosen serpent. The favored child of destiny. But chosen for what?"
He never figured it out.
Su Yan returned to cultivation. Days passed in trance. No eating, no drinking, no sleeping. He climbed to the second layer of the Gate-Breaking stage's heaven.
Above him, a heavenly river met a sea of fire. The clash was violent, covering the third layer's sky. Su Yan tried to ascend, but astral winds threw him back, hot and cold tearing at his body.
"The cultivation path truly allows no shortcuts," he thought.
He woke from his trance. The great bell was gone. So were Yuan Qi and the bull brothers.
Su Yan walked out of the ascension ground. The sound of combat reached him. Niu Zhen was fighting someone.
The bull brothers had recently broken through the Gate-Breaking stage. Su Yan had taught them the Grand Yin Origin-Nurturing Art and the Eight Yuan Tones without holding anything back. In the ascension ground's rich spiritual environment, their progress had been explosive.
Su Yan had also removed their incense-god bindings, freeing them from underworld service. Their power had dipped temporarily, but now they had surpassed their former peaks.
Their opponent, however, was formidable. A young man in his twenties with two grotto-heavens floating behind him.
Those grotto-heavens were strange. They hovered within a glass-like realm, drawing power from it.
Su Yan didn't recognize the Secret type.
The young nuo master's qi was extraordinarily dense. Every gesture carried oceanic force. Niu Zhen couldn't land a single strike with the Soul-Lashing Whip—it bounced back the moment it touched the man's qi.
Su Yan had long recognized the whip's weakness. It only struck souls, not bodies. Against a sufficiently powerful opponent, it couldn't connect at all.
"This young man's qi is too deep," Su Yan noted.
Niu Zhen was fierce and battle-hungry, but he was losing. The young man's technique summoned tidal waves that swallowed the bull demon whole. Again and again, the waves hammered Niu Zhen until blood poured from every orifice.
Yuan Qi's voice rang out. "Stop! We concede!"
The young man didn't stop. His techniques intensified.
Yuan Qi exploded into motion. His true form—twenty zhang of serpent—erupted outward. "We've surrendered! Why press for annihilation?"
The young man smiled and pushed harder, intending to crush both bull demon and serpent in one stroke.
His clan had marched on Mount Wuwang in force. They hadn't expected to be humbled by two bull demons before even meeting their true target. Dozens of their nuo masters lay wounded.
He was here to reclaim their honor.
Yuan Qi's aura detonated. His serpent tail shattered the oceanic technique. The young man spat blood, his defense broken, watching in despair as a wall of scales crushed toward him.
Then a dozen nuo masters charged forward. "Dare harm the Pei family's Seventh Young Master?"
They opened two or three grotto-heavens each, their roots buried in that same glassy realm. Their qi was far denser than anything Su Yan had seen from the Zhou or Guo families.
"Ganging up? You've abandoned all shame!"
Yuan Qi roared. Sword qi erupted around him, shredding their techniques. He transformed into a hundred-zhang colossus, scales gleaming like sword blades. In an instant, the dozen experts fell.
A middle-aged man appeared before Yuan Qi, smiling. "Young Master Su's pet serpent is impressive indeed. Let me test you with Tidal Horizon!"
Four grotto-heavens manifested. A spring tide tore across the sky, endless and merciless.
Even in his hundred-zhang form, Yuan Qi was caught in the surge, tossed and compressed by tidal forces.
The man thought, "The Seventh Young Master failed to establish dominance. Very well. I'll kill this serpent instead."
A figure inserted itself between them—a broad-shouldered youth with dark skin. He raised his hand.
Two grotto-heavens appeared behind him. One plunged into the Chaos Sea. One hung above a sea of fire, crescent-shaped.
His palm strike unleashed a lone peak surrounded by eight rotating mountains, a hundred thousand peaks bowing before it, heaven and earth tilting.
Their palms met. The middle-aged man's technique collapsed entirely. Pure yang force—neutral yet tyrannical—crushed his qi and pulverized his bones.
Finger by finger. Joint by joint. His arm twisted into a wrung cloth. His skeleton shattered.
"How dare you harm a Pei!"
Hidden nuo immortals leaped out, grotto-heavens fully open.
The great bell descended. Light walls spiraled outward, shattering every technique, every art, every desperate strike.
A single chime. All the Pei family's immortals vomited blood and tumbled away.
The middle-aged man knelt, legs broken, staring in terror at the youth before him.
"Pure yang qi," he rasped. "You've refined pure yang qi!"
Su Yan smiled warmly. "You're not bad. I sensed purity in your qi. You've touched pure yang cultivation. Your foundation is cleaner than other clan disciples'."
The man collapsed, unconscious.
Su Yan turned to the Pei family survivors. "We're evenly matched. Let's call it a draw. Everyone keeps face. Besides, I'm injured too."
He coughed theatrically.
Yuan Qi gave an encouraging nod. "A-Yan, you're becoming quite the gentleman. You let them keep their dignity and preserved your own grace. Everyone saves face."
Su Yan beamed. "I learned from Brother Veyon and from you."
A deep voice laughed. "Serpent King Su of Lingling. Truly extraordinary. The Pei family requests your presence in the capital."
A vigorous gray-haired elder emerged from the crowd. When his gaze met Su Yan's, nine grotto-heavens flashed behind him.
"This old man is Pei Jingting. I invite you, Young Master Su, to come with us."
Yuan Qi shrank and whispered, "The Pei family is a nuo law clan. Two thousand years. Thirty-one grand generals. Seventeen chancellors. Thirty-eight ministers. One of the oldest clans alive."