After shutting the window gently, Xiao Chen returned to the desk. He was quite embarrassed to find only a small bed in this room. All the other rooms had been taken. He smiled. "Senior Sister Luo, rest well tonight. I will sit in the room and contemplate our next move." Luo Shangyan glanced at him and said, "You didn't rest last night either. Will you be fine?" Xiao Chen shook his head and smiled. "I will." At this moment, in the fortress on the west mountain, a handsome man in red was surveying the people below him with an indistinct smile on his lips. A cyan-robed man approached him from a path behind. He said blandly, "The news you have released about the Ancient Immortal Clan ruin has brought many cultivators here." The cyan-robed man was Leng Ningfeng, who had represented the Qing State during the Immortals League Competition. The handsome man still gazed down below him, like a supreme Immortal overlooking all sentient souls. He smiled

Xiao Chen focused his eyes and was on his guard. He asked, "Could you show yourself, sir?" "Ahem, am I not in front of you...?" The old voice rang out again. Xiao Chen finally noticed a white skeleton before him. Its remains were more complete than the others. "It's been a thousand years. There is almost nothing left of my Soul. I can no longer show myself. The outside Barrier had been shattered too. This palace has finally revealed itself to the eyes of men... " Xiao Chen gave a start. So it was this old man who had sealed the oasis with his Soul power. His remnant Soul was still so powerful after his death 1,000 years ago! This old man must have been a great wizard. Xiao Chen asked, "Please, sir, who were these people who had died here?" For now, this was his most urgent question. "This palace was called the Shao Palace. They, like me, were servants of this palace." Xiao Chen's heart missed a beat.

The old woman narrowed her turbid eyes and sized up Xiao Chen and the other two as they slowly drew near. She asked Mu Chengxue, "Little Xue, are they your friends?" Yu Yifeng saluted her with a gentle smile. "Madam, I paid you a visit last year with A Xue. Don't you remember?" The old woman stared at him for a long time before nodding. "I'm old now. I can't remember very well." Xiao Chen and Luo Shangyan promptly introduced themselves. The old woman appeared delighted and said, "It's windy here in the woods. Let's have a seat inside the house." What greeted them after walking out of the forest of peach trees was a small village with a creek passing through it. Numerous married women were on the riverbank, drawing and transporting water home for cooking. There were also many children catching dragonflies by the field. Their arrival turned quite a few heads. "Has Little Xue come home?" Mu Chengxue greeted them one

Yu Yifeng took him to a place called Bright Moon Valley located in the back of the mountain. The view of the valley was gorgeous. Flowers of all kinds blossomed beautifully and there were more Spiritual Qi here than in most places. He began letting go of all distracting thoughts and began his mental cultivation. Cultivating here for a day was as effective as cultivating in other places for three days. This place was supposed to be open only to the sect's disciples, but Perfected Immortal Qing Chen had personally given his permission for Xiao Chen and the other two to enter as they wished. In the days that followed, Xiao Chen cultivated inside the Bright Moon Valley in deep concentration. Each day, he would only return after the moon hung high in the sky. One day, after seeing how determined he was, Mu Chengxue couldn't stop herself from laughing at him. "Hey! Why are you working so hard? Don't you know that your Senior Sister Luo is forced to wait for you until late at

For a little more than half an hour they lingered, before Xiao Chen and Yu Yifeng rode on the latter's sword as they flew to the Hall of Celestial Authority, once the abode of Perfected Immortal Qingxuan who was the head of the sect during his time. They glided further down to the Immortal-slaying Platform; it was there where he was once bound to the massive column of stone that used to stand in the center of the square that served as the execution post for wrongdoers about to meet their fate. The column was no more; broken into halves, its grandeur spent, as it laid half-submerged in dirt and filth. Xiao Chen sighed heavily, his wearied steps slowly bringing him to the edge of the Platform, a precipitous crag that hung precariously to such abyssal depths that even an Immortal would perish if thrown off the cliff and plummet down; hence its name, the Cliff of Fallen Divinity. It was here where he and Hua Weiyang had leaped to their death, he remembered, a