Brother, the times have changed.

As the celebration of seeking defeat on the wasteland grew ever more frenzied, it began showing signs of devolving from a series of friendly tests into sheer chaos and farce.

Several venerable elders from the great sects who still retained their reason could no longer stand by. Each raised their voice with authority and ordered their disciples to stop.

The head of the Ancient Desolate Wang Family also wore a grim expression. With emotions too complicated to put into words, he silently led his people away.

The departure of the top powers and their prodigies was like the ebbing tide, carrying away the greatest noise and danger with it.

The remaining cultivators gradually came to their senses from that collective frenzy. They exchanged awkward glances.

Looking at the battered surroundings, the traces of their sparring, and their fellow disciples with swollen faces and blackened eyes yet gleaming gazes, they felt a jumble of indescribable emotions. In the end, they too dispersed in small groups.

Outside the Imperial Tomb, silence returned.

On the mountaintop, Gu Changge withdrew his gaze and said indifferently to Xuanyangzi beside him, “The show’s over. Let’s go.”

Xuanyangzi, clutching the Imperial Scripture, glanced back at the wasteland once more before leaving with Gu Changge. Their figures slowly faded away.

Ling Canglan also returned to the Lingxiao Sacred Land disciples and led them back to the sect.

Xiao Ruobai, Ling Xi, and the others had vanished long ago.

Thus, the storm surrounding the Imperial Tomb came to an end.

Yet the real storm had only just begun to spread outward.

The name Cyan Rakshasa swept across the entire Eastern Region like a hurricane, in a manner even more rapid, shocking, and legendary than Battle Asura had once done. At an astonishing speed, it began spreading toward the other great domains as well.

One finger had defeated a Saint.

Amid countless embellished retellings, her reputation quickly rose to a height that inspired awe. She became synonymous with mystery, power, and unfathomable strength in this era.

Alongside this world-shaking reputation came a subtle yet far-reaching shift in the prevailing atmosphere.

Perhaps it was the shock of seeing Wang Zhan emerge reborn from defeat. Perhaps it was the inspiration brought by that first cry from the wasteland—

“Grant me a defeat!”

A completely different attitude from the old one of “seeking only victory and regarding defeat as shameful” truly began to spread like sparks among the younger generation of the Eastern Region.

Before long, as one traveled through various parts of the Eastern Region, it became common to see young cultivators stop their peers—or even their seniors—not to provoke them, but to clasp their fists with utmost seriousness.

“Please enlighten me, fellow cultivator. I seek only defeat, so that I may understand my shortcomings.”

At first, this behavior drew countless astonished looks, mocking laughs, and even angry rebukes. Gradually, however, some people truly began trying it, accepting such challenges, and even treating it as a new method of cultivation.

Many prodigies had spent days in secluded cultivation and happened to break through. Filled with satisfaction, they would emerge eager to find someone against whom they could test their swordsmanship, verify their cultivation, and restore their reputation.

Yet the moment they left seclusion and stepped into a marketplace or sect, they would be stunned to discover that their peers were no longer discussing who had defeated whom. Instead, they were talking about where someone had gone to seek defeat and what insights they had gained from it.

The challenge platforms were also filled with strange invitations to battle:

“I seek only defeat!”

These people stood at the edges of bustling crowds, holding divine abilities they had just finished tempering and carrying grand ambitions of making a name for themselves.

As they listened to those absurd conversations and watched those battles unfold in ways utterly different from what they had expected, the confidence on their faces gradually froze and turned into blank confusion.

Quite a few could not help grabbing a familiar friend and pointing toward the chaos. Their voices trembled with uncertainty.

“Wait, fellow cultivator. How long was I in seclusion?”

“Why does it feel as if I’ve entered a completely different world?”

Their friends would often give them a complicated look. In the end, they would pat them on the shoulder and sigh with deep feeling.

“Sigh, brother. The times have changed.”

“If you want to get by among the younger generation of the Eastern Region, you may not have won any battles, but you’d better have the courage to seek defeat—and a story to go with it.”

That prodigy would stand frozen in place, staring at the now-unfamiliar atmosphere. He could only feel that the divine weapon in his hand had suddenly lost its appeal.

Even his newly broken-through cultivation realm felt unstable. His mind was filled with only one thought:

“What the hell is wrong with this world?!”

Yet beneath this seemingly absurd craze, a fiercer—even crueler—competition was quietly taking shape.

Once defeat was no longer frightening, and was even granted the sacred significance of aiding one’s path to enlightenment, the adventurous and ambitious spirit suppressed within countless cultivators was instead completely ignited.

The number of people daring to challenge stronger opponents—even those in higher realms—increased visibly.

“Even if I lose, it won’t be shameful. I can still see my shortcomings.”

This new logic became the best justification and psychological shield for many people as they crossed gaps in strength and charged toward greater heights.

For a time, examples of those challenging across realms appeared throughout the Eastern Region.

Some cultivators in the Heavenly Human Realm, fully aware that they were no match, still challenged seniors in the King Realm to battles seeking defeat, simply to personally experience the might of a higher realm.

Even if they were sent flying while vomiting blood, as long as they could glimpse the operation of a single thread of Dao principles during the battle, they considered the experience immensely worthwhile. After returning to seclusion to digest what they had learned, they would often find that their cultivation bottlenecks had genuinely begun to loosen.

Many used almost self-torturous methods to temper their souls and comprehend higher realms. Though they lost ten battles out of ten, their auras became more condensed with each defeat.

Some went even further, walking along the edge of life and death and verifying what they had learned through bloody battles, breaking through their limits.

As a result, the casualty rate rose. But those who survived advanced at a startling pace.

Eastern Region, Heavenly Secrets Pavilion, Starwatching Platform.

The night wind was cool as it stirred the ranking list in Xinglan’s hands. The list had been woven from specially made threads bearing star patterns, and the ink upon it was still fresh.

At the top of the first page, the three characters “Prodigy Ranking” flowed with Daoist charm, glittering beneath the starlight.

Below them were the names and annotations that he had spent countless hours deducing, verifying, weighing, and carefully arranging.

This should have been another grand occasion in which the Heavenly Secrets Pavilion established its authority through the rankings.

Yet Xinglan’s handsome face lacked its usual composure. His brows were faintly furrowed.

The earthshaking duel outside the Imperial Tomb, Wang Zhan’s solitary departure, and the absurd frenzy of seeking defeat that had erupted afterward had all become indelible marks upon his Dao heart as he sought to divine the secrets of Heaven.

Every rise and fall of the names on the list seemed incompatible with this strange new trend of seeking the Dao through defeat.

The atmosphere among the younger generation appeared to have shifted overnight—from competing for the glory of victory to tempering oneself through defeat and illuminating one’s heart.

“Master.”

Xinglan stopped several paces away. His voice carried a rare hesitation as he raised the ranking list in his hands.

“Should we still publish this newly revised Prodigy Ranking as scheduled?”

Master Tianji did not turn around.

Only the wind answered from the Starwatching Platform.

After a long while, he finally spoke. His voice was calm, yet carried a desolation Xinglan had never heard from him before.

“Put it on hold for now.”

He paused. His gaze seemed to pierce the river of stars and glimpse the source of those unfathomable changes. He murmured,

“As for the changes taking place in this world… it isn’t just you who can’t see through them. Even I cannot.”

Xinglan’s heart trembled. The ranking list in his hands suddenly felt as heavy as a thousand jun.

He silently rolled it up, bowed, and withdrew.

Just as he was about to leave the Starwatching Platform entirely, an extremely faint, halting mutter drifted down from the platform’s highest edge on the wind.

The voice was indistinct, filled with bewilderment—and a hint of cursing.

“It makes no sense. The world is reviving, the Imperial Star is about to appear, and it should be in the Eastern Region. But how did the omen turn out so damn crooked…?”

“One finger defeating a Saint is one thing, but how did it lead to a whole world of lunatics begging to be beaten?”

“Wang Zhan’s destiny is indeed somewhat unusual, but with this ‘defeat’ taking the lead, it can actually influence the prevailing atmosphere?”

“I’ve never seen anything like this in a thousand years of deductions…”

“What the hell is going on?”

Xinglan’s footsteps faltered almost imperceptibly as he descended. The corner of his lips twitched, stiffly and so faintly that it was nearly impossible to notice.

He immediately composed himself and quickened his pace, as though he hadn’t heard a thing.