Xing Tian'ao’s gaze turned once more toward the distance, settling on the Stairway to Heaven and the young figures climbing it.
His eyes paused for a moment on Xiao Ruobai, Ling Xi, Fang Hanyu, and the others.
Then he withdrew his gaze and uttered two words:
“There are.”
Inwardly, he added, “Which of the Honored Master’s disciples lacks the potential to become an Emperor?”
Master Qingxu’s spirits lifted. The stone weighing on his heart seemed to drop halfway. There really were some!
But immediately afterward, even greater curiosity and speculation surged within him.
Could they be those ancient monsters who had long since made names for themselves throughout the world?
Their foundations were the deepest, and they were indeed the most likely candidates.
Or perhaps the favored children of the current age—the Divine King Physique, or that exceptionally gifted young man of lightning?
Could it be Battle Asura and the others? Their performances had been nothing short of astounding.
One name after another flashed through his mind as he tried to match them with the words “Emperor’s potential.”
Xing Tian'ao withdrew his gaze from the Stairway to Heaven. The faint ripple in his eyes gradually subsided, returning to calm.
“A hidden dragon lurks in the abyss; once it rises, it will soar to the ninth heaven. The true contest has only just begun.”
At those words, Master Qingxu’s heart tightened. He knew that his master was referring to something.
He focused his senses and indeed discovered that the fluctuations of fortune on the Stairway to Heaven had not calmed after the large number of prodigies stopped climbing. Instead, at several crucial points, they were brewing an even more astonishing eruption.
Eight thousand three hundred steps.
Shi Potian let out a low growl. Beneath his bronze-colored skin, every inch of muscle groaned beneath an unbearable burden.
“Cough… Have I reached my limit?”
He dropped to one knee and panted heavily. His eyes were filled with unwillingness, but even more so with the helplessness of facing an absolute chasm.
Not far away, Ji Xuanye leaned on his sword, his face ashen. He struggled upward for another dozen steps before finally stopping at the eight-thousand-three-hundred-and-fifteenth step.
He knew that, for now, this was where his path ended.
Xinglan stopped at the eight-thousand-five-hundredth step and sat cross-legged, allowing the Dao rhythm to wash over her body as she remained there.
The Golden Lion, Yaoguang’s former Holy Son, Lingxiao’s Successor, and the other top prodigies of the second echelon gradually reached their respective limits at different heights between the eight-thousand-three-hundredth and eight-thousand-five-hundredth steps. Helplessly, they came to a stop.
Some sat, while others lay down, seizing the opportunity to use the Dao rhythm—far richer here than below—to repair themselves. Their gazes were complicated as they looked upward.
From this moment onward, the true stage belonged to those above.
Beyond the eight-thousand-five-hundredth step, the scene was entirely different from below.
Chu Daolin walked at the very front and was already nearing the nine-thousandth step. His pace had long since slowed to a tortoise’s crawl, but every step remained steady.
Qin Wuye and Jiang Ruofeng followed close behind. Each step they took made the stairs rumble with a deep, muffled boom.
Lei Dong had nearly transformed into a humanoid storm of lightning. His utterly yang, utterly rigid thunderous power swept away all evil.
His aura fluctuated violently under the strain of this confrontation, yet it remained vigorous and unyielding.
Xuanming’s domain of ice had been compressed to its absolute limit here, barely able to protect the three feet around his body.
As for Mo Xingyun and Frostmoon Fairy, the two prodigies from the starry sky, they had now fallen more than a hundred steps behind the others.
They had stopped at a relatively level stretch around the eight-thousand-six-hundredth step and were doing their utmost to regulate their breathing.
Just then, steady and distinct footsteps came from below.
Mo Xingyun and Frostmoon Fairy both tensed almost simultaneously and abruptly turned to look back.
Five figures were steadily making their way upward below them.
At the front was Battle Asura, with Fang Hanyu and several others behind him.
What made Mo Xingyun’s pupils contract was that these five were not moving with ease.
They, too, were bearing a heavy, mountain-like pressure of Dao principles corresponding to their own cultivation realms, yet their steps remained steady.
They could only watch as the five approached them unhurriedly, passed them without slowing, and continued onward.
The backs of Xiao Ruobai and the others crossed into the turbulent region of Dao principles ahead. Even there, they maintained the same steady pace as they continued climbing.
Only then did Mo Xingyun slowly withdraw his gaze. He exchanged a glance with Frostmoon Fairy, whose expression was equally complicated.
In each other’s eyes, they saw the same shock—and a trace of bitterness.
“The Central Continent…”
Mo Xingyun’s voice was somewhat hoarse as he stared in the direction where Xiao Ruobai and the others had disappeared.
“No wonder it is the center of the Profound Yellow Great World. Our Tianshu Star Domain swept through our generation and never met an equal. I thought… Heh.”
He shook his head and said no more.
They had thought that Chu Daolin and the others ahead had already endured enough pressure to teach them that there was always someone greater, and always a heaven beyond the heavens.
Yet they had never expected there to be five more—and these five did not appear to have reached their limits by any means.
After a moment of silence, Frostmoon Fairy said coldly, “Catch up to them.”
Her voice was cold, but it carried a resolve she had never shown before.
Reality, however, was often cruel.
The moment they entered the turbulent region ahead, the pressure above suddenly increased severalfold!
A terrifying surge of chaos swept over them.
Mo Xingyun’s expression changed drastically. The galaxy domain around him contracted to its absolute limit, while moonlight blazed wildly around Frostmoon Fairy.
“Pfft!” “Pfft!”
The two of them groaned almost simultaneously, blood trickling from the corners of their mouths. The divine light protecting their bodies flickered violently, and the sudden assault—far more powerful than anything before—sent them staggering backward several steps.
They looked up in horror toward the even deeper and more terrifying chaos above.
They now understood that the ease with which those five had passed through did not mean this stretch was truly easy.
It meant that those five had already grown strong enough to reach a level they could not comprehend.
The path ahead was no longer something they could force their way through in their current state.
“Damn it!”
Mo Xingyun let out a low roar, his eyes filled with unwillingness.
But he knew that if he continued to force his way forward, the consequences would be far worse than mere injury. His Dao foundation itself might be damaged.
Eight thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine steps!
Chu Daolin, Qin Wuye, Jiang Ruofeng, Lei Dong, and Xuanming arrived here one after another.
The nine-thousandth step lay directly ahead. Setting foot upon it meant that, barring unforeseen circumstances, one was destined to become a Quasi-Emperor in the future—and might even reach the threshold of Emperorhood.
Yet the five of them stood before this final heavenly chasm, and all fell silent.
Not one of them immediately took the next step.
An invisible pressure locked their bodies and souls in place.
A weakness and exhaustion originating from the depths of their souls gnawed frantically at their last reserves of strength and will.
Yet it was precisely beneath this extreme pressure that their Dao hearts were tempered until they shone more brilliantly than ever.
“My Dao is battle! Why should I fear the end?”
Qin Wuye was the first to let out a low roar. His shattered battle intent and remaining blood essence ignited with a thunderous blaze, transforming into a scarlet rainbow that surged defiantly upward as he took the final step.
“The Divine King descends upon the world; all Daos retreat!”
Jiang Ruofeng threw back his head and let out a long howl. Ancient sacrificial hymns echoed from within his body as his pale-gold divine blood burned. Behind him, the vague phantom of a Divine King appeared, guarding his body as he forcefully ascended.
“Time is as I am; through the ages, I remain unchanged.”
Chu Daolin’s eyes regained their absolute calm. The chaotic forces around him were forcibly unified, transforming into a river that bore him upward as he took his step.
“Thunder Emperor’s Edict—open!”
Lei Dong rasped the words under his breath, drawing upon a trace of the primordial source of thunder from the unseen depths. A brilliant radiance erupted and crashed toward the path ahead.
“Boom!” “Boom!” “Boom!” “Boom!”
Four vast and boundless phenomena, far surpassing anything before, erupted with a thunderous roar above the platform at the nine-thousandth step.
The Dao resonance of Heaven and Earth thundered, as if crowning them!
They did it!
Chu Daolin, Qin Wuye, Jiang Ruofeng, and Lei Dong had all successfully set foot on the nine-thousandth step!
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
't think I'm that capable, I'm just trying my best to stay alive. I've been kind all my life, never did anything bad, yet worldly suffering spared me not one bit. The human world is a nice place, but I won't come back in my next life. A kind young man, who wanted to just get by singing, but through repeated deceits and betrayals, has gone down an irredeemable path.
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
