The instant those three words fell, the great bell atop the Ancestral Hall—silent for who knew how many years—rang out on its own, though no one had struck it.
Its deep, resonant tolls rolled across the ages, as if they had traveled through time from centuries past. One peal followed another, spreading throughout the entire Celestial Master’s Residence.
Nine tolls. Not one more, not one less.
Each peal surged like a wave through every corner of the Celestial Master’s Residence.
From the ginkgo grove to the Heart-Calming Pagoda, from the Scripture Repository to the rear mountains, from secluded cultivation caves to the distant servants’ quarters—
Wherever the sound passed, everyone’s footsteps halted involuntarily, and every gaze turned toward the Ancestral Hall.
Lin Qingyan’s expression changed.
It was not shock, but panicked urgency.
She spun around and said in a trembling voice, “Chengcheng! Why didn’t you use a Dao title?”
Using a Dao title when swearing an oath was customary for every disciple of the Celestial Master’s Residence.
Just like Lin Qingyan—her Dao title was Jingzhe.
She had sworn those vows in the name of Jingzhe. The four sentences of the oath were engraved upon that title.
One day, should she wish to leave the Celestial Master’s Residence, all she had to do was cast off her Dao title, and she would be freed from it.
But Gu Chengyin had not chosen a Dao title. He had used his real name.
That meant the four declarations would be engraved forever upon his Dao heart.
Not upon some title he could discard whenever he wished.
They would be carved into the very core of his existence.
They would remain with him for his entire life, until both body and Dao were extinguished.
The entire square fell deathly silent.
The gazes of more than a hundred people landed in unison upon the moon-white figure inside the hall.
Some were shocked. Some were confused. Others thought the man had to be insane.
Who would engrave their real name upon the oath in the Ancestral Hall?
Who would bind four sentences to themselves for an entire lifetime?
Did he not understand what this meant?
Gu Chengyin steadily inserted the three incense sticks in his hand into the bronze burner.
The sticks stood upright in the ash as wisps of blue smoke rose slowly, drawing a perfectly straight line before him.
Then Gu Chengyin turned around and saw the anxiety filling Lin Qingyan’s beautiful eyes.
He raised a hand, stopping the words that had yet to leave her lips.
“Auntie, I know exactly what I’m doing.”
His tone was filled with certainty. Every word sounded as though it had been chiseled from solid stone.
It was not that he did not wish to leave himself a way out. Rather, he understood the weight of those four sentences better than anyone.
Using a Dao title would be tantamount to preparing an escape route from the very beginning.
But from the moment Gu Chengyin had decided to swear the oath, he had never considered retreat.
He intended to spend his entire life fulfilling those four sentences.
Even after ascending.
Lin Qingyan looked at the certainty in Gu Chengyin’s eyes. Her lips moved, but in the end, she said nothing more.
She drew a deep breath and once again returned to the usual cool composure of Fairy Jingzhe.
Yet when her gaze swept over the hundred-plus eyes in the square—some shocked, some disdainful, some curious—that cold composure instantly transformed into silent pressure.
Lin Qingyan stepped half a pace forward and stood beside Gu Chengyin. She did not truly release her aura, allowing only the slightest trace to leak out.
Yet that mere trace was enough to make the few Golden Core elders among the enshrined offerings darken their expressions.
The bell’s tolls gradually faded, and silence returned to the hall.
Gu Chengyin and Lin Qingyan crossed the threshold of the Ancestral Hall side by side and stood once more upon the stone steps.
More than a hundred gazes shot toward them like arrows—hostility from other cultivators, scrutiny from the gray-robed stewards, and undisguised appraisal from several enshrined elders.
But the nine bell tolls still lingered in everyone’s hearts. For a moment, no one spoke.
The gray-robed cultivators exchanged glances. The green-robed stewards shared meaningful looks. Although the few enshrined elders wore displeased expressions, they merely watched from a distance.
There were indeed quite a few people in the crowd itching to make a move.
Many cultivators were whispering among themselves, seemingly discussing something.
Under the eastern corridor, Perfected Xuanstone stood with a black sword on his back, his eyes slightly closed. No emotion could be read from his face.
Beneath the ginkgo tree on the western side, Perfected Spirit Pine chuckled twice and gave Gu Chengyin a thumbs-up.
Yet no one could tell what his smile meant—whether he genuinely admired Gu Chengyin or was simply waiting for a spectacle.
Beside him, Reverend Coldstone still wore the same stern expression. His hands were clasped behind his back, and he said nothing.
However, all those restless impulses died down beneath Lin Qingyan’s icy gaze.
She walked slowly down the stone steps. Her moon-white robes fluttered lightly in the breeze, and every step seemed to land upon the hearts of those present.
Her gaze began with the direct disciples of the enshrined elders and swept over them one by one.
Every cultivator touched by Lin Qingyan’s gaze felt as though a basin of ice water had been poured over them from head to toe.
There was no threat in that gaze, no warning, not even any unnecessary expression.
It was simply cold—cold to the bone.
The cultivators she looked upon lowered their heads one after another, avoiding her eyes.
Several who had originally intended to cause trouble wished they could shrink into the crowd and never show their heads again.
This was the might of a Golden Core cultivator unmatched beneath the heavens.
The few enshrined elders were helpless as well. Though they wanted to see what Gu Chengyin was capable of, none of them was willing to provoke Lin Qingyan over it.
In the Celestial Master’s Residence, strength was the hardest currency.
And no one could match Lin Qingyan’s strength.
At that moment, however, Gu Chengyin stepped down from the stone steps and walked straight toward the center of the square.
The surrounding cultivators instinctively parted, their eyes fixed on his back.
Gu Chengyin reached the center of the square and stood upon a smooth, rounded blue-gray flagstone.
Then he turned around, swept his gaze across the crowd, and called out clearly:
“I intend to become the Celestial Master’s Residence’s Taihe. Here and now, I formally issue an open challenge.”
The words sent shock through the entire square.
Perfected Xuanstone abruptly opened his eyes. His gaze, as still as an ancient well, fixed directly upon the moon-white figure at the center of the square, while the black sword on his back let out a resonant hum.
The pine nuts Perfected Spirit Pine had just finished shelling tumbled all over the ground. He opened his mouth, then swallowed hard.
Even Reverend Coldstone, who had not spoken a word, furrowed his brows until they formed a deep vertical crease.
As soon as Gu Chengyin finished speaking, someone immediately leaped out.
It was one of the cultivators who had been itching to make trouble in the back of the crowd.
He strode up to Gu Chengyin, his voice so loud that the entire square seemed to buzz.
“Gu Chengyin, you’re nothing more than a Foundation Establishment cultivator!”
“To become Taihe through an open challenge, you have to defeat every enshrined elder!”
“How do you expect to fight Golden Core cultivators? You’re a newcomer who has only just entered the residence. What gives you the right to stand here and spout such nonsense?”
He was about to continue, but Gu Chengyin raised a hand and cut him off.
Gu Chengyin swept his gaze across the square, his eyes settling calmly upon the grim-faced Golden Core elders.
Then he looked over the surrounding cultivators, whose expressions were filled with doubt and uncertainty, and smiled.
His smile was open and assured. There was not the slightest hint of provocation, nor any trace of guilt.
“I naturally know the rules of the Celestial Master’s Residence.”
“Perhaps some of you are wondering whether I intend to rely on someone else’s strength?”
Gu Chengyin paused briefly, deliberately glancing toward the enshrined elders.
“Of course not.”
Gu Chengyin clasped his hands behind his back, his spine straight as a spear.
The sunlight shone from behind him, casting a long, slender shadow before him.
“I swear upon my Dao heart that my aunt will only ensure that I remain alive.”
“Beyond that, she will not interfere in any of the challenges.”
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
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.
s + Rent Collection Wealth】 At the start, he inherited a rundown house in the urban village from his grandfather. The house had no tenants, but the moment he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, a self-proclaimed empress from the Tianxuan Continent arrived as his first tenant. Ye Chuan soon discovered that with every new tenant moving in, not only did he receive massive daily payments, but he also obtained unique items related to their backgrounds. 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Tiger Strength Pill—dramatically enhances physical power!】 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Deer Blood Pill—significantly boosts vitality!】 …… From that day on, all sorts of bizarre tenants began appearing in the house: the empress from Tianxuan Continent, an apocalyptic sorceress from the Magic Realm, a mysterious scientific girl who fell through a spacetime rift… Every single day, he received strange, powerful items and endless money. Then one day, he suddenly realized—he had become invincible. Enough, enough! Stop giving me more!
uld barely embark on the path to immortality. Just as he was on the verge of death, his golden finger awakened. No matter whether it was poison, drained blood and vital energy, diminished lifespan, or any other physical debuff caused by paying a price—once midnight passed, everything would be refreshed. From then on, whenever someone asked what kind of person Chu Ran was, the answer was simple: Forbidden arts that other cultivators dared not learn? Chu Ran would learn them. Prices that even demonic cultivators dared not pay? Chu Ran would pay them. Lifespan that even righteous cultivators dared not burn? Chu Ran would burn it. All the blood essence in his body? Take it. Want both his hands and feet? He would cut them off and send them to you. You say he’s finished? He wasn’t built to sit idle. You think he’s gone mad? No—he was simply waiting for midnight. From that day onward, Chu Ran would respect neither Heaven nor Earth, bow to neither gods nor ghosts. He had only one wish: For midnight to arrive a little sooner.
