After paying respects to the Mysterious Maiden and all the ancestral patriarchs, the suanni boy led Li Qingyun to an immortal estate, lifted the mutton-fat jade pendant, and with a single gesture dispelled the ward to usher him inside.
"Uncle-Master, this is Penglai Immortal Realm, the Immortal Traces Treasure Vault—where our lineage stores artifact-spirits and Dao companions.
Every true disciple on entry may choose one magic treasure here for protection. If any catches your eye, just tell me."
Oh? You get a magic treasure just for joining? Decent perks.
At a glance the vault was a riot of five-colored light—treasure-qi boiling to the rafters, divine radiance blotting out the sky. These weren't the little trinkets he'd slapped together; these were elders' carefully forged maste— ahem, treasures.
Then, when he really looked past the particle effects, what remained were pots and bowls, blades and staves. Seriously—what era is this? Got anything at cruiser-class? I'd even take an enchanted RPG.
Fine. It's an ancient orthodox sect; antiques with heritage and cultural value.
He noticed the layout: one treasure per room. He asked offhandedly,"Little nephew, can all these take human form?"
The boy nodded."Any tool-spirit that can't transform isn't qualified to serve in our True Dao. If you like one, simply ask whether its primordial spirit will acknowledge you as master.
If you want more than one, that's also fine. So long as you get chances to go down the mountain, the seniors are happy to look after the juniors and shine for the sect again."
Li Qingyun nodded."True enough—sit in a room long enough and anyone wants to go out and play."
Viewed from a cultivator's eye, these were serious pieces—every last one Refining Qi into Spirit grade. A sweep of his gaze and he could feel most of their pressure exceeded his own. He couldn't help clicking his tongue.
The hundred plus cultivators on the square had already been shocking. Who knew the vault held this many heavy-hitting artifact-spirits? The Taishang Nine True really did have depth.
But circling twice, he didn't pull a greedy "I'll take everything."
He'd read the Shangzhen Canon; he knew the initial pairing was about fate—not only life-saving protection, but also dual cultivation and mutual fulfillment.
And that isn't "the more the merrier."
He wasn't some novice. He'd used flying swords. He knew these treasures, for all their might, had equip limits and reset cooldowns—like shipboard systems with power grids and CPU budgets; cram too many implants in and you'll go cyber-psycho.
You can't kit from head to toe, rip your robe open and yell "King's Hoard!" while hurling gear in every direction.
And it's not just a question of spiritual power and divine sense. It's your wallet.
Taking on a Dao companion-treasure is karmically like a marriage—you're borrowing a share and will have to pay it back.
These spirits protect you and boost your path because they're gambling on "one person attains the Dao and chickens and dogs ascend."
So afterwards, you fund their cultivation—maintenance, upgrades, re-forging—all done by your own hand as part of your tool-forging practice. The elders won't interfere.
In short, you choose carefully. It's like taking a wife—collecting a harem feels great for a minute, but someone has to pay the bills.
Dual cultivation's healthy, sure—but too many partners delay the path. One or two is plenty.
Granted, Penglai disciples are loaded, and Shangzhen Palace is rich in the Void Star Sea. He could afford ten.
But his eyes were picky. He already had a handkerchief, a sword pill, and now a janky axe he'd made. Whatever he chose couldn't be weaker than his own handmade trash. After one pass, nothing truly popped.
Not that the axe was great; it's just that magic weapons, however timeless, are bounded by materials and craft.
These tools were the sensational masterpieces of their day, but the day had passed. Craft and material strength—last gen.
Like museum supercars—glorious drivetrains, rigid chassis, intoxicating sound—championship pedigree—yet you wouldn't pit them against maglev cabs on an automated expressway.
So, after two loops with nothing he loved, he told the pendant boy,"Forget it. Let's go. I won't take one."
"Uncle-Master finds these unworthy? Or not in the mood to forge?"
Seeing through the empty purse, the suanni boy offered him an out:"Shall I fetch something from the Taiji era? Ancient items damaged in past duels—fallen in realm, spirits injured—sealed and asleep. If you've leisure, you can re-refine them. At least as a memento."
"Oh? Taiji relics?"
"Yes—things from before the Demon Ancestor split the heavens, when the star ramparts collapsed and the Dao foundation shattered. The period when the Three Venerables founded their teachings. This way."
He took Li Qingyun through a garden to a broom-closet of a storeroom. A big rack of literal junk, dust thick enough to write in—clearly sealed forever.
Seeing Li Qingyun's face, the boy grimaced,"The sect gifts all new disciples—please pick one, Uncle-Master. I need to mark it down."
"Alright then… this one."
Li Qingyun picked up a brick. Gold. Even if useless, it would look festive sitting at home.
The boy dutifully logged it: "Granted one golden brick by the sect." Then he led Li Qingyun to a study.
Shelves groaned with books."Oh—so now I pick secret arts? I already have the Shangzhen Canon."
The boy smiled. "A misunderstanding, Uncle-Master. This is the question bank."
"The… question bank?"
He drew a volume: "Master Wei's Lectures on Arithmetic—Jiazi-Year College Entrance Math: Fully Worked Solutions & Exhaustive Past Papers."
Li Qingyun blinked. Looked again. Still Past Papers Ocean.
Great. I've cross-glitched into cyber psychosis.
The boy explained,"We have unified past papers from every orthodox school, mock exams, plus question banks from Demon Mountain, demonic sects, and other side paths. Borrow as many as you like—just return them when you've worked them."
Li Qingyun gaped."What the hell would I do with these?"
"To solve them, of course. If you don't grind problems, how will you pass the exams?"
A chill crept up his spine. He suddenly realized Master Xian had more than sightseeing in mind."We're… having exams?"
"But of course." The boy pointed to a posted regulation behind the shelves."Only through diligent practice with regular testing can you grasp the True Dao.
Our Taishang Nine True internal unified exams go: a quiz every five days, a midterm every tenday and every month, a grand yearly tournament, and once every three years you sit the Unified Six Arts Comprehensive Exam of the True Dao. Since you're now formally an inner disciple, the grinding begins today.
Only those who place in the top three each time earn rewards and points. Over sixty years of great exams, mastering all six arts, the top three overall become Dao Children of the Three Mountains."
Li Qingyun's liver quivered."Sixty… years… of exams?"
To hell with cultivation!
The boy clutched his sleeve, pleading,"It's not so hard. These are transmissions and lived case studies our patriarchs compiled because they feared disciples would only sit and breathe with no worldly training—so they shared their field wisdom.
When you go out and meet calamity, you'll have recipes to hand. The sect's good intentions!"
Li Qingyun squinted."Don't bluff me. What's arithmetic got to do with cultivation? Why grind problems when I can just cut?"
The suanni boy wagged his head."Arithmetic is at the root of the Great Way. To unite with the Dao, how can you not understand heavens and nature? Grain by grain the heap grows. If you can't do it on paper, who'll trust you to forge, to draw talismans, to refine pills?
Resources aren't infinite. Heavenly materials are condensed sun-moon essence and ambient qi—once used, they're gone. If you can't handle the numbers, how can you squander them with a wave?"
Li Qingyun paused. Fair. Even firing artillery needs coordinates. Foundations are the real kung fu. He bowed."I am instructed."
"No need, Uncle-Master—it's just what I've absorbed."
He leaned in and whispered,"As a mid-entry inner disciple you may not know: home-mountain disciples who fail get corporal punishment. Fail one subject—hang your head from the beam. Two—stab your thigh with an awl. Fail the annuals—caned and lashed. Miss the unified—mountain of blades, oil cauldron, suppressed under Penglai until you pass…"
"What kind of discipline cult are you running?!"
The boy winced."The True Dao has always been strict—stern teachers, excellent students. And really, hardly anyone fails if they grind. Getting top three is the hard part.
You know as well as I do—Refining Qi into Spirit is common; Refining Spirit, Returning to Void is rare. But if you become a Dao Child of the Three Mountains, resources pour in—and the Taishang Dao Ancestor will personally transmit Scripture and Tome. That's the orthodox path!For true seekers—who wouldn't fight and scramble for that? What's an exam?"
That calmed him.
True enough—unlike him, others don't just have the Nine Yin Manual and Blood Heavenly Tome lying around.
Sacred Sect folks conquer worlds to trade for a single Heavenly Tome; a True Dao disciple merely grinds and ranks. Easy by comparison.
"Alright, alright—grind it is. Bring me a chest—hold up, I'm starting now—am I behind? With quizzes every day, midterms every month, yearly grand exams—besides closed-door cultivation, I'm minding Master's furnace. How am I supposed to keep up?"
The boy dragged over a book chest."That's easy. The sect treasure you just got bears a Taixuan Register. Send your primordial spirit out, activate the Taixuan Gate, and it will pull you to Penglai to sit the exam.
Each subject is only one stick of incense long—barely any time. If something urgent comes up, you can apply to the Sect Master for a make-up."
Ah. So that's why they insisted he take something—because their out-of-body technique is for going to exams. Ridiculous.
The boy glanced up."Even the little quizzes are taken before the Patriarch's image. Cheat, and your soul is scattered."
"Excuse me! Do I look like a cheater? And scattering a soul over a little cheat sheet is a tad excessive!"
Exhausting… who knew cultivation was this exhausting…
With the boy's help he emptied the room—stuffed a whole book chest with past papers and mocks to take home. (The chest itself was a mustard-seed storage treasure for books. If not for his perfected Nine Yin body, he might not have been able to carry it.)
Leaving the question bank, the boy offered,"Would Uncle-Master like flower seeds, spirit herbs, or divine beasts and immortal birds to raise? Inner disciples can claim them for free."
"Please—I'll barely have time to grind. No birds."
With a back-breaking chest of papers, any joy of roaming immortal lands was gone. Who wants this? This is worse than going back to 0791 to, uh, channel-surf.
Sensing his mood, the boy tried:"Would Uncle-Master like something to eat?"
That lit him up. "What's good here?"
The boy studied him."Uncle-Master is from the Void Star Sea, right? Do you usually eat raw or cooked? Blood fare or meat fare?"
"Er… aside from pills, I mostly eat fish. What do those mean?"
The boy looked… envious."Pills—and fish? Live fish?"
Li Qingyun nodded and pulled a piece of fish meat from his belt sack."Ugly thing, but the meat's fresh. Want a taste?"
The boy swallowed and shook his head."I've taken refuge in the True Law and refined a spirit body—only smoke and fire now, no blood or raw flesh.
How nice… so Daiyu really still has live fish…"
No blood or raw flesh—yet you can't stop staring…
Looking at him and then at the ocean inverted overhead, Li Qingyun frowned."You mean—there's no raw fish here?"
The boy shook his head."Here, raw means spirit greens and immortal fruits from the gardens; cooked is the refectory's vegetarian fare. Cultivators mostly breathe clouds and take pills; only at banquets do we eat fruits and spirit wines. Those who've attained the Dao usually avoid meat."
"But I just saw a flock of fat quail fly past. Those aren't for eating?"
"Those were juvenile phoenixes…"
He managed a rueful smile."The mountain's divine beasts and spirit birds are disciples' Dao companions and pets, used to gather treasures. If they gain enlightenment and take shape, they'll be fellow disciples—we can't eat them.
Only when something reaches the end of its yang-life and dissolves do we take the remains to pill-rooms and workshops—skins peeled, bones parted—the leftovers we can eat: that's meat fare. And the heavenly ghosts used for rites, or demons captured from beyond—that's blood fare.
But disciples are many. Blood or meat fare is rare and never enough."
"Then hunt outside? If we can't eat the ones the sect keeps, eat the wild ones."
The boy stared at him."Wild? Outside there's nothing. What wild?"
Li Qingyun blinked."What do you mean, nothing?"
"Nothing means nothing." He spread his hands. "The star ramparts collapsed, the Dao foundation shattered."
Li Qingyun stood dumb a moment."…Can I go look outside?"
"Why not." The boy turned in place and became a golden-maned suanni with a jade pendant on his neck.
"The void malice out there is heavy. Your Dao body might suffer. Please send out your primordial spirit—I'll shield you."
Only when the boy revealed his true form did Li Qingyun realize his cultivation was far above his own—peak Refining Qi into Spirit. He nodded, sat, and let a nascent-soul projection rise from his crown to settle on the suanni's head.
The suanni shook his head, body flickering; fire jetted from his nostrils as a seven-colored cloud wrapped him. He rode golden light straight into the sea-wall of the sky.
The blue water parted into a crystalline corridor. Five-colored light strobed past; immortal mountains and seas slipped away to either side. The blue glow around Penglai receded; the sea dimmed—and then darkness closed in from every direction, like a ten-thousand-fathom abyss tipping toward them.
Then—whoosh.
Li Qingyun's divine sense flared wide—as if the curtain wrapped around him had torn away. On all sides there was only blank nothing.
Nothing at all.
Boundless void—not a single star.
Nothing…
At all…
"Uncle-Master—look behind you."
The suanni's voice brought him around.
Hanging in the void behind them was a single crystal-clear, blue-glowing bubble—like a giant jewel fixed in endless dark. If you peered, you could just make out green mountains and grand palaces inside.
"This is Penglai."
The suanni carried him once around the blue bubble in the middle of the emptiness.
"The Void Abyss has expanded without restraint. The Taiji world has long since been swallowed; in the human realm, nothing remains.
The Taishang Dao Ancestor's barrier can hold for a time, but no treasure can endure the corrosion of the void's malice.
When the Twenty-Four Sea-Fixing Divine Pearls are spent, I fear Penglai will also be swallowed by the endless Void Abyss.
Let's hope Daiyu Mountain is finished soon so our Nine True can move to the Void Star Heaven.
The Void Abyss will swallow that someday too—but for now, it's a way out.
Escape for a time is still escape."
.
.
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⚠️ 30 CHAPTERS AHEAD — I'm Not a Cyberpsycho ⚠️
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