Chapter 44

Xu Yizhuo actually knew where Yunwu City was. She had seen the Immortal Order Office’s Yunwai Flying Boat route, and Yunwu City just so happened to be one of the major cities where it stopped.

However, Yunwu City was quite far from Konglong Mountain, and the flying boat had already passed by and would not turn back. If Xu Yizhuo had to find a way to reach Yunwu City on her own, forget arriving within a month—even if she were given a year, she might not necessarily make it there.

After Yu Wangshu learned of this, as soon as they returned to Xucheng, she began helping Xu Yizhuo arrange matters related to traveling to Yunwu City. With how vast the Western Continent was, if one took an ordinary mortal carriage, who knew what year and month one would arrive? Fortunately, this was a cultivation world.

Xu Yizhuo boarded the small flying boat Yu Wangshu had arranged and set off together with some other cultivators who were also hurrying to Yunwu City to enter the Burning Mountain Secret Realm. A small flying boat could not compare to the Yunwai Flying Boat. Its speed, endurance, and safety were all much worse, and its consumption was especially high, but it was indeed the most suitable mode of transportation for Xu Yizhuo right now.

The small flying boat had someone specifically controlling it. One craft could seat four people, and it had small rooms used for resting. The rooms were only barely large enough for one person to lie down. Relying on the fact that she was small, Xu Yizhuo felt the space was actually quite roomy.

However, Xu Yizhuo had yet to see anyone else on the flying boat sleep.

All the cultivators were seizing every moment to cultivate, refusing to waste even a single minute or second before entering the Burning Mountain Secret Realm, hoping they might achieve some breakthrough. Among them, Xu Yizhuo felt too embarrassed to keep being a salted fish, so she also took out the classics Di Xiang had left behind and began flipping through them.

Now, aside from the classics Di Xiang had given her, Xu Yizhuo had also inherited Konglong Mountain’s ​unauthorized copy​library. However, Konglong Mountain was clearly a sword cultivator sect, at most dabbling a little in formations. After flipping through a few sword manuals, Xu Yizhuo decisively gave up.

To Xu Yizhuo, sword manuals were like heavenly books, and sword cultivators also needed body refinement. Whenever she accidentally remembered Fang Yue’s experience in Lin He’s hands, Xu Yizhuo could not help shuddering.

She should just obediently be a spell cultivator who used mirrors…

Xu Yizhuo read books in fits and starts, spending three days fishing and two days drying the net. When she did not want to read, she went to ask the cultivator controlling the flying boat about the Burning Mountain Secret Realm, and she did learn some information from him.

First was Knocking on the Immortal Gate. Knocking on the Immortal Gate was not held every year. After asking that cultivator, Xu Yizhuo learned that Knocking on the Immortal Gate happened once every fifty years. Because only cultivators under a hundred years old could participate, that meant a cultivator could participate in Knocking on the Immortal Gate at most twice in their life. Xu Yizhuo had been rather lucky. If she had not made up her mind to leave Qingping Town at that time, even a slight delay might have caused her to miss the dispersal of the Lidan River’s fog, and then she would have missed this session of Knocking on the Immortal Gate.

As for the secret realm stage before Knocking on the Immortal Gate, it was not always the Burning Mountain Secret Realm. In reality, there were five secret realms used as candidates. The year before Knocking on the Immortal Gate was held, they would announce which secret realm had been drawn, as well as which force would host this session of Knocking on the Immortal Gate.

Because there were many candidate secret realms, and because the interval between each session of Knocking on the Immortal Gate was quite long, not many people knew what exactly the Burning Mountain Secret Realm was like. Disciples of major sects and children of aristocratic families naturally knew, but ordinary cultivators like Xu Yizhuo and the cultivator driving the flying boat basically had no channels for obtaining information.

While controlling the flying boat, the cultivator cheerfully asked Xu Yizhuo, “You’re also heading to the Burning Mountain Secret Realm because of Tower Master Jun, right?”

It was not only this cultivator. Yu Wangshu also believed that Xu Yizhuo had decided to go to read the original at bailiantales.com Knocking on the Immortal Gate because of Jun Yu. After all, it was only after Yu Wangshu said that this session of Knocking on the Immortal Gate would be hosted by the master of Shiwai Tower that Xu Yizhuo had asked how to participate.

Even if Jun Yu was not the only reason, she should at least be one of the main reasons.

Yu Wangshu did not think there was anything wrong with Xu Yizhuo’s thinking. After all, as far as she knew, the number of young cultivators rushing to Yunwu City this time was astonishingly large. The last time Knocking on the Immortal Gate had such a grand occasion was a thousand years ago… when that legendary Imperial Daughter had still been around.

Even Yu Wangshu held a trace of delusion in her heart about becoming the disciple of the master of Shiwai Tower. Although the great experts presiding over the major immortal sects were also renowned existences in the cultivation world, compared with the number one person in the cultivation world, even those great experts paled.

Only Xu Yizhuo knew that her participation in Knocking on the Immortal Gate had nothing to do with Jun Yu at all.

It would be nice if she had a chance to meet someone familiar, but Xu Yizhuo was entirely aiming for the major immortal sects.

To be precise, she was aiming for Lisheng Sect among the major immortal sects.

Xu Yizhuo did not know exactly how many major immortal sects were participating in Knocking on the Immortal Gate, but Lisheng Sect, which possessed a fragment of the Yellow Springs Mirror, was definitely among them. Di Xiang had a large number of records about the Lisheng Mirror possessed by Lisheng Sect. Who knew how long she had been coveting it?

Lisheng Sect was a rather special sect. It had been born because of the Lisheng Mirror. Its founder was a ghost cultivator whose movements were mysterious, and for unknown reasons, he had obtained the Lisheng Mirror. It was not that no one had seen him as weak and isolated and wanted to snatch it from his hands. However, because of the Lisheng Mirror’s characteristics and the founder’s identity as a ghost cultivator, he used that mirror with extraordinary mastery. Later, he even founded a sect, making it even harder for others to act.

Lisheng Sect was not entirely made up of ghost cultivators. There were also some human cultivators, and the proportion of human cultivators had grown larger and larger. This sect’s style of doing things was actually somewhat similar to demonic cultivators. However, back then, both the immortal path and the demonic path wanted to pull this ghost cultivator sect that possessed the Yellow Springs Mirror into their camp. The founder was moved by the awe-inspiring righteousness of the immortal path cultivators, so he resolutely leaned toward the immortal path. After that, Lisheng Sect’s position had not changed for thousands of years.

That was the widely circulated version.

Di Xiang had recorded with great disdain that it was clearly because the immortal path had a large family and great wealth, and had offered enough benefits. Otherwise, that fellow would have dragged his whole household to the demonic path long ago.

“That fellow” referred to Lisheng Sect’s first sect master.

The sect master had changed many times by now, but it was said that the original ghost cultivator had failed to ascend and had never dissipated either. At least when Di Xiang was alive, she had still had contact with that ghost cultivator. Perhaps because of this, among the remaining Yellow Springs Mirror fragments, Di Xiang understood the Lisheng Mirror the most.

After careful comparison, Xu Yizhuo believed that the possibility of obtaining the Lisheng Mirror was the highest. Now that an opportunity to slip into Lisheng Sect and approach Lisheng Sect’s core figures in one move had been placed before her, Xu Yizhuo naturally wanted to try and grasp it.

Xu Yizhuo herself was quite optimistic. She had now entered the Dao and was no longer in the situation where she had an entire body of cultivation but did not know how to use it. Although she lacked a bit of practical combat experience, she would definitely clash with others in the Burning Mountain Secret Realm. After staying in the secret realm for one month, by the time she came out, her skills should be enough to deal with Knocking on the Immortal Gate no matter what.

Xu Yizhuo even had a premonition that by then, what she stolen content would need to worry about was probably how to disguise herself as a little more useless.

Pretending to be a weak little noob was also a difficult problem.

During the first half of the journey to Yunwu City, Xu Yizhuo was still fairly relaxed. As the day the Burning Mountain Secret Realm opened gradually approached, Xu Yizhuo inevitably began worrying about whether they could arrive on time. She was clearly not the only one worrying about this. When there were only five days left until the Burning Mountain Secret Realm opened, the atmosphere on the flying boat was obviously somewhat restless.

The cultivator driving the flying boat calmly comforted them. “Don’t worry, don’t worry. I won’t let you be late. Let me tell you, our current speed is actually just right. Your departure time was already late. Even if you arrived in Yunwu City now, there’d be nowhere to stay. Why not fly a little slower? When we arrive in Yunwu City, you can sign up and directly enter the secret realm. You won’t even need to think about lodging. Isn’t that arrangement great?”

This cultivator was truly skilled at timing things perfectly.

The Burning Mountain Secret Realm opened at noon. Xu Yizhuo arrived in Yunwu City at the hour of Mao that same day. The moment she saw Yunwu City from far away, Xu Yizhuo understood the origin of its name.

This truly was a city standing above the clouds and mist.

It was built at the peak of a tall mountain, where the summit almost connected with the sky. That was the Western Continent’s tallest mountain, Chengyun Mountain. It was said that in ancient times, many cultivators had broken through on this mountain, ascended to immortality, and ridden the clouds away. Because Chengyun Mountain rose straight into the clouds, a wondrous sight appeared. From far away, the sea of clouds cut Chengyun Mountain in half at the waist, and its summit was like a small island floating above the cloud sea.

The flying boat Xu Yizhuo rode could not reach Yunwu City’s altitude.

“We can’t go any higher. This kind of flying boat can only fly this high. If you want to go higher, you can only ride the Yunwai Flying Boat,” the cultivator said. “I’ll set you down at the mountainside. You’ll have to walk the rest of the way yourselves.”

“With Knocking on the Immortal Gate approaching, the formations on Chengyun Mountain have already been withdrawn. Just follow the mountain road upward. At the end is Yunwu City.”

At that time, the waning moon hung low, and stars filled the sky.

Xu Yizhuo raised her head and looked up. Before she saw the city that seemed built upon the clouds, she first saw a sea of clouds. Faintly, she could see lights among the clouds.

When Xu Yizhuo walked into the sea of clouds, pale purple lanterns floated toward her. When Xu Yizhuo saw the full appearance of the lanterns, she could not help widening her eyes. They were actually extremely similar to the Soul-Detaining Lanterns she had seen in Lotus City, only the color was different.

The lotus lanterns seemed alive. When Xu Yizhuo carefully touched one with her finger, she felt the soft texture of petals. The lotus petals shyly closed together, and it drifted far away all at once.

If someone said these lotus lanterns had nothing to do with Di Xiang, Xu Yizhuo would never believe it.

At this moment, a cultivator walking beside her sighed emotionally, “It’s said that these lotus lanterns were also left behind by that person. In the end, the aristocratic families gave up on erasing all traces of her existence. I wonder whether the Cloud Palace in the city is still the same as in the past.”

Xu Yizhuo did not know what the Cloud Palace was. She only knew that dawnlight broke through the clouds, and she arrived in Yunwu City.

Yunwu City was a city built from white stone. At this hour, there were already very few cultivators coming to sign up, so Xu Yizhuo entered the city very easily. Following the directions of passersby, she went all the way to the city’s central square and completed her registration in a nearby stone pavilion.

By the time Xu Yizhuo finished registering, it was nearly noon. She followed the crowd, and before she even quite understood the situation, she muddleheadedly followed the others into the opened Burning Mountain Secret Realm.

Not long after she entered the Burning Mountain Secret Realm, Yunwu City welcomed the most important guest of this session of Knocking on the Immortal Gate.

An exquisite Yunwai Flying Boat slowly descended onto Yunwu City’s Cloud-Ascent Platform. Rather than calling it a Yunwai Flying Boat, it was more like a white jade tower among the clouds.

After the elder of Xuanyu Immortal Sect finished opening the Burning Mountain Secret Realm, he did not continue to keep watch over the square, but hurried to the Cloud-Ascent Platform.

A woman dressed in snow-white walked out from the white jade tower. The elder said in a clear voice, “Tower Master Jun, long time no see!”