37 First Marking

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“Ah! They are both good children. I blame myself for being so rash and bringing them here. I neglected their upbringing, and that is how they picked up these bad habits!” Aunt Lan sighed, her face filled with remorse. The crow’s-feet at the corners of her eyes seemed to deepen.

“You’re saying that’s all you know?” Tie Cheng had already guessed that Liu Zhang would try to shift part of the blame.

Countless cultivators had appeared. Even the Adepts, normally as elusive as dragons, were now making frequent appearances, streaking across the sky as beams of light.

“If that’s the case, has anyone ever left this place? Have you ever thought about leaving?” Ye Yinfeng asked curiously. In a chaotic, desolate place like Frostbound City, surely some people could not bear to remain there and would choose to leave. Yet he had never heard the other man mention leaving Frostbound City, and this puzzled him greatly.

Some sat high atop fine steeds, while others rode in ornate carriages. When they saw Ye Yinfeng standing there alone, disdain flickered in their eyes. At the same time, they looked surprised, as though they had discovered a new continent. They had never seen such a shabby young man appear on this main avenue.

That was why he had to seize this opportunity. Even if it meant gambling ten years of his life—twenty or thirty—he would do so without hesitation.

With nowhere left to retreat, Jin Xiuquan could only give it everything he had. For a time, fists and feet flew in a spectacular frenzy. Yet against Lin Jian’s inhuman, steel-like body, Jin Xiuquan’s heavy blows looked no better than flashy forms without substance, carrying an unmistakable air of weakness beneath their outward force.

Had the Six Doors not established the principle of “putting people first” as its founding constitution, and had the relics of the Age of Deification not intimidated the nonhumans into submission, Zhang Hao would never have dared openly defy Qiao Naihe.

The purple-robed man threw back his head and laughed twice. Not the slightest ripple stirred his magical power. Even Wukong, standing within arm’s reach, could not sense his cultivation level. His heart tightened, but then he remembered that he was only a monkey and wondered what he had to be nervous about.

Lin Jingyi noticed this fact and formed a certain suspicion. However, he knew that Luo Jiutian’s next words would surely unravel the mystery, so he did not press the matter further.

Luo Tian now knew how to refine pills as well. When he was ten, he had written to his good-for-nothing father and asked him to find an alchemist to teach him. With the theories in his mind as a foundation, Luo Tian had studied pill refinement for only a year, yet he could already be considered a fourth-grade alchemist and could barely manage to refine fifth-grade pills.

“Can you understand this?” Qin Yu asked, only to regret it the instant the words left her mouth. After all, she had written it herself.

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They feared neither life nor death. One after another, they charged forward, their assassination techniques exceptionally sharp and clearly the product of rigorous training.

“I thought the person opposite us was supposed to be formidable. He’s so slow even when moving around,” Ling Jiangyue said disdainfully.

Seeing Li Muchen merely stare at him coldly, Jin Jiesi realized that he had once again asked a question in vain. Since the other man had no intention of answering, he had no choice but to change the subject.

Old Xin’s legs always troubled him when winter came. When his grandson failed to answer, he made his way toward the entrance with the aid of his cane—but then his mind suddenly exploded with a thunderclap.

Holding her teacup, Bai Weiyang calmly thought to herself, Those who cannot keep pace with the tide of the times will eventually be cast aside by it.

In the dim stone chamber, Gu Yue leaned against the wall in a corner, his head lolling casually to one side. His left leg was bent at the knee, his right stretched out straight. His expression was especially desolate, his brows drawn into deep furrows. He had just tried to sense the curse of the dead, but his mind had nearly collapsed beneath its pressure. The heavenly force contained within that curse was truly terrifying.

Another man stood behind him, tall and graceful, his ears faintly translucent beneath the yellow, suggestive lamplight.

Geng Long knew that Xue Zhao was trying to comfort him. But he was so accustomed to being cared for by others that when suddenly asked to show concern for someone else, he found himself unable to organize his words effectively.

Then I looked at my parents’ spirits and gently waved my hand. Their spirits awoke from their slumber.

“All right. There’s basically nothing wrong anymore.” Feng Wu reached out, took Niannian’s hand, and began examining her pulse carefully.

Ao Lie supported Xuanzang as they climbed by grasping vines and clinging to creepers. When they finally reached the very summit, they indeed saw countless rays of golden light and innumerable strands of auspicious energy. A square boulder stood there, with a seal pasted upon it bearing six golden words: “Om Mani Padme Hum.”

“We both know what Wu’er is like. If she finds out that you truly have a fiancée and are still entangled with her...” Qin Meinan let the implication hang, gazing expressionlessly at Ye Xiang as he waited for an answer.

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Ye Xiang’s gloomy expression finally eased a little, but his mind continued replaying Wu’er’s words. Why had Wu’er let her imagination run wild? Why had she become so sorrowful? Could it have been because he had left without saying goodbye? No, that did not make sense. She had seemed perfectly fine when they were on the street that day. Had something happened in between—something he knew nothing about?

After annihilating the enemy forces at Jiashi Pass, Cao Shuo did not order his troops to halt and regroup. Instead, he pressed onward, driving the routed soldiers toward their central army and throwing its formation into disarray. Three thousand soldiers clad entirely in black were like three thousand ferocious tigers descending from the mountains, fighting all the way from the northern end of Jiashi Pass to the southern end.

They had only themselves to blame for failing to anticipate Yang Xin’s abilities. They had assumed hers was a strength-based power, and the anesthetic rounds laced with an ability-suppressing agent had made them careless. As a result, Yang Xin and Liu Zhengxian caught them completely off guard.

When Nezha heard this, his mouth fell open. With difficulty, he said, “Elder Uncle Huanglong is your elder uncle?” Before his reincarnation, Nezha had witnessed the ruthless treatment Elder Uncle Huanglong had meted out to Qingxu and Daoxing. A chill ran through him at the memory. Then he remembered his master’s warning that he would be taught a lesson if he caused trouble.

In truth, he understood these principles himself. It was just that, even after realizing them, he had still been unable to escape that shadow.

Of course, another aftereffect of the great upheaval in Fobole remained unknown to the world: a monster whose strength rivaled that of a pan-dimensional being—in the terminology of the primary plane, a god.

Qian Shao had fallen into a dead end. He had not remembered the matter of the Batcave. He thought they were merely a few ordinary unaffiliated players. Since players did not usually display their tribe names above their heads, he had paid no attention to them at all.

At the same time, Yahoo announced that it had formed a strategic alliance with Alibaba. Yahoo would invest one billion U.S. dollars in exchange for a forty percent stake in Alibaba, becoming one of the company’s shareholders.

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