The Ling Mountain Summit lies at the end of the southwestern branch of the Bottomless Pit. With an elevation of eight thousand meters, it effectively keeps cultivators below the Ghost Envoy realm away.
Around midnight, the surrounding area within a hundred li would be shrouded in dense fog, making it extremely difficult to locate the place with the naked eye.
Because Ling Mountain Summit occupied such a peculiar location, a black market gradually flourished there. Unbeknownst to anyone, it had already existed for a thousand years.
No matter how deserted it was, whenever the black market opened, hundreds of rogue cultivators would gather there.
Rogue cultivators were extremely impoverished. They did not even possess complete inheritances of cultivation arts. Every major faction knew what Ling Mountain Summit was really like, so no one had any interest in the black market.
At midnight, when the dense fog spread across the area, blood-red vegetation would sprout from the soil. In merely a few moments, it would grow into bulging structures.
The bulges resembled military tents, but were actually enormous leaves.
The leaves continuously absorbed the dense fog, barely maintaining visibility within the black market and at least ensuring that the rogue cultivators would not become lost on Ling Mountain Summit.
An old man crawled out from a grave. He was known as the "Lamplighter," and his cultivation had only just reached the Half-Corpse realm. However, as an Undying, his lifespan was practically endless, so he had remained on Ling Mountain Summit all this time.
The Lamplighter staggered to the center of the black market and took corpse oil from the wound in his abdomen, placing it inside a rusty bronze lamp artifact.
The bronze lamp emitted a faint glow, making Ling Mountain Summit stand out amid the dense fog.
Dark crows cried loudly from the branches, seemingly heralding the opening of the black market and drawing the long-waiting rogue cultivators toward Ling Mountain Summit.
Cultivators gradually arrived from the Bottomless Pit on their artifacts. Each found a bulge to settle down at and began arranging the resources they were about to sell.
For rogue cultivators, a black market that existed for a long time was extremely important.
They would inevitably have resources they had no use for that they needed to exchange. Given enough time, perhaps they could gain a little more opportunity to break through their bottlenecks.
The waning moon hung high in the sky, and the black market became lively.
Feng Ye traveled through the Bottomless Pit on the howling wind. Following the mission issued by Dream City, he soon arrived at Ling Mountain Summit.
The Wind Void People had yet to join the Stomach World, but that did not mean they were not members of The Heavenly Court.
Because they were likewise descendants of Immortals and gods, they were permitted to enter Dream City and were also qualified to accept missions. As a result, they did not receive the monthly allowance of three stones of Blood Crystals given to members of the Restraint Officers' Hall.
To avoid exposing his cultivation, Feng Ye had taken a pill that suppressed his cultivation in advance. In the eyes of others, he was merely a cultivator of the Ghost Envoy realm.
After arriving at Ling Mountain Summit, he discovered that he had still underestimated the strength of the rogue cultivators.
There were actually several Yang God realm auras within the black market. Their ability to coexist peacefully in the cramped Ling Mountain Summit indicated that the person behind the black market possessed at least Heavenly Aberration realm cultivation, otherwise they would not be so wary.
Feng Ye looked around and discovered quite a few dragon-shaped decorations in the black market. His expression became somewhat startled.
He hurriedly lowered his head, pretending to conceal the fluctuations in his emotions, and walked toward the stalls inside the black market. No cultivator stopped him.
Feng Ye noticed that the rogue cultivators' stalls were all selling their own organs or flesh and blood tissues stripped from corpses. They did not care at all whether consuming them would cause uncontrolled mutation.
He felt somewhat uncomfortable, but followed the requirements of the mission and began investigating.
More than a dozen pairs of eyes secretly watched Feng Ye, all remaining silent.
Although they did not know that Feng Ye possessed Heavenly Aberration realm cultivation, they could tell that he most likely came from The Heavenly Court, so none of them asked about his identity.
Cultivators from The Heavenly Court generally possessed systematic inheritances of cultivation arts, yet they had no sense of reverence whatsoever.
Because of the Restraint Officers' Hall's missions outside, cultivators from The Heavenly Court had now spread throughout every region. They were a group of extremely fanatical lunatics.
Their most famous trait was their endless pursuit of resources.
Whenever cultivators from The Heavenly Court appeared somewhere, it meant they would emerge endlessly like locusts until everything had been completely consumed.
The Yang God realm cultivators in the black market were somewhat uneasy. However, remembering that the black market's master was a descendant of an ancient Immortal god of The Heavenly Court, they did not attempt to do anything foolish to Feng Ye.
The facts were indeed as they had expected. Feng Ye had come to Ling Mountain Summit precisely because of the black market's master.
Feng Ye probed for clues indirectly. After hearing that the black market's master had made a spectacular display in Jingzhou, he could not help feeling apprehensive.
"So your black market master is called Dragon King of the Four Seas?"
Feng Ye asked with a strange expression. He received the same answer from every stall owner, and some rogue cultivators even claimed with certainty that they had seen Dragon King of the Four Seas himself.
They spoke with absolute confidence about Dragon King of the Four Seas overpowering several opponents of the same realm.
Even when Immortals and Buddhas made their moves, Dragon King of the Four Seas could still escape safely. Among the Heavenly Aberration realm Immortal Wanderers, he was even considered one of the top ten experts.
When Feng Ye wanted to continue probing for information about the black market's master, he noticed that Dragon King of the Four Seas rarely appeared and had only shown himself three years ago.
Feng Ye shook his head with a solemn expression.
The mission he had accepted was to investigate the black market's master. If it had truly been founded by Dragon King of the Four Seas of The Heavenly Court's Thunder Department, there was no reason for Dream City to issue such a bizarre mission.
Feng Ye waited until sunrise, when the rogue cultivators of the black market dispersed.
He reported the clues concerning the black market to Dream City, then returned to the Bottomless Pit. The black market would not reopen until the fifteenth of the following month.
Feng Ye noticed that there were more and more missions concerning The Heavenly Court. Could there really be cultivators deliberately impersonating The Heavenly Court and making a spectacle of themselves outside?
All the mission information eventually converged in Ren Qing's hands.
Not only Dragon King of the Four Seas, but even titles such as Lord of the North Pole Star, Plague-Bringing Immortal, and Doushu Star Lord were frequently appearing in various places.
At first, Ren Qing suspected that cultivators such as Elephant Lord were borrowing the name of The Heavenly Court.
But he soon noticed that cultivators such as Elephant Lord were still operating around Jingzhou and simply did not have enough time to travel to Ling Mountain Summit.
Moreover, the black market on Ling Mountain Summit had existed intermittently for more than a thousand years.
Although the rogue cultivators had always been suspicious of the black market master's identity, the sudden act of pointing the finger at Dragon King of the Four Seas had occurred almost without warning.
It was as if an invisible hand were influencing the direction of The Heavenly Court's reputation.
Ren Qing had already dispatched more than a dozen cultivators to investigate the black market.
According to the information they reported, the black market was merely a crude gathering place. Its ability to survive for a thousand years was simply because it was inconspicuous.
Ren Qing cursed under his breath several times.
He could now confirm that a certain faction was preparing to snatch the fruits of his labor.
The other side's foundations were definitely deeper than those of the Restraint Officers' Hall. Judging from the rumors about The Heavenly Court that had emerged independently in various regions, they possessed at least double-digit numbers of Heavenly Aberration realm cultivators.
One had to understand that the "Theory of The Heavenly Court" had already been accepted by most factions.
It was as though, several thousand years ago, there truly had been a world beyond the heavens that housed Immortals and gods, but for some reason, it had ultimately led to the destruction of The Heavenly Court.
Most cultivators already believed that The Heavenly Court had once existed. Even those who thought it was fabricated would not openly deny it.
As long as the Restraint Officers' Hall established itself as the descendants of The Heavenly Court, it would be equivalent to gilding itself with legitimacy.
In the future, if their strength became sufficient to convince everyone, they could even openly rebuild The Heavenly Court, because the Restraint Officers' Hall possessed the "righteous cause."
This was also why Ren Qing was working so hard to develop the Restraint Officers' Hall. Who knew whether the dangers of this world were limited to Immortals and Buddhas? What if the Three Dao Ancestors and the Three Buddhas of the Three Ages were still not the end?
He wanted to raise the banner of The Heavenly Court and make the cultivators of the world become grasshoppers tied to the same rope.
Yet Ren Qing had discovered that a faction was secretly fighting over the title of The Heavenly Court and even claiming to be Dragon King of the Four Seas.
If he continued burying his head in development as he normally did, it was entirely possible that in a few years, the orthodox succession of The Heavenly Court would belong entirely to someone else.
A cold smile appeared on Ren Qing's face. They really thought the Restraint Officers' Hall was a soft persimmon that could be squeezed at will.
He instructed the various cultivators to keep an eye on the places where the rumors originated. If anything unexpected happened, Daoist Mu Snake was ready to provide support at any time.
Ren Qing wanted to see exactly what faction had such enormous nerve. Did they think the third level of the Underworld had too much empty space in its prison cells?
He was afraid that a false The Heavenly Court would cause the lie to collapse, because those so-called ruins of The Heavenly Court were certainly fictitious.
After pondering for a moment, Ren Qing decided to open the Minor The Heavenly Court within Matchmaking Immortal's Mud Pellet Palace.
Although the Minor The Heavenly Court still had considerable flaws, it was far more genuine than those obviously fake ruins of The Heavenly Court.
If the deception surrounding The Heavenly Court could be maintained for a long time, it would allow him to drive large numbers of cultivators to work for him and search for the Immortal positions hidden throughout this world.
Using Matchmaking Immortal, Ren Qing communicated with the many Heavenly Aberration realm cultivators from Jingzhou, including Lady White Bone, who had spent more than a decade imprisoned in the Underworld.
Lady White Bone was still using a clone, with varying degrees of decay in the joints of her hands and feet.
She had already grown accustomed to life in prison. She could calm her mind and temper her cultivation arts while using her soul to absorb the Yin Qi drifting through the surroundings.
Lady White Bone felt that if she were imprisoned in the Underworld for several thousand years without going insane, perhaps she could discover a way to reach the consummate Heavenly Aberration realm without possessing an Immortal position.
Unfortunately, Lady White Bone possessed a clear understanding of the soul.
In another three or four hundred years, instinct would probably cause her soul to fall asleep, preventing her consciousness from destroying itself.
Lady White Bone continued to let her thoughts run wild until she gradually fell asleep.
For more than a decade, her dreams had repeatedly brought her to the ruins of The Heavenly Court. Her initial excitement had long since turned into numbness.
As usual, Lady White Bone wandered around the Southern Heavenly Gate, gazing at the world beyond the heavens that had once been inhabited by countless Immortals and gods thousands of years ago.
She had assumed that the ruins of The Heavenly Court would not have changed at all even after a thousand years.
But the resistance Lady White Bone had imagined never appeared. The Southern Heavenly Gate actually accepted her presence without the slightest attempt to stop her.
She passed through the Southern Heavenly Gate and arrived at The Heavenly Court formed from ruins. She could vaguely see several Wind Void People guarding the halls of the Thunder Department.
"Perhaps I can rely on The Heavenly Court's inheritance to escape the Underworld's prison."
Lady White Bone smiled and hurried toward the halls of the Plague Department.
The halls of the Plague Department were dilapidated, but a complete statue could still be vaguely seen among the ruins. Its stone surface was covered in densely packed writing.
It very likely recorded a cultivation art that led directly to the Earth Immortal realm.
Lady White Bone quickened her pace, but she had barely gone far before she seemed to encounter an invisible barrier. After only a thousand meters, she could no longer advance.
Her expression turned resentful. Just as she had seen a glimmer of hope, it was immediately extinguished, and the state of her mind as a Heavenly Aberration realm cultivator instantly began to fall out of balance.
Ren Qing took advantage of the opportunity to cast the Zhili Technique, applying it to Lady White Bone's memories.
He discovered that Lady White Bone, like Daoist Mu Snake, had no memories of her previous life after comprehending her cultivation arts through the Heavenly Dao.
Ren Qing became deeply suspicious. Madam White Gu should have been a new life resurrected from a corpse.
Her original soul had already been scattered by the impact of the Heavenly Dao, which was why her potential was far inferior to what she had possessed during her lifetime when she was capable of creating cultivation arts.
From the two of them, Ren Qing also came up with an extremely bold idea.
"In a sense, as long as the creators of cultivation arts reconstructed by the information stream grow up, they should inevitably be able to reach the Heavenly Aberration realm, right?"
In any case, he had nothing to lose by trying. If it succeeded, the Restraint Officers' Hall would be able to produce Heavenly Aberration realm cultivators in batches.
He guided Lady White Bone until, without realizing it, she arrived at a corner of the Southern Heavenly Gate.
Lady White Bone had also calmed down by this point. She knew that being confined in a prison cell for too long had caused her soul to accumulate a great deal of negative emotion.
If she did not pay attention, the slightest mistake could cause her to lose control and go astray.
As an Undying, she actually had plenty of patience to wait in the Underworld for an opportunity. But if an accident caused her state of mind to fall out of balance, she might die and have her cultivation destroyed within only a few years.
Lady White Bone took a deep breath. Whatever happened, it was good enough that she had found something in The Heavenly Court.
Perhaps after discovering the rules of The Heavenly Court, she could continue deeper into the ruins. There was no reason that even the Wind Void People, who did not possess Heavenly Aberration realm cultivation, could move around the vicinity of the Thunder Department halls.
Lady White Bone immediately began carefully searching the surrounding area.
She noticed that she was merely a projection formed from consciousness, so any physical labor required the consumption of a corresponding amount of soul aura.
Even moving an object weighing half a meter required Lady White Bone to spend considerable time.
"The Southern Heavenly Gate should be guarded by giants over a thousand meters tall. Completely clearing the area is practically impossible. I might as well lower my expectations."
Lady White Bone's gaze settled on the barracks beside the Southern Heavenly Gate. Countless remnants of blades, swords, halberds, and spears were scattered inside, and a murderous aura rushed toward her.
She slowly walked toward the barracks. Only after stepping onto the drill ground did she encounter faint resistance.
With Lady White Bone's vision as a Heavenly Aberration realm cultivator, the ruined weapons covering the ground were still far from ordinary. Any one of them could drive Yang God realm cultivators mad with desire.
What shocked her most was that the weapons were practically flawless. The craftsmanship was also identical, and even the time required to forge them was nearly the same.
It was difficult to imagine how terrifying The Heavenly Court had been at its peak.
Exactly how many master craftsmen had it possessed to gather all the Immortals and gods of the world under its command? And what kind of enemy could turn The Heavenly Court into ruins, leaving it in such a miserable state that it had to survive for thousands of years?
Lady White Bone stood motionless in the barracks for several hours, until her consciousness returned to her body.
She had never considered the possibility that the ruins of The Heavenly Court were fake. From this, one could see how masterful Ren Qing's methods were. It was nine parts truth and one part falsehood.
Mixing nine parts truth with one part falsehood was the truly sophisticated form of deception.
The weapons had all been forged by Ghost Shadows. Only Ghost Shadows could perform assembly-line artifact forging, allowing every weapon to possess high quality and an extremely high degree of uniformity.
Although Ren Qing felt great pain over deliberately destroying the weapons, the price had to be paid. In any case, the Stomach World could also produce ore.
He digested Lady White Bone's memories and gradually perfected the idea in his mind.
Whether in Daoist Mu Snake's soul or Lady White Bone's soul, Ren Qing had discovered an extremely obscure "lock."
The soul lock was the legendary "Mystery of the Womb."
As long as the Mystery of the Womb was unlocked, memories from a previous life could be recalled.
Of course, not every cultivator possessed a Mystery of the Womb. One possibility was a situation like Lady White Bone's, where a new soul was born from a corpse.
Another possibility was reincarnation into the Stomach World through the Earth Immortal Office. Once one's cultivation deepened, memories of the previous life would gradually awaken.
The reason Daoist Mu Snake was willing to become a Ferryman in the Yellow Springs was that having his soul washed by deathly aura gave him a chance to unlock the Mystery of the Womb.
However, in Ren Qing's view, Daoist Mu Snake could not possibly inherit his memories in their entirety.
He could only obtain fragments of insight. He could not become the Daoist Mu Snake who comprehended multiple cultivation arts and forged a cultivation path uniquely his own.
The following night, Lady White Bone once again voluntarily entered the Minor The Heavenly Court. She went straight to the barracks, wanting to find useful clues.
The Wind Void People noticed Lady White Bone's figure, but under Ren Qing's instructions, they merely monitored her and did not drive her away.
Lady White Bone did not dare waste time and searched as thoroughly as possible.
"How is this possible?"
"Since this is where the Heavenly Soldiers lived, there should be something extraordinary here. Could all the cultivation inheritances be inside the halls of the Immortal Departments?"
Lady White Bone came to the Minor The Heavenly Court every night, but the result left her extremely disappointed.
The barracks seemed to contain nothing but ruined weapons and the armor worn by the Heavenly Soldiers.
It was already difficult enough for her to freely enter and leave the Southern Heavenly Gate. Even if she brought the weapons into the Underworld, it would be impossible to break through the sturdy prison doors.
Not to mention that the Underworld itself was an enormous prison.
Lady White Bone had just intended to leave the barracks when she was suddenly drawn to a well in the corner. A faint moonlight seemed to emerge from within it.
How could the Minor The Heavenly Court have a sun and moon? The sky was perpetually shrouded in dense, impenetrable black clouds.
She instinctively approached the well. Moonlight fell across her face, and her soul felt waves of coolness. The fatigue in her soul was immediately swept away.
Lady White Bone became immersed in the strengthening of her soul, and time passed silently.
After awakening in the prison, the stagnant Yin Qi within her body had become active, making it easier for her to absorb external Yin Qi.
Lady White Bone was overjoyed and immediately sat down to cultivate her cultivation arts.
She seemed to see a possibility of escaping the prison. She concentrated all her effort on the same path, and before she realized it, her cultivation had risen to the Yang God realm.
Her soul far surpassed those of cultivators in the same realm and had already recovered to eighty percent of an ordinary Heavenly Aberration realm cultivator.
While Lady White Bone cultivated, Ren Qing also figured out the soul lock. She did not notice that her body and soul were gradually becoming covered by a disease seed.
The disease seed covered Lady White Bone's soul and used a crude method to unlock the Mystery of the Womb.
Lady White Bone inexplicably felt exhausted in both body and mind, assuming it was because she had been entering and leaving the Minor The Heavenly Court so frequently. She had no idea that someone was stealing her memories.
After Ren Qing obtained all of Lady White Bone's memories from her lifetime, his expression became excited.
He had never expected the memories to be so complete. They included Lady White Bone's experiences in the pleasure houses, her humiliation and descent into becoming a beggar, and finally her death, when her corpse was wrapped in a straw mat and discarded in a mass grave.
"If I can truly create Lady White Bone through her memories."
Ren Qing's idea had come from the two Ancestors. When it came to talent, no one could compare with those cultivators who had created their own cultivation arts.
Great Dream Perfected Person was an excellent example of talent.
There were quite a few cultivators of the same generation as Great Dream Perfected Person within the Restraint Officers' Hall. Head in the Jar had once been capable of standing alongside him.
Yet Head in the Jar was still stuck at the bottleneck of the Yin Difference realm, while Great Dream Perfected Person had already reached the consummation of the Yang God realm and was only one step away from the Heavenly Aberration realm.
Ren Qing was extremely curious whether cultivators resurrected through the memories of their previous lives could possess astonishing talent and break through the restrictions of the Heavenly Aberration realm.
His inspiration also came partly from Jingzhou. Did the Buddhist sect not use the souls of ancient monks to create tens of thousands of Buddhas?
If ordinary human souls were used instead, the Buddhas would need at least several years to adapt.
With a thought from Ren Qing, Lady White Bone involuntarily fell into a deep sleep.
Ren Qing took out a pill refined from the Other Shore Flower and gave it to Lady White Bone.
Other Shore Flower was cultivated by Zhuo Liuzi. After consuming the Other Shore Flower, if the soul could not withstand the mutation, the soul would dissolve. Otherwise, after thirty-six days, a false soul would be nurtured.
The proportion of Other Shore Flower contained in the pill was not high. It could only support a Ghost Envoy realm cultivator in nurturing a false soul, so it had little effect on someone in the Heavenly Aberration realm.
About a month passed before another strand of false soul appeared in Lady White Bone's Mud Pellet Palace.
However, the false soul was only the Corpse Dog Soul, one of the Seven Po Souls. It could not be considered complete, but it was sufficient to carry Lady White Bone's memories.
Ren Qing spent a long time selecting a village in the Stomach World. After allowing Lady White Bone's remnant soul to fuse with the Ghost Immortal Office, he sent it to guard a mountain range.
He injected the memories into the remnant soul. Lady White Bone's false soul barely resisted and successfully received nearly eighty percent of the memories.
Relying on the faith of mortals, the false soul would be able to completely recover within several decades.
At that time, Ren Qing intended to use the Earth Immortal Office's reincarnation ability to send them into the cycle of reincarnation and allow them to obtain physical bodies.
However, the Earth Immortal Office had a limited number of positions, so chosen ones could not possibly appear in large numbers.
Ren Qing repeated the same process. Daoist Mu Snake's memories and false soul were obtained with ease, and the latter offered little resistance as well.
He once again transformed the false soul into a Mountain God, then took a fungus seed from the Treasure Pavilion.
This fungus seed had been formed from several hundred divided souls tainted with the aura of Dao Lord Tai Sui when Great Dream Perfected Person advanced to the Ascension Ladder. In essence, it possessed all the characteristics of a soul.
Based on Ren Qing's understanding of the Scripture of Tai Sui, the fungus seed very likely retained the memories of Dao Lord Tai Sui.
After all, Dao Lord Tai Sui had reached the Heavenly Aberration realm through the Restraint Officer method, and his body and soul possessed the characteristics of a Strange Entity. Like a centipede that could remain active even after its death, he was extraordinarily tenacious.
Ren Qing directly cast Dao Lord Tai Sui's fungus seed into the Mountain God's temple.
After incorporating the Ghost Immortal Office into the fungus seed, the fungus seed seemed to undergo a subtle change, but on closer inspection, there was no difference at all.
Ren Qing himself had no confidence that the fungus seed could give birth to a soul.
Ren Qing still had four Earth Immortal Office positions. He intended to give two of them to his Ancestors.
But to Ren Qing's surprise, Heavenly Daozi actually chose to refuse.
Heavenly Daozi possessed only rudimentary intelligence and could not bear to leave the village's safety unattended. He would rather become a minor god who protected the mountain range from generation to generation.
Ren Qing awakened Chen Changsheng's consciousness. After hearing about the effects of the Earth Immortal Office, the latter agreed without much hesitation.
"There is no question of whether I am willing or not. After spending a hundred years in the mountains, I have already come to understand this. No matter how great the risks are, it is still better than sitting down and dying."
However, when Chen Changsheng learned of Heavenly Daozi's choice, he was not surprised in the slightest.
"Heavenly Daozi and I have been friends for many years. How could I not understand the nature of the Wuwei Daoist Temple?"
Chen Changsheng said helplessly, "I once advised Heavenly Daozi to bring his direct disciples to Xiangxiang and establish a lineage there, but Heavenly Daozi could not abandon the sect he had personally established."
"That is simply Heavenly Daozi's nature. It seems that sooner or later, he will awaken."
Chen Changsheng severed his own vitality, and his soul became increasingly dim.
"Grand-disciple, don't worry."
"If I can unlock the Mystery of the Womb in my next life, I will go to Mount Daxing and personally persuade Heavenly Daozi to reincarnate."
The Earth Immortal Office carried Chen Changsheng's soul toward the Heavenly Dao. What kind of life form he would become in his next life was no longer something Ren Qing could control.
Ren Qing also had no time to pay attention to it, because the matters arising from the false The Heavenly Court were even stranger than he had imagined.