The Eight Scenes Villa was, in essence, a formation corresponding to the Eight Gates Golden Lock. For the Great Perfected Master Qi, this was no great challenge. Soon, she led Li Qingxiao to the position of the Death Gate among the eight.
The sight before them was one of utter devastation, as if a fierce battle had taken place. Broken walls and ruins filled their vision, the area nearly reduced to rubble.
Li Qingxiao was speechless with shock. This was the Grand Patriarch's "hidden residence"—how could it have fallen into such a state?
Leaving aside the question of who would dare to wreak havoc in the Grand Patriarch's ancestral home, even if someone had done so, why hadn't the Li Clan restored it?
Could this be related to the Death Gate of the Eight Gates Golden Lock?
Just what had happened in the Eight Scenes Villa?
The Great Perfected Master Qi remained silent, pressing forward without pause.
Soon, the remnants of a structure came into Li Qingxiao's view.
Most of the building had been destroyed, leaving only its foundation. Yet, bizarrely, the entire foundation was upside down.
In other words, there had once been a building here, but it had not been constructed upward in the usual manner—instead, it had been built downward, inverted.
This was unlike ordinary underground palaces or tombs. Though subterranean, those were still built right-side up. This structure, however, was constructed in reverse, completely inverted, with even the murals on its foundation upside down.
The Great Perfected Master Qi pointed and said, "There was once an inverted tower here, part of the Daoist 'Jade Capital in the Heavens' project. Now, the tower has broken and fallen into the underworld."
Li Qingxiao could only respond with a single word: "Huh?"
Just this morning, he had been worrying about his livelihood. In the blink of an eye, he was now entangled in such a grand mystery? Was the Supreme Dao Ancestor playing some kind of joke on him?
The Great Perfected Master Qi continued, "The Li Clan sealed this place. To break the seal without alerting the Grand Patriarch who set it, I'll need to borrow your blood."
Finally, Li Qingxiao couldn't hold back his question. "Great Perfected Master Qi, you said the chaotic aura within me is why I was tainted by the 'Great Desolate Heaven' and why I'm different from other members of the Li Clan. Then, may I ask—where did this chaotic aura come from?"
The Great Perfected Master Qi raised two fingers. "There are only two possibilities. The first is external infusion, something only celestial outsiders can achieve. The second is inheritance from one's parents. After being filtered through the first host, the chaotic aura in the second host is no longer lethal but lies dormant."
A chill ran through Li Qingxiao's heart.
Both his parents had died in the line of duty—his father before he was born, and his mother shortly after his birth. As for the exact cause of their deaths, the Daoist authorities had always been vague, merely citing "accidents." Could it all be related to this so-called chaotic aura?
Had his parents died because they were accidentally exposed to the chaotic aura of celestial outsiders?
And as their posthumous child, had he inherited this chaotic aura from them?
The Great Perfected Master Qi went on, "Chaotic aura is extremely subtle—most wouldn't notice it. But I'm an exception. If even I couldn't detect it, few in this world could. Enough talk. Prepare to shed some blood."
With that, she grasped Li Qingxiao's wrist and lightly traced a fingernail across his vein. Blood flowed out, but the wound was smooth as a mirror, and the blood didn't spill haphazardly. Instead, it hovered in the air, forming distinct droplets like beads of glass.
As the Great Perfected Master Qi had said, at first glance, the blood seemed ordinary—indeed, unnoticeable to the untrained eye.
Only when Li Qingxiao grew pale from blood loss did the Great Perfected Master Qi swipe her hand over the wound, stopping the bleeding and erasing all traces of the injury, leaving not even a scar.
Then, with a sweeping motion, she gathered all the blood droplets. Using her finger as a brush and the blood as ink, she painted a massive blood talisman—each stroke corresponding to one of the 365 droplets, matching the number of celestial cycles.
"By decree!" The Great Perfected Master Qi pointed at the blood talisman.
A faint shattering sound echoed, as if something unseen had been broken.
In an instant, the scene before them twisted violently, like shattering a reflection in a mirror or disturbing the moon in water.
The foundation remained inverted, but the ground around it vanished, replaced by a bottomless abyss. The foundation now hovered above the abyss, beneath which lay an unfathomable darkness.
Li Qingxiao cautiously peered down and saw fragments of structures drifting in the abyss—likely the remnants of the so-called inverted tower.
"Is that... the legendary underworld?" he murmured.
The Great Perfected Master Qi produced a lantern, crafted entirely of crystal-clear glass. A single flame, no larger than a bean, burned within, radiating a shifting spectrum of seven colors.
Raising the lantern high, she illuminated the remaining foundation and the wreckage in the abyss, chanting under her breath.
Li Qingxiao assumed it was some profound Daoist incantation and leaned in to listen carefully.
But what he heard was:
"First, I summon the soul of the Supreme Dao Ancestor;
Second, the Mystic Sage descends upon me.
Third, I call upon the Eastern Emperor and Ancestor Yao;
May our forebears shield us with righteous energy.
To the south, the Celestial Masters observe our rites;
To the north, the State Preceptor takes heed.
Gather the scholars and warriors of the Three Teachings;
Aid this old Qi in stabilizing the cosmos.
The Three Pure Ones take their rightful places;
The Qi ancestors fortify my spirit.
Let the waters of the four seas stand inverted;
Let the clouds of the nine heavens cover the earth.
May all heroes of the realm unite;
This old Qi shall repay the debt in time.
Repay the debt!"
Li Qingxiao was speechless. This sounded more like the ramblings of a street performer than the words of a Daoist Great Perfected Master.
Yet, in the next moment, time froze. Everything turned monochrome, locked in stillness.
Then, time began to flow backward.
The wreckage that had fallen into the abyss now rose from the depths, reassembling itself piece by piece.
Stone slabs reformed the ground; red bricks rebuilt the walls; tiles reassembled into eaves. Even a rusted bronze bell flew up from the abyss, its verdigris fading at a visible pace until it regained its original brass hue, reattaching itself to the eaves.
Talismans, mantras, and totems reappeared on the tower's surface, revealing the grand significance of this colossal structure.
More broken segments of the tower ascended from the abyss, reconnecting with the foundation in proper order. The inverted tower grew taller and taller, stretching downward into the unfathomable darkness.
Finally, an inverted pagoda—towering above the abyss—appeared before Li Qingxiao's eyes, pristine as if newly built.
Thirty-three stories high, corresponding to the Daoist Thirty-Three Heavens.
The sight was awe-inspiring, nothing short of a divine miracle.
Li Qingxiao stood in stunned silence.
The Great Perfected Master Qi turned to him and said, "Three years. If you're still alive in three years, we'll meet again."
With those words, a jade pendant fell into Li Qingxiao's hand.
"Take this token and seek out Chen Jiansheng in Borneo. He'll understand."
Her voice faded as she strode toward the inverted tower.
The upside-down gate slowly opened.
Everything inside was inverted. As the Great Perfected Master Qi stepped inside, she walked upon the ceiling, the floor now above her head.
Then, the gate slammed shut.
The blood talisman gradually faded until it vanished entirely. Everything returned to its original state—no abyss, no inverted tower, just an upside-down foundation, as if nothing had happened.
Yet the absence of the Great Perfected Master Qi and the jade pendant in his hand reminded Li Qingxiao: this was no illusion. It had all been real.
A Daoist Vice-Patriarch, a Great Perfected Master, had entered the underworld through the inverted tower, promising to meet Li Qingxiao again upon her return—provided he survived the corruption of the "Great Desolate Heaven."