Xu Yang exhaled slowly.
At least he wasn't going to lose his life at this very moment. That was something. He could figure out a way to nullify the contract later — there was always a way.
"You seem oddly calm about this," Mei Xue said, watching him.
"I suppose I'm just relieved you're not going to kill me right now."
Mei Xue's eyes narrowed. A moment of silence passed — then she laughed.
"Follow me."
Xu Yang fell into step behind her, pausing briefly to loot the storage pouch of the fallen Foundation Establishment disciple. No point leaving it behind.
They moved deeper into the tomb. So far they had passed through the entrance chamber and the first hall where they had fought the poison beast. Now, as they stepped into the next passage, a massive door loomed before them — its surface covered entirely in glowing runes.
Mei Xue formed a quick sequence of hand signs. A dense ball of energy condensed in her palm and shot forward, blasting the door open with a resonating boom.
Xu Yang wasn't particularly impressed. He had seen far more powerful cultivators in the Eastern Domain. He kept the thought to himself and followed her through.
What waited on the other side made him stop.
A vast underground lake stretched out before them, its surface perfectly still and dark. Above it, hovering without support, was a single purple orb — radiating a quiet, ancient pressure that made the air feel heavier just standing near it.
Xu Yang didn't move. Something about it set his instincts on edge.
"Do you know what that is?" he asked.
"Something that belonged to the Moon Emperor," Mei Xue said. "From the previous era."
Xu Yang stared at her. "Are you fucking serious?"
She turned and gave him a sharp look.
"Watch your mouth."
"...Yes. My apologies, Senior."
*********
The Moon Emperor.
Even someone like Xu Yang, who paid little attention to ancient history, knew that name.
In the distant past, a handful of Heaven Ascending cultivators — beings who had touched the very edge of what cultivation could achieve — had waged a war so catastrophic that the world itself had fractured. The sheer scale of the conflict had split the continent into four uneven domains: North, South, East, and West. The devastation had been so total, so irreversible, that the Heavenly Dao itself had expelled those cultivators from the world once the dust settled.
What remained was a broken continent, each domain separated by vast, uncrossable valleys. No one flew over them — the moment a cultivator approached those boundaries, their spiritual energy would drain away completely, leaving them helpless and falling. Only those at the very peak of power that would be Earthly Fusion cultivators dared attempt the crossing.
The Moon Emperor had ruled the Eastern Domain. He had stood against the Forging Emperor of the West and the Ice Emperor of the North, with only the Southern Empress fighting at his side. Her Dao was said to involve plants and trees — though that was the extent of what the world knew about her. She was the most reclusive of the four, her history buried beneath centuries of silence.
As for why those four had gone to war in the first place — no record had ever mentioned it. But whatever the reason, it had been significant enough for those god like beings to tear the world apart.
***********
"You're saying this is his tomb?" Xu Yang said slowly. "The actual Moon Emperor's tomb?"
Mei Xue didn't answer. She was already moving toward the lake.
She reached into her storage pouch and withdrew the token she had taken from Dai Qing'an's body. Without hesitation, she crushed it in her palm.
A rainbow-hued halo erupted from the broken token and wrapped around her entirely. She stepped out onto the surface of the lake — and the water held her. She walked calmly to the centre, reached up, and swallowed the purple orb whole.
Then she went still.
She hovered above the water's surface, eyes closed, the ancient energy working through her as she sat in silent digestion. The pressure radiating from her began to grow — slowly at first, then rapidly, until it crashed outward like a wave.
Xu Yang took a step back without thinking.
When Mei Xue opened her eyes, she was at the Nascent Soul realm.
Early stage — but Nascent Soul nonetheless. Just like that.
She floated back to solid ground, her presence transformed. The air around her felt different now, heavier and sharper all at once. It was only when Xu Yang finally exhaled that he noticed something he had missed entirely during the breakthrough — a second door had appeared at the far end of the lake, behind where the orb had been floating.
Mei Xue didn't even glance at it.
"What was that orb?" Xu Yang asked.
"A catalyst," she said, brushing off her sleeve. "Something capable of elevating a cultivator's talent to the point where the Earth Fusion Realm — or even Heaven Ascension — becomes theoretically possible. Though its effects are likely exaggerated. Heaven Ascension is not a destination anyone has reached since the Emperors, and there are good reasons for that."
Xu Yang arranged his expression into something appropriately admiring and dipped his head.
"Congratulations, Senior, on such a monumental achievement—"
She patted him on the head like one would a dog.
"Call me Ling Zhi. Mei Xue is just an alias."
"Ah — what a commanding name. Truly befitting of Senior, haha..."
He trailed off as his eyes drifted to the second door at the back of the chamber. He gestured toward it carefully.
Ling Zhi didn't even look.
"It's a trap. Nothing below the Mortal Transcendence realm survives what's behind that door."
Xu Yang had his doubts, but with his life contractually in her hands, he held his tongue.
A moment later, she grabbed him by the collar.
The world blurred. She moved at a speed that made his eyes water, and within moments they were outside — standing under open sky, the tomb entrance behind them.
Xu Yang steadied himself and cleared his throat.
"Senior… how do we plan to explain the casualties to the sect?"
Ling Zhi smiled.
"Who said we're going back to the sect?"
Xu Yang blinked. "What? Why— no, wait. Before that—" He straightened. "If we were never going back, why did you bother enslaving me?"
She looked at him with something close to pity.
"Why not? The others fought me or panicked. You just stood there like a duckling that had lost its mother." A corner of her mouth curved upward. "I found it amusing. So I decided to keep you."
"That was called reading the situation—"
"Exactly," she said, her smile infuriating in its serenity. "Good survival instincts. That's precisely what I want in a subordinate."
Xu Yang took a slow, measured breath. Then another.
"May I at least ask," he said carefully, "why we aren't returning to the sect?"
"Because Dai Qing'an was the Sect Leader's illegitimate son."
Everything clicked into place.
The Sect Leader had known. He had known this was the Moon Emperor's tomb — had known about the orb and what it could do. He had sent his son, armed with that token, to claim it quietly. No announcement, no fanfare, no extra protection that might alert the spies and rivals lurking within the sect's own walls.
And Ling Zhi had walked in and taken it all out from under him.
"Why didn't the Sect Leader send hidden guards with him?" Xu Yang asked. "Secret protectors, at least?"
Ling Zhi rolled her eyes. "Because announcing that his son required protection on a sensitive mission would have been the same as announcing the mission itself. His enemies would have moved the moment they caught wind of it."
The logic was sound. Xu Yang would have reached the same conclusion himself, given time. But the sheer volume of revelations — the enslavement, the murder, the breakthrough, the conspiracy — had stacked up faster than he could process them.
He exhaled.
"If not the sect," he said, "then where are we going?"
"The Southern Domain."
Xu Yang stared at her.
">○.○<"