“Lu Xuan?” Ji Chen could not help but blurt out, drawing the attention of the surrounding cultivators.
“Why is the Young Lord of Wentian City here? Shouldn’t he be up there?” a cultivator familiar with Ji Chen asked in surprise.
“I… If I’m not mistaken, from the looks of it, he came to accompany the young lady beside him?”
Only after hearing the words “young lady” did Ji Chen shift his gaze to Mingming. Wasn’t this the Second Miss of the Shen Clan whom he had met once before?
How had she become connected to Wentian City? Wasn’t the immortal sect her mother belonged to long since in decline?
Her cultivation did not seem particularly high either. Could it be that she was hoping the Young Lord of Wentian City would escort and protect her?
In that instant, countless thoughts flashed through Ji Chen’s mind before he finally settled on what he believed was Mingming’s objective.
His expression turned livid as he said coldly, “Young Lord of Wentian City, isn’t this rather unfair to the other cultivators?”
Above, on the aerial formation, Wen Shao could not help but laugh. Turning to Lu Wei, he said, “I never expected the Young Lord of Wentian City to be such a devoted romantic.”
“The Shen Clan of the Eastern Region, haha… Lord Wuya, I can already picture the scene when you go to the Shen Clan to deliver a marriage proposal on behalf of Young Lord Lu Xuan.” Wen Shao laughed.
Lu Wei’s expression instantly turned icy. His attention had remained fixed on Mingming the entire time. Through gritted teeth, he said, “Impossible.”
Below Changxiao Palace, the crowd buzzed with discussion as they watched Mingming and Lu Xuan enter the illusion realm.
──
As soon as she entered the illusion realm, Mingming was separated from Lu Xuan, each of them being sent into the void alone.
Lu Xuan had originally transformed into a rabbit with soft fur and a warm, beating heart. But the moment he was forcibly separated from Mingming, he instantly felt a sharp pain in his chest, and his body grew weak as his heart ceased to beat.
Even though Lu Wei had given strict instructions beforehand, he still changed his form, once again becoming a little black snake.
Fortunately, this illusion realm existed to force cultivators to confront the deepest desires within their hearts. Even the one who had laid the formation could not see what transpired inside.
After being separated from Lu Xuan, Mingming found herself in a pitch-black illusory domain.
The moment she stepped into the formation, she had already understood its purpose. The path of cultivation was not merely about growing stronger. It also required cultivating one’s heart and tempering one’s character.
The first trial required cultivators to face the deepest desires hidden within their hearts, and then overcome them.
Mingming knew very well what her desire was. Raising her eyes toward the depths of the illusion, she saw a lone figure standing beneath the only patch of light. Clad in robes whiter than snow, with a strip of white silk covering his eyes, he looked sacred and immaculate.
‘Who told him to be so delicious?’
Step by step, Mingming walked toward the apparition. When she reached this illusory Lu Wei, faced with the ultimate temptation of such exquisitely delicious food, she did not even spare him a second glance before walking straight past him.
Changxiao Palace had truly chosen the wrong target for this trial. Ever since Mingming had gained sentience, she had learned to suppress her appetite. Even with the real person standing before her, she could remain perfectly composed, let alone a mere false illusion.
Just as she was about to leave the formation, Mingming scratched her head, then remembered that exiting so quickly would not match the abilities expected of the Second Miss of the Shen Clan.
So she turned back, walked over to the illusory Lu Wei, and sat down cross-legged in front of him to rest.
The illusory Lu Wei also bent down and sat beside her. Tilting her head, Mingming leaned against him.
‘I’m so hungry. I can only sleep.’ Mingming narrowed her eyes.
She slept for a very long time, so long that by the time she awoke, someone else had appeared beside her.
──
As expected, after entering the illusion realm, Lu Xuan saw the person he had longed to see within the darkness. She was dressed in magnificent ceremonial robes and a lofty ritual crown, the attire that later generations of the Immortal Realm had always used to depict Qing Ming.
Her features were hidden beneath the shadows, making her face impossible to discern. Only as Lu Xuan drew closer and closer did he finally see her appearance.
Just as he had imagined, she bore Mingming’s face. Though she did not possess peerless beauty, that compassionate smile with its gently upturned lips was exactly the same as Mingming’s.
Indeed. From the very first moment he had seen Mingming, he had felt that all those statues and paintings of the deity should have borne her face. It suited them so perfectly, as though crafted by heaven itself.
Lu Xuan stopped before “Qing Ming” and lowered his gaze to her eternally unchanging smile. As he lowered his head, it seemed he was about to kiss her lips.
His hands cupped the illusion’s cheeks. But just as their lips were about to meet, countless cracks spread outward beneath Lu Xuan’s fingertips. The living figure reverted into a divine statue once more and shattered upon the ground.
Amid the shattered fragments strewn across the ground, Lu Xuan broke free from the illusion and reverted to his snake form. He did not hurry to leave. Instead, he began searching the illusion realm for Mingming.
His strength was great enough to ignore some of the illusion realm’s rules. Before Mingming even realized it, he had already entered the trial realm that belonged to her.
Lu Xuan had assumed that Mingming’s illusion would be filled with all kinds of delicious food. In truth, he was not entirely wrong.
But what he saw instead was Mingming, her head tilted as she slept, leaning against a figure dressed in white.
The moment he arrived, the white-robed figure dissolved into nothingness, leaving Lu Xuan with only the faintest glimpse of a blurred silhouette.
As the white-robed figure vanished, Mingming instantly lost her support and toppled to one side. Just as she was about to hit the ground and wake from her slumber, Lu Xuan appeared beside her.
Taking the place of the white-robed illusion, he let Mingming lean against him instead.
Long afterward, the first round of the Ascension Gathering’s trial had essentially come to an end. Most of the cultivators emerged from the illusion realm looking dazed and reluctant to leave.
They had become immersed in the desires woven by the illusion, and were naturally eliminated. From that point onward, their future paths of cultivation would continue to be tempted by those same desires.
This was also why Madam Lan had warned Mingming that the first two rounds of the Ascension Gathering’s trials were dangerous. A mere illusory formation was enough to shatter a cultivator’s Dao Heart, painstakingly built over many years, and could even affect their path of cultivation for the rest of their lives.
Meanwhile, even more people’s attention had fallen upon Lu Xuan. After Ji Chen recognized him, word that he was the Young Lord of Wentian City spread like wildfire, quickly reaching every corner of Changxiao Palace.
Many prominent clans and noble families had set up formations to observe these first two rounds of the trials. Within the Shen Clan’s encampment, Shen Ji spotted Mingming at a glance.
“Why is the Young Lord of Wentian City by her side? Did he come to help her pass the trial?” Shen Ji said after staring blankly for a moment.
“So she became connected to the Young Lord of Wentian City because of that incident… when Lord Wuya lost his treasure? But the Young Lord of Wentian City never even appeared that day.” No matter how much Shen Ji thought about it, she could not understand how Mingming had managed to become acquainted with someone of such stature.
“Everyone has their own opportunities,” Shen Lin finally said. “If Second Sister had wanted to, she could have accepted Senior Su’s invitation and come here long ago. Why would she need to participate in some trial?”
──
In the end, the clamor around her still woke Mingming from her sleep. She opened her eyes to see the bright daylight and Lu Xuan sitting beside her.
“Ah…” Mingming was still half-asleep and only lifted her eyes to glance at Lu Xuan.
Lu Xuan’s icy voice rang out. “Shen Ming.”
“Hm?” Mingming asked.
“I don’t remember ever wearing white,” Lu Xuan said.
Mingming lifted her eyelashes slightly and remained silent. Then she rose to her feet.
Having already passed this trial, and with Lu Xuan having helped her break free from the illusion, Mingming ranked fairly high.
The next round naturally tested the cultivators’ strength. After stepping onto the trial platform, Mingming went right back to taking it easy.
Without even using a single spell, she admitted defeat and stepped off the platform.
As a result, the rumors that she had only passed the first trial because the Young Lord of Wentian City had helped her spread even further.
Mingming sat with downcast eyes not far below the trial platform, while Lu Xuan remained within a radius of a dozen or so zhang from her, competing against his opponents.
Seeing this, Wen Shao could not help laughing again. “Lord Wuya, it seems your nephew truly can’t bear to be apart from the Second Miss of the Shen Clan.”
Lu Wei: “…”
Naturally, he knew the real reason Lu Xuan could not leave Mingming’s side. It was Lu Xuan himself who had crushed that mechanical heart, trapping himself beside her.
Below, Mingming observed the aptitudes of the trial participants, identifying several cultivators whose talent was wholly insufficient to pass the third round. She then defeated every one of them, ensuring that she herself would make it into the third round.
The cultivators she defeated were all ranked near the bottom, so her own ranking remained precarious, constantly hovering on the edge of qualifying for the third round.
Mingming had naturally calculated the scores in advance. She would neither steal the opportunity from those who truly possessed the strength, nor allow herself to miss the third round.
But her ranking was so dangerously close to the cutoff that it kept everyone on edge. Even the look in Lu Xuan’s eyes as he watched her became increasingly solemn.
“You’re only this strong?”
“I’m only this strong,” Mingming replied.
After thinking it over, Lu Xuan realized that was true. From beginning to end, the only techniques Mingming had used proficiently were the basic Five Elements spells. Her opponents would not patiently wait for her to finish casting the way Su Yu had.
Against opponents fighting with everything they had to secure victory, it was only natural that she would be defeated.
“My ranking should be enough.” Mingming glanced at her fluctuating position on the scoreboard above the formation and tried to reassure Lu Xuan.
There was another cultivator whose score hovered around hers, and that was Ji Chen.
As luck would have it, Lu Xuan’s next match was against him. It was a battle with a vast disparity in strength, one in which Lu Xuan held absolute confidence.
Mingming had not been paying attention to the match at first. She had even forgotten who Ji Chen was. But when she saw Lu Xuan casting his spells without the slightest restraint, she straightened up.
On the trial platform, life and death were of no consequence. The Ascension Gathering was no child’s game, and fatalities or serious injuries were common enough. However, those usually occurred between evenly matched opponents, where both sides fought with all their strength and could not fully control their techniques, making casualties unavoidable.
But Lu Xuan was clearly fighting Ji Chen with effortless ease. There was no possibility of his spiritual energy spiraling out of control. The fact that he was showing Ji Chen no mercy could only mean…
…he intended to eliminate Mingming’s greatest rival, ensuring that she would safely advance to the third round.
At such a grand gathering, if someone openly did something like this, everyone would only direct their criticism at Mingming below the stage. If it were not for her own lack of strength, why would the Young Lord of Wentian City go to such lengths to protect her?
To everyone’s surprise, Ji Chen on the trial platform proved remarkably tenacious and refused to admit defeat, so the battle could only continue.
Yet only Ji Chen himself knew that, at the very moment he had been about to concede in order to save his life, Lu Xuan, standing amid the brilliance of countless spells, had casually pointed a finger at him from afar, sealing his movements.
If Lu Xuan wished to kill someone, he did so as he pleased. Even under the watchful eyes of tens of thousands upon the trial platform, he intended to achieve his goal.
On the trial platform, Ji Chen was steadily driven back. By this point, Mingming had already risen to her feet.
Her delicate brows, which rarely furrowed, drew together. This target of her mission acted entirely on his own whims, far beyond her expectations.
Ji Chen should never have suffered such a calamity. The current situation… had come about entirely because of her.
So Mingming got up and ran toward the trial platform.
At the same moment, Lu Wei, high above on the aerial formation, also sensed that something was wrong.
Suppressing his anger, he said, “Utterly unreasonable.”
The next instant, his figure vanished from the sky as well.
Having witnessed Lu Xuan commit such a reckless act with his own eyes, there was no way he would allow him to exploit his status and kill Ji Chen.
But Mingming moved even faster. Just as Lu Xuan’s offensive spell was about to strike Ji Chen, she leaped forward and shielded him behind her.
The overwhelmingly powerful spell slammed into her, sending her body hurtling backward until she landed before Lu Wei.