Music cultivators were the cultivators with the strongest destructive power besides sword cultivators, but music cultivation also had particularly harsh requirements for spiritual energy. Although the damage they inflicted was terrifying, for cultivators whose cultivation wasn’t high enough yet, there was one major problem—they consumed spiritual energy exceptionally quickly. With Kong Hou’s current cultivation level, she could control the phoenix head very well, but she couldn’t sustain it for long.

It could be said that music cultivators in their early cultivation stages were delicate, pitiful creatures with weak bodies. But if they reached the Nascent Soul Stage and beyond, they were killing gods who wouldn’t make a move unless necessary, but when they did, they’d leave death and destruction in their wake. However, in the entire cultivation world, there weren’t many more music cultivators than the pitiable, statusless culinary cultivators, because the music cultivation path had exceptionally high talent requirements—it wasn’t cultivators choosing it, but it choosing cultivators. Therefore, music cultivators in the entire cultivation world were extremely rare. In the past few hundred years, the total number of music cultivators who had survived past the Nascent Soul Stage was… zero.

Kong Hou acted as if she hadn’t heard Lingbo’s words. She looked at the succubi surrounding them from all directions and lightly plucked the strings with her fingers.

She didn’t like that her imperial father had been obsessed with music, allowing treacherous ministers to control the court. She had even once harbored resentful feelings toward musical melodies. Now she had long since understood that musical melodies were innocent, and musical instruments were innocent—the only one truly at fault was her imperial father alone.

Succubi most loved human negative emotions—fear, jealousy, hatred, regret, and sadness were all delicacies to them.

The musical notes rose. This was a relatively simple piece among Kong Hou’s instrumental repertoire, with a melody that was calm yet carried joy and blessings. This was the only piece she had learned when she was only six years old, before the Ji Family imperial dynasty had fallen.

Learning this piece wasn’t for herself, but rather to win her imperial father’s favor. However, before she had a chance to perform it before her imperial father, Emperor Jing Hong had brought troops and attacked. From that time on, she had never played the Kong Hou instrument again.

People who didn’t understand joy, who didn’t understand bringing joy to others—how could they play this piece?

But now she already understood, and she had already let go of the past.

The simple melody carried powerful spiritual energy spreading outward in all directions. The succubi were like flies and mosquitoes that had lost control, scattering and fleeing in all directions. But where could they hide? There was sound in the wind, sound in the forest—even in the crevices of darkness, there was sound.

Large swaths of succubi transformed into black smoke and disappeared. Kong Hou’s fingers playing the phoenix head didn’t stop plucking the strings, and the musical notes traveled very, very far.

Lingbo stood holding her sword in a daze, her expression confused as she recalled many small matters. When she first arrived at Zhaohan Sect, the beautiful dresses her master bought her; when she successfully drew qi into her body, how her master and senior brothers praised her as the most talented cultivator in the cultivation world besides Zhongxi Zhenren; the strict, rule-abiding head senior brother who, the last time she returned to the sect and was punished with confinement, secretly brought her the honey flower dew she loved.

It turned out that since she had entered Zhaohan Sect, so many trivial yet joyful small matters had occurred.

When the piece ended, the succubi had already disappeared completely and cleanly. After who knows how long, Lingbo finally came back to her senses. She slowly shifted her gaze toward Kong Hou. Kong Hou had already transformed her natal magical tool back into a hairpin and reinserted it into her hair at her temples.

“Kong Hou…” Looking at Kong Hou again, Lingbo felt a kind of shock in her heart. This kind of control over a natal magical tool really didn’t seem like something a cultivator who had just advanced to the Heart Stirring Stage could possess. What a terrifying level of talent this was!

Kong Hou smiled brilliantly at her, then said, “Lingbo Xianzi, quickly come help me up.”

Seeing her face was somewhat pale, Lingbo guessed that she had probably exhausted most of her spiritual energy and hurriedly reached out to help her. However, someone behind her moved even faster—like a white light flashing past her eyes. When she could see clearly, Kong Hou had already been supported by him.

“Focus your mind, calm your qi.” Huan Zong stuffed a Qi Condensing Pill into Kong Hou’s mouth and extended his hand to support her waist. However, the hand supporting her waist had its palm formed into a loose fist—he didn’t take the opportunity to press his entire palm against Kong Hou’s waist.

Lingbo silently withdrew her own hand.

“How do you feel?” Huan Zong channeled some spiritual energy into Kong Hou’s spiritual platform. Seeing her complexion ease, he slowly released her.

“It’s… it’s not bad.” Kong Hou’s eyes sparkled brightly as she looked at Huan Zong, appearing very happy. “In that moment just now, I felt like my consciousness and the phoenix head seemed to merge into one. The phoenix head could sense my emotions, and I also knew how to play the phoenix head to bring out its maximum capability.”

Kong Hou touched the phoenix head hairpin in her hair. She had never loved her natal magical tool as much as she did at this moment. It was like a part of her own body, never to be separated.

“You’ve already touched the threshold of heart enlightenment.” Huan Zong looked at the young girl’s slightly flushed cheeks. “Very impressive.”

“Really?” Kong Hou’s eyes opened even wider, filled with laughter and excitement.

The corners of Huan Zong’s lips curved slightly. “I’m not lying to you.” He summoned a flying sword and pulled Kong Hou up onto it. “Rest for a while first. Relax your mind and don’t think about anything.”

“Mm.” Kong Hou nodded, sat cross-legged on the sword, and closed her eyes to meditate.

Lingbo hauled her junior brother, whose spiritual energy was exhausted, onto her own flying tool, then turned to ask, “Huan Zong Zhenren, won’t using flying tools in the secret realm be too conspicuous?”

Huan Zong turned his head to look at Lin Hu, letting him explain on his behalf.

“Miss Lingbo, if the secret realm hadn’t yet developed spiritual intelligence, then walking would be the most prudent method. But the secret realm’s spiritual intelligence has already awakened—almost all of our movements cannot be hidden from it. Choosing to walk now would only delay time.” Lin Hu brought the middle-aged independent cultivator onto his own flying tool with one hand, then turned to ask Jin Ling, “Would Miss Jin Ling like to come up as well?”

“No need, I can manage on my own.” Jin Ling took out her own flying sword, jumped onto it, and flew into the air.

Having witnessed Lingbo Xianzi’s swordsmanship and Kong Hou Xianzi’s music attack techniques, Jin Ling felt deeply ashamed. As a woman, she couldn’t let her own performance be too terrible and damage the image of women.

Flying silently in the middle, Jin Ling glanced at Kong Hou, who was meditating while sitting on Huan Zong Zhenren’s flying sword ahead, her feelings somewhat complex. If she were Kong Hou Xianzi, she definitely couldn’t completely trust someone from another sect, especially when her talent was so outstanding—if another sect wanted to destroy her, now would be an excellent opportunity.

Much beauty would be torn apart by jealousy. Wasn’t Kong Hou afraid?

Whether Kong Hou was afraid or not, Jin Ling wasn’t clear, but until they were blocked by a barrier, Kong Hou hadn’t woken up.

The sudden appearance of a barrier could no longer surprise everyone. What was surprising was that on the mountain wall beside the barrier, a painting had actually appeared. This painting was extremely strange—beautiful people held knives to kill and eat hearts, ugly-faced people knelt by the river weeping, and there were expressionless passersby on both sides of the road.

Jin Ling merely looked twice before feeling dizzy and wanting to vomit. She hurriedly closed her eyes to steady her mind and didn’t dare look again.

Lingbo was much better off than Jin Ling. She looked at the ugly woman covering her mouth and crying in the painting and frowned slightly. Could it be that the person eaten by the beautiful person was her relative, which was why she knelt on the ground covering her mouth in painful tears?

Was this mural suddenly appearing now some kind of hint?

“Young Master?” Lin Hu turned his head to look at Huan Zong.

Huan Zong drew his sword from its sheath. Powerful sword intent flew directly toward the barrier, and amid the barrier’s swaying and shaking, it was actually broken open by a single sword strike.

“There’s an array in this painting. Looking at it too long makes it easy to fall in and be unable to come out.” Huan Zong said indifferently, “Playing tricks and acting mysterious—this kind of method in a secret realm isn’t anything rare.” As his words fell, he struck out with another sword stroke. The painting on the mountain wall was destroyed, and the woman kneeling by the river covering her mouth in painful tears transformed into a pile of rubble.

Jumping back onto his flying sword, Huan Zong glanced at Kong Hou, who hadn’t been awakened, and said to everyone in a flat tone, “Let’s go.”

Things that could be solved with a sword weren’t problems.

The Zhaohan Sect disciple and the middle-aged independent cultivator stared dumbfounded at this scene, unable to recover their senses for quite a while. Just what realm had this Huan Zong Zhenren’s cultivation reached, that he could break open a barrier established by the secret realm with a single sword?

Being such an impressive expert, what kind of tempering could entering this secret realm provide? It couldn’t be that he came in to look at the scenery, could it?

After the barrier, there was yet another world—high mountains and barren rocks, the scorching sun blazing down, the burning temperature roasting their skin painfully. Jin Ling hurriedly took out three umbrellas from the storage pouch at her waist, distributed one to Lingbo, and when she wanted to give one to Kong Hou, she remembered that Kong Hou was still in meditation. So her hand reaching toward Kong Hou’s direction became awkward—she didn’t know whether to casually withdraw it or forcibly push it over.

“What is this for?” Huan Zong accepted the umbrella and saw that Lingbo beside him had already opened her umbrella to shade her head.

“Zhenren, this kind of sunlight easily tans people. It takes quite a few whitening pills to recover.” Jin Ling pointed at the scorching sun in the sky, then glanced at Kong Hou’s snow-white skin. “Kong Hou Xianzi has such fair and tender skin—what a pity if she gets tanned.”

“No need.” Huan Zong returned the umbrella to Jin Ling.

Jin Ling accepted the umbrella and looked sympathetically at the unaware Kong Hou. This was the consequence of trusting men too easily. She hoped that when she woke up and discovered her face had darkened considerably, she wouldn’t be so angry that she’d turn against Huan Zong Zhenren.

Just as she was thinking this, Jin Ling saw Huan Zong take out a jade-bone umbrella from his storage ring. This umbrella was made of unknown materials—even from a distance, she could feel traces of coolness and spiritual energy.

Watching Huan Zong open the umbrella and hold it over Kong Hou’s head, Jin Ling silently flew a bit farther from Huan Zong Zhenren.

She was still young, her mental state not very stable—she couldn’t withstand this kind of stimulation.

Seeing this, the Zhaohan Sect disciple hurriedly stood up from his flying sword and smiled ingratiatingly at Lingbo standing in front of him. “Senior Sister, let me hold the umbrella for you. Don’t tire yourself out.”

Lingbo didn’t stand on ceremony with him either, turning to stuff the umbrella into his hands. “Hold it properly.”

The Zhaohan Sect disciple nodded repeatedly, as attentive as a small puppy. Lingbo’s mood immediately became cheerful. As expected, her own senior and junior brothers were the best—they knew to show attentiveness in front of others and bring honor to her face.

“Help!”

A cry for help came from the ground. Lingbo Xianzi looked down to see more than half of Senior Brother Chang De’s body buried in mud, with only his head and hands outside flailing in all directions, attempting to grab onto something to delay the speed of his sinking.

“Senior Brother!” Both Lingbo and her junior brother became anxious upon seeing this. Lingbo flew down wanting to help. Huan Zong waved his hand and swept her back with spiritual energy. Lingbo Xianzi tumbled onto the flying sword and turned her head to glare angrily at Huan Zong. “What is Zhenren’s meaning in this?”

“Daoist Chang De is an extremely calm person. If he were truly trapped in this kind of predicament, he couldn’t possibly just call for help in panicked confusion.” Huan Zong formed a hand seal and tapped it in the air at Lingbo and the Zhaohan Sect disciple’s foreheads. “Look again.”

Lingbo looked again—where was this her senior brother? It was clearly a continuously climbing skeleton. Fine beads of sweat emerged on her forehead. If Huan Zong Zhenren hadn’t been here today, she might have already jumped down to rescue it.

Huan Zong looked expressionlessly at the skeleton. This kind of ghost that was unwilling to accept death only needed one sword stroke to destroy. He found a bottle of spiritual dew that the abbot of Pure Clarity Temple had given him from his storage ring, took a single drop, and flicked it onto the skeleton.

In the blink of an eye, the skeleton transformed into ashes, and the ghost attached to the skeleton became a wisp of green smoke and disappeared.

Kong Hou opened her eyes. What she saw was the scene of Huan Zong flicking spiritual dew onto the skeleton. Watching the ghost drift away, she opened her mouth to ask, “Huan Zong, what are you doing?”

“Performing transcendence.” Seeing Kong Hou stand up, Huan Zong shifted the umbrella’s position so sunlight wouldn’t shine on her body.

“Wow.” Kong Hou exclaimed in admiration. “You really know how to do everything.”

In fact, what Huan Zong had done was simply use spiritual energy to drip the spiritual dew given by the Pure Clarity Temple’s abbot onto the skeleton. Any righteous path cultivator could do it.

Huan Zong shook his head. “It’s not that I know how to do everything—it’s the merit of this bottle of spiritual dew. The spiritual dew was a gift from the Pure Clarity Temple’s abbot and has Buddhist blessing upon it.”

“That still shows you’re impressive.” Kong Hou said, “I heard the Pure Clarity Temple’s abbot doesn’t see outside visitors year-round. That you could actually obtain spiritual dew he gifted is sufficient proof of your excellence.”

Hearing this explanation, Huan Zong was slightly astonished, then smiled despite himself.

Being wholeheartedly trusted by someone, and having one’s image be incomparably lofty in the other person’s heart, was truly a kind of flattery impossible to refuse. Huan Zong thought, if at this moment Kong Hou wanted to see the sea, he would definitely take her to find the ocean, and if she wanted to touch the stars, he would take her to pluck them.

Being trusted so sincerely by someone made him unwilling to let her be even the slightest bit disappointed.

“Give me the umbrella. I’ll hold it myself.” Kong Hou reached out to grasp the umbrella handle. Her tender fingers touched Huan Zong’s hand, and Huan Zong’s fingertips trembled slightly before he rapidly released his grip. The tingling, burning sensation from the back of his hand spread along his arm all the way to his heart.

Kong Hou saw Huan Zong’s cheeks were somewhat red and stood closer to him, holding the umbrella over both their heads. “With such a big sun, you don’t even shade yourself?”

Looking down at Kong Hou’s fair and tender cheeks, Huan Zong stepped to the side. “It’s fine.”

“Your face is already sunburned red.” Kong Hou grabbed his sleeve and pulled him back. “One tan covers a hundred beauties—treat your face better.”

Such a good-looking face—if she had to watch it get sunburned with her own eyes, that would simply be a sin.

Having recovered from her shock, Lingbo was about to thank Huan Zong when she turned her head and saw his intimate posture with Kong Hou, and chose not to speak. This time, no matter what Senior Brother Chang De said, she would never again believe these two had a pure friendship between a man and woman.

She wouldn’t believe it even if beaten to death.

After transcending the ghost, they didn’t encounter any other strange illusions along the way. Even after they flew out of the barren mountain area, nothing happened. So what was the purpose of this barren mountain area appearing—to let them get a bit more sun?

Outside the barren mountain, as expected, another barrier appeared. Beside the barrier stood a stone tablet inscribed with three characters: “Gate of Life and Death.”

Involving the two words “life and death” was always rather intimidating.

The Zhaohan Sect disciple had just prepared to speak when he saw Huan Zong step on the stone tablet with one foot. The stone tablet split with a sound. “Let’s go.”

Lin Hu: “…”

Why did he feel that the young master was acting especially… fond of showing off today?

What surprised Lin Hu the most was that the young master’s spiritual platform was unstable—today he had both cleaved the sky and slashed barriers, so his inner abdomen should have been uncomfortable. But at this moment, the young master appeared completely normal in expression. Except for occasionally coughing lightly a few times, he looked much better than when he had just left Liuguang Sect.

Could it be that when he was transported to another place, some good thing he didn’t know about had occurred?

Kong Hou had thought that behind the Gate of Life and Death would be a scene of ice and fire, two extremes. Who knew that inside was blue sky and white clouds, green mountains and clear waters—a paradise scene. The sunlight was warm and bright, spiritual energy abundant. Just standing here made one’s body and mind comfortable, forgetting unpleasant things.

“Such a beautiful place must definitely have problems.” Kong Hou rubbed her chin and didn’t dare wander around randomly. “Trying to trick us—not so easy.”

Lingbo and the others also felt this place was beautiful to the point of being strange, which reminded them of the beautiful, picturesque stream when they first entered the secret realm. She turned back to look at her junior brother. “Stay close. Don’t wander around.”

The Zhaohan Sect disciple nodded and gripped his sword tightly.

They walked forward along the small path. Apart from discovering some rare spiritual herbs by the roadside, nothing unexpected occurred.

“Senior Sister.”

“Don’t follow me. Get lost.”

From the distance came the faint sound of two women arguing. Kong Hou could tell from one listen that these two had accumulated grievances for a long time.

“Senior Sister, I really didn’t mean to get close to Senior Brother He. Please believe me.”

“Does it matter whether I believe you or not? Why don’t you look at that face of yours reflected in the pond? Even if you approached those men, would they give you a second glance?”

The arguing voices gradually intensified. Two women wearing green robes walked out from behind the flowering trees. The woman walking in front had fair skin and a beautiful face, with anger not yet faded from her features. The woman following behind her had a frightened expression, her spine hunched, as if she had already become accustomed to being submissive before others.

When she raised her head, Jin Ling almost couldn’t help gasping. What kind of face was this? The left side could still be called delicate and lovely, but the right side was uneven like ravines and even hung with pus and blood—extremely terrifying.

Could these two female cultivators be from the Independent Cultivators Alliance?

She vaguely remembered that there were several people wearing green robes in the Independent Cultivators Alliance. However, when entering the secret realm, all her attention had been on Kong Hou’s group, so she didn’t have much impression of the Independent Cultivators Alliance people.

Was this a drama of two women fighting over one man?

In this day and age, everyone had mixed to become cultivators—with status and cultivation, were they still lacking a man? If men from the cultivation world weren’t suitable, there was still the mortal realm. Making themselves look so fierce and malevolent—how embarrassing for women!

The two female independent cultivators also discovered them. The beautiful female independent cultivator recognized Kong Hou and the others, put away her weapon, and bowed to them. “Greetings to all fellow Daoists.”

“Greetings to both fellow Daoists.” Kong Hou’s gaze swept over the two of them once, pretending she hadn’t heard those words just now. “Have you encountered any dangers along the way?”

The beautiful female cultivator smiled bitterly. “We only managed to preserve our lives. The spiritual herb we wanted to obtain was guarded by a spiritual beast. I plan to go to the auction market to look—spending more money is better than losing one’s life.”

“Are you two ladies independent cultivators who came from the west?” The middle-aged independent cultivator traveling with Kong Hou’s group scrutinized the two. These independent cultivators came from all eight directions and six harmonies—they had barely managed to gather together thanks to the Independent Cultivators Alliance elders. To say they were very familiar would be going too far.

“Greetings, Daoist Lu Yi.” The ugly-faced female cultivator said softly, “We are indeed from the west.”

The middle-aged independent cultivator called Lu Yi felt somewhat embarrassed. The other party even remembered his name, while he didn’t even know what her surname was. Both being independent cultivators, Lu Yi wanted to invite them to travel together, but he himself was only able to preserve his life by relying on these sect personal disciples, so he really had no face to ask Huan Zong Zhenren and the others to bring two more people along. Therefore, he didn’t speak up.

“Fellow Daoists, please be careful. This secret realm seems to have some problems.” The ugly-faced female cultivator gave a soft reminder, then turned to leave. However, after taking only a few steps, a vine suddenly shot out from the flowering tree, rolled her entire person into the air, then viciously threw her down.

“Hiss.” Jin Ling stepped back two paces. Just watching made her bones ache—she didn’t know how that young lady was.

Kong Hou stepped forward. Huan Zong pressed down on her shoulder. “I’ll go.”

“Be careful.” Kong Hou didn’t insist and gave Huan Zong a small nod.

Huan Zong severed the vines with several sword strokes. Looking at the female cultivator on the ground in wretched condition, barely able to stand, he said coldly, “Get up.”

After speaking, without waiting for the female cultivator’s reaction, he turned and walked away.

The female cultivator touched the right side of her face, her gaze dimming. Forcing herself with one breath of qi, she climbed up from the ground and silently followed behind Kong Hou and the others.

Passing through a sea of flowers, a crystal-clear river blocked their path. Kong Hou was just preparing to take out a jade boat to cross the river when she heard the sound of a slap from behind.

She turned back in astonishment. For some reason, the beautiful female cultivator had actually slapped the disfigured female cultivator. Lu Yi stood beside the two with an awkward expression—advising them wasn’t appropriate, and not advising them wasn’t appropriate either.

Lingbo watched the two coldly and said impatiently, “If you want to fight, go fight to the side. Don’t disturb us.”

The beautiful female cultivator lowered her hand and suddenly grabbed the disfigured female cultivator’s collar, dragging her to the riverside. “Look at yourself. Stop putting on that pitiful appearance in front of men. Disgusting.”

The Zhaohan Sect disciple saw this scene and felt he couldn’t watch anymore. “Senior Sister, this is too…”

“Shut up.” Lingbo snorted coldly. “Before understanding the causes and consequences of a matter, don’t easily distinguish right from wrong.”

The junior brother didn’t dare speak again and turned to look at Kong Hou Xianzi, who was the most kind-hearted among them. He didn’t expect that even Kong Hou Xianzi had no reaction facing this scene.

Women’s hearts were like needles at the bottom of the sea—he truly couldn’t understand them.

Just where was the problem with these two people?

**Author’s Note:**

Lin Hu: Who would have thought the young master would become a vulgar man who likes to show off.