—

The Feng Clan's status as one of the Six Great Families stems from their inheritance of the Celestial Master title. The Celestial Master title passes only to members of the Feng Clan, but a single Celestial Master can take dozens or hundreds of disciples. The accumulated family background over generations is beyond ordinary imagination.

Feng Li is the youngest and the strongest Celestial Master in all recorded history.

The original body was a disciple of a registered disciple of the previous Celestial Master—one generation below Feng Li by rights, so he should have taken the initiative to greet Feng Li properly. But among the Feng Clan's many disciples, the original body was a nobody no one remembered. Jiang Luo didn't think Feng Li would remember him, and following the principle that less trouble is better than more, he couldn't be bothered to go.

Watching Feng Li's figure disappear below, Jiang Luo withdrew his gaze without a ripple. 'Let's go. Didn't you want to try the local crossing-the-bridge rice noodles?'

The two went out and found a fairly well-known shop, ordered a serving of crossing-the-bridge rice noodles. All kinds of miscellaneous ingredients piled together, the noodle bowl was bigger than Jiang Luo's face. He rolled up his sleeves, and he and Lu You each devoured a whole bowl.

After a month of School cafeteria meals, Jiang Luo finally understood why Ye Xun and Lu You had been moved to misty-eyed tears over a dish of sour-and-spicy shredded potato.

After they finished eating, they bought a box of flower cakes to bring back for their companions.

The Hotel lobby was full of students coming and going. Jiang Luo and Lu You entered through the side door and saw a group of students standing silently in the hall, each one as tense as if facing a teacher.

A cold voice came from the center of the crowd: 'Which school in Southern Fujian set up this fox-spirit altar? Take it down.'

Lu You whispered, 'Southern Fujian has a custom of worshipping fox spirits.'

A student flushed red and stepped forward. 'Master Feng, I set this up. But I was worshipping it alone in my own room—why take it down?'

'You broke the rules,' Feng Li said calmly. 'Since you know how to worship a fox spirit, why didn't you check whether this place is suitable for worship?'

Feng Li's tone wasn't harsh, but it tightened the skin all over one's body, no one daring to meet his eyes.

Jiang Luo and Lu You hid at the back of the crowd watching the show. Feng Li and several other judges seemed to be inspecting the students' rooms one by one. The students were terrified, afraid of having some fault found in their rooms.

Lu You nudged Jiang Luo: 'You didn't bring anything prohibited, right?'

Jiang Luo: 'Broke as a church mouse. Got nothing.'

Lu You said with relief: 'I didn't bring anything either. Need talismans, buy from you; need artifact refining, find Kuang Zheng. We're both broke as church mice—perfectly safe.'

Jiang Luo: '...' Your broke-as-church-mouse and mine aren't quite the same thing.

The two of them figured the judges were about to reach their floor at The First Floor, so they headed back to the room first. Jiang Luo went to deliver flower cakes to Ye Xun and the others; when he returned, Lu You was sitting on the sofa watching TV and said to him, 'They've finished the inspection.'

Jiang Luo was mildly surprised: 'That fast?'

Lu You nodded, waving the paper in his hand: 'The Competition notice is out too.'

The entire Competition has three rounds. The first round begins in three days. The content is breaking a formation, and the location is a place called Hubu Village.①

The paper had a photo of Hubu Village's exterior and a few lines of introduction. Hubu Village is a Ba Gua village—the houses and roads inside are all laid out according to the Nine Palaces Ba Gua Formation. Easy to enter, hard to leave. Outsiders who enter are like entering a maze, often losing their bearings.

The first round is only the basics, testing participants' fundamental knowledge and skills. The requirements clearly state that participants may not carry any tools other than the Compass.

Jiang Luo looked at the thick stack of Spirit Papers in his bag and fell silent.

If he couldn't bring Spirit Papers, he felt it wasn't very safe.

Not that Hubu Village was unsafe—but that the evil ghost hiding somewhere unknown was unsafe.

A month ago, Jiang Luo had said he'd torment Chi You all night, and he actually used Spirit Papers to torment Chi You all night.

Chi You grew weaker and weaker. The thin mist went from thick to faint. The Spirit Papers burned on his body fell to the ground, piling up a thick layer of paper ash, but his laughter grew more frantic and twisted.

'Interesting,' Chi You laughed before disappearing.

This entire month, Chi You had never shown himself—he must have been injured at his core by Jiang Luo. Jiang Luo could already imagine, once that madman recovered, how frenzied and unscrupulous the methods he would use to retaliate even more cruelly.

Is Jiang Luo afraid?

The answer is naturally no.

During this month of desperate studying, every night before falling asleep, he had recalled the eighteen times Chi You killed him.

The resentment and fury in Jiang Luo's heart climbed higher. Eighteen times—he hadn't repaid even half of it yet.

Chi You was so kind and gentle—how could Jiang Luo possibly take advantage of him?

*

Three days later, Jiang Luo boarded the bus bound for Hubu Village.

Hubu Village is forty kilometers from the city; the bus drove two or three hours before reaching the destination. Jiang Luo and twenty-some unfamiliar participants followed the staff to the entrance. The staff member said: 'The total duration of this Competition is twenty-four hours. Participants need to find the small flag we left at the Array Eye, and bring the flag out of Hubu Village. Participants who fail to exit Hubu Village within 24 hours will be eliminated directly.'

Jiang Luo checked the time. It was now three in the afternoon.

There are eight entrances into Hubu Village in total. Although there are as many as 180 participants, Hubu Village's internal layout is interconnected. Once inside the village, probably none of those 180 people would run into each other—everyone could only rely on themselves to leave Hubu Village.

The staff member said: 'A reminder to everyone—this entire Competition will be live-streamed throughout on our internal website.'

Live-stream?

Jiang Luo considered thoughtfully.

If there's a live-stream, it would actually guarantee his safety to a certain extent.

After announcing the start of the Competition, the participants rushed impatiently into Hubu Village.

Jiang Luo quietly followed behind the crowd.

Everyone took out their Compasses, and in an instant only a few scattered people remained walking. Jiang Luo also took out his Compass along with everyone else, but he didn't look at the Compass's direction—instead he raised his head to look at the sky.

The saying goes: Taiji gives birth to the two forms, the two forms give birth to the four images, the four images give birth to Ba Gua, and Ba Gua transforms into the sixty-four hexagrams. The variations within are endless, cycling endlessly.② The Array Eye is the core of the Ba Gua Formation. Logically, one only needs to walk toward the center, but when inside, Hubu Village's roads are complex and ever-changing—seeming to lead somewhere but actually blocked. Not only can one not reach the center, one might even walk further and further away.

Jiang Luo looked up, and without needing the Compass, saw Golden Light gathering at the center of the Ba Gua Formation—comparable to the brightest guiding beacon.

But besides him, no one seemed to see this Golden Light at the Array Eye.

Jiang Luo followed the Golden Light. Although he didn't need the Compass, he didn't put it away either. It felt like he'd turned on a cheat code—the answer laid out before his eyes, waiting to be plucked. Jiang Luo had a clear goal. After turning left and right countless times, gradually only he remained by his side.

On the website watching the live-stream, someone gradually noticed his strangeness.

[This guy is a bit uncanny]

[He seems to barely use his Compass? Holy shit, from the aerial view his speed seems even faster than Qi Ye!]

[? Upstairs is exaggerating]

[Wuwuwu beautiful gege kiss kiss, gege's face is so lickable]

[I'm gonna lick the screen till it explodes! I declare I'm living in this stream now!]

[Help, who is he, so good-looking, crying crying]

[This is a serious website, keep it clean up there. The more I look at this guy the more off he is—he really hasn't been looking at his Compass much! Amazing amazing, experts really are among the common people]

[Genuine question, how do you get out of the Ba Gua Formation without looking at the Compass?]

In the judges' room, several judges also noticed Jiang Luo.

Feng Li scanned across the many camera feeds at a glance, finally settling slowly on the black-haired youth's camera.

The black-haired youth walked steadily along the paths, his composure stable, occasionally glancing at the sky. If a path was blocked, he'd return to where he was. His sense of direction never wavered, slowly approaching the Array Eye.

Zhuo Zhengyu, the Zhuo Clan head beside Feng Li, saw the trick. He said quietly to Feng Li: 'This young man is remarkable.'

He looked again at his daughter. Zhuo Zhongqiu's speed wasn't slow either, but comparing the two methods of finding the Array Eye, his daughter was immediately left in the dust.

Feng Li responded, calmly: 'Good talent.'

'Zhuo Zhongqiu mentioned this kid to me,' Zhuo Zhengyu said. 'He's also a disciple of your Feng Clan.'

Feng Li raised his eyebrows slightly in surprise, then showed a faint smile. 'So he's a Feng Clan disciple.'

When Jiang Luo had finished one-third of the journey, it was already six in the evening. He planned to find a place to rest and have dinner.

There happened to be a simple rest Pavilion nearby. Jiang Luo put his things down, took out a Self-Heating Pot from his bag. When the Self-Heating Pot was nearly ready, a boy walked over from outside.

The boy had sharp, angular features, arrogant and unruly, his expression visibly irritable. He held a Compass in his hand, was stunned upon seeing Jiang Luo, then frowned, as if unable to believe someone had gotten here before him.

'Who are you?' the boy asked in a bad tone.

Jiang Luo glanced at him sideways, too lazy to speak, his gaze tail drawing back.

[Ahhh beautiful gege you're electrifying me!]

[Sitting on a bench eating watermelon, fight fight fight]

[Holy shit they actually met, Qi Ye's bad temper is done for, they're definitely gonna fight]

Being glanced at so dismissively, the irritation in Qi Ye's heart was like oil being poured on it, nearly exploding. He suppressed his temper: 'Hey. I'm asking you a question.'

The heat of the Self-Heating Pot gradually stopped. Jiang Luo broke apart his chopsticks, lifted the lid, prepared to eat.

The aroma drifted with the wind into Qi Ye's nose. Before Qi Ye's temper could explode, his stomach embarrassingly growled.

His face stiffened, clearly unable to save face, and he stood silently in place without speaking.

Jiang Luo acted as if he didn't exist, comfortably finished his meal, and finally tidied up the trash to avoid polluting the environment.

After the meal, the sunset had already set. Jiang Luo looked up at the sky, decided to make do for the night in the Pavilion, and set out again tomorrow morning.

Otherwise, if he kept walking like this, once it got dark, if Jiang Luo couldn't see the Golden Light, then his day's effort would be wasted.

Unexpectedly, that seemingly irritable boy also entered the Pavilion, apparently having the same plan as Jiang Luo.

The two did their own things, and got along peacefully—disappointing the viewers who wanted drama. But among the comments, one eye-catching comment suddenly appeared.

[Oh my god... look quickly at beautiful gege's shadow—is there something moving inside?]

In the live-stream, Jiang Luo's shadow cast diagonally on the ground was subtly, slowly twisting.

As if some terrifying monster were hidden within—the edges of the shadow had ghostly claws seeming to gather, slowly approaching Jiang Luo's toes on the ground.

And Jiang Luo, completely unaware, was seriously reading a Compass Detailed Guide.