Red Sand City.

Ren Tiange and the Silver-Eyed Great Sage stepped out of the mercenary guild, having just completed a job.

The work had gone flawlessly — the herbs they’d been tasked with gathering came in two full grades above the contracted target. The merchant, predictably stingy, offered nothing extra for it. “Payment per the contract terms, as agreed” was all he said before sending them on their way.

“Eight days of work, three Heaven Crystals to show for it.” Ren Tiange felt his labor had been criminally undervalued. Being a mercenary was genuinely no joke.

“You’d feel considerably worse knowing those overgraded herbs alone were worth at least five hundred crystals.” The Silver-Eyed Great Sage offered a faint smile, paying no mind to Ren Tiange’s sudden stop, continuing forward with easy composure.

“Why—” Ren Tiange caught up, voice rising with each word. “You knew it was worth that much and didn’t say anything? Five hundred crystals — we could have just broken the contract! Even if we’d failed the job outright, the penalty would’ve been a single crystal for the delay. We could have absorbed that easily! Heaven above, five hundred crystals, just handed over to that miserly fat merchant for nothing?”

“Because I’m honoring Human Valley’s order,” the Great Sage said, calm and unbothered.

“I understand what you mean — if this were a client who honored fair dealing and showed gratitude in return, of course we’d hold to that standard. But that miser broke the rules first. There’s an explicit provision that a client owes a reasonable bonus when a job is completed above target. That fat man has hired us three times now, and every single time he’s forced the unfair contract terms through to the letter, knowing full well that small-time mercenaries like us have no real leverage to negotiate. They don’t follow the rules themselves — they draft exploitative contracts specifically designed to squeeze us, to steal the value of our labor. Why exactly do we owe people like that any consideration? They’re not worth the gesture, and even if we extended it, they wouldn’t feel an ounce of gratitude. People like that don’t understand what gratitude even is!” Ren Tiange’s voice climbed with each sentence, anger bleeding through.

“You’re not wrong. They don’t follow the rules. But the question is — do we become like them?” The Great Sage shook his head gently. “We’re reincarnated challengers. We came here to be tested, not to accumulate wealth. How much money we end up with isn’t what matters. What we’re after is assimilation into Human Valley’s truth, passing the trial it represents.”

“Hey, I never said you were wrong.” Ren Tiange had never once doubted the Great Sage’s judgment — the frustration was simply real, regardless.

They walked on for a stretch in silence.

Eventually Ren Tiange sighed quietly. “If we had five hundred crystals, we could buy so much. We could even build you a proper construct research lab — develop our own designs. And Hauge — he’s having a genuinely rough time of it. I worry he won’t last much longer. If we had that money, he wouldn’t have to keep swallowing his pride working for other people. A man with his temper, doing manual labor for wages — it’s painful to watch.”

The Great Sage nodded slightly. “Yes. Forcing Hauge into manual labor is a genuine ordeal for him. But that’s precisely what Human Valley was designed for. Whoever you are, coming here means suffering, means hardship, means tasting every flavor of human existence — only then do you understand what it truly costs to be human, only then do you learn to value whatever you eventually gain. A powerful being acquires money and status easily. But if he never learns to value it, never understands the worth of material things, then no amount of accumulation will ever bring him happiness. Whether a life is fulfilling has nothing to do with how much one possesses — it comes entirely down to one’s understanding of value itself. We came here specifically to step down from a position of supreme strength and immerse ourselves at the very bottom, to genuinely experience it, to let these things become woven into our own values and our own state of mind. That way, even after we eventually leave Human Valley, we’ll carry that understanding with us — we’ll know how to value things, how to comprehend humility, how to feel genuine gratitude for life — rather than becoming some lonely sovereign perched above everyone else, possessing everything and feeling nothing.”

Ren Tiange stood there, stunned into silence.

He had never once imagined this was the true purpose behind Human Valley’s existence.

No wonder someone like Yue Yang — who clearly could have chosen the most advantageous starting conditions available — had declined them entirely, settling instead for whatever his mother had left behind. Of course. People like him and the Great Sage hadn’t come to Human Valley to accumulate wealth and clear it as quickly as possible. They’d come to experience life itself.

The Great Sage’s pace slowed further. “To an ordinary person, ‘the divine’ might seem something perched far above, radiant beyond comprehension, magnificent and sacred the instant it appears. To a supreme power, ‘the divine’ might seem, beyond its incomprehensible strength, something fundamentally solitary — the assumption being that to ascend to godhood, one must have abandoned everything tied to the mortal world. Both views, I suspect, miss something essential. My own guess is that the divine may in fact be the form of supreme power that understands humanity most completely — no matter how much suffering a person endures, how difficult their circumstances, how unfortunate or sorrowful their life becomes, the divine understands all of it. So why don’t the gods simply intervene to relieve human suffering directly? Because they want humanity to rise from within that suffering — to overcome it, to overcome themselves, to transcend their own limitations and advance toward the divine realm that lies beyond suffering altogether, rather than sinking into comfortable indulgence in the mortal world. However pleasant worldly comfort might feel, it never escapes age, illness, and death — never escapes tragedy as its final destination. How does one truly escape human misfortune? By ascending to the divine realm — by elevating oneself to the state of ‘god.’ Why was this Human Valley established at all? After my days of observation, experience, and reflection here, I believe it is, fundamentally, a trial.”

“And it’s not only Human Valley,” the Great Sage continued. “The entire Trial Grounds operates on this same principle. The ancient great deities who created the Trial Grounds didn’t build it to make people stronger. They built it to free people from misfortune, to elevate them toward godhood. Of course, as one draws nearer to the divine realm, strength naturally follows — but many people fixate on that byproduct and mistake it for the actual point.” The explanation left Ren Tiange sweating with the effort of processing it.

“Since you’ve understood all this yourself, why not pursue it personally? Why tell me?” Ren Tiange didn’t believe he possessed the insight or capability needed to ascend to godhood himself.

“Actually, I’m no different from you in this,” the Great Sage said, smiling. “I understood far too late. And even understanding it isn’t the same as being able to achieve it. Only someone with considerably greater insight and far stronger capability could ever fully realize what the ancient deities hoped for.”

“That’s a relief to hear, honestly. I think I’ll settle for being an ordinary man — ascending to godhood is more responsibility than I could carry.” Ren Tiange wiped a bead of cold sweat from his brow.

He’d genuinely been afraid the Great Sage was about to tell him he was exactly that kind of person, demanding he live up to some impossibly high standard.

Ascending to the divine realm had been, in some sense, Ren Tiange’s lifelong dream.

But a dream was one thing. Being asked to immediately live according to the standards of someone destined for godhood was something his heart couldn’t accept. Without that level of insight, without that strength of will, he didn’t believe he could manage it — and forcing himself to try might well drive him mad. A dream didn’t need to be fully realized to matter; the slow approach toward it was, in itself, life’s greatest source of drive and meaning.

Being asked to achieve it all at once was simply more than he was prepared for.

The Great Sage laughed heartily at this. “Ha — do you think I don’t understand you by now? What I just said was meant to keep you from feeling envious later, when you see others ascending around you. The divine realm isn’t something an ordinary person can pursue — understanding the principle behind it isn’t enough on its own. I can’t do it. You can’t do it. Whoever genuinely can must have comprehended even more than I have, comprehended it sooner than I did, and stand as an unmatched genius across every dimension — knowledge, wisdom, insight, willpower, capability, all of it — a true paragon among people. Such a person could find enlightenment in their own suffering or in someone else’s; in their own life or in someone else’s; in their own battles or someone else’s. They could absorb all of it, transform it into their own beliefs and convictions, and from that, crystallize an eternal, unshakeable divine will — forge their own singular divine nature. No external power can substitute for this process, no outside force can shortcut it. It must be the product of the person’s own effort to remain permanent, eternal… Why are humans so weak? Precisely because that weakness creates the possibility of ascension — because humans, through great wisdom, can walk out of the most bitter, most difficult circumstances imaginable and arrive directly at the divine realm. This is something other powerful races can only dream of and never achieve. That’s why, to ascend to godhood, even war beasts and other races must eventually walk this same path — must come to this ‘Human Valley,’ live as a human for a time, experience what a human life actually is, comprehend what it means and why it matters to be human — only then can the path toward true godhood begin.”

Ren Tiange closed his eyes tightly, overcome.

So that was the truth of it. That was the reason behind everything.

In that moment, he felt a deep pride in being human — a profound gratitude for the simple fact of his own humanity.

Humans were the weakest of all beings. And yet every form of life, without exception, had to walk this same road — emerging from the weakest, most painful, most difficult starting point — in order to ascend toward something higher. Without that path, no matter how much raw power a being accumulated, it remained nothing more than a pitiable creature of the lower realms, forever cut off from anything resembling eternity, immortality, permanence.

“Let’s go find Hauge and Qingmo. Now that we understand the true meaning of Human Valley, we should tell them too — spare them unnecessary detours. If we’re here to experience life, then suffering and joy stop mattering in the way we thought they did.” Ren Tiange laughed freely. The weight he’d been carrying since entering Human Valley felt entirely lifted now, as though his chest had opened wider, room enough for a thousand new things to settle in.

“Do you think Hauge’s understanding will arrive the same way yours did?” The Great Sage shook his head gently. “I think he’ll need to have everything first, before he can truly absorb a lesson like this. Right now, with his resentment still pressing down on him, he won’t be able to hear any of it. If Hauge were wealthy already, with nothing left to chase, he might reflect on it naturally. But penniless as he is right now, asking him to understand suffering as a form of growth — that’s a difficult thing to ask.”

“Then let’s go find someone who’ll actually understand the reasoning — let’s go find that kid!” Ren Tiange couldn’t wait to see Yue Yang’s face after hearing this whole philosophy laid out.

“No need. Do you really think his understanding would lag behind mine?” The Great Sage let out a quiet sigh. “That young man is someone we can barely look up to as it is. It was precisely his choices that left me genuinely puzzled — until I finally worked it out myself, just yesterday. Do you really think his comprehension moves slower than mine? He may well have understood all of this before he even set foot in Human Valley.”

“What?” Ren Tiange broke into a cold sweat. Titan can’t possibly be that monstrous, can he?

“Going to find him is a good idea regardless — Hauge needs his help more than anything right now. Once Hauge is settled, let’s see what else we can do to help here in Human Valley.” The wise light returned to the Great Sage’s eyes, and the corner of his mouth settled back into that familiar expression — calm in the face of anything, utterly assured.

Just as Ren Tiange agreed and turned to head toward Walnut City, someone appeared ahead, clearly waiting.

A clear-eyed, fine-featured young man, dressed in plain mercenary garb.

Before either of them could speak, he stepped forward and bowed respectfully. “Are you Lord Ren Tiange and Sage Silver-Eye? I’m Wenxin of the Iron Lion Guard, under Star Diamond Castle. My lord instructed me to wait here for you both.”

Ren Tiange blinked, startled. The lord of Star Diamond Castle knows who I am?

Then it clicked. Of course. It had to be that kid Titan.

Before he could even ask what was going on, Wenxin had already produced two gold bracelets from inside his robe, presenting them formally. “These are gold bracelets from my lord, gifts for you both — each already sealed with two gold-tier constructs. Lord Ren Tiange’s contains the Golden Lion King and a Gold Horned Python for aquatic combat. Sage Silver-Eye’s contains a Golden Mammoth and a Gold Tiger Shark for aquatic combat. Please, accept them with my lord’s compliments. And my lord made a point of instructing me personally — this letter must be delivered directly into Sage Silver-Eye’s hands.”

With that, the young mercenary tore open a hidden seam in his clothing and retrieved a sealed letter from within, presenting it to the Great Sage with deep respect.

“I worked myself half to death for almost three months just to scrape together enough for an unranked construct — not even bronze tier. And this kid shows up out of nowhere and hands me two gold constructs. Is Titan trying to shame me into hanging myself?” The moment Ren Tiange fastened the bracelet onto his wrist, he discovered the constructs’ special functions immediately, and the sheer shock of it nearly knocked him over. Had he not needed to preserve some dignity in front of a young attendant like Wenxin, he might have stripped off his shirt and sprinted around in sheer disbelief. A gold-tier construct — by his own savings, scraping it together would have taken a century, easily.

“I’ve received the letter. Go back and tell your lord we’ll be there on time, without fail.” The Great Sage read through it quickly and nodded his reply.

“Understood.” The young mercenary Wenxin summoned a silver-tier war wolf, preparing to ride off.

“Wait a moment.” Ren Tiange called out to stop him. “I’d like to know — has your lord sent anyone toward Walnut City? We have a friend there as well.”

“You mean Lord Hauge, I assume?” Wenxin bowed respectfully. “My lord heard about Lord Hauge’s situation and took it very seriously — he went there personally. By now, I’d expect Lord Hauge has already reunited with my lord. There’s no need to worry. We also have several other brothers dispatched separately, to Green Bamboo City, Flame Sun City, Blood Rock City, and Black Mist City, to receive Lord Qingmo, Lord Xuying, and Lord Xueti respectively.”

“Heavens above — is this what they mean by the gap between man and god?” Ren Tiange shook his head, slightly dazed. “Here we were scraping together coins for a single bronze construct, and this kid just hands us two gold constructs apiece, like they’re cabbage he grew straight out of the dirt.”

“I think I’m starting to feel a little sorry for Ji Wuri now,” the Silver-Eyed Great Sage said, breaking into open laughter.

(End of Chapter)