The outskirts of the Ruins of the Gods.

The Hall of Guidance.

Half a month earlier, several shadows had stepped out of the void to explore this mysterious, unfathomable entrance to the Ruins of the Gods. Every rune inscription and every message left by earlier explorers had been studied by these shadows in every possible way. Unfortunately, for all their thorough preparation and all their godlike powers — they could fly through the heavens and burrow through the earth and do anything they pleased — the shadows had still been defeated by this riddle of a place.

They had tried dozens of methods, close to a hundred, including using divine power to force their way in against the laws. Every single one had failed.

“It’s no good. This damned place isn’t the entrance to the core of the Ruins of the Gods at all. What rotten luck. I told you from the start that the real entrance is under the guard of the Mirage at the Tianra Imperial Palace, but you wouldn’t believe me. You had to waste time here, and look where that’s gotten us — half a month gone and nothing to show for it. We’ve been flying around blind like headless flies, and it hasn’t done the slightest good. This ‘Hall of Guidance’ is an ancient con. I’d bet everyone since ancient times has been taken in by it. We can’t waste any more time here!” A fiery red shadow was angrily blaming his companions.

“Don’t get angry. Things haven’t gone badly enough to be worth losing your temper over.” Some of the shadows had very good tempers.

“This is the real entrance. It’s no con.” Some were extremely stubborn.

“If you think this is a con, you’re free to leave on your own. Nobody’s asking you to stay. ‘Volcano,’ do whatever you like — we won’t stop you. But please stop whining here. It doesn’t help the work along one bit. It only hurts everyone’s morale and gets on people’s nerves.” A purple shadow, whose view was the complete opposite of the fiery red shadow’s, scolded him without the least courtesy.

“What? Are you saying my staying here is dragging everyone down?” The fiery red shadow his companions called “Volcano” was furious.

“You’re not dragging anyone down, but you aren’t doing anything useful either. If I were you, I’d be smart and shut my mouth!” The purple shadow held his ground all the way.

“All right, all right. We’re all companions here. We came for the secret treasures of the Ruins of the Gods, and until we have them in hand, we ought to pull together instead of blaming each other like this. If that old goat Tianyu saw us carrying on like this, he’d laugh his teeth out… While Dongfang, Tianyu and the rest are locked in a fierce battle with the Sky Tower’s guardian and can’t spare a hand, we need to hurry, find the real entrance and claim the treasure. It’s very rare to get a chance like this, where the fisherman profits while the heron and the clam are fighting, and we should treasure it. Normally, snatching a bite of meat from right under Tianyu’s nose is no easy thing. Right now he’s wary of the Sky Tower’s guardian and doesn’t dare show himself lightly, so we have to make the most of it.” A sapphire-blue shadow stepped forward to play peacemaker, trying to calm the fiery red shadow and the purple shadow down.

“You can’t go wrong listening to Vast Sea. Volcano, Thunder, the two of you should say a little less! And Storm Cloud, Wilds, help talk them down. If you start fighting among yourselves before we’ve even gotten inside the Ruins of the Gods, and word of it gets back to the Sky Realm, could any of you live that down?” A silvery-white shadow, who seemed to be a woman, urged them gently.

“I’ll shut up.” The fiery red shadow gave a sullen snort. “But I still say the real entrance is at that guarded place in the Tianra Imperial Palace.”

“That doubt isn’t entirely unreasonable,” a pitch-black shadow chimed in. “If Tianyu knew where we were, he couldn’t possibly sit back and ignore it — unless this isn’t the real entrance, and nothing we try here will do any good.”

“Storm Cloud, that’s just a hypothesis. Tianyu is making his final push to break through. He has no idea we’re here at all.” An emerald-green shadow disagreed the moment he heard it.

“Well, I don’t think Tianyu is that easy to fool. And never mind him — even that crafty Dongfang may have found out about us. It’s just that he can’t turn us into his pieces the way he controls other people. Is there anybody who’s made a name for himself in the Sky Realm who’s a fool? No. The real fools got themselves killed by their own stupidity long ago. How would they have lived this long… I’m not trying to hurt anyone’s morale, and I’m not trying to rule out what we came here to find. I just think we should stay careful enough and cautious enough.” The pitch-black shadow held to his opinion too.

“Doubt isn’t impossible, but letting your imagination run wild is just dumb.” The emerald-green shadow gave a cold laugh, mocking his dark companion, the one they called “Storm Cloud.”

“I’m not talking to you.” The pitch-black shadow, Storm Cloud, was plenty angry too.

“So what do we do now? Keep looking for the secret entrance, or head for the Tianra Imperial Palace?” a golden shadow asked, somewhat at a loss — and with that question he voiced what was on all their minds.

What were they supposed to do next?

Opinion had split into two completely different directions. One side believed this was the real entrance and they should hurry to unlock its secrets; the other believed the real entrance was somewhere else entirely and there was no need to waste any more time here.

Whichever way they went, the results would be completely different, even opposite.

And splitting up was the last thing these uninvited guests from the Sky Realm wanted to do.

Each of them might have divine power far beyond an ordinary person’s, but individually, compared with that Divine Hall Supreme, “Tianyu,” who stood high above them like an immovable mountain, they were unquestionably outclassed. They admitted as much and saw it clearly: unless they pulled together, they could never stand up to the Divine Hall Supreme…

They could not split up, and yet their opinions were completely opposed.

What were they to do?

Every shadow turned its eyes toward the most mature and steady among them, the sapphire-blue shadow, “Vast Sea.”

He alone had taken part in the last Sky Tower war fought over the secret treasures of the Ruins of the Gods. Back then, “Vast Sea” had been a minor figure of no importance, but at least he had been there, in that war over the treasures — older and further back in time than the Prison Emperor six thousand years ago, or even the Conquest Queen ten thousand years ago.

And it was after that war, having gained enormous advantages from it, that Tianyu truly became the foremost power of the Central Divine Hall.

“This really is the real entrance. I’ve never been inside myself, but an old friend of mine who died in that war fought here once. To win one of the places to go inside, he threw away his bright future and his powerful life. Compared to him, I was just a weak rookie back then, nowhere near qualified to take part. I’d only come because I’d heard of the place — and a good thing too, or that silly rookie would never have lived to this day.” The sapphire-blue shadow, Vast Sea, recalled his past with deep nostalgia. “The Sky Tower’s powers back then weren’t withered away like they are today. I remember that while I was still in the ancient passage, two Sky Tower powers caught me. With their strength, they could have crushed me to death without lifting a finger. But they didn’t. They just laughed out loud and said they’d give me a chance to live. They even said they wanted to leave the invaders from the Sky Realm some seed to grow from, so as not to kill too much… It’s true. The Sky Tower’s powers back then really did have the standing to say something like that. Their strength — how can I put it? Perhaps everyone here is very confident in their own strength, but to be honest, compared with them back then, all of us put together might not last three moves against any single one of them!”

“What?” The fiery red shadow cried out in disbelief. Not only him — every one of the shadows found it incredible.

“I’m not exaggerating. You should all know I’m in the habit of telling it straight, and when something is a ten, I only ever say eight.” The sapphire-blue shadow, Vast Sea, waved his companions off from doubting him just yet. “The Sky Tower’s warriors back then truly had tremendous strength. If you ranked only the top ten in the Sky Realm, five or six of them would have come from the Sky Tower — and that’s no exaggeration at all.”

Sky Tower warriors could claim five or six of the top ten places in the Sky Realm?

That — that’s just too terrifying, isn’t it?

Never mind the Sky Realm — the Heavenly Realm alone was who knew how many times bigger than one tiny Sky Tower! It was impossible even to imagine. A single random “continent” of the Heavenly Realm was probably larger than the whole Sky Tower put together. And the Heavenly Realm had a full million “continents”! It had a hundred “domains,” and the domain emperor of each one ruled nearly ten thousand continents’ worth of territory.

A Heavenly Realm that vast, plus the Sky Realm on top of it, and all together they had only about as many top-tier powers as the Sky Tower, a backwater the size of a hand?

If it were just that the Heavenly Realm’s warriors were too weak, fine. But the Sky Realm? There was no such thing as a mediocre fighter in the Sky Realm.

Had it been anyone but Vast Sea — the one of them least capable of lying — nobody would ever have believed it.

The Sky Tower’s warriors — that’s just way too outrageous!

Are they trying not to let anybody else live?

Compared with that, when you thought about today’s Sky Tower warriors, how far they had fallen seemed pitiful. With the Heavenly Realm legions invading, even a handful of low-grade rank-and-file had them showing signs of cracking. If it weren’t for Yue Titan, who could fairly be called a freak, the Sky Tower might as well not bother resisting at all and save itself the effort!

The Sky Tower warriors who had once looked down on the whole Sky Realm could now barely find a few decent fighters to stand up against the Heavenly Realm legions.

Where had all those top-tier powers who once shook the world gone?

“They’re all dead. And the ones who aren’t dead were sealed away by the ancient great gods.” When the sapphire-blue Vast Sea said this, all his companions were stunned.

“No way — all dead?” The fiery red shadow, Volcano, simply could not accept it.

“Those were top-tier powers numerous enough to take five or six of every ten places in the Sky Realm!” The pitch-black Storm Cloud found it incredible too. Who had done it? Who could possibly have the power to kill that many top-tier powers?

“Yes. Every last one of them is dead. And what killed them was nothing else — it was themselves! The Sky Tower’s warriors were forever fighting among themselves. Yes, that’s the Sky Tower warriors’ greatest trait: they love to fight each other, and it’s the kind of infighting no outside power can ever settle. The warriors of the Longteng Continent fight the warriors of the Demon Abyss to the death, and the warriors of the Demon Abyss fight the warriors of the Longteng Continent to the death, and nobody has ever been able to work out what kind of hatred, what kind of reason, could make them fight like that, never stopping until one side is dead.”

“And these wars aren’t a matter of once or twice, or a day or a night. Some of them have gone on for a thousand years, ten thousand years — son after grandson, handing down the hatred and the power, fighting forever without end.”

“You could say the Sky Tower’s decline was caused entirely by its infighting. The Sky Tower’s warriors love to fight each other far too much. Their strongest were all killed or sealed by their own people. Only a very, very few survived to found their own schools and pass on their power. But once the new generation of disciples had fully grown, they started fighting each other all over again, killing each other all over again, until once more only a very, very few survivors were left to carry on the glory of those who came before. And if there’s ever a gap in the middle, the ones who come after lose their predecessors’ inheritance completely, and they have to start again from nothing, poor as dirt… just like Yue Titan now! Still, Sky Tower warriors grow very fast. Yue Titan’s growth is freakish, far beyond anyone’s, but on the whole, the Sky Tower warriors — the human warriors of the Longteng Continent above all — have always grown astonishingly fast. That genius brat Yue Titan is just better and more outstanding than the other geniuses.” The sapphire-blue Vast Sea slowly told his companions about all the ways things had been back then, and the other shadows listened, exclaiming and sighing without end.

“How do you divide them into groups? Are the humans of the Longteng Continent and the demons of the Demon Abyss each one group?” the emerald-green shadow asked.

“No. Their groups are very, very complicated. Even the Longteng Continent and the Demon Abyss are split into at least a few dozen groups each. The Sky Stairway’s warriors are more unified — you could probably count them as one group. They’re also the fewest in number, of course.” The sapphire-blue Vast Sea shook his head.

“Then how did the Sky Realm tell them apart?” the golden shadow asked.

“Well, back then, the Sky Realm divided them this way: by where they came from — the Longteng Continent, the Sky Stairway, or the Demon Abyss… Within the Sky Tower, one tiny bottom layer of the world, the Sky Realm generally recognized three clan-like groups of top-tier powers. At first I thought that was the right way to divide them too, but when I actually got here, I found that every big group had lots of little groups inside it. The makeup is very complicated, and the fighting inside a big group is every bit as fierce as the fighting between them. Of course, when there’s an outside enemy, it’s fairly normal for a big group to hold together and fight. Like now: with the Heavenly Realm legions invading the Sky Tower, everyone is fighting back under Yue Titan’s command. But of course, that’s mainly because the Sky Tower has no top-tier powers left. If it had dozens or even hundreds of powers like Yue Titan, they would never pull together and fight shoulder to shoulder. That would be impossible. Only — never mind hundreds, if the Sky Tower had even a few dozen Yue Titans, no one in the Heavenly Realm would dare to invade. Even back in the old days, if the Sky Tower’s warriors hadn’t fought among themselves, this place would have stayed forbidden ground forever, and no Heavenly Realm warrior could ever have set foot here. It would never have come to what it is now, where even the Heavenly Realm’s rank-and-file dare to strut around baring their claws…”

“Tell us more about the differences between the three groups. I’ve suddenly gotten a bit interested in this,” the emerald-green shadow asked eagerly.

“By their habits of behavior, the Sky Realm could sort them out clearly. Generally speaking, there’s the hot-blooded type of Sky Tower power who doesn’t like picking on the weak — on the contrary, they love speaking up for the weak and fighting powerful enemies with reckless courage — and warriors of that type came from the Longteng Continent, so they were called the Longteng Continent group. That hot-blooded group was also the largest. In other words, the powers from the Longteng Continent were the biggest group of all. The ones from the Demon Abyss were different in a lot of ways. First, they worship force and are extremely warlike. When they meet someone strong, whoever it is, they have to challenge them. They’re fairly indifferent toward weak lifeforms, but unlike many warriors in the Sky Realm, while they ignore the weak, they seldom interfere in the lives of those beneath them. That’s a lot better than the Sky Realm’s powers, who’ll massacre whole clans or seize them as slaves and vassals at the drop of a hat. If you want an accurate description, the Demon Abyss powers were mostly a pack of lunatics who loved fighting more than life itself, and they didn’t seem to have much enthusiasm for occupying or ruling land.” The sapphire-blue shadow, Vast Sea, summed it up.

“And the Sky Stairway?” the emerald-green shadow asked again.

“The Sky Stairway seems very mysterious. In the Sky Realm, there are fewer legends about the Sky Stairway’s warriors than any others,” the golden shadow said, interested too.

“That’s right. The most surprising of all are the Sky Tower warriors from the Sky Stairway. They’re the fewest in number, and most of them are women, but their strength is nothing to sneeze at. These strange races may be tied to the Eastern Immortal Clan in countless ways, though no one can say exactly how. The Sky Stairway’s warriors are peaceful by nature. They don’t like fighting at all, and they cherish life deeply. A blade of grass, a tree, an insect, a bird, even the lowliest servant — in their eyes, all of them are lives, and they won’t kill any of them lightly. Maybe because of that temperament, the warriors from the Sky Stairway were often misunderstood. People mistook them for weak, and they were often attacked by fools who didn’t know their limits… Back then, several ‘Divine Wars’ broke out exactly that way! A Sky Stairway warrior would be attacked, and that would enrage the warriors of both the Longteng Continent and the Demon Abyss, and the Sky Realm would erupt into a free-for-all that couldn’t be stopped. Unless some ‘gods’ fell because of it, and some ‘gods’ were sealed, a ‘Divine War’ would never end easily.”

“You mean the Sky Tower’s divine-realm warriors all fell in their own infighting? And this Ruins of the Gods holds the treasures they left behind?” The fiery red shadow, Volcano, finally understood why “Big Brother Vast Sea” had brought them all this enormous distance to explore here.

“You could put it that way.” The sapphire-blue shadow, Vast Sea, agreed.

“Then how many treasures must be in there!” Every shadow’s eyes lit up.

“Heavens, if we could get a tenth — no, even a ten-thousandth of it — we’d instantly…” The golden shadow could not even finish imagining it.

“But why? Why would the Sky Tower’s warriors have to come back to this Ruins of the Gods when they fell? Set aside why they fought among themselves and why they fell — even if they fell, why did they have to come back here? I don’t understand!” The emerald-green shadow could make no sense of it however he turned it over.

“The Sky Tower’s powers never really identified with the Sky Realm. They’re not like us. Once we enter the Sky Realm, we build our homes there, build our own territories and power bases, and keep pushing outward. They didn’t do that. Even if they had an outpost there, a city, even a very large kingdom, they could never come to feel it was where they belonged. They could never feel about it the way they felt about the Sky Tower, their homeland. Word has it — and this is only a secret I’ve heard secondhand — that when a Sky Tower warrior reaches their peak, they go to the legendary secret realm of the Sky Stairway, and there they leave behind their own mark and an inheritance of their power, so that those who come after can learn their unique path of comprehension and cultivation… And when they fall, they choose to return their souls to the origin — to this Ruins of the Gods — and seal away everything they had in life inside it, either to give those who come after what they need to grow, or to sleep quietly through the long river of time. Here at the origin, everything goes back to the beginning, everything goes back to chaos… I don’t understand it either, but one thing is certain: their choice is not like that of the warriors of the Heavenly Realm or the Sky Realm.”

“What a contradictory race! They love fighting each other while they’re alive, and then they like to go back to the origin together once they’re dead. That — that’s behavior nobody could make sense of!” The purple shadow, Thunder, shook his head and sighed. His way of thinking would never let him understand such contradictions.

“Then again, these people who clearly love to fight each other have one more strange and contradictory trait. The moment the Sky Tower is invaded by the Heavenly Realm, they put their hatred aside and fight the enemy together. Maybe that’s what comes of feeling they belong to their homeland! Look at Yue Titan now. He came from the Longteng Continent, and yet he can join hands with warriors from both the Sky Stairway and the Demon Abyss to fight Dongfang… You’d never see resistance like that in the Heavenly Realm or the Sky Realm. It’s a fight with no chance of winning at all, and still so many people follow Yue Titan without fearing death. Fools like that are far too rare in the Heavenly Realm, and yet it’s fools like these who shake me. This is the first time my heart has ever been shaken by such weak lives!” The fiery red shadow, Volcano, had slowly shifted into admiration.

“Ha! That really is different from our Heavenly Realm and Sky Realm.” The sapphire-blue Vast Sea suddenly shook his head and laughed out loud. “I agree with you about being shaken, but not about there being no chance of winning. The way I see it personally, Yue Titan is bound to win!”

“What?” All the shadows stared at their leader in astonishment.

“Don’t be so surprised. The battle isn’t clear yet, but I believe the final victory will belong to Yue Titan. The Sky Tower has too many top-tier powers guarding it in secret. They’ll never sit by and watch Dongfang and Tianyu wipe out the Sky Tower. Among the countless fallen gods, there may be one left — maybe many. Who can say? The Sky Tower’s warriors back then were as many as the stars in the sky, and they shone just as brilliantly. How could all of them have fallen? There’s always a very few left over… And besides, the Sky Tower’s inheritance can’t be stopped by any power of extinction. Look at their history. Back when Sky Tower warriors were falling in great numbers, especially ten thousand years ago, when there was almost no one left — was the Sky Tower wiped out? No! The Sky Tower gave birth to a Conquest Queen! The Conquest Queen, who tried to sweep across the Heavenly Realm, was sealed — so was the Sky Tower wiped out then? No! The Sky Tower gave birth to a Prison Emperor! The Prison Emperor died in battle, and the Sky Tower was about to be wiped out — and was it? No. Now this place has given birth to an even more freakish Yue Titan! At the most dangerous moment of all, he has grown up at unbelievable speed… So I say the Sky Tower can never truly be wiped out. It may sink for a while, but once it has rested and recovered, countless geniuses will spring up at once to keep it alive and carry on the glory and honor of those who came before.” The sapphire-blue shadow, Vast Sea, was looking far, far ahead.

“That still doesn’t mean Yue Titan has it won. After all, Dongfang’s layout has already reached the point where it can’t be reversed.” The fiery red Volcano was still a little doubtful.

“Which is why we should all stay neutral. Until the final victory is certain, neutrality is the wisest move,” the emerald-green shadow said with a laugh.

“If you are willing to stay neutral all the way through, then I, as one of the masters here, would be glad to receive you on Yue Titan’s behalf. And if our honored guests from the Sky Realm would like to tour our most secret Ruins of the Gods, this humble girl has no objection at all. Wuxia will gladly do what little she can and personally lead you inside to view the supreme glory of the Sky Tower’s many predecessors.” A voice as lovely as music from heaven came from who knew where. In an instant it had drifted into the midst of the shadows, passed with perfect clarity straight through the defenses of their wills, and, carried by divine mind, entered each of their minds.

Before the shadows could react, there was one more person on the field.

She floated down as lightly as an immortal descending from the ninth heaven, without stirring a single speck of dust — a winsome smile, and bright eyes full of wisdom.

(End of Chapter 1267)