ATEG Chapter 142.1

The Inverted Heavenly Ladder is not climbed by traversing the path of Wudi Gorge — it is climbed through one’s own cultivation. The Wudi Cave is not entered by descending into the fathomless Underworld — it is entered through the leakages in the Dao-heart of whoever comes. If one’s Dao-heart has no leakage, and one’s own cultivation is complete and whole, then one may transcend life and death and escape the cycle of reincarnation. Without understanding what the Inverted Heavenly Ladder truly is, one cannot climb out of it. Without perceiving what the Wudi Cave truly is, one will sink ever deeper into the cracks of one’s own heart.

Nu Xu had already come to understand this. She had only needed to calm her mind in order to climb out of the Inverted Heavenly Ladder — yet a single sudden utterance had laid bare the unsteady place in her path of cultivation and forcibly dragged her down into the state of the Wudi Cave.

Her Dao manifested only as a short stretch of stone spikes beneath her feet. Beyond those spikes, all around her was boundless, fathomless darkness.

If she could not resolve this doubt in her Dao, she would be trapped here forever.

Yet in that boundless, fathomless darkness, a figure suddenly appeared — complexion a pallid blue-white, lips cold, eyes colder still, clad in a sleeveless armor of deep green and ink-black, revealing two arms wrapped in narrow dark-red sleeves. From each shoulder plate extended a long chain, faint ghostly flames flickering along its length, trailing down past the elbows and coiling around the forearms to form a strange pair of vambraces.

Nu Xu suddenly opened her eyes and looked at the figure. “Xi Chen’an.”

Xi Chen’an gazed at her with deep, somber eyes. This Ghost King who held dominion over an entire realm had suppressed his aura to near-nothingness, as though he were nothing more than a faint shadow — yet his gaze seemed to pierce through flesh and bone.

It was he who, moments ago, had uttered those words that exposed the crack in Nu Xu’s Dao-heart and forcibly trapped her here.

Xi Chen’an studied Nu Xu for a long while. His gaze held no emotion, nor any goodwill. He did not seem inclined to address her question, and simply stepped forward through the fathomless dark toward her, one step at a time.

No — not through the darkness. His feet seemed to tread upon a different path entirely.

Watching his stride, Nu Xu understood: beneath Xi Chen’an’s feet there was likewise a path — his own Dao, visible to him alone. This was the peculiarity of the Wudi Cave — each person could only walk their own path, and could only see their own path. Xi Chen’an, however, was perhaps different. He was the first cultivator ever to have climbed out of the Inverted Heavenly Ladder, and he had dwelled within the Wudi Cave for untold years. He seemed capable of seeing the paths beneath others’ feet, of discerning another’s Dao from those manifested stone spikes.

Because Nu Xu’s Dao-heart was unstable, she was confined to the narrow patch of ground beneath her feet. If someone with no clear sense of their own Dao fell into this Wudi Cave, they would likely find not even a single stone spike to stand upon, and would plunge directly into the fathomless dark.

Though Xi Chen’an had a path of his own, to reach Nu Xu he first had to understand where her Dao lay — and so he did not walk quickly.

Nu Xu glanced at him once, then closed her eyes.

At that, Xi Chen’an curved the corner of his mouth. His outer eye corners slanted upward, his lips thin and long; when he smiled, it looked like nothing so much as cold, disdainful mockery.

Yet he genuinely found Nu Xu’s reaction quite clever. Sensing his ill intent and reading the situation clearly, she wasted no time on further questions and instead sought to break through the barrier of doubt before he arrived, so that she might be free to move within the Wudi Cave.

Only if she could move would she have any chance.

But a barrier in one’s cultivation — could such a thing be so easily broken through?

Nu Xu was not going to waste time asking Xi Chen’an — yet now, of all times, Xi Chen’an found himself wanting to tell her.

“You came here for the Yellow Springs Inn?” he asked, walking forward at an unhurried pace.

Nu Xu kept her eyes closed and said nothing.

“It is well that you came,” Xi Chen’an continued, paying no mind to whether she answered, speaking entirely to himself. “Establishing a sixth Yellow Springs Inn within the Underworld is no easy thing. It requires a solid foundation. I see that…”

Even as Nu Xu ignored him, his voice reached her ears regardless. “You would do perfectly.”

Killing intent surged. Nu Xu instinctively gripped the white bone blade resting across her knees. Even knowing that Xi Chen’an was trying to disturb her state of mind, the information revealed in his words still shook her to the core.

Xi Chen’an — was he truly in league with those wicked cultivators in the Underworld who refined vengeful spirits into foundations for coffin-boat inns?

****

Within the Underworld.

The yin-mist was thick as congee, and pinpricks of lamplight scattered like stars.

That stretch of the Yellow Springs was in chaos. There were cultivators who were Yellow Springs Ferrymen, as well as ghost cultivators under Nu Xu’s command and cultivators of the Mingdeng Sect.

The Black Dog Little General’s enormous claws crackled with vicious killing intent. With one swipe he forced open a coffin-boat, then bit down with his sharp teeth, swung his head savagely, and tore out a Yellow Springs Ferryman in a tattered black robe, flinging him into the Yellow Springs river.

It was almost laughable — these cultivators called themselves Yellow Springs Ferrymen, yet without their coffin-boats refined from vengeful spirits, the moment they touched the Yellow Springs waters they would sink, with only their souls remaining to be drawn into reincarnation. Ferrying, ferrying — what they ferried was not vengeful spirits at all. They used the suffering of those vengeful spirits to ferry themselves.

Sadly, the common folk of the mortal world were foolish and deluded. Under the orders of the Yin Son of Heaven and through years of deliberate conditioning, many ordinary people had come to worship the Yellow Springs Ferrymen as legitimate deities — believing them to be gods who could travel the Yellow Springs at will. The faith and votive power that accumulated around the Ferrymen was absorbed and refined by them, and gradually, even without riding their coffin-boats, they could linger above the Yellow Springs for a moment or two.

The Ferryman’s black robe now radiated the power of incense and prayer. That power kept him afloat upon the Yellow Springs for a single breath — and in that breath, the vengeful spirits he commanded through the yin-mist surged forward one after another, holding him aloft.

The Little General’s eyes blazed ferociously. He lunged at the Ferryman again, his roar scattering several vengeful spirits before him, pressing the Ferryman down toward the Yellow Springs. The Ferryman struggled wildly, clawing away at the ghost-energy coating the Little General’s body. The Little General was hurt, but only grew more savage — he tore through the Ferryman’s black ritual robe and drove him bodily into the Yellow Springs waters.

The moment the Ferryman touched the Yellow Springs waters he could no longer struggle, and was swept away. But then another coffin-boat came — its prow carved with a ferocious ghost-mouth and sharp ghost-horns — and while the Little General was still fighting the previous one, it rammed straight into his flank.

A point of lamplight blazed suddenly bright, wrapping around the Little General and holding the coffin-boat at bay. But from beneath the Yellow Springs, four or five more coffin-boats were already rising.

A cultivator of the Mingdeng Sect pulled the Little General back, formed a hand seal, and in an instant both vanished from the surface of the Yellow Springs.

A moment later, the two of them reappeared on a calm, undisturbed stretch of the Yellow Springs. This stretch had none of the relentless Yellow Springs Ferrymen, no Yellow Springs Inns — only stillness and the firm, profound flow of arcane meaning.

“Rest a moment,” said the Mingdeng Sect cultivator, exhausted. They had gotten away quickly enough; on the stretch of Yellow Springs they had just left, some of the lampflames had already gone dark.

Through this stretch of the Yellow Springs flowed the power of Shetu, and the crooked methods by which the Ferrymen refined vengeful spirits into coffin-boats could not hold up here for long. They could afford to relax a little.

The Little General was restless at heart, yet he still gave a nod. Now that he had let himself relax, he found he truly was struggling to hold on.

Their method of traveling through the Yellow Springs had come from the deity at the summit of Daqing Mountain. It was far more nimble than the Ferrymen’s coffin-boats — but in this upended Underworld dominated by the Yellow Springs Inns, it was paradoxically the Ferrymen who moved with greater ease. The Ferrymen had operated in the Underworld for a long time, and were not to be easily opposed. Some of the more formidable ones no longer even needed their coffin-boats.

When Nu Xu was present, these hard bones were hers to deal with. Since her departure, all that pressure had fallen upon the ghost cultivators under her command. Had the Mingdeng Sect cultivators not been there to help, the ghost cultivators would likely have been in full retreat long ago.

Over these past few days, some powerful unknown figure had consecutively destroyed three Yellow Springs Inns and fixed three stretches of the Yellow Springs. The Ferrymen’s coffin-boats could not lurk within these three stretches, and if they lingered too long, they might even be forcibly dragged into the Yellow Springs and swept off to their next reincarnation. These three stretches of the Yellow Springs had thus become places of refuge for the Mingdeng Sect and the ghost cultivators.

But after those three stretches were fixed, the Yellow Springs Ferrymen on the remaining six stretches became completely immovable. Every single one of them massed on those six remaining stretches, refusing to cede a single step, whether a Yellow Springs Inn was stationed there or not — they would sooner die than yield. And so the cultivators of the Mingdeng Sect and those under Nu Xu’s command found themselves in an ever more desperate situation.

Many Ferrymen had been sent by them into reincarnation — and likewise, many among their own number had fallen.

The Little General rested his head on his two forepaws, his dignified round eyes looking a little dim.

Once the King returned, surely things would be better.

****

“You intend to break through the barrier of doubt in your cultivation in this little window of time?” Xi Chen’an’s cold, mocking voice drifted around Nu Xu like cool, slippery mist. “You wish to walk a path unlike that of orthodox ghost cultivation — do you fancy yourself wiser than the countless ancestors who built this tradition across untold years? Your Dao is nothing but a narrow, crooked path!”

Nu Xu’s eyes snapped open, sharp as blades. She looked into Xi Chen’an’s eyes — he had drawn very close, now only three steps from her side — yet his gaze was not as relaxed as his tone. To capture her, he had to approach her. To approach her, he needed to understand her Dao.

But her Dao — how could it be his place to judge so easily?

The heart has no boundaries. What person could bear the boundless grudge-energy of all living beings? A grudge, by its nature, is injustice — how can injustice be cut away with injustice?

Yet this so-called barrier of doubt — had she not already known its answer from the very day a deity had illuminated her path?

The injustice resides in me. The vengeful fury resides in me. I am all living beings. To bear the vengeful-energy is to observe the lack within the heart. To cut through injustice is…

Nu Xu slowly rose to her feet. The killing intent born from the flaw in her Dao-heart was now under her control.

“Understanding is not the same as being able to do,” Xi Chen’an said, his expression suddenly reverting to the somber gravity of their first meeting, the earlier flippant mockery fully withdrawn. “But you have no time left.”

He now stood within a single step of Nu Xu.

Xi Chen’an was a Ghost King of long years and deep cultivation, far more familiar than she was with the workings of the Wudi Cave. He could move freely within it, while Nu Xu was still confined to the small patch of ground beneath her feet. This would be a battle whose outcome could be foreseen.

“Perhaps,” Xi Chen’an said, “I can offer you another choice.” The chains on his forearms slowly lowered, ghostly flames gliding along them like spirit-serpents flicking their tongues. He looked at Nu Xu, his gaze growing ever more somber. “Come serve under me, and you may become the master who presides over the sixth Yellow Springs Inn.” It seemed like a not-unreasonable offer — at least far better than being forcibly refined into the inn’s foundation.

The path beneath Nu Xu’s feet remained unchanged. She had reached understanding — but understanding and being able to act were two different things.

To retreat one step was to fall into fathomless darkness. To advance one step was to enter the Yellow Springs Inn.

To fall into the fathomless darkness — she might lose everything, might be utterly extinguished.

She had no way to retreat.

But she had no intention of retreating either.

The white bone blade blazed with sudden light, decisively cleaving forward one step!

To bear the vengeful-energy and cut through injustice.

To cut through heaven and earth — and through the heart itself!

The blade-light was devastating, like a thunderbolt crashing down, illuminating even the near-bottomless depths of the pit!

When the stroke was done, Xi Chen’an’s face was dark. He had fallen back three steps. The iron chains on his right arm had been completely severed, and the wound beneath them was deep enough to have nearly reached bone. Had he not retreated in time, that arm would have been lost to the blade.

But within the Wudi Cave, there was no longer any trace of Nu Xu.

….

In the Underworld, Li Quan suddenly raised his head.

Bi Dongdi raised his head in tandem, instinctively following. Above them was only the boundless Underworld, with no visible ceiling — he could see nothing, and so he drowsily turned his gaze back to Li Quan.

“Let us go,” Li Quan said, not explaining further, lowering his eyes.

“The time has come.”

….

In the Wudi Cave.

Xi Chen’an shook out his right arm; the wound upon it gradually healed, and the chains re-formed and sealed themselves back together.

He had barely stepped out of the Wudi Cave when a voice reached him. “You failed?”

Xi Chen’an looked at the half-white-haired Daoist waiting outside, his expression displeased. “Bie Chunian.”

Bie Chunian looked somewhat older than before, but otherwise appeared no different from the past. His expression still carried that warmth that made people instinctively let down their guard, as though he were entirely unconcerned by the Five Declines of Heaven and Man upon his own body. His gaze fell on Xi Chen’an’s right arm, where no scar remained visible — yet Bie Chunian still perceived something slightly off in the aura there.

“You underestimated her,” Bie Chunian said, stating it flatly.

Xi Chen’an gave a cold snort. “If not for agreeing to your conditions, how could she have ever landed a blow on me?”

Bie Chunian still wore his gentle smile, and asked again, “She escaped?”

“She fell into the Wudi Cave,” Xi Chen’an said.

The Wudi Cave connects to the Underworld. To fall within it means one’s life-force is extinguished in an instant and one re-enters the cycle of reincarnation. For ghost cultivators, of course, there is no life-force to be dispersed — but in re-entering reincarnation through this means, their memories and cultivation would be scattered all the same. It would be no different from an ordinary cultivator’s death.

“If that is so,” Bie Chunian said, “has your goal not been achieved all the same?”

The sixth Yellow Springs Inn required a particular kind of foundation to be driven into the Yellow Springs — but Xi Chen’an did not necessarily need to capture Nu Xu himself. He only needed to force her into the Underworld; after that, the Yellow Springs Ferrymen already waiting there would take care of the rest.

Xi Chen’an studied Bie Chunian’s face carefully, unable to glean so much as a hint of anything from it.

Earlier, Bie Chunian had come to him and asked him to go easy on this matter. Xi Chen’an had agreed — and so he had made no additional moves, letting Nu Xu enter the Inverted Heavenly Ladder on her own. Otherwise, with tens of thousands of ghost soldiers surrounding her in Wudi Gorge, she would never have escaped. But he was not inclined to let too much slide — anyone who could not even reach him in the first place was not worthy of him weighing whether to show mercy.

Bie Chunian must have sought to request this of him because he did not want Nu Xu to fall into the Yellow Springs Inn. Yet now, hearing that the outcome had not changed, Bie Chunian seemed not to mind at all.

But if he did not care whether or not the sixth Yellow Springs Inn was built — why had he gone to all this trouble?

……