Chapter 111: The Secret Vault

A mere fourth-rank sect’s Foundation Establishment dared to be so arrogant? Wei Yuan flew into a rage, deliberately ignoring the influence of his Immortal Lord status, and struck immediately.

A golden cauldron floated above his head; then his body and the cauldron both swelled larger. He seized its legs, swung it high, and brought it crashing down upon his senior brother’s head! The blow was ferocious—his senior brother had no time to dodge and could only raise his flying knife in a desperate defense.

A deep bell rang—the golden cauldron in Wei Yuan’s hands shattered. His senior brother spat blood, his flying sword snapped into several pieces, and more than half his body was driven deep into the earth! This strike was a direct collision of their Foundation Establishments; one blow alone damaged his senior brother’s already Spirit-Nurturing Foundation, making his spiritual power flow with great difficulty.

The cauldron shattered, and Wei Yuan’s mind briefly reeled; a stone on his Foundation cracked into fragments. But since it had always been scattered rock—not part of a solid stratum—he felt little pain. With a flick of his spiritual sense, another stone on the ground began to reshape, transforming into a square, three-legged cauldron. Wei Yuan reached out and grasped it—another golden cauldron appeared in his hand.

This time, as the cauldron came crashing down, his senior brother had no defense left. He spewed blood uncontrollably, his Foundation cracked open, and his entire body sank into the ground, leaving only half his head exposed. In truth, his senior brother lost miserably—Lanshen Palace had risen on incense-based divine arts, boasting countless devious techniques, but direct combat was never its strength. Now, trapped in a confined space and clashing Foundations head-on with Wei Yuan, he was using his weakest point to strike the enemy’s strongest. Even with his Spirit-Nurturing cultivation, he couldn’t withstand three blows.

Seeing his senior brother on the verge of death, the junior brother cowered in the corner, his eyes filled with terror.

Having knocked down his senior brother with two strikes, Wei Yuan habitually summarized the battle: “Molding a cauldron on the spot takes time—it gives the enemy breathing room. Next time, make several backups.”

Wei Yuan retracted the golden cauldron, glanced at Yun Feifei lying motionless with her robes askew, then at the red-clad woman whose Primordial Spirit aura was utterly different, and asked: “Who are you?”

The red-clad woman gave Wei Yuan a sorrowful look and said: “My soul-form is actually Feifei’s senior sister. I died horribly when our sect shattered; a fragment of my soul was collected and nurtured by Feifei in her Soul-Guiding Casket. Over the years, we’ve hidden and fled—whenever Feifei couldn’t go somewhere, I went instead. My actions, including that Yin Wind I blew on you, were fueled by decades of accumulated incense and devotional power from the palace. Recently, Feifei was cursed by blood magic and could only suppress it through deep sleep, so she attached a fragment of her spiritual awareness to me. So I am me—and I am also Feifei.”

“Then where’s the item on her? Hand it over—I need to return to the sect and report.” Wei Yuan said, expressionless.

The red-clad woman was stunned. “Feifei’s like this—aren’t you taking her with you?”

“Taking the item back is enough.” Wei Yuan made it clear he had no intention of dragging along a burden.

The red-clad woman had never encountered such a thing. In the past, whoever saw her or Yun Feifei rushed to help—none were like this man, who already treated Feifei as dead just because she was asleep.

“Won’t tell?” Wei Yuan stared at the red-clad woman, a cold smile slowly curling at his lips.

“W-what are you going to do? Don’t you dare touch Feifei!” the red-clad woman cried out—even though Wei Yuan hadn’t moved toward Yun Feifei at all.

Wei Yuan ignored her warning entirely. He drew a simple array diagram on the floor, and suddenly the red-clad woman found herself frozen in place!

Spirit-Binding Array. This array could briefly immobilize ghostly or yin souls, creating an opening for follow-up attacks. Wei Yuan had long been uncertain what the red-clad woman truly was—now that she admitted she was a remnant soul, the Spirit-Binding Array was perfect.

Wei Yuan drew another circle of arrays outside. Instantly, the red-clad woman grew scorching hot; faint flames began spewing from her nose and mouth!

Soul-Refining Array! This array was deadly—it could directly reduce weak ghosts to nothingness. Even with her devotional power shielding her, being reduced to ash was merely a matter of time.

Yet she was stubbornly defiant—screaming in agony as she burned, she refused to reveal what the item was or where it was. Wei Yuan didn’t waste time. He shut down the Soul-Refining Array and told Xu Waner: “Stay here and watch them.”

Wei Yuan pointed three times, trapping the red-clad woman inside as well, then added: “Don’t believe anything they say. If anyone tries to run, kill them.”

Before leaving, Wei Yuan still wasn’t satisfied—he laid a fengshui array in the room, cursing everyone nearby with misfortune. Wei Yuan himself, with his overwhelming fortune, was unaffected.

He set up so many precautions because he realized the relationship among Yun Feifei and her siblings was utterly toxic—none of them seemed decent. Perhaps only the third sister, who had fled to Hanyang Pass, was somewhat sane. In Wei Yuan’s view, neither the senior brother nor the junior brother needed to be taken to Hanyang Pass; not killing them on the spot was already mercy.

Of course, if they could prove their worth, that would be different. Wei Yuan was not a man who would violate his principles for silver—unless the sum was enormous.

As for Yun Feifei, once the item was retrieved, there was no need to bring her back to the palace. The Immortal Lord cared for the item, not her. Wei Yuan had read countless texts—he knew better than to confuse the two. As for tender feelings or gallantry, such things didn’t exist for a volatile sword cultivator.

Xu Waner, however, was remarkably simple-minded—perhaps raised in a government office, she’d seen little of the world’s hardships, like a sharp-edged sheet of pure white paper.

After careful instructions, Wei Yuan headed toward the main hall. The array plate showed the strongest karmic trace lay beneath the hall, and the key to unlocking it should be the token in the jade statue’s hand. Whether Yun Feifei spoke or not was irrelevant—once Wei Yuan searched all locations tied to karmic traces and still found nothing, he could always return to bargain with Yun Feifei.

After Wei Yuan left, the room fell silent. Everyone stared at Xu Waner, making her instinctively

step back. The red-clad woman urged: “Quickly wipe away the array under my feet—I’ll help you escape!”

Xu Waner took two steps toward the red-clad woman, then stopped. The red-clad woman’s expression shifted rapidly, then she said: “You—you aren’t…?”

Xu Waner’s face flushed faintly, her voice barely a whisper: “I think… we should follow Senior Brother’s orders. Don’t ruin his mission.”

The red-clad woman snapped: “He’s treated you like this—and you still defend him?”

She looked at Xu Waner’s deeply flushed face and suddenly understood: “You’re trying to…?”

“No!” Xu Waner denied it instantly.

The red-clad woman stamped her foot in frustration but forced herself to calm down, preparing to persuade again. She knew Xu Waner was gentle and indecisive—easily swayed. As for Wei Yuan, she wasn’t worried—he was just boasting. He’d never find the Ancestral Secret Vault. Back then, the Wuyu tribe’s army and others had scoured the entire Lanshen Palace for days, tearing it apart—and found nothing.

The priority now was to escape. Once Wei Yuan left empty-handed, they could return and find another way to open the Ancestral Secret Vault.

Thinking of the vault, the red-clad woman clenched her teeth inwardly, cursing: “Old bastard deserved to die! Die, then—why didn’t you hand me the secret before you went? Good riddance!”

In the Ancestral Hall, Wei Yuan dragged the collapsed Xu Wenwu aside and paced through the hall, observing the reactions of different karmic light spots. The strongest trace remained underground, roughly ten zhang deep. Another was inside the relatively intact goddess statue; another lay in the ruins of the disciples’ quarters—far enough to sit at the edge of the array plate.

Wei Yuan approached the goddess statue, studying it closely. Neither his eyes nor his spiritual sense detected anything unusual—only the Qi-Viewing Technique revealed lingering incense and devotional power. Even after Lanshen Palace’s destruction, many still worshipped these deities.

Wei Yuan pointed, summoning a water spell that slammed into the statue. In this region, water and wood arts were especially potent, possessing unique marvels unseen elsewhere. Wei Yuan’s Primordial Spirit was powerful—others’ water spells split into three or five branches; his split into over a hundred, each branch strong and precise.

!.

Thin streams of water, like blades, peeled away the statue’s surface layer by layer, like peeling an onion—until the secret within was revealed. Inside the statue was another statue: another goddess, with a hollow gap in her chest and abdomen—exactly matching the shape of the small token. Wei Yuan removed the token from the jade statue and placed it into the goddess’s chest.

A faint, hazy glow suddenly illuminated the hall, and faint whispers of countless commoners praying and making wishes echoed through the air. Several floor tiles gradually faded and vanished, revealing a deep, dark passage leading underground. Only Wei Yuan, holding the token, could see this passage—others still saw the floor as intact.

“How unoriginal,” Wei Yuan muttered inwardly.

This method of concealing chambers had existed for tens of thousands of years—utterly uninspired. In his Art Theory classes, the teachers had taught dozens of ways to hide secret chambers. Placing the trigger on an inanimate object was the stupidest method; using a dead token to open the entrance was stupidity piled upon stupidity.

These teachers had innovated endlessly, developing countless novel solutions. One widely admired method involved fusing the chamber’s trigger with the master’s Primordial Spirit—requiring the master to be in a specific emotional state to activate the secret realm. In simple terms: you had to make the person happy before the entrance would open.

Others took this further: they required a beauty to seduce the master, and not just any beauty—she had to match his idealized dream woman and be utterly devoted to him, so his emotions would reach the required threshold. When this method surfaced, countless female cultivators spat in disgust, and elder masters flew into rage to punish its creators.

Yet after that, some female cultivators secretly adapted the method for their own use, developing numerous new applications—and it became the inspiration for countless later romantic tales.

But historically, the highest-level entrance mechanism was never designed by the Art Theory teachers—it was created by the Heaven and Earth Theory teacher.

That master simply left a riddle at the entrance: calculate the orbital trajectory of two massive stars. Solve it correctly, and the door opens. Fail, and you’re struck by lightning.

Few in the entire Tai Chu Palace could solve it.

Similarly, the most ingenious way to enter the secret chamber was also his invention. After solving the riddle, a door would open into a void—you had to fly along the exact calculated trajectory to reach the chamber. Any deviation, and you’d be lost forever in the void, never finding the secret room.

This method was designed specifically to foil those who cheated by having others solve the riddle. It was said that after its release, several True Lords fell into inexplicable bad moods, venting their anger on everyone around. The True Lords of Tai Chu Palace were all used to arrogance—they couldn’t accept being outmatched in Dao, nor could they accept being outwitted, even if it was true.

For a time, Tai Chu Palace was in chaos—Zhang Sheng’s temper was still too low on the list of problems.

(End of Chapter)