The mystical plant guards its master through adversity, unveiling a path of triumphant resurgence.

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Cracks on the bronze cauldron oozed dark red blood veins. The moment Shen Yi’s fingertips grazed the cauldron’s surface, he abruptly withdrew his hand.

With every beat of the suspended heart, the trial ground’s bluestone slabs fractured further, and even the jade beads on Gao Yao’s sword tassel began to sway as if stirred by an unseen breeze.

“This round of the trial just changed the rules,” Ling Xian’s voice came through, resonating like the clash of metal, “Those who pass through the Thorny Valley will advance.”

The stone walls around them thundered down, revealing a mist-shrouded gorge beyond.

Shen Yi caught sight of Mo Yu’s torn sleeve caught on a thorn, the bloodstain greedily absorbed by creeping vines.

Calmly, he switched the Divine Farmer’s Hoe to his left hand, while the fingertips of his right still lingered with the cool medicinal fragrance from Gao Yao’s wrist—the Rejuvenation Pill she had just slipped to him was burning hot in his palm.

“If you can’t move forward, Young Master Shen...” Gao Yao’s sword sheath suddenly appeared three inches before his face, deflecting a slicing gust, “You can ask me.”

Seizing the sheath for leverage, Shen Yi rose, his nose nearly brushing the silver chain dangling by her ear. “Fair Immortal Gao, do you know the girl who last said this to me later brought peach blossom pastries to my herb garden every day?” Before he could finish, she shook him off, stumbling into the entrance of Thorny Valley, and he distinctly saw the faint blush coloring the tips of her ears.

The miasma instantly engulfed all senses.

The system’s visor exploded with a blood-red warning like a mist of gore. Shen Yi flicked three iron burr seeds backward, hearing their muffled bursts ten paces away.

Behind him came frantic curses; five or six figures emerged ghostlike through the toxic fog—gamblers who had bet on Mo Yu’s victory earlier from the spectator stands.

“Brother Shen, you’re quite the schemer!” Feng Yi’s voice hissed from the ground fissure. Shen Yi dodged aside just as seven venom-coated spikes erupted where he had stood.

Rolling into a thicket, the Divine Farmer’s Hoe hidden in his sleeve suddenly heated up, its blade reflecting a spiritual energy vortex three zhang behind and to the right.

That was the Thorny Valley’s deadliest "Soul Devouring Formation," now triggered by Feng Yi’s pursuers.

Biting his tongue to clear his mind, Shen Yi flicked out a jade vine seed.

As the vine burst through the earth to entangle his ambushers’ ankles, he used the reaction force to hurl himself toward the formation’s core, his garment brushing past the deadly spiritual vortex.

“Thanks for the gift!” Shen Yi caught fragments of a shattered magical tool tossed by the formation—half a broken sword jammed with a bulging storage pouch.

Behind him came the sound of heavy objects crashing and agonized screams, but he crushed the Rejuvenation Pill mid-stride—the pain of his dantian nearly being drained reminded him that the hidden injuries he had accumulated from secretly eating spiritual fruits at night were now rebelling within his meridians.

Gao Yao’s sword energy suddenly tore through the left side of the miasma. Shen Yi instinctively tilted his head just in time to dodge an icy spear aimed at his back.

The assailant’s face, concealed by a Silence Charm, twisted in the toxic fog. Shen Yi recognized this technique—the pharmacy owner had died the same way three days ago behind the counter.

“You sect trials...” Shen Yi gasped, planting the Divine Farmer’s Hoe into the rock wall for leverage to leap onto a protruding stone platform, “Do you even recruit from the funeral trade?”

His mocking words were choked by the metallic sweetness of blood.

As he knelt on one knee, he realized his right calf had been wrapped by blood-colored vines, each leaf sucking spiritual energy.

Amid the system’s frantic red warnings, he saw the Nine-Turn Resurrection Grass flickering in a crevice twenty paces away, and Feng Yi leading the last three challengers in a pincer attack.

“Brother Shen, that hoe of yours is rather elegant,” Feng Yi’s folding fan pointed to his throat, its ribs hidden seventy-two spirit-sealing needles. “Why not send it with me as a burial gift?”

Suddenly, Shen Yi relaxed his grip, letting the Divine Farmer’s Hoe fall. At the stunned gasps, three pansy seeds flew from his sleeve, exploding overhead in dazzling light.

Using the blinding moment, he lunged toward the crevice. The instant his fingers brushed the resurrection grass’s soft fuzz, the entire mountain rock turned to flowing sand.

“Careful!” Gao Yao’s alarmed shout cut through the sand vortex with sword energy. Shen Yi caught the sword tassel she threw him in midair.

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At the entrance to the Nine-Turn Resurrection Grass, he saw the girl’s torn sleeve stained with blood—the stain pulsed in sync with the Qiongqi heart.

As a sharp pain exploded in his dantian, the system’s visor suddenly unfolded a starry totem map.

Coughing blood, Shen Yi laughed, his blood-stained teeth shining as jade-green sprouts wildly grew in his palm—the Soul Devouring Epiphyllum, nurtured for forty-nine days in his herb garden, known for absorbing killing intent from lethal formations.

“Fair Immortal Gao,” he tore the sword tassel wrapped around his wrist, letting the golden threads dissolve into guiding runes within the miasma, “please assist me...”

The ethereal glow of the Soul Devouring Epiphyllum swallowed his unfinished words, and the entire Thorny Valley formation emitted a deathlike wail.

The last sensation Shen Yi felt in the blaze was countless spiritual energies rushing from the Epiphyllum’s root system into his meridians, burning, and Gao Yao suddenly gripping his sleeve tightly.

When his vision cleared, he was lying upon a white jade platform outside the trial ground, still clutching a half-blood-stained Epiphyllum petal.

Ling Xian’s sword hovered three inches above his head, its blade reflecting the countless horrified faces in the spectator stands, and Feng Yi’s humiliating figure dangled upside down on the bronze cauldron, ensnared by vines.

“Young Master Shen, impressive tactics,” Ling Xian’s sword tip lifted his collar, revealing the faint but discernible Qiongqi tattoo on his chest, “But this beast’s mark...”

Shen Yi pressed the Divine Farmer’s Hoe that had started heating again against his chest. As a blood-red alert flared across the visor, he heard the crisp snap of chains breaking deep within the trial grounds.

The Qiongqi tattoo on his chest shimmered with an eerie purple glow beneath the sword light. He flicked Ling Xian’s blade; the metallic vibration startled the blue-tail sparrows perched on copper bells.

“If you wish to inspect the dormitories, Immortal Elder, my herb garden still lacks a stone lion to guard it.”

Ling Xian frowned, but a thunderous chain-breaking sound came from the trial ground’s southeast corner.

Seizing the moment, Shen Yi rolled off the white jade platform, his lower back striking a bronze beast’s head at the spectator stands. A seed of Awakening Herb slipped from his sleeve into the beast’s mouth.

Three breaths later, the guardian spirit beast sneezed loudly at Ling Xian.

Amid the chaos, Shen Yi wiped the blood from his mouth.

The system’s visor projected a 3D map of Thorny Valley. Among the formation’s lines drained by the Soul Devouring Epiphyllum, the unique Black Lotus mark of Mo Yu remained.

He pinched the Epiphyllum pollen on his fingertips and whistled toward Gao Yao.

The girl, wiping blood from her sword tassel, shot him a glare but forgot the faint blush still lingering on her ear tips.

Shen Yi shook a jade medicine bottle he had somehow acquired; its surface reflected her suddenly tightened lips. “Fair Immortal Gao, this bottle of Nine-Flower Jade Dew...”

Before he could finish, the star map on the trial ground’s dome suddenly reversed direction.

The blue bricks beneath his feet cracked into spiderweb patterns. Instinctively, he leaped toward Gao Yao but was bounced back to the center by an invisible barrier—the entrance to the second trial, the Thousand-Mechanism Forest, was slowly opening overhead.

Twenty-eight bronze compasses hovered, each face reflecting a different lethal formation.

As Shen Yi’s cloth shoes stepped on the “life gate” position, three poisoned crossbow bolts whizzed past his ear, embedding in the stone wall.

Gasps rose from the spectator stands. Some began betting he would fall before half an incense stick burned.

“Master Shen begging now...” Feng Yi’s sinister voice mixed with the whir of the compasses, “You might still keep all your limbs.”

Shen Yi suddenly tore off his hairband; as his ink-black hair dispersed, thirty-six Ghost Needle Grass seeds hidden within cascaded to the ground.

These spirit seeds, nurtured under moonlight for seven nights, erupted into half-human height thorn walls the moment they touched earth, blocking all incoming hidden weapons.

“Brother Feng, do you know the greatest joy of farming?” Shen Yi spun to dodge spikes bursting from the ground. The Divine Farmer’s Hoe scraped the compass edge, sparks flying to ignite phosphor powder scattered in the air. “It’s watching weeds bloom in the direst circumstances...” He paused deliberately, then a sudden flicker of spiritual light from his fingertips commanded all the Ghost Needle Grass to turn. “Into flowers you never expected.”

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Poisonous thorns shifted direction with his words, prompting several pained cries from the spectator stands.

Feng Yi’s Silence Robe was riddled with holes as he scrambled to slap calming talismans onto himself.

Seizing the opportunity, Shen Yi dashed beneath the Kun position compass. Golden silk vines wove from his sleeve, climbing the bronze patterns, draining thirty percent of the formation’s spiritual energy in moments.

At that moment, Gao Yao’s sword energy tore open the southeastern barrier.

From the corner of his eye, Shen Yi saw her fingers feigning to adjust her hair, secretly performing the Thunder Summoning Art. A perfectly timed thunderbolt struck the death gate three steps away, shielding him from seven Spirit-Piercing Nails.

“Immortal, your thunder technique...” Shen Yi leapt onto the Zhen position compass, deliberately crushing Feng Yi’s formation flags, “Has the same rhythm as when I chop wood in the fields.”

In reply came a sudden downpour talisman.

Without dodging, Shen Yi let the rain soak his robe front. The Dragon’s Blood Bodhi Seed hidden in his bosom swelled upon contact with water, releasing a red mist from which hundreds of spirit-devouring ladybugs flew.

These small creatures, gleaming golden-red, precisely attacked the hidden trial participants controlling the formations. The spectator stands erupted in cries as storage bags were devoured.

When the last compass was gnawed through at its core, Shen Yi staggered out of the Thousand-Mechanism Forest.

His hairband, long lost in some formation node, left his tangled hair dusted with phosphor powder and blood, unable to conceal the blazing stars in his eyes.

“Thank you for the game,” he saluted the stands. From his sleeve, the Soul Devouring Epiphyllum’s roots quietly ensnared a shadow trying to slip away.

He had noticed earlier while breaking the formation that Mo Yu’s Black Lotus mark was spreading along the bronze cauldron’s cracks—that villain’s remnant soul was now possessing a gambler.

Suddenly, Gao Yao’s sword sheath blocked his path.

Looking down, Shen Yi saw the jade bead tied to the tassel reflecting the scene behind him: at the edge of the trial ground, the eye of a bronze beast head held a familiar residual soul forming a seal.

“Young Master Shen,” Gao Yao’s voice was colder than her sword’s edge, but her fingertips secretly traced a heart-protecting talisman in his palm, “The sect’s crematorium is closed for business.”

Shen Yi clasped her fingers before she could withdraw them, laughing wildly into the shrinking pupils of the girl.

“Then I shall...” He suddenly pulled Gao Yao into a spin. The Divine Farmer’s Hoe brushed her shoulder as it flew toward the bronze beast’s head. “Fair Immortal, witness a miracle.”

The Soul Devouring Epiphyllum’s roots exploded inside the beast’s mouth, and Mo Yu’s residual soul screamed before vanishing as blue smoke.

Catching the rebounding Divine Farmer’s Hoe, Shen Yi noticed a dark rune etched on its handle—the unfinished curse symbol from Mo Yu.

As Ling Xian’s sword sang overhead, Shen Yi toyed with the black jade key taken from Mo Yu’s remnant soul.

Facing the judging sword light, he raised his hand. The Qiongqi mark on his palm suddenly resonated with a seal deep within the trial ground.

“Immortal Elder,” he twisted the Epiphyllum pollen on the key, “Do you think this key...” His voice deliberately dragged out as all the bronze relics vibrated simultaneously, “Could be the spare kitchen key for the canteen’s back storeroom?”

As the last afterglow vanished beyond the horizon, Shen Yi leaned against an ancient cypress outside the trial ground, bandaging his wounds.

Moonlight flowing through his fingers as he toyed with the key cast a shadow on the blue bricks—an intricate triple Rashomon gate only found in the forbidden zones of the Immortal Realm.