One divination a day, a trainee celestial master

"call!"

Ye Cheng suddenly opened his eyes.

He felt as if he had been pulled up from the depths of water, his chest heaving violently as he gasped for breath. His heart pounded wildly in his chest, and the terrifying roar of the world collapsing seemed to still echo in his ears.

Before me was a gray-white sky.

There was no abyss. There was no altar. There was no suffocating minotaur.

"..."

Ye Cheng lay there blankly, blinking in a daze, his mind still a little confused.

Then, he jolted awake and sat up abruptly.

Hard, cold stone walls.

The campfire was still smoldering.

That familiar, sheltered, gentle slope nestled against a sheer cliff.

"..."

"This...this is fucking..."

Ye Cheng looked at the real scenery around him, his voice trembling uncontrollably.

……

"Well……"

"Cough, cough..."

All around, heavy breathing and violent coughing could be heard one after another.

Xu Lingfei braced himself against the cold ground, sitting up with a cold sweat dripping down his face, his eyes still somewhat unfocused.

Wen Daoqing clutched his chest, looking around blankly. Tao Qingci clutched the talisman box tightly, staring blankly at the half-extinguished campfire in front of him, his cold eyes filled with lingering fear.

Zhang Lingqiu slowly sat up against the stone wall. His androgynous handsome face was now completely bloodless, as white as a sheet of paper. His slender fingers unconsciously reached for the hilt of the sword at his waist.

Li Xunfeng then flipped over and leaped up like a leopard. His hand instinctively rested on the hilt of his sword, and his sharp eyes warily scanned his surroundings.

……

And in front of them.

Jiang Shou was already standing.

He stood with his back to the crowd, facing the gray-white, withered forest beyond the gentle slope. His black special forces uniform fluttered slightly in the morning breeze, and he stood there quietly, motionless.

……

"ah!!"

A piercing scream suddenly came from the other side of the stone wall!

Everyone's heart tightened, and they turned their heads sharply to look.

……

It's another team.

Those thirteen people who were arranged last night to escort the wounded and intelligence out of the mountains this morning.

They're all still here.

They did not leave.

……

But they looked completely different from how they did before nightfall last night!

Xu Hao leaned against the stone wall, a sharp, bloody gash suddenly appearing on his chest! The wound stretched from his left shoulder to his right rib, the flesh twisted outwards in a horrifying manner, gushing blood!

Zhao Feiyan knelt on the muddy ground, her right sleeve soaked in blood, a shocking dark red. She was desperately pressing down on a young junior brother lying on the ground beside her, convulsing, screaming hoarsely, "Don't move! Don't move!! I'll put some medicine on you!!"

Senior Sister Ni, whose right arm had long been severed, was huddled in a corner, her lips turning purple and her whole body trembling.

Beside them, two or three other people lay stiffly on the ground, their faces pale, their fate unknown.

……

"What...what's going on?!"

Tao Qingci was the first to react. She rushed over, grabbed the wrist of her junior brother lying on the ground, and checked his pulse. "You, how did you get injured like this?!"

"...Sect, Sect Master..."

The junior brother's eyes were still unfocused, his pupils were unfocused, and he was mumbling incoherently, as if he was still immersed in an extremely terrifying nightmare.

"...The sect leader of the Fallen Yin Sect has arrived..."

"What?!" Zhang Lingqiu's pupils shrank suddenly.

"...We've gone halfway..."

Zhao Feiyan gritted her teeth and raised her head. Her once heroic face was now covered in blood and tears, and her voice was so hoarse that it was almost inaudible.

"...Early this morning, we were halfway there when a group of people suddenly appeared out of the woods..."

"The leader... is the sect leader of the Fallen Yin Sect..."

"..."

"They outnumbered us too much, and they were all elites... We fought our way out..."

Zhao Feiyan dug her hands into the dirt, saying, "Senior Brother Xu was severely injured while shielding me from that poisonous magic weapon... Senior Sister Ni's wounds all reopened... Junior Brother Chen... he..."

She choked up and couldn't continue.

"..."

"We thought...we thought we were really going to all die there this time..."

Xu Hao leaned against the cold stone wall, breathing heavily, and took over the conversation.

"……Then."

A bewilderment so absurd it seemed to pierce through Xu Hao's eyes.

"...and then the sky shattered."

"..."

"..."

"In the blink of an eye..."

Xu Hao slowly raised his head, looking blankly at the familiar gentle slope, at the half-extinguished campfire, and at the gray sky above.

"...We're back here."

……

"..."

"..."

After hearing Xu Hao's words, the nine members of the assault team looked at each other in bewilderment.

A bone-chilling coldness crept up my spine from the soles of my feet.

……

Li Xunfeng squatted down and reached out to take out a bandage to press on the wound on Xu Hao's chest.

"The injury is real."

The Qingcheng Sect swordsman's voice was so dry it sounded like sand being squeezed out of his throat.

"...The injuries sustained in the illusion."

"It has been brought into reality."

……

"..."

"Then we..."

Ye Cheng's Adam's apple bobbed with great difficulty, and he felt a bitter taste in his mouth.

"We've been walking around there all day..."

"That forest of corpses we traversed with utmost care, that bottomless abyss, that enormous altar, that bull's head..."

"It's all fucking fake?!"

"..."

No one answered him.

……

Tao Qingci slowly stood up, her gaze sweeping over the crowd and landing on the outer edge of the camp.

There, there was a circle of Laoshan "Jingsha Incense" that had been lit last night.

……

The tiny white flame on the incense stick flickered faintly in the cold mist of dawn.

Each one still has a small section remaining.

……

"..."

"The incense is still burning."

Tao Qingci's voice was very soft, as if she were afraid of disturbing the morning mist.

"..."

"We were dragged into that illusion in the middle of the night..."

"..."

"We were inside, and it felt like we'd been walking all day. We walked through forests of corpses, and then we reached the abyss..."

She slowly raised her head and looked at the pale light on the horizon that was gradually tearing through the night.

"But it's only just dawn outside."

"..."

"..."

"……Hold."

Ye Cheng's vision went black, his legs went weak, and he collapsed heavily to the ground.

……

Just then.

……

Zhang Lingqiu ignored the chilling details and instead focused his gaze on the figure who stood with his back to the crowd, facing the withered forest.

"Jiang Shou."

He slowly walked towards Jiang Shou, his legs heavy, a result of the exhaustion of his true essence and spiritual power after he had used his life tablet in the illusory corpse forest.

"...What are you looking at?"

……

Jiang Shou did not turn around.

He remained in that posture, his voice calm.

……

"It depends on the person."

"..."

Everyone was taken aback upon hearing this.

……

Then, following Jiang Shou's gaze, one after another, they turned their heads to look over.

……

Outside the gentle slope.

The edge of that grayish-white deadwood forest.

……

It was packed with people.

……

One.

ten.

One hundred.

……

Those figures were all dressed in identical dark brown robes. They were like a black tide, stretching from the edge of the deadwood forest all the way to the cliffs on both sides.

This gentle slope, surrounded by stone walls on three sides and with only one exit, was completely blocked off.

There wasn't a single gap.

It stood there silently in the dawn mist, in the chilly early winter morning.