For the next five or six months, Chi Creek and Ben Coates kept the peace with the group. Chi Creek made a point of appearing in person to greet the First Ancestor, who, though extremely weak, did not avoid him. Unable to gauge the First Ancestor’s true condition, Chi Creek had no choice but to focus all his energy on steering the green boat toward the Hanging Realm.
The tower-ship was badly damaged, its six wings all broken off, and its speed had dropped sharply. Chi Creek replaced the original wings with those of Fire-Crow Godmen, but the ship was still much slower than before. Even though they took a shortcut, the journey ended up taking far longer than expected.
During these months, aside from cultivating his Primordial Spirit with Lynn Ling, Quinn spent most of his time sparring with Ben Coates, studying the fighting techniques of three-headed, six-armed combat.
Ben Coates practiced the Seamless War-God Art passed down by Chi Creek, a formidable technique. Previously, Quinn had seriously injured Ben with a single palm strike and had underestimated this Chiming-era art. But after witnessing Chi Creek’s battle with the Great Sun Star Lord, Quinn became interested in the three-headed, six-armed style.
Ben Coates was nervous and deeply afraid of Quinn, so when Quinn suggested sparring, he refused without hesitation. Only after Quinn gave him a beating did he reluctantly agree.
As they sparred, Ben Coates’ understanding of the Seamless War-God Art grew rapidly. One day, a reckless thought struck him: “My strength is improving so quickly—if I suddenly go for the kill, I could definitely take out that Quinn kid!”
He tried a surprise killing move on Quinn during their match, hoping to finish him off—only to end up bedridden for over ten days before recovering.
After Ben Coates finally healed, he refused to spar with Quinn again. No matter how much Quinn swore he wouldn’t go all-out, Ben wouldn’t budge.
Quinn had no choice but to let Lynn Ling spar with Ben while he watched from the side.
Lynn Ling practiced the Ancestral Dragon Supreme-Mystic Art, an Emperor’s-Throne-level technique. Although she wasn’t of dragon blood, she had trained in the Nine-Dragon Emperor Art since childhood, so her progress was swift.
What’s more, Libationer Barrett had pointed out the path of merging battle arts for her. Lynn Ling advanced boldly along this route, surging forward like a wild dragon, cultivating a body of raw, draconic strength.
Her strength was evenly matched with Ben Coates, and in terms of raw power and divine art might, she far surpassed him. However, when it came to physical transformations, she couldn’t compete with the Seamless War-God Art’s three-headed, six-armed form.
One day, Ben Coates suddenly broke through and opened his Life-and-Death Treasury. Lynn Ling was instantly outmatched and quickly defeated.
Feeling triumphant, Ben Coates glanced at Quinn, and a surge of confidence welled up inside him: “Now that I’ve broken through to the Life-and-Death Treasury, and he’s still stuck at Seven Stars, taking him out would be a piece of cake! I’ll spell out a giant ‘submit’ with his corpse… Though, with the First Ancestor protecting him, it’s tough to make a move…”
Just then, Chi Creek suddenly called out nervously, “We’re almost at the Hanging Realm!”
Quinn and Lynn Ling immediately hurried to the forest at the bow of the ship and looked out, but saw nothing. The First Ancestor also came over, but he too saw nothing at all.
Over these days, Quinn had been treating his injuries, so the First Ancestor’s complexion had improved a lot. Still, the damage from the Heaven-Collapse Three Forms was too severe—his face was still pale and sickly.
Suddenly, the battered ship shook violently and bucked hard. Chi Creek poured all his power into steering, desperately trying to keep the ship from falling apart.
Quinn looked outside—everything was still shrouded in darkness, with nothing visible at all. He had no idea what was making the ship lurch so violently. Just as he was puzzling over it, he saw the tower-ship start to grow longer and thinner.
Not only did the ship stretch out, but they themselves became long and thin as well—hair-fine, yet stretching for thousands of miles!
The bow of the ship shot ahead faster and faster, but the stern lagged behind. That was when Quinn realized—they and the tower-ship were being sucked into a hole in the starry sky!
The hole blended perfectly with the surrounding darkness—utterly invisible!
Whoosh—
The tower-ship, along with Quinn and the others aboard, was swallowed by the hole. Suddenly, the dark space quivered twice, like congealed fish jelly, then stilled. The battered, tree-covered ship vanished without a trace.
After passing through the invisible hole, the tower-ship returned to normal.
A moment later, the scene before them turned bizarre and dazzling. Streams of multicolored light flashed past like a spinning lantern. It felt as if they were sailing inside a maze made of shifting colors. Chi Creek piloted the ship with intense focus, not daring to relax for a second.
“Where are we?”
Quinn was unsettled—the surrounding lights gave him an intense sense of danger, as if a single touch would mean instant death and soul annihilation.
“This is the place the first Crimson Emperor discovered. After he entered, he didn’t reappear for centuries. No gods or demons who followed him ever returned alive. The Chiming Era plunged into chaos: rival gods and demons fought for the throne, founded a false dynasty, carved up the realm, and the mortal world was thrown into turmoil.”
Chi Creek explained, “Eventually, one peerless genius among the Crimson Emperor’s descendants crushed the false dynasty and rebuilt the Chiming Divine Dynasty. He’s known as the Bright Emperor. The Crimson Emperor’s age is called the West Chiming Age, and the Bright Emperor’s reign is the East Chiming Age—East Chiming and West Chiming are both part of the Chiming Era. During a grand ancestral rite, the Bright Emperor contacted a wisp of the Crimson Emperor’s drifting consciousness and learned the path to this place. Only he knew it. Later, the Bright Emperor died in battle and passed the route to the Chiming Divine Son, who led our Chiming survivors here to take refuge. It’s been three hundred fifty thousand years.”
Quinn, Lynn Ling, and the others listened in rapt attention. That chaotic stretch between East and West Chiming must’ve been a free-for-all—heroes popping up everywhere, the whole world duking it out. Bet it was a sky full of dazzling stars, the kind of era that burns itself into legend.
“It’s a shame we weren’t born in that era. Would’ve loved to see those legendary heroes strut their stuff up close,” Quinn said with a wistful grin.
Chi Creek’s six eyes slid over to him, and he let out a cold laugh. “Wouldn’t have helped even if you were! Bright Emperor was the real ‘child of destiny’—you’d have shown up just to get steamrolled flat, maybe even with a big ‘I submit!’ sign stamped across your face!”
“Child of destiny? Like, someone fate’s picked out for greatness?”
Quinn’s heart skipped a beat. “So does that mean the Chiming Divine Son is also one of those fate-chosen types?”
Chi Creek didn’t reply, and for a moment the suspense hung in the air.
Chi Creek didn’t answer. Just then, the labyrinth of light came to an abrupt end—a massive continent materialized ahead, floating in a swirl of colored radiance. Above, suns and moons wheeled through the sky, with a handful of lonely stars scattered around.
Quinn glanced all around, taking in how the continent was cocooned in pure light—no outside world to be seen, not a single other star in the heavens.
A world completely cut off from everything else. ‘Hanging Realm’ was the perfect name for it.
Their green, forest-grown boat glided toward the heart of the continent. The First Ancestor, voice barely above a whisper, said, “Shepherd boy, look up at the suns.”