The first breath in the Sacred Nether World tasted like cold smoke.
When the Chaos domain folded back, they stood beneath a sky that wasn't really a sky at all.
The heavens above were dim, as if someone had laid a funeral shroud across the world. Two faint lights—one like a pale moon, one like a sickly, distant sun—hung far away, their glow filtered through hazy clouds that never dispersed. The air was thick with Nether qi and ghostly Yin, a chill that wasn't simple cold but the weight of countless graves stacked atop each other, pressing down on flesh and fate alike.
Under their feet, the ground was a mix of dark, compacted soil and pale stone. In the distance, jagged black mountains rose like broken teeth. Here and there, colossal tomb mounds were embedded into the landscape, some so huge they were practically small hills, layers of burial earth and dao patterns piled upon one another like epochs of death.
A thin, eerie wind blew, carrying distant whispers—half like chants, half like lamentations. Sometimes it sounded like someone laughing hoarsely in a language older than dynasties.
Bing Yuxia drew a slow breath.
"…So this is the Sacred Nether World," she murmured.
The frost within her bones stirred. Her Ice Dao flared instinctively, reacting to the dominant Yin and ghost qi. Fine threads of cold light flowed over her skin, invisible to mortals but clear as day to cultivators of their level.
Su Yonghuang's gaze swept the horizon. Her eyes, clear as sunfire beneath long lashes, narrowed slightly.
"The qi is strange," she said quietly. "Not just Yin. There's something else. An ancient heaviness. Like dust from old coffins that never scattered."
"It's a world built on graves," Ling Feng said lazily. "Generations of Ghost Immortals piling their dead up, then deciding to live on top of them. Of course it feels like this."
He closed his eyes.
Chaos Force unfurled silently.
His Spirit Sense spread out in all directions, slipping through the thick Nether air like a tide of invisible storm-light. He tasted the structure of this world's grand dao—how the flows bent toward burial grounds, how ghost flames replaced true sunlight, how lingering souls clung to old bones rather than returning to the river of time.
The Sacred Nether World's dao was different from the Mortal Emperor World's. Closer to death. Closer to lingering will. Closer to immortal ghosts who refused to disperse.
But in the end, it was still a world.
Lines of order. Currents of power. Things he could grasp, bend, and fold if he wished.
He smiled and opened his eyes.
"Nether Border," he said.
Xu Pei blinked. "Nether… Border?"
"That's where we are," he explained, as if commenting on the weather. "Eastern region of this world. Over there—"
He lifted a hand.
In the far distance, beyond haze and rolling grave plains, his Spirit Sense had already found heavy concentrations of dao—cities, sect domains, tribes whose ancestral grounds stank of ancient power.
"There's a lovely place called Necropolis," he continued. "One of the major cities here. Cemeteries stacked on cemeteries, ghosts stacked on ghosts. Further out, Prime Ominous Grave, Crossing City… whole playground of ghost lineages."
Chi Xiaodie wrinkled her nose.
"Even the names are ominous," she muttered. "Suddenly, Lion's Roar's ancestral halls feel cheerful."
Ling Feng chuckled.
"That's because your Lion's Roar ancestors at least remembered to burn incense and drink wine between wars," he said. "These folks? Well, they're dedicated to their history."
His tone was relaxed, but his eyes remained sharp, taking in every detail of this foreign sky.
Then his voice softened.
"But for us, it's fine," he added. "My Chaos has already adjusted your bodies. The Nether qi won't corrode your foundations. Take a few breaths. Feel the difference. Let it sharpen you."
They did.
Li Shangyuan closed her eyes, letting the Yin wind brush over her jade-enhanced meridians. Her Pure Jade Physique drank in the strange cold, refining it into crystalline strands of power that slid through her Fate Palaces without resistance.
Chen Baojiao clenched her fists, feeling the ghostly pressure crash into her tyrannical springs and rebound as refined force. Every impact sank into the depths of her Immortal Springs and came back twice as fierce, like an undercurrent ready to erupt.
Xu Pei rotated her halberd dao slowly. The land's dead stillness made her strikes cleaner, less wasteful. Each movement carved a straight, ruthless line in the air, as if her Dao wanted to split this grave world from crown to root.
Bai Jianzhen's sword intent tasted the faint echoes of countless battles that had taken place here. The deathly silence of fallen generals, the last breaths of nameless soldiers—her blade drank it all in, integrating that solemn weight into her sharp, ice-cold will.
Chi Xiaodie's Lion's Roar bloodline rumbled, an instinctive rejection of death that made her qi burn brighter. Her veins roared like a caged god-beast, refusing to bow even to a world made of graves.
Bing Yuxia shivered once—not from cold, but from resonance.
"This Yin…" she murmured. "It's pure. Different from mortal land winters. This cold carries grudges and memories."
Ling Feng glanced at her, eyes warm.
"Good sharpening stone for your Ice Dao, Yuxia," he said. "We'll find you a nice snow-covered cemetery later."
She shot him a wary look over her fan.
"Young Noble's idea of 'nice' remains questionable," she said dryly. "So. What are you planning to do first? Charge at the strongest ghost lineage? Pick a fight with their Heaven's Will candidates?"
The others turned to him as well.
"Yeah," Chen Baojiao said, battle light already igniting in her eyes. "What's the plan? You didn't drag us across worlds just to stroll around and breathe funeral air, right?"
Ling Feng smiled.
"Actually," he said, "that's exactly what I'm going to do first."
Seven pairs of eyes blinked.
"…What?" Xu Pei blurted out.
He spread his hands.
"We just arrived," he said. "Sacred Nether is huge. Before we start flipping Ghost Immortals and shattering pride, I want to get absorbed in the atmosphere."
He tilted his head toward the horizon, where distant silhouettes hinted at grave-mountains and ghost cities.
"So," he continued, "we're going to walk for a bit. Enjoy the sights. Get used to the air. Listen to the gossip. Let this world show us its face before we punch it."
Bing Yuxia narrowed her eyes at him.
"Listen to you pretending to be patient," she said. "Did you hit your head on the way here?"
"Even I know how to bask in scenery sometimes," he said. "Besides—"
He stepped closer to her, smile slanting.
"Walking gives me more chances to do this."
He leaned in.
His lips brushed hers, quick and light, like a stolen snowflake.
Bing Yuxia's entire body stiffened.
"Y-you—!"
Her fan snapped shut with a loud crack, cheeks flushing an utterly un-Ice-Feather shade. "In a foreign world, you still—"
"Of course," he said, completely unrepentant. "What, you thought crossing worlds would make me behave?"
Li Shangyuan's lips curved, jade eyes soft.
"Walking does sound… nice," she said gently. "We can see how this world's dao flows and adjust slowly. It is not a bad way."
Chen Baojiao rolled her shoulders, the chains on her immortal springs clinking faintly in the depths of her body.
"Tch. Fine," she said. "I'll accept a slow start. As long as there's a good fight at the end."
"There will be," he promised. "This place is full of people who need education."
Chi Xiaodie snorted.
"I knew it," she said. "You say 'vacation,' but your idea of relaxing is just 'pick better targets.'"
"Isn't that what makes it fun?" Ling Feng grinned. "Alright, ladies. Let's go."
He turned and started walking, boots crunching softly on Nether soil.
They followed.
...
They did not rush.
Ling Feng could have bent space, using Chaos Control to step across vast distances in an instant, appearing right outside Necropolis or in front of some grand ghost sect's ancestral gate.
He didn't.
He let his group move at a pace that would have made impatient geniuses grind their teeth.
They walked along old ghastly roads where ghost lanterns flickered atop crooked poles, the flame inside each lantern a strange grey-blue, as if souls had been set on fire and forced to light the way.
They passed low, sprawling grave mounds where lesser ghost tribes lived. Pale lights drifted in and out of the earthen walls, occasionally forming vague figures that watched them with hollow, curious eyes before fading back into the tomb.
They crossed narrow stone bridges over rivers that weren't water but slow-moving streams of thick, grey radiance—remnants of countless souls' lingering will, flowing bit by bit toward deeper parts of the Sacred Nether World.
When a gust of wind passed over such a river, faint voices rose with it—pleading, laughing, raging, all tangled together into one endless murmur.
Humans were rare on these roads.
Once in a while, they saw caravans with a few human cultivators, heads bowed, traveling alongside Ghost Immortals from various tribes. The human auras were careful and compressed, like flames trapped in lanterns being shielded from storm winds.
Xu Pei watched one such caravan pass, a group of human traders handing over jade boxes to a squad of ghastly guards whose bones glimmered beneath translucent skin.
"Humans really are on the weaker side here," she whispered. "Their dao isn't that bad, but their backs are bent before they even speak."
"In this world, yes," Su Yonghuang said softly. "The Sacred Nether World is the ancestral home of the Ghost Immortal Race. Their tribes established the dominant lineages here. Humans who come must either be extremely powerful or extremely careful."
Chen Baojiao narrowed her eyes.
"So the roles are reversed," she said. "In the Mortal Emperor World, Ghost Immortals are the guests. Here, we're the outsiders."
Ling Feng's lips curved.
"Good, isn't it?" he said. "Different angle, different pressure. You'll learn more this way. And if anyone looks down on us too much…"
He let his voice trail off, just smiling.
In the distance, a grave mound cracked as if sensing his mood.
As they traveled, they listened.
In ghost taverns built in the shadows of giant tombstones, Ling Feng paid for information with their currency or casual threats. The drinks there were made from distilled Yin qi and bone dust, brewed in cauldrons carved from old skulls. When poured, the liquor released a chill that slipped straight into one's bones.
The women sat at his side or across from him while he traded offhand jokes and lazy conversation for news.
They heard the big names.
The Yin Moon Tribe—Ghost Immortals who carried a lunar chill in their blood. Their dao was cold darkness, like crescent shadows clinging to the horizon, and their influence spread over sections of the Nether Border like nightfall.
The Black Cloud Tribe—whose shadows were thick and oppressive. Whenever their elites marched, a vast, ink-black cloud would gather overhead, smothering light and courage alike.
And the Hundred Bones Sacred Tribe—Ghost Immortals born without flesh, only bone. Their skeletons were etched with dao patterns from birth, their fortified bones capable of blocking Life Treasures. The deeper the color of their bones, the more terrifying their strength. Some elders' bones were as dark as night iron.
"Born without flesh…" Chi Xiaodie muttered once, watching a column of Hundred Bones warriors march past outside the tavern's window. Their ivory bodies clacked softly with each step, runes glowing faintly in the joints. "They look like walking bone armors."
"They are," Bai Jianzhen said lightly, hand resting on the hilt of her Life Treasure Emperor Sword. "Their dao is focused and pure. No wasted effort on flesh and blood."
Ling Feng's gaze lingered briefly on the skeletal warriors, then moved on.
"Interesting tribe," he said. "We'll probably bump into them properly later."
Another name came up again and again in whispers.
Snow-Shadow Tribe.
A minor tribe based around Crossing City, known for the white shadows that clung to their bodies. Where other ghosts cast dark silhouettes, Snow-Shadow cast pale ones—like faded moonlight dripping onto the ground instead of darkness.
"In recent years, Snow-Shadow's territory has been squeezed," a Ghost Immortal bartender told them, polishing a bone cup with a rag woven from ghost silk. "Black Cloud on one side, Yin Moon on the other. Those two tribes want all of Crossing City's outskirts. Snow-Shadow is barely hanging on."
"Humans shouldn't touch that mess," a nearby patron grunted, jawbone clicking. "Middle of a tribal struggle. Unless you have a death wish."
Ling Feng swirled the grey liquor in his cup, watching faint soul-faces rise and vanish in its depths.
Outwardly, he seemed only mildly interested.
Inwardly, his attention sharpened.
Snow-Shadow. Constantly pressured by Yin Moon and Black Cloud. A small tribe whose white shadows marked them as strange even among Ghost Immortals.
He filed the name away.
While rumors and lore flowed, he did not forget the other part of his self-assigned mission.
He flirted.
He teased.
He touched lips and hands and hearts under a dim, foreign sky.
...
In a quiet grave valley, where ghost willows hung their pale branches over a still pool of grey light, he pulled Li Shangyuan close.
Her body was warm against him, her Pure Jade Physique radiating a gentle, refined power that smoothed the harsh chill of the valley. His hand rested naturally at the small of her back. Above the pool, wandering souls drifted like drowned stars.
"This Yin qi feels… clean," she murmured, voice soft as jade chimes. "The Pure Jade Sacred Heart Art resonates with something buried under these graves. There are veins here—hidden channels of power, like crystallized resentment turned into mineral."
"Then we'll dig," he said, leaning in until his breath brushed her ear. "Slowly. Carefully. And steal everything good under their bones."
Her laughter was small, but bright.
She leaned into him more fully, jade aura blending with his Chaos. When she lifted her head, he kissed her, sweet and unhurried, while the ghost willows swayed as if embarrassed.
In the distance, a stray Nether beast howled and then fell silent. Perhaps it had seen too much.
On a high ridge overlooking a field of old tombstones, he stood behind Chen Baojiao, arms wrapped loosely around her waist.
Below them, scattered ghost beasts stalked between gravestones, their forms half-faded, half-solid—perfect moving targets.
"There," she said, pointing with her chin. "If that one rushes, its momentum will carry it into that ridge. If I use Violent Cloud Chant there and there—"
Her finger traced imaginary pathways in the air.
He listened while she mapped angles and timings, turning the grave-field into a battlefield in her mind. When her warlike nature burned too hot, when her killing intent flared overly bright, he dipped his head and kissed the corner of her mouth.
The tyrannical springs inside her shuddered. Some of that wild, explosive force flowed right into him through the kiss.
She smacked his chest with a fist that could level mountains.
"If you keep kissing me every time I plan a massacre," she warned, "I'll start doing it on purpose just to watch your face."
"Win-win," he said calmly.
Her laughter rang out, loud and unrestrained, bouncing between tombstones like a battle drum.
On a narrow path lined with bone lanterns, he walked shoulder-to-shoulder with Xu Pei, their fingers intertwined.
The ghost lamps crackled softly overhead, the grey flames inside them bending toward Ling Feng's group, as if curious about these foreign auras that did not bow to Nether laws.
"This world's pressure…" Xu Pei said quietly. "It reminds me of my first steps. Back then, everything pressed down. Expectations, fear, stronger elders, stronger enemies. You walk wrong, breathe wrong, and someone uses it as an excuse to crush you."
He hummed.
"You scared now?" he asked.
She hesitated.
"…A little," she admitted. "Not of them. Of repeating that feeling."
He stopped.
Without giving her time to step away, he backed her against an ancient gravestone, its surface covered in faded ghostly carvings. His free hand settled against the stone beside her head.
"Look at me," he said.
Her eyes lifted, dark and steady.
He kissed her.
Not gentle, not brief. He kissed her until the halberd dao in her Fate Palaces blazed so bright the ghost lanterns above them dimmed in shame. Yin wind whirled around them and then scattered, unable to cling.
When he finally drew back, her cheeks were flushed, breath slightly unsteady.
"Remember this feeling," he said. "Not the old one."
She swallowed, then smiled—small, but fierce.
"…Alright," she whispered. "Feng."
With Bai Jianzhen, it was quieter.
They sat atop a solitary grave mound, the world spread below them in layers of tomb and mist. Her sword lay across her knees, the Immortal Emperor aura within it compressed to a thread, but still sharp enough to cut seasons.
She traced invisible dao lines into the air, each stroke leaving a faint afterimage of sword intent. The Sacred Nether World's deathly calm seeped into her blade, tempering its chill with solemnity.
Ling Feng leaned against her shoulder, head tilted slightly, eyes half-closed.
He didn't say much.
Occasionally, he let his fingers slip up to brush her hair back behind her ear. Once in a while, he kissed the side of her head.
Her sword hand trembled once, twice.
She never pulled away.
At last, when the grave-winds softened and the world quieted, he turned her face toward him and claimed her lips. The kiss was brief and awkward and made her ears turn pink, but the surge of sword dao that erupted afterward was so sharp the grave mound under them groaned.
Even Ling Feng raised a brow.
"…That's going to be fun later," he murmured.
Bai Jianzhen pretended not to hear, knuckles white around her sword hilt.
Chi Xiaodie, of course, pretended to be offended every time he did anything remotely intimate in public.
"You're doing this on purpose," she snapped once, cheeks scarlet, when he caught her hand in the middle of a busy grave street and brushed his lips over her knuckles. The nearby ghost crowd paused to stare. "We're in another world, surrounded by Ghost Immortals, and you're still—"
"Of course," he said seriously. "Someone has to show these ghosts what a proper Lion's Roar princess looks like when she's loved."
Her retort turned into a strangled sound when he kissed her properly, right there under a flickering ghost lantern.
Some local Ghost Immortals muttered about shameless humans. One or two tried to let their auras press down on him, the weight of ghost pride rolling out like a cold tide.
Ling Feng glanced their way and smiled lazily.
The ghost lantern above his head flared.
Invisible Chaos will snapped across the street like a whip.
For an instant, the gathered ghosts felt as if the entire Nether Border had shifted. Their souls seized. Their Yin qi shrank back into their bones. Whatever words they'd meant to say died in their throats.
They lowered their gazes.
Ling Feng went back to kissing Chi Xiaodie like no one else existed.
"…You're impossible," she muttered later, clinging to his sleeve despite her glare. "If my imperial father saw this, he'd spit blood."
"He'd still have to accept you're happy," Ling Feng said cheerfully. "That's his problem."
And with Bing Yuxia…
He took her to a high, cold cliff where Nether winds blew strongest.
Below them, an entire valley of frozen graves glittered faintly. Frost had crept up the tombstones there, turning stones into white fangs jutting from the earth.
Her white garments snapped in the ghost wind, Ice Dao raging like an unleashed blizzard. Every breath she took condensed faint crystals in the air.
"Not bad, right?" he said, stepping up beside her. "Told you I'd find you a place cold enough."
She didn't look at him.
"This world's chill is different," she said. "It's not just cold. It carries resentment. Memory. If I pull too hard, it will claw back."
"Then don't pull," he said. "Invite. You're the one in control. Make their grudges work for you."
He stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist.
She stiffened.
"Y-you—"
"Relax," he murmured into her hair. "We're on vacation. I'm allowed to hug my Yuxia when the scenery's this good."
Her fingers clenched around her folded fan.
"…If you say something that would shame Ice Feather Palace," she muttered, ears pink, "I'll freeze your bed solid."
"I'd like to see you try," he said brightly.
He kissed the side of her neck.
Her Ice Dao exploded outward. The cliffside groaned as a new layer of frost spread in a spiderweb pattern, swallowing jagged rocks and old ghost sigils. Down in the valley, a Nether beast roared in outrage as its den abruptly froze shut.
Bing Yuxia bit her lip, half from fluster, half from focus, drawing that swollen frost back under control.
Su Yonghuang watched all of this with a mix of exasperation and quiet amusement.
At night, when the others meditated or circulated their arts, Ling Feng sometimes walked with her alone along remote grave ridges. She wore a simple cloak that suppressed the blazing presence of her Chaos-Enhanced Solar Immortal Physique. Under the cloak, eleven Fate Palaces turned slowly, suns orbiting an unseen sky.
He didn't need many words with her.
A brush of his hand against hers.
A casual, "My Solar wife," murmured near her ear.
A warm palm at the small of her back as they looked down at ghost flames burning in distant grave gardens.
"You are impossible," she told him more than once, eyes half-lidded, lips curving despite herself.
"And yet, you're still here," he always answered.
She never denied it.
...
Time passed.
Not the sluggish kind that crawled through dull days, but the sharp, bright kind that filled itself with new sights and new understandings under a foreign sky.
Eventually, the landscape began to change.
The grave plains grew denser. The tomb mounds more elaborate, carved with layers of runes that pulsed faintly when the Nether wind blew. Ghost lanterns hung in neat, organized rows instead of ragged clusters. The flow of Nether qi became ordered, streams of Yin being drawn toward a distant focal point.
Necropolis.
They saw it first as a dim outline on the horizon—a vast city of black stone and pale light, built atop terraces of ancient graves. Each layer of the city was like a ring in a tree, representing another era buried and then used as a foundation for the next.
Towers rose like bone spears. Walls bristled with dao markings that had watched countless generations live and die. Rumor said the strongest lineage here, Ancestral Flow, ruled from an unseen domain; its master rarely showed herself, but no one dared step half a foot into that domain without permission.
Far beneath the city, there was said to be a Treasure Mountain that promised immortality, and a hidden key linked to Prime Ominous Grave's deepest secrets. Those were tales for another time. Right now, Necropolis sat before them like a silent beast watching the grave plains.
"Looks like a nest of trouble," Chen Baojiao said, eyes gleaming as they gazed at the city from a distant ridge.
"Natural," Ling Feng said. "Where there are graves, there are secrets. Where there are secrets, there are idiots guarding them."
Bing Yuxia folded her fan thoughtfully.
"So?" she asked. "Are we going straight in?"
"Not yet," he said.
He was about to elaborate when his expression shifted.
His head turned slightly, eyes narrowing.
Space itself rippled.
To the others, it was almost imperceptible—a faint distortion in the air, like heat waves over a summer road. To Ling Feng, whose Chaos attunement brushed the deepest layers of time and space, it was as obvious as thunder.
Far to their right, near a lesser grave region on Necropolis' outskirts, a clash of dao flared.
He felt it as overlapping pulses.
One side: two Ghost Immortal forces braided together—the sinking chill of Yin Moon, the crushing gloom of Black Cloud. Their auras merged into a suffocating pressure, like a storm wrapped around a crescent moon.
Opposing them was another cluster of Ghost Immortals whose qi tasted different.
Cold, but not like Yin Moon's cold. More like snow that refused to melt even under ghost light.
In that battlefield, ghostly lights flashed. Bones clashed. Dao roared.
The side defending against Yin Moon and Black Cloud was losing.
Their qi fluctuated wildly, dao lines fraying. Their formation wavered under focused assaults. One aura after another dimmed, then flared desperately as their owners burned their very bone marrow to hold the line.
Ling Feng's lips curled.
"Hoh," he murmured. "That's interesting."
Su Yonghuang's eyes sharpened.
"You sensed something?" she asked.
He nodded.
"Near Necropolis," he said. "Some Ghost Immortals are ganging up on others. The ones resisting are being crushed."
He turned to his women.
The light in his eyes grew familiar and dangerous.
"Girls," he said, smile widening. "Our vacation just got an event."
Chen Baojiao's brow twitched.
"Event, he says," she muttered. "Last time you used that tone, an Ancient Kingdom lost its True Gods."
Xu Pei sighed, already tightening her grip on her halberd.
"Your idea of fun always involves someone screaming," she complained softly.
Chi Xiaodie folded her arms.
"So this is when our 'walk' ends, huh?" she said. "Knew it. You can't go more than a few days without finding trouble."
Bing Yuxia snapped her fan shut with a soft click.
"You call this a vacation," she said. "But every time you smile like that, I feel like we're about to flatten another lineage."
Su Yonghuang's lips curved despite herself.
"Since when have you not enjoyed it?" she asked softly.
Bing Yuxia huffed and looked away, the tips of her ears pink.
Ling Feng laughed.
"Come on," he said, stepping off the ridge, Chaos already beginning to twist space around them. "Let's go see who's bullying whom—and whether they're interesting enough to keep alive."
Ghost winds howled.
Space folded.
Ling Feng didn't bother with spectacle. No blinding radiance, no roaring heavenly drums. One moment, they were striding down the Nether ridge; the next, Chaos Control pinched the distance between two points and turned it into something you could tear through with your bare hands.
The world lurched—and then stilled.