Chapter 398

Fang Yuan curses and summons a golden dragon that pulps a knot of heavy tai dogs, clearing his way. Yi Chong charges him through crashing waves demanding the immortal treasure, but bone wings Gu lets Fang Yuan dodge and climb into the sky. Yi Huo sends fire birds after him; golden aurora Gu wraps him in light and speeds him clear. The commotion draws Mo Wu Tian and Xiao Mang’s attention, and Xiao Mang hurls a giant elephant-sized hand of light that Fang Yuan barely twists away from. ^{ch. 398}

A gentle voice then brushes his ears, Mo Wu Tian’s gentle feelings Gu, and though Fang Yuan shakes it off, the moment’s hesitation lets the light hand catch him. He fights back with his own Gu rather than dodge, and the explosion disperses the hand but flings him earthward like a kite with its string cut. The wind wakes him mid-fall, and he shouts a lie to buy himself room: that Tie Ruo Nan has a peerless Immortal Gu and is refining it. Mo Wu Tian and Xiao Mang’s attention snaps away, the crowd erupts, and the surge only tightens the pressure on Tie Bai Qi. Fang Yuan uses Wu Gui’s movement Gu to vanish into dark clouds, but four chains lash out of nowhere, bind his limbs, and drag him into the void. He reappears inside the bronze hall, the four Tie clan old-timers half-kneeling around him at each direction, black steel chains streaming from their palms in their killer move, Infinite Search and Lock. ^{ch. 398}

Far off in central continent, on Dang Hun Mountain inside the Hu Immortal blessed land, a contest for the land’s ownership is nearing its end. Lord Sky Crane’s voice, sounding far more tired than at the start, urges Fang Zheng on, and Fang Zheng, soaked in sweat and swaying, answers that only one opponent stands between him and the peak. Xiao Qi Xing stares in disbelief at being outclimbed by a nobody, and Ying Sheng Ji, furthest from the summit and reading Fang Zheng’s pace as unbeatable, simply lets go and falls, the land spirit sparing his life by whisking him straight out of the blessed land. ^{ch. 398}

Fang Zheng keeps climbing, the skin of his arms and legs torn and bleeding, the vibrations shaking his soul growing worse the closer he gets. He is pushed past the limits of his body, his mind narrowed to the peak alone, and Feng Jin Huang is visibly moved to see him hold on with what looks like limitless reserve. He passes her and takes the lead, less than a meter from the top, while the blessed land’s small, cute land spirit watches from the cliff’s edge. ^{ch. 398}

Outside, watching Gu Masters begin congratulating He Feng Yang on the Immortal Crane Sect’s best showing yet, though some sigh that a rank six exquisite warp Gu, a star shuttle Gu, a fixed immortal travel Gu or some other movement Gu of one’s own might have changed the outcome. He Feng Yang calls it simple luck, his tone betraying how pleased he is. Then another Gu Immortal sneers that the Hu Immortal Inheritance belongs to the Spirit Affinity House, and as he speaks Feng Jin Huang grows a pair of dazzling wings from her shoulders and ascends past Fang Zheng with a single flap. ^{ch. 398}

The crowd recognizes the legendary Immortal Gu, Dream Wings. It exists only in dreams, and activating it draws on the user’s spirit and soul rather than immortal essence, so forcing it as a mere mortal risks severe damage to Feng Jin Huang’s mind, ranging from amnesia at best to severe, lasting impairment at worst. She has never known defeat and will not let Fang Zheng win alone, declaring she will pay even the heaviest price for victory. She retakes the lead and folds the wings back, but the toll shows at once: dizziness from the depths of her soul leaves her almost fainting at the cliff’s edge, having reached her own limit, since forcing an Immortal Gu open was never going to be easy for her. Fang Zheng, his arms already at the peak’s rim and one step from winning, believes in that instant that he has lost. ^{ch. 398}

Feng Jin Huang forces her head up with her last strength, her eyes glowing amber, likened to a young phoenix spreading its wings for the first time, dazzling even the watching Gu Immortals. She bites her lip, drags herself over the rim, and rolls onto the peak. She has won, the sole victor and the new owner of the Hu Immortal blessed land. ^{ch. 398}

Back at the bronze hall on San Cha mountain, Fang Yuan hangs bound in chains as Tie Ruo Nan greets him. Bai Ning Bing tells him it is useless: she secretly planted a fixed star Gu in his left arm, so infinite search and lock can drag him back even from the edge of the world. He looks down to find it glowing there, an eight-sided crystal star fragment of the immemorial era, tinting his forearm with an eerie transparent blue. ^{ch. 398}

Fang Yuan howls her name and struggles until the chains clank. In his past life, the same killer move was used to capture Kong Ri Tian; this time it has been turned on him. The narration notes that earlier, when Bai Ning Bing herself was caught by the four old-timers, Fang Yuan had not rushed to free her, wary of exactly this technique; without a fixed star Gu on its target, infinite search and lock would be toothless. Bai Ning Bing tells him she planted it while he was injecting yellow gold primeval essence to nurture her aperture, mocking that he never suspected a thing, a move the narration calls a strike at the very root of his hopes for reversal. Through gritted teeth, he concedes that the fixed star Gu was well played, that she is simply too good for him. ^{ch. 398}

Tie Ruo Nan presses him: sealed and stripped of his primeval essence, he has no hope left, though she advises against ordering his Gu to self-detonate rather than accept it. He goes silent. He had already tried furiously to force his Gu worms to work, but infinite search and lock, both a space and a seal path killer move, had sealed even his rank five warp Gu. ^{ch. 398}

Bai Ning Bing sighs that it has ended, that the Demon Suppression Tower will be his home for the rest of his life, feeling both joy and sorrow at seeing her enemy finally caught. She thanks him, with earnest sincerity, for the excitement he has brought to her otherwise lonely life, and tells him he should feel honored to have been part of an even more exciting one to come. ^{ch. 398}