The city wall rose a hundred zhang high, its entire surface embedded with dense rows of Spirit Lanterns that lit the surrounding hundred li as bright as day.
Above the wall, hundreds of Flying Artifacts of every kind circled in the air, while below the city gate stretched a line of merchant caravans formed by cultivators, where demonic breath and Spiritual Qi intermingled in rare fashion, yet did not encroach upon each other.
At the very center of the city stood a tall tower. At its summit hung a massive Sun-Moon Crystal, radiating blinding light.
“The largest free city in the Southern Wilderness- Boundless City,” Chu Yi said. “Fighting is forbidden within the city, all factions govern jointly. Chao’er’s forces cannot reach here, Pei Shuying’s sword cannot be drawn here, and even Deity Transformation pressure cannot override the Boundless City Rules.”
The carriage swept over the top of the city gate. The guarding cultivator glanced only once at the emblem on the carriage’s side before respectfully clearing the passage.
“This one day and one night,” Chu Yi said as she poured Shen Mo a second cup of tea, “Young Master Shen need only stay safely by my side. No one can find you, and no one would dare take you.”
The carriage slowly descended onto the plaza before the tall tower, surrounded by neatly trimmed spirit trees and silent armored guards on patrol.
The tower doors opened wide, warm bright light spilling from within.
Shen Mo stepped down from the carriage and lifted his head to gaze at the tall tower.
Boundless City.
He had heard of this city.
The borderland where the Southern Wilderness, Northern Desert, and Central Plains meet- a lawless zone.
There were no sects here, no rules, only one simplest principle- the Boundless City Rules are everything.
And the city rules stated clearly: within the city, regardless of grievance, martial combat is forbidden. Violators are executed without mercy.
This was indeed the most perfect cage Chu Yi could have chosen.
As he stepped toward the tower doors, a faint breeze drifted over from the other side of the plaza.
The wind carried a certain unfamiliar spiritual breath.
This spiritual breath was very light, very faint, like a snowflake landing on the back of one’s hand in deep winter- barely perceptible in its coolness, yet it made the skin on the back of his neck prickle slightly.
Shen Mo instinctively turned his head.
At the other end of the plaza, a woman was leaning against the trunk of a spirit tree.
She was extremely beautiful, with a trace of casual languor between her brows and eyes, wearing a plain white Immortal-Soothing Skirt, a wine gourd the size of a walnut hanging at her waist.
In this Boundless City of dancing demons and chaos, the aura around her was remarkably clear and pure, like a lotus rising unstained from muddy water.
But beneath that clarity, Shen Mo always felt she harbored something else in her eyes.
The woman was drinking with her head lowered, seemingly sensing his gaze, and slowly raised her head.
Across the distance of half the plaza, she smiled at him.
A very faint smile.
Then she raised her wine gourd, toasting him from afar, her lips moving silently as though she had spoken two words.
Shen Mo did not catch her lip movement clearly.
But Chu Yi had evidently also seen that woman, and her expression underwent an extremely subtle change in that instant- the tips of her brows lowering slightly, her pupils contracting a fraction, then immediately returning to calm.
“Young Master Shen knows her?” she asked.
“No,” Shen Mo said.
Chu Yi glanced at the woman once more, then withdrew her gaze, saying plainly, “Let’s go,” and stepped through the tower doors first.
Shen Mo followed behind her. At the final step crossing the threshold, he glanced at the plaza from the corner of his eye.
The woman leaning against the tree was already gone.
Only on the trunk she had been leaning against remained a line of characters faint as water marks, rapidly drying in the night wind.
Shen Mo had no time to read it all, catching only the last few characters-
“…Floating Life Enters Dream.”
He turned his head as the tower doors slowly closed behind him.
And far above the distant city tower, that woman sat on the edge of the flying eave, legs dangling in midair, swinging her feet as she watched him walk into the tower.
The faint smile from before still lingered at the corner of her mouth. Between her fingers she twirled a Talisman, whose surface flickered faintly with spiritual light.
At the other end of that Talisman, across countless mountains and rivers, Lin Jingzhe, sitting cross-legged in her Cave Dwelling on Jiaoyue Peak, shuddered from head to toe.
Within the Dream Realm of the Dreamlike Floating Life Art, Shen Mo’s figure suddenly became incomparably clear.
So clear it was as though he were right before her eyes.
And above that figure’s head hung a line of characters she had never seen before-
Boundless City.
Jiaoyue Peak. Night.
The instant Lin Jingzhe walked out of her Cave Dwelling, the Spirit Cranes guarding the peak all startled into flight.
Her aura had changed.
The barrier of Jin Dan Peak had shattered half a shichen ago, and the Spiritual Power of early Nascent Soul poured into her limbs and bones like melting snow in early spring.
The Dreamlike Floating Life Art circulated on its own to the fifth stage, wrapping her in a layer of faint golden spiritual light, now present, now absent.
That was the sign of a cultivation method reaching perfection- the Transcendent Master who created this method had once written at the opening of the Jade Slip: “Floating life is like a dream, and the dream itself is cultivation.”
But what Lin Jingzhe perceived at this moment was not the joy of breakthrough.
It was a crack in the Dream Realm.
Shen Mo’s figure in the dream had been pulled very far away.
Previously, he would always surface in the Depths of her Sea of Consciousness when she circulated her power, clear enough to count the curve of his eyelashes.
But tonight was different. His figure had become blurred, wrapped in a layer of breath that did not belong to her- very faint, very light, as though someone were using another hand to move pieces on her Go Board.
What unsettled her even more was that the Shen Mo in the dream turned his head and looked at her.
At the corner of his Mouth was a smile that did not belong to him.
“Eldest Senior Sister! You came out of seclusion at just the right time!” A staggering figure chased up from behind- a peak-guarding disciple, face lit with joy. “The Peak Master sent a Message back! Using the peak’s secret Talisman!”
Lin Jingzhe snatched the Talisman.
Su Wan’er’s Voice came through the Talisman’s surface, light and urgent, as though suppressing injury:
“I have escaped. Hurry to Boundless City in the Southern Wilderness. Shen Mo has been taken by Chu Yi. My Spiritual Power is insufficient, I cannot breach it alone-“
The Talisman suddenly emitted a harsh static.
As though something were interfering with the Spirit Communication.
Su Wan’er’s Voice became fragmented, the last few words drowning in a sharp spiritual ringing.
Lin Jingzhe clutched the Talisman, her knuckles white.
Boundless City.
She dredged up the name from her memory.
The lawless zone where the Southern Wilderness, Northern Desert, and Central Plains meet.
Fighting forbidden within the city, governed jointly by all factions.
If Chu Yi dared bring him there, it meant she was confident she could complete what she intended under the protection of the city rules.
Lin Jingzhe tucked the Talisman into her sleeve, her body already transforming into a streak of Sword Light that vanished into the night sky.
The disciple stood frozen in place. In that instant just now, she had clearly seen that this Eldest Senior Sister, usually the most sharp-tongued of them all- her eyes were red.
Boundless City.
Inside the tower.
Shen Mo was placed on the seventh floor of the tower.
It was an elegantly furnished Quiet Room, complete with screen, writing desk, and soft couch.
The window lattice was covered with pale golden Prohibition Seal spiritual light.
Not a prison, yet harder to escape than a prison.
Before leaving, Chu Yi said only, “Rest well tonight. We depart tomorrow,” then closed the door, her footsteps fading.
He did not attempt to break the window.
Along the way he had been observing.
The number of Corpse Puppets Chu Yi brought was around forty, each equivalent in strength to a Golden Core Cultivator, and one was even Nascent Soul Peak.
With his Foundation Establishment Cultivation Level, forcing his way out would be no different from seeking death.
But he had tried something else.