High noon, the sun blazing overhead.

Chen Pingan set down the bamboo pole, stood up, and with a flick of his toes, sent the wine flask soaring. He caught it, took a sip, and said, “Let’s walk and talk.”

Lu Chen had taken up temporary residence in the old man’s humble inn, and now strolled alongside Chen Pingan along the creek.

To any observer, it wouldn’t seem unusual; Bai Bo, the Jade-Cutting Mountain mining official, was known to be on good terms with Chen Jiu, the outer sect guest elder.

Chen Pingan spoke, “It’s merely a fabricated illusion, Headmaster Lu. Why the need for such a grand display, even to the point of violating the Confucian Temple’s precepts by sneaking into the Vast World? Unless…”

Lu Chen chuckled, completing the sentence, “Unless this humble Daoist had a wandering wisp of his heart and mind, never recalled, lingering within the Vast World all along. Since I didn’t arrive directly from the Jade Capital, it doesn’t count as violating the Temple’s rules.”

Chen Pingan shook his head. “Unless Headmaster Lu seeks to ascend to the fifteenth realm immediately, filling the void left by our Master’s Dao dissolution and your return to the Jade Capital, to awe the Azure Darkness Fourteen Continents. Since both the Vast World and the Barren Lands can be seen as a Dao-traversing vessel, surely the Azure Darkness is the same. As the ancient saying goes, ‘If the ruler does not cultivate virtue, all those on the boat will become enemies.’ As for whether invincibility is truly invincible, Headmaster Lu, as an observer, must have your own answer. The result of your deductions led you to believe that breaking through at this moment had an inexplicably low chance of success. Sensing something amiss, you thought of me, suppressed your cultivation, and used a secret art to deceive the heavens. How long can Headmaster Lu remain here? A quarter of an hour? Or the time it takes to burn an incense stick?”

“Chen Pingan, you are not a difficult person to fathom. Dividing your spirit and venturing into danger, seeking to bring a world within your heart infinitely closer to reality, using technique to approach the Dao, yet you were exposed. An ordinary cultivator might hesitate, seeking a compromise, but not you. You only have two choices: either observe and hope for a false alarm, or decisively shatter a fragment of your soul, even at the cost of damaging the foundation of your Great Dao, forming an irreconcilable feud. Then you would inform the Confucian Sages guarding the Celestial Curtain, asking them to monitor the barriers between worlds, while summoning Mr. Xiao Mo and Miss Xie to block the way. Chen Pingan, after all these years, you still haven’t completely abandoned this black-and-white thinking.”

These two “Daoist friends,” with their complex relationship, had a reunion in a foreign land, yet engaged in a conversation where each spoke their own language, like a chicken talking to a duck.

“What is the difference between thought and line of reasoning?”

“Thoughts can be boundless, limitless, immeasurable, but reasoning has order, a defined path and method.”

Chen Pingan nodded. “Could this be considered a separation of the heart and mind? For example, the same road gradually diverging into emotion and reason.”

Lu Chen smiled. “Celestial studies cultivate the heart, human studies cultivate the body. A peaceful body and a joyful heart is the essence of the celestial and human. Perhaps that’s too general, so I’ll give a simple example. In later generations, spirit tablets can be found everywhere: in ancestral halls on mountains, in folk shrines, and even in the grand ancestral temples of a kingdom. They are generally used to worship ancestors and predecessors, establishing a spirit to serve the dead. The tablet bears the name of the deceased, and beside it, in smaller script, the name of the worshiper. Respect heaven and honor ancestors, carefully remembering the end and pursuing the distant past. In this case, if the heart and mind truly differ, who is the master and who is the servant?”

Chen Pingan was puzzled. “Can it be compared like that?”

“Of course.”

Lu Chen declared, “Cannot!”

Chen Pingan turned his head, and if it weren’t for Bai Bo’s body, he’d be tempted to land a punch.

Lu Chen said, “This humble Daoist is merely proving that you guessed wrong. There’s no time limit of a quarter of an hour or an incense stick. I can stay in the Vast World as long as I please. The Confucian Temple cannot control me.”

Chen Pingan suddenly said, “Actually, I was wrong from the start. A person’s emotion and reason aren’t two diverging paths, but a continuous lineage. Emotion comes before reason? No, reason comes before emotion. The distinction between heavenly principles and human desires? Like your so-called spirit tablet, the one being worshiped and the one worshiping… Tracing back to the source, one can trace back to the ancestor of a clan, and further back… is the body master to the man, the mind master to the heavens?”

Lu Chen nodded vigorously, like a chick pecking at rice. “Alas, to think it could be interpreted this way! Did this humble Daoist stumble upon a dead rat by blind luck? Wonderful, wonderful indeed.”

Lu Chen first looked up at the sun, then surveyed his surroundings, and flicked his sleeves. “Truly, grand words are like scorching flames. The words of the Great Dao are like a raging fire, reaching the northernmost and southernmost points, and the teachings extend to the four seas. Heh, all-encompassing, nowhere to hide.”

Chen Pingan sighed. “Headmaster Lu is indeed formidable. You’ve found my second doppelganger so quickly.”

Lu Chen smiled slightly. “Since I’m idle anyway, why not solve a riddle?”

He made a sound of surprise, turned sideways, and walked in that manner, looking at Chen Pingan’s profile. “The guest elder Chen Jiu here, the Jade Announcement Kingdom’s Daoist Wu Di, plus the Falling Phoenix Mountain bamboo building doppelganger, that’s already three fragments of your heart and mind. Add to that the ‘spirit tablet’ in the village school at the foot of Yun Prefecture Mountain, opening a school to teach the young. You must not move around too much, as immovable as a mountain, like the North Star in the sky, drawing a straight line, perhaps the remaining doppelgangers are divided into seven paths? Hmm, I finally understand. It’s a Great Array emulating heaven and earth, the Big Dipper Formation. Did Mountain Lord Chen draw inspiration from the Golden Summit Temple of Tongye Continent? But ultimately, you’re still imitating this humble Daoist. I am honored, deeply honored, exceedingly honored. Since the human world uses the rising and setting of the sun and moon to determine east and west, and the Ziwei Star to determine north and south, does that mean that Mountain Lord Chen’s seven doppelgangers attached to talismans have limited ranges of activity in the Treasure Bottle Continent, except that the mouth of the Dipper must always point toward the main body in the school? As for the hiding places of the remaining three doppelgangers, allow this humble Daoist to guess: Dali’s Yu Prefecture, the Qingxing Kingdom area south of the Great River. The last one is a little difficult to guess… In any case, to protect the seven fragments of your heart and mind from being intercepted and defeated one by one, Mountain Lord Chen has put in a lot of effort.”

With such an array, Chen Pingan’s originally risky act of dividing his spirit became much more secure. Through the array’s connection, it was like setting up a life-extending lamp in the “Ancestral Hall” for the scattered fragments of his heart and mind.

Unless targeted by a preternatural great cultivator, it would be difficult for even the earth immortals of the Treasure Bottle Continent to strip and imprison a doppelganger’s heart and mind. If a battle truly broke out, the opposing cultivator, even if victorious, would only be astonished at why a living Qi Refinement cultivator didn’t even have a soul. By the time Chen Pingan’s fragment of heart and mind dissipated and disappeared, returning to the “Ancestral Hall,” revealing the true nature of the talisman puppet, those cultivators would understand that they had provoked someone they shouldn’t have.
Chen Pingan said, “Actually, there are two more hidden auxiliary stars, responsible for providing support from the sidelines, to prevent the Earth Immortals from easily shattering one of my talisman papers, causing a chain reaction that leads to a complete failure, forcing me to immediately withdraw all the talisman clones.”

Lu Chen sighed, “No wonder you once told this poor Daoist in the Mud Bottle Lane that your memory was excellent, and you could remember everything you saw.”

Back then, the straw sandal-wearing youth of the Mud Bottle Lane would still respectfully call him Daoist Lu, a truly nostalgic time.

From Daoist Lu, to Lu Chen, to Bastard, to the current Headmaster Lu, how utterly melancholic.

Lu Chen now rejoices that this trip was not in vain, it was definitely worth it. The current Chen Pingan, having begun his cultivation journey, has already reached the mountainside. Lu Chen’s definition of “mountainside” is different from that of ordinary Qi Refiners. It refers to a position where one can see the scenery of the mountain top. Only then is one qualified to be called being on the “mountainside,” and it has no absolute relationship with the level of one’s cultivation. For example, many Ascension Realm great cultivators never find the opportunity to harmonize with the Dao in their lifetime. In Lu Chen’s eyes, they are still outsiders who have not yet reached the mountainside.

Now, Chen Pingan, relying on the superposition of the natal abilities of his two flying swords, has already found an extremely broad “Sword Dao,” which is to gather one small chiliocosm after another through various methods, including seeing, hearing, hearsay, and imagination. If it was just a slightly immature concept before returning to the Great Landscape from the Sword Qi Great Wall, then after Chen Pingan began to refine a River of Time with the Golden Essence Copper Coins, especially after returning from beyond the heavens this time and raising the grade of the flying sword “Moon in the Well,” Chen Pingan’s clones in various places, the seven “Chen Pingans,” all that they see, hear, think, and imagine in different parts of Treasure Bottle Continent, is a kind of “sword refinement” that seems to be constantly honing the edge of the sword with the real world as the Dragon Slaying Platform.

Such a way of refining swords has opened Lu Chen’s eyes.

For example, what the visiting guest Chen Jiu saw at the wine gathering today, Bai Ni, Xiahou Zan, and Liang Yuping, the three people’s figures, appearances, eyebrows, eyes, voices, tones, demeanor, and expressions, have all been “recorded” by the visiting guest Chen Jiu and have quietly integrated into the sword art world of the main body, Chen Pingan.

In short, all the characters and landscapes on the road that Chen Pingan is walking are a “word” or a “phrase,” then this wine banquet at the Scattered Flower Beach of Cutting Jade Mountain is like composing a “sentence.”

The more words and phrases that make up this sentence, the denser they are, and the more detailed the content is, the closer it is to the “truth” that is opposed to the “false appearance.”

Just like what Lu Chen asked earlier, does time really exist? Is it composed of countless frozen stills into one? Lu Chen’s statement is equivalent to regarding the entire world as a completely still book. Only when Lu Chen’s recognized “that one” begins to turn the pages, will the characters and scenes in the book “consciously” and “passively” flow. And Lu Chen’s statement is obviously from the same source but a different stream as Li Xisheng’s idea.

Suddenly forgetting a certain word, and suddenly remembering something, as if it had happened before…

How tragic it is to be alive. The sorrow of worrying about the sky falling, the cry of being at the end of the road, have all made Lu Chen feel a sense of kinship.

Also, like when Chen Pingan was in the heavens, returning to the Great Landscape with Xiao Mo and Bai Jing, Bai Jing threw him a large pile of paper with ancient scenery painted on it. At that time, Chen Pingan felt like it was a small comic book, even more like Pei Qian drawing a small person in the corner of the book page in class. Different postures, quickly flipping the pages, were a complete set of actions.

Therefore, when Chen Pingan, the writer, extracts “this sentence” alone and puts it into the River of Time in the Cage Bird, those who see it in the future will feel it is even more real.

If today’s wine banquet is a short sentence, then in the capital of Jade Propaganda Country, in Daoist Wu Di’s residence in Yongning County, the female ghost Xue Ruyi, the young man Zhang Hou, and the flowers and plants in the courtyard, plus the daily outings and banquets with those yamen clerks, chatting on the street, and setting up a stall to tell fortunes… it is a “long sentence” that has been stretched to several months in the River of Time.

And Lu Chen’s “false appearance” is the origin of all dharmas, like the first… ancestral tablet.

However, when Chen Pingan was chatting with Li Xisheng, when the two talked about Zou Zi, what Chen Pingan thought in his heart was that as an anchor existing for the positioning of the river channel, it could not be Lu Chen.

This is a kind of self-deception of Chen Pingan’s similar habitual “thinking.”

And this method of first deceiving oneself, then deceiving others, and then deceiving heaven, is naturally what Chen Pingan learned from Cui Chan, but unfortunately he did not learn it all. After all, Chen Pingan is self-taught, relying entirely on his own to explore, just like an arithmetic problem, knowing the answer to the exam question, and then tracing back to a very complicated solving process. At the same time, it is precisely this superfluous self-deception that Chen Pingan had this thought, which is equal to verbally uttering Lu Chen’s name, which made Lu Chen, who was also watching from afar in the heavens at that time, suddenly notice something was wrong and also started to trace back… It was another shocking experience, not even inferior to the assassination that was about to happen but had not yet happened at the Sword Qi Great Wall. If Lu Chen had not left the Azure Netherworld and had not joined in this excitement, being isolated by a great world, he might have missed this clue.

Lu Chen’s return to the Great Landscape this time was not an illegal “smuggling,” but was reported to the Sage of Rites beforehand.

There was really a serious matter to come, and seeing Chen Pingan was just a detour.

“Let this poor Daoist calculate again. This year’s Qingming Festival, the opening of the Big Dipper of Mountain Lord Chen’s Seven Star Array is pointing to… the Yongjia Street in the capital of Jade Propaganda Country?!”

Lu Chen always walks like a crab, following Chen Pingan’s steps, and asked, “Is a Ma Kuxuan worth you diverting so much attention to consecrate him?”

Lu Chen’s so-called consecration is not the consecration of ennoblement, but the consecration of prohibition and mountain closure.

Chen Pingan and Ma Kuxuan both know that there is an old score between them, someone collecting debts and someone repaying debts.

It may be two, it may be three. If Ma Kuxuan must block, then it may be three or four.

All will die.

Lu Chen turned around and kicked a stone on the road into the stream, “Logically speaking, even if Ma Kuxuan’s parents can become mountain and water deities along the way, receiving the protection of the West Mountain Monarch’s Mansion of a continent invisibly, so what? Can they stop you from taking revenge?”

“Yes, yes, that’s it, so it’s a bit tricky.”
“These two, to actually ascend into the ranks of the City Gods, to obtain the talisman of the Netherworld’s official decree, this veers onto a different path than the mountain and river deities. Heh, more than just a talisman, truly the most fitting life-saving charm in the world.”

“Strange indeed, how did they manage this? With the stingy and mean nature of Ma Ku-xuan’s parents, even if they wanted to rise to this rank through various charitable acts, accumulating karmic merit, the Fengdu Netherworld has always had that iron rule, ‘Intentional good deeds, though good, are not rewarded’. Mortals of the Yang realm, even if skilled in the Netherworld’s laws, seeking to amass merit and exploit loopholes, will be blocked by this threshold. To aspire to the high position of a City God is simply wishful thinking.”

Chen Ping-an finally spoke, “Ma Ku-xuan is clever, he planned to bypass them both from the start, secretly arranging people in the capital of the Jade Declaration Kingdom, forcing his parents to do certain things, deliberately not stating the reasons, even forbidding them from asking why, once using extremely stern words, even threats, towards his parents.”

“Giving a man a fish is not as good as teaching him how to fish. Ma Ku-xuan is doing the opposite, it might be slower, but it’s effective.”

Lu Chen laughed, “Roughly when did Ma Ku-xuan start this scheme?”

Chen Ping-an said, “Not too late, and definitely not too early. Back when Apricot Blossom Lane Ma’s family, along with that group of relatives, moved out of the small town, directly moving out of the then Great Li Dynasty, to the Jade Declaration Kingdom in the Western Mountain region, Ma Ku-xuan was proud and arrogant, not thinking I was qualified to be his enemy. The reason for having his parents move away from their hometown was at most to worry about their fate, comparing it to Cai Jin-jian and Fu Nan-hua, after all, he had to cultivate in True Martial Mountain, it was impossible to watch over the Li-zhu Grotto Heaven at all times.”

“When I left Sword Qi Great Wall for the first time, returning to Treasure Bottle Continent, especially after leaving the Book-slip Lake, Ma Ku-xuan might have become wary, but more likely, it was to deliberately disgust me, intentionally making me want revenge but unable to, even feeling that revenge was hopeless for a lifetime, wanting me to live in hatred and guilt for a lifetime. When I became the Hidden Official of Sword Qi Great Wall, and the news reached Vast Bright World, Ma Ku-xuan truly began to see me as a threat. I carefully researched the front and behind the scenes actions of the Ma family in the Jade Declaration Kingdom, it was in those years that the descendants of each branch began to frequently take action, even trying to gain imperial titles through the imperial examinations of their descendants, glorifying their family, and then attempting to have someone or several people receive court posthumous titles and posthumous gifts to the family, all these measures began to be carried out in an orderly manner. The only accident was that Ma Ku-xuan didn’t expect me to catch up to his cultivation so quickly.”

Last time when observing the ceremony of the Upright Sun Mountain in Fallen Phoenix Mountain, Ma Ku-xuan had listened to the suggestion of that Yu Shi-wu from True Martial Mountain, the latter frankly saying that if he didn’t take action again, there would be no more chances.

It was a pity that Chen Ping-an almost dismantled the entire Upright Sun Mountain, still not giving Ma Ku-xuan the opportunity to strike.

Chen Ping-an smiled slightly, “When Ma Ku-xuan’s parents become City Gods of the Jade Declaration Kingdom, I believe the first ones they will deal with will be those evil-doing family members within the Ma family, relying on this to secure their golden bodies. In the Capital City God Temple, the civil judge Gao Sheng was transferred away from the Jade Declaration Kingdom, the original head of the Yin-Yang Division, Ji Xiao-ping, took the opportunity to be promoted to civil judge, and the vacancies for the Yin-Yang Division and a certain division were filled by two City Gods from local prefectures and counties who came to the capital to report their duties and were promoted based on their merits.”

Lu Chen said with a smile, “As expected of Ma Ku-xuan, truly meticulously planned.”

The City Gods of various levels in a kingdom, are different from the mountain and river deities. Although the Mountain Lords of the Five Peaks have the right to govern both, the former’s true superiors are still the Fengdu Netherworld. In short, the Mountain Lords of the Five Peaks can directly decide the promotion or even life and death of the mountain and river deities within their territory, but they are not qualified to punish the City Gods of various levels, they must transfer the accusation to Fengdu for judgment according to the law. That is to say, the Mountain Lord’s office of the Great Peaks has some power to determine the guilt of the City Gods of various levels, but has no power of execution.

In the officialdom of mountains and rivers, the City God Temple is like the Censorate of a kingdom’s court, with a detached position and a noble status, able to supervise all officials, but the Ministry of Personnel cannot directly decide the promotion or demotion of a censor.

Of course, Ma Ku-xuan was able to accomplish this because Li-zhu Grotto Heaven forms its own cycle of heaven’s laws. The life, death, sin, and fortune of the people of the small town in the past are not controlled by Fengdu and other Netherworld realms.

Lu Chen asked, “Is there a way to break this?”

Chen Ping-an nodded, “Yes.”

“The kind of unreasonable approach that your sword cultivators occasionally take?”

“On the contrary, following the rules. Not to mention the City God Temple of the Jade Declaration Kingdom’s capital, even the Fengdu Netherworld can’t find any fault. Since they can’t find fault, they can’t protect Ma Ku-xuan’s parents according to the laws of the Netherworld, and can only act impartially, without favoring either side. Not doing so will only lead to endless entanglement, when will the cycle of revenge end? The grievances of the previous generation, our generation will make a complete end to them, repaying kindness with kindness and revenge with revenge, leaving nothing for the next generation.”

Lu Chen laughed, “Ma Ku-xuan, meticulously planned, completely defeated, wouldn’t he be angered to death by you?”

Chen Ping-an said, “His Dao heart is firm, he won’t be angered to death.”

Lu Chen was speechless.

This poor Daoist was just joking with you, you don’t need to be so rigid.

Lu Chen changed to a more pleasing topic, “Chen Ping-an, you’ve really become a receptionist.”

Previously, Lu Chen had suggested to Chen Ping-an that he must become a receptionist whenever he had the chance, it would be very interesting.

Chen Ping-an laughed, “Following good advice is like flowing water.”

Lu Chen sighed without reason, “What the eyes see is the world, how precious and how fragile is a person’s memory.”

The setting sun was about to fall, with purple and azure colors in myriad forms, changing endlessly in an instant, like a dream.

That’s not right, isn’t it noon? Why is the sun setting in the west?

Overconfident, Lu Chen knew things were not good, and immediately closed his eyes and opened them again.

If you walk by the river often, you’re bound to get your shoes wet, what a tragedy.

You Chen Ping-an are too ungrateful, this poor Daoist is the matchmaker who helped you and Miss Ning connect!

By the river, Bai Bo sat next to the apricot tree and asked, “How many fish have you caught?”

Chen Ping-an, squatting and holding a fishing rod, laughed, “No catch for now, only one big fish has taken the bait, but even if it’s hooked, it may not be able to be reeled ashore.”

Bai Bo laughed, “You’re still a cultivator, can’t you even pull up a fish?”

Chen Ping-an put on a stern face and nodded, “The fish must have become an immortal.”

Bai Bo was dumbfounded and chuckled, this kid is quite good at telling jokes.
Within a bizarre and wondrous realm, Lu Chen faced another Lu Chen, their visages mirroring each other, as if reflected in a looking glass. Thus, within each other’s eyes, an infinite multitude of Lu Chens existed.