Chapter 56: Descendants of Heavenly Secrets, the Decline of Ancestral Legacy

It had been two years since leaving the homeland of Daxia.

Jiang Xiuyuan and his companions were in no rush to reach any destination. Like true mortal travelers, they followed the coastline eastward, wandering and pausing along the way. They witnessed the lives of mortals growing ever more humble and insignificant, like ants under the rule of the Immortal Sect; yet they also saw some coastal towns, distortedly prosperous due to the frequent comings and goings of cultivators in this new order.

One day, they arrived at a large mortal settlement called Tidewave City.

Tidewave City rested against the continent, facing the Eastern Sea—a natural deep-water harbor. Mortals and cultivators lived intermingled within the city, a blend of dragons and snakes, vibrant yet chaotic. Towering immortal pavilions intertwined with shabby mortal shanties; cultivators soaring through the sky on magical instruments left behind looks of envy or numbness on the faces of the mortals. Along the streets, shops sold elixirs and miraculous medicines, while street vendors hawked baked cakes and dried fish, creating a bizarre and colorful tableau.

Jiang Yiyi and Jiang Xiaobai had grown accustomed to such scenes. Xiaobai, much livelier now, was tugging on Yiyi’s hand, fascinated by a stall selling sugar figurines.

Yet Jiang Xiuyuan’s gaze was drawn to a humble stall at the corner.

It was a crude setup: a worn wooden plank laid over two wooden boxes, the entirety of the young vendor’s belongings. Behind the stall sat a boy around fifteen or sixteen years old.

The boy was slender, clad in a faded coarse cloth garment patched in several places. His face was thin and pale, tinged with the pallor of malnutrition, yet his eyes shone with astonishing brightness. When he lowered his head to focus intently on his work, the world around him seemed to vanish. His concentration and calmness were incongruous with his age and the surrounding noise.

On his stall were several disassembled round formation plates, palm-sized. These were the lowest-grade formations—such as the Dust Gathering Array, the Dim Light Array, and the Constant Temperature Array—used by ordinary households or low-level cultivators.

At that moment, he was carefully engraving symbols finer than hair with a polished carving knife onto a fragment of spiritual stone no larger than a fingernail. His movements were steady and precise, his wrist unwavering. After a few strokes, he would pause, pick up another component of the formation plate, and carefully compare them, brows furrowed as if engaged in a complex calculation.

“Daddy, what are you looking at?” Jiang Xiaobai returned happily clutching a lifelike white fox sugar figure she had just bought.

“Someone interesting,” Jiang Xiuyuan smiled, pointing to the boy.

Jiang Yiyi followed his gaze. With her cultivation, she could immediately tell that the boy was only at the second level of Qi Refinement—so low it was almost negligible. Yet she also noticed the boy’s hands.

Those hands were thin and bony, covered with tiny scars and calluses, black metallic powder and grease embedded in the nails. But when manipulating those delicate formation parts, they displayed a stability and dexterity beyond his level, as if born for this very purpose.

At that moment, the boy seemed to complete the last rune. He exhaled deeply, sweat beading on his forehead. Carefully, he embedded the fragment of spiritual stone into a groove in the formation plate, then used a special tool to gently adjust several nodes on the plate.

A faint hum sounded.

The once dull formation plate glowed softly from its center with a stable, bright white light.

At last, a pure, heartfelt smile spread across the boy’s gaunt face—a smile like sunshine after rain, instantly dispelling the sorrow and fatigue etched between his brows.

“It’s done!” he whispered joyfully, like a child who had just received a beloved toy.

“Hey, little brother, is my Dust Gathering Array fixed?” A stout woman squeezed through the crowd, shouting.

“All done, Aunt Zhang,” the boy quickly stood and handed over the formation plate. “See? It’s working properly now.”

“Hmph, you’re not bad, kid,” Aunt Zhang said, tossing three copper coins casually onto the plank. “Here’s your pay.”

“Aunt Zhang, we agreed on five coins…” The boy’s voice was anxious.

“Stop your whining!” Aunt Zhang glared. “You kept me waiting a whole hour! You delayed my business; deducting two coins is already generous! You’re a poor nobody, and you dare to haggle?”

With that, she twisted her stout waist and strode away.

The boy stared at the three copper coins on the plank, clenched his fists, lips moving silently, then slowly relaxed his grip. Silently, he pocketed the coins, his eyes dimming as he sat back down and resumed his work on the cold pieces.

Jiang Xiaobai looked angry. “How can someone be like that? So mean!”

Jiang Xiuyuan said nothing. He walked over slowly and took from his storage pouch a delicate “Warm Jade Pendant,” its internal runes already broken. This was a small trinket he had casually refined before, now deliberately damaged.

“Little master, can you fix this?” Jiang Xiuyuan’s voice was gentle and mellow.

The boy looked up and saw Jiang Xiuyuan clad in plain azure robes, his demeanor gentle and refined, unlike an ordinary person, so he did not dare to neglect him. He took the pendant, examining it carefully, frowning even deeper.

“Sir, this… this is no mere mortal trinket. The ‘Constant Temperature Array’ inside is more intricate and complex than any formation plate on the market. I’m afraid… I’m not skilled enough to repair it.” He was honest, not boasting for business.

“No matter. Give it a try,” Jiang Xiuyuan smiled. “If you fix it, I’ll pay you ten low-grade spirit stones. If not, I won’t blame you.”

Ten low-grade spirit stones!

The boy’s head snapped up, eyes wide with shock. Ten stones meant he could buy several sets of top-quality carving knives and materials, enough to eat well for half a year.

The enormous temptation made his heart race, but glancing once more at the pendant’s structure—far beyond his understanding—he shook his head, struggling. “Sir, a gentleman does not deceive. I truly lack the skill and cannot risk damaging your treasured item for spirit stones.”

“Oh?” Jiang Xiuyuan’s eyes flickered with approval. “What is your name?”

“I am… Chen Mo,” the boy answered softly.

“Chen Mo.” Jiang Xiuyuan nodded. “You know, your repair method has an ancient flavor. Especially when you fixed the Dust Gathering Array just now, using the ‘Three-Point Reversion’ calibration method—rarely used nowadays. Where did you learn it?”

Chen Mo shuddered as if touched by some deep memory. He eyed Jiang Xiuyuan warily. “Are you… a formation master?”

“A little knowledgeable.”

Chen Mo fell silent for a long time, seemingly wrestling with fierce inner turmoil. Finally, as if making a decision, he produced a pitch-black token from his bosom, material indiscernible, and handed it to Jiang Xiuyuan.

On it, in ancient script, were three characters: Heaven’s Secret Pavilion.

Jiang Xiuyuan took the token; a warm sensation passed through his fingertips. His gaze sharpened.

Heaven’s Secret Pavilion!

Even to him, the name was thunderously renowned.

According to the vast records of the Immortal Hall’s Ten Thousand Scroll Pavilion, during the ancient era when the cultivation world flourished with competing schools, Heaven’s Secret Pavilion was the supreme authority on formations. Its main gate itself was said to be a colossal super formation encompassing all of heaven and earth. Its master could divine the secrets of heaven through formations, peering into the future, with unfathomable power.

Yet tens of thousands of years ago, during a cataclysmic “Path Extinguishing Calamity” that swept the cultivation world, Heaven’s Secret Pavilion, one of the top sects at the time, was struck first and hardest. Legend tells that its main gate formation was forcefully breached; disciples perished or were severely wounded, and all core formation diagrams and jade scrolls were destroyed.

Since then, the once glorious Heaven’s Secret Pavilion vanished from history. The world believed its legacy was lost forever.

Unexpectedly, today, they had encountered its descendant here.

“You are… a descendant of Heaven’s Secret Pavilion?” Jiang Xiuyuan’s voice held a trace of concealed emotion.

Chen Mo’s face bore a mixture of bitterness and self-mockery, yet above all, an innate, indelible pride.

“Yes. I am the thirty-seventh generation and the… sole inheritor.” He pointed to himself. “Now, the Pavilion is just me and a bunch of incomplete scraps passed down from ancestors.”

He spoke as he retrieved several worn beast skins and bamboo slips from a tattered cloth bundle behind him.

Jiang Yiyi looked over. The beast skins and bamboo slips were in ruins; most of the writing and diagrams were blurred beyond recognition. Only foundational formation theories and a few simple formation models were faintly discernible.

“Our ancestors said that during that great calamity, all the core legacies were destroyed. Only one ancestor traveling abroad survived by a hair’s breadth, but he carried only basic introductory texts for novices.”

Chen Mo’s voice was low and hoarse, as though recounting a history unrelated to himself.

“Since then, every generation of Heaven’s Secret Pavilion ancestors has devoted their lives to restoring the sect’s glory. They have exhausted themselves trying to piece together those fragments to reconstruct the legendary godly formations. But… it’s too difficult.”

“Without the core ‘Heaven’s Secret Formation Diagrams’ and the fundamental ‘All Phenomena Unified Manual,’ it’s like learning only arithmetic but trying to solve calculus. Each generation ages in study, managing to complete perhaps one or two minor formations or correct a few errors in theory.”

“When my grandfather’s generation came, he used up all his strength to restore a fragment of the ‘Seven Stars Gathering Spirit Formation’ but died exhausted. My father… he thought the path hopeless and didn’t want me to endure such hardship; he gave up formations to do mortal business. But a few years ago, he was lost at sea.”

“Now only I remain.”

Chen Mo lowered his head; his thin shoulders trembled slightly. He did not cry, yet the buried sorrow and unwillingness in his blood weighed heavily on the air around him.

The ancestral legacy withered, the transmission broken.

Those eight words pressed down like a mountain on this boy of merely fifteen.

He inherited a name of unparalleled brilliance but also a crushing despair. He loved formations, possessed remarkable talent, yet was imprisoned by incomplete knowledge, barely scraping by repairing the lowest-grade formation plates to sustain himself and maintain that distant dream.

Jiang Yiyi and Jiang Xiaobai were silent. They looked upon Chen Mo as if seeing a guardian burdened with a vast treasure but lacking the key.

Jiang Xiuyuan gently returned the token of Heaven’s Secret Pavilion to him.

“I understand,” he said sincerely, meeting Chen Mo’s eyes. “Take this pendant and study it. You don’t have to fix it—it’s a gift from me. As for payment…”

He paused, placing the ten low-grade spirit stones on the wooden plank.

“This is what you deserve for standing by your principles.”

With that, he turned and, with Jiang Yiyi and Jiang Xiaobai, slowly disappeared into the crowd.

Chen Mo stared blankly at the spirit stones and the delicate pendant on the plank, then at the direction Jiang Xiuyuan had vanished, remaining silent for a long time.