Severing Ties: The Sect Regrets My Departure

Jiang Xun’s venture into the world was not a blind stumble into the unknown.

Before leaving the Azure Mystic Sacred Land, his route had been meticulously planned by his doting Senior Sisters. The itinerary was straightforward: travel west from the sect, stopping at major cities and friendly sects along the way to the Eastern Desolation Sacred City.

But plans are often discarded the moment a cultivator steps out the door.

Instead of heading west, Jiang Xun veered immediately into the Heaven-Leveling Mountains.

This deviation was not unusual; cultivators followed Fated Chances like moths to a flame. But Jiang Xun didn’t wander aimlessly. He moved with purpose, heading in a specific direction as if guided by an invisible compass.

High above in the clouds, concealed by her arts, Yuchi Chunlei watched him with bated breath.

“Has Junior Brother discovered a hidden Fated Chance?” she whispered, her eyes shining with anticipation.

The world was vast, filled with ancient legacies waiting for the destined. Without fate, a Grandmaster could dig three feet into the ground and find only dirt. With fate, a lucky novice could trip over a divine artifact while taking a walk.

Yuchi Chunlei prayed her Junior Brother was the latter.

“Is he using a divination technique learned from Eldest Sister?” she mused, observing his erratic behavior. “No… that doesn’t look like any divination art I know.”

Jiang Xun didn’t cast spells or consult the stars. He simply walked, stopped, closed his eyes for a moment, and then adjusted his course. It was baffling.

“Found it!”

Jiang Xun’s sudden exclamation echoed through the forest.

He stood before a nondescript cave entrance, overgrown with vines. After a brief pause, he plunged inside.

Yuchi Chunlei frowned. She could sense faint traces of an old formation at the entrance—likely a temporary shelter left by a wandering cultivator. Nothing about it screamed “legendary treasure.”

Curious but cautious, she retrieved a delicate jade cup from her robes—the Mirror Cup. It was her own invention, designed to spy on areas where projecting Divine Sense might alert the target.

She poured a drop of spiritual wine into the cup and whispered an incantation. The liquid shimmered, displaying the interior of the cave.

What she saw made her eyebrows knit together in confusion.

“Junior Brother is… what is he doing?”

Jiang Xun wasn’t searching for treasure. Instead, he sat cross-legged in the center of the cave and pulled a jade object from his robes.

The Heaven-Bestowed Ruyi.

This emerald-green scepter had been with him since he was an infant, brought back by Guan Xuelan. It was a known defensive artifact that automatically protected its master, but beyond that, it had never shown any special properties.

Until now.

Floating before Jiang Xun, the Ruyi pulsed with a soft, rhythmic green light, like a beating heart.

Nothing else happened. Jiang Xun just sat there, waiting.

Yuchi Chunlei squinted at the image in the wine. She had a vague sensation that the Ruyi was drinking something from the air—absorbing an invisible energy that permeated the cave. But what it was, she couldn’t say.

After a long silence, Jiang Xun grabbed the Ruyi and tucked it away.

“Too little,” he muttered, his voice echoing in the cup. “Still not enough. I need to get to the next location quickly.”

He stood up and began placing formation flags around the cave.

Yuchi Chunlei’s eyes widened as she recognized the pattern. It was the Blazing Annihilation Formation—a destructive array she had taught him herself.

He wants to destroy the cave? Why?

Jiang Xun activated the formation and stepped outside. He didn’t leave, though. He stood by the entrance, watching the flames roar inside, waiting until every stone was scorched black.

It looked like he was destroying evidence. Or perhaps, ensuring that whatever “energy” he had harvested would never regenerate.

Burning the bridge after crossing it? Or eradicating the root to prevent future trouble?

The fire raged for nearly half an hour. Only when the Spirit Stones powering the array crumbled to dust did Jiang Xun re-enter.

He inspected the charred walls meticulously. Finally, he spotted a faint, stubborn formation mark that had survived the heat.

“Trash formation,” Jiang Xun scoffed. “Second Sister really teaches garbage.”

He slapped several high-grade explosive talismans onto the mark and detonated them. Only when the wall was reduced to unrecognizable rubble did he nod in satisfaction.

High above, Yuchi Chunlei felt a sudden, terrifying palpitation in her heart.

She looked up.

The clear sky had vanished. Dark, angry storm clouds were swirling directly above the mountain.

Crack!

Before she could react, a bolt of silver lightning tore through the sky and slammed directly into the cave below.

…

While Jiang Xun was busy getting struck by lightning, miles away in the underground relic, Gu Xiu stood silently in the shadows.

The atmosphere in the massive cavern was thick with frustration and despair.

“Damn it! I can’t take it out!” a cultivator shouted, throwing a rare ore to the ground. “The moment I stepped toward the exit, a killing intent locked onto me. If I took one more step, I’d be dead!”

“Me too,” another groaned. “It’s like everything here is cursed. You can pick it up, but you can’t put it in a Storage Ring. And holding it makes you feel like you have a sword against your throat.”

“We’re guarding a mountain of treasure but can’t take a single coin. Are we destined to leave empty-handed?”

Gu Xiu watched them, his expression unreadable.

He had been in the mine relic for some time, observing the chaos. The cavern was filled with incredible wealth—rare ores, ancient Dharma Treasures, and refined materials left by a master blacksmith of antiquity.

But the corpses littering the entrance told a grim story.

At least ten cultivators lay dead near the stone guardians. Some had tried to run with the loot. Some had tried to refine the materials on the spot. All had been instantly decapitated by the statues.

These guardians were the enforcers of the relic’s rules. Break the rules, and you die. Even the combined might of the Emerald Wave Sect and the Red-Robed Ancestor’s alliance couldn’t scratch them.

It was a deadlock.

Most cultivators had given up on the main chamber and moved deeper into the tunnels, hoping to find less restricted treasures.

Gu Xiu remained.

In his dream of the future—Seeing Ten Thousand Years in a Glance—he had watched Jiang Xun sweep this room clean. Jiang Xun had used the Heaven-Bestowed Ruyi to suppress the statues, walking out with bags full of loot as if he owned the place.

Gu Xiu didn’t have the Ruyi. He couldn’t brute-force the rules.

But after watching the others fail, a new idea began to form in his mind.

He walked over to a massive chunk of Crimson Blood Fine Gold. It was the size of a human head, a treasure that would fetch a sky-high price in the outside world. Normally, this metal was sold by the gram. Here, it sat like a discarded rock.

Gu Xiu didn’t pick it up.

Instead, he activated the Dust Observation Technique.

The world shifted. The dull red metal suddenly glowed with thousands of shimmering specks of gold and crimson light.

Dust.

The essence of the material.

The rules of the relic were simple: Do not remove the item. Do not store the item. Do not consume the item.

But what if he didn’t take the item? What if he only took its essence?

What if he used the Dust Shattering Method from the Divine Record of Artifact Forging to extract the “Dust” and leave the physical shell behind?

It was a risky theory. But worth a try.

Gu Xiu prepared himself. He released the little black monkey and deployed ten Rain Ghost puppets around him as a meat shield. They wouldn’t stop the statues, but they might buy him a split second to dodge.

He gripped the Carefree Jade Pendant in one hand and the mysterious finger bone in the other.

Ready.

Gu Xiu took a deep breath. He raised his right hand, fingers curling around an invisible handle.

In the vision of the Dust Observation Technique, a spectral hammer materialized in his grip—the Dust Shattering Hammer.

He swung.

Clang!

A dull, heavy sound echoed in his ears, audible only to him. To any observer, he was just miming a hammering motion in the air above the rock.

But under his gaze, the Crimson Blood Fine Gold shuddered. A massive cloud of golden-red Dust was shaken loose from the metal’s structure.

Gu Xiu froze, his senses expanding to the limit, waiting for the killing intent. Waiting for the statues to move.

Nothing happened.

The statues remained still. The killing intent did not appear.

Gu Xiu grinned. He raised his palm.

“Gather Dust!”

The cloud of shimmering light swirled into a vortex and flowed into his Dantian. The Yin-Yang Purple Qi Dao Platform greedily devoured the energy, expanding slightly as it digested the high-grade essence.

Still no reaction from the guardians.

The loophole was real.

Gu Xiu didn’t celebrate. He swung the hammer again. And again. And again.

He pounded the Crimson Blood Fine Gold until the last speck of Dust was extracted. The metal looked unchanged on the outside, but structurally, it was now a worthless, hollow shell that would crumble at the slightest touch.

Gu Xiu straightened up, his eyes shining with a mischievous light.

In the future he saw, Jiang Xun took everything.

But what if, when Jiang Xun arrived with his magical Ruyi… all the treasures were already empty husks?

Gu Xiu looked at the cavern full of priceless materials.

Let’s get to work.