Xuandu finished speaking and fell silent. The air remained still for a moment.
Zhaoye waited for three breaths, and when no further explanation came, he grew frantic.
“What's wrong with you? Why only tell half the story? Xuandu! Xuandu!”
“What's gotten into you? You weren't like this before. Weren't you the one most obsessed with rules? Since when did you learn to keep people in suspense?”
“Is his soul age too low? So low it breaks the rules? No, wait, low is good. The lower the soul age, the higher the talent.”
“Or is it too high?”
“Let me guess—did it exceed the threshold?”
“That shouldn't be right. I saw him with my own eyes; his aura is young. It's definitely not some old monster who's lived tens of thousands of years wearing a fake skin.”
“Then what's the problem?”
“Could there be something strange about his soul age? Like it was tampered with? Or maybe he's a reincarnated soul who took over a body?”
“You’re going to be the death of me!!!”
“Zhaoye.” After enjoying Zhaoye's agitation for a moment, Xuandu finally spoke slowly. His voice was as flat as ever, but a careful listener could detect a hidden trace of amusement. “You talk too much.”
The Zhaoye Ghost Emperor choked on his words, then snapped back, “I talk too much? I only talk this much because of you!”
“You say there's a problem but won't say what it is—how could I not be anxious? I even gave that kid my ghost decree. Out with it! What's wrong with him?”
Xuandu didn't answer directly, still speaking unhurriedly. “You underestimated him.”
“Underestimated?”
“You mean his soul age is less than ten thousand years?”
“Exactly how much? Eight thousand? Five thousand? It couldn't possibly be three thousand, right?”
Xuandu shook his head slightly, his long hair swaying with the movement. “Less than that.”
Zhaoye's voice jumped half an octave. “Not even three thousand?! Xuandu, stop being a riddler. Speak to me! Exactly how many years?”
Xuandu raised his right hand and traced a line through the void with a slender finger.
A dark cyan light pierced through the void, transmitting directly into the main hall of the Zhaoye Ghost Emperor Mansion.
The light unfolded before Zhaoye, forming a line of text.
Zhaoye looked down.
And then, the entire Zhaoye Ghost Emperor Mansion fell silent.
After a long while, Zhaoye's voice rang out again, but it had changed pitch entirely. “How... how many?”
Xuandu didn't bother repeating himself, and Zhaoye didn't need him to. He had already seen the words clearly.
【Soul Age: One Year.】
Four words, clear and unmistakable.
“One year?! Are you sure it’s one year? Not ten thousand? Not one thousand? One year? Twelve months? Three hundred and sixty-five days?”
Zhaoye's voice grew higher, faster, and shriller until he was practically screaming.
“Xuandu! Are you sure you measured his soul age? Not something else? Like the duration he’s practiced his newest technique? Or the time since he condensed his godhead?”
“I measured it personally,” Xuandu teased. “Or do you lack confidence in the Underworld rules of the Great Emperor's Palace?”
Zhaoye fell silent.
The Underworld rules were personally established by the Northern Great Emperor, linked to the karma of heaven and earth. They never made a mistake.
In other words, Chen Zhou’s soul age really was only one year.
One year.
What did one year even mean?
To a mortal, one year was just a single cycle from spring to winter. To a cultivator, it might not even be enough time to grasp the basics of an introductory technique.
But what had Chen Zhou achieved in this one year?
He had pushed his cultivation to the seventh-stage five contracts.
He had accumulated seven zhang of merit.
He had gathered eight chi of faith.
He had brought together over seventy million believers, including more than a million Devout Believers.
Zhaoye felt his brain struggling to keep up. Could all these feats really be accomplished within a single year?
He had never seen such a being.
No, forget seeing—he had never even heard of it, nor would he have dared to imagine it.
Zhaoye took a deep breath and said, “Impossible.”
His voice had suddenly become very calm, but it wasn't the calm of someone who had settled down. It was the calm of someone so shocked they didn't know what emotion to express anymore.
“Xuandu, this is impossible. This is absolutely impossible. I don't believe it; you must be bluffing.”
“Reaching the seventh-stage five contracts in a year? Accumulating seven zhang of merit in a year? Gathering seventy million believers in a year?”
“It’s fundamentally impossible. Even the top-tier descendants of the divine races from the ancient era, even if they started cultivating in the womb, couldn't reach the seventh-stage in a single year!”
“Let alone accumulating merit and faith at the same time. Merit is built on actual good deeds, and faith is the actual convergence of believers. Neither of these can be rushed.”
“You must have made a mistake.”
Xuandu just listened quietly to Zhaoye’s shouting for a while before speaking slowly.
“I did not make a mistake.”
“I measured it personally.”
“I measured it three times.”
“The result was the same every time.”
“A soul age of one year, accurate and unmistakable.”
Zhaoye went silent again.
Three times.
Given Xuandu's personality, the fact that he had repeated the test three times meant that even he hadn't believed it at first.
But with the result being the same all three times, it could only mean one thing.
It was the truth.
“No,” Zhaoye suddenly said, his voice resolute. “I have to come see for myself. Open the door; I’m coming over right now.”
Xuandu raised an eyebrow. “You're coming now? You don't need to guard the Zhaoye Ghost Emperor Mansion?”
“Guard what? No one has come to the Great Emperor's Palace in tens of thousands of years. What is there to guard? Bang, bang, bang! Open up! I’m coming over!”
“I want to see with my own eyes exactly how much of a genius this prized darling of mine is—the one I personally gave a ghost decree to and have high hopes for!”
Xuandu seemed to have expected this and gave a light flick of his sleeve.
A crack opened in the void at the center of the hall, and dark gold light poured out, transforming into a portal of light.
The moment the portal formed, Zhaoye rushed out, looking around wildly. “Where’s my one-year-old boy? Where is he?”
Xuandu tilted his chin toward the ceiling.
Zhaoye looked up.
Beneath the dome, tens of thousands of cyan light orbs floated, like galactic debris covering the entire void.
Within the orbs, a figure could be faintly seen sitting cross-legged in the void, surrounded by a dozen or so lit-up clusters of mist.
“He’s in the third stage?” Zhaoye asked.
“Yes.”
“How long has it been?”
Xuandu glanced at the nearby incense burner.
“The first stick of incense has only just begun to burn.”
“Is he choosing talents?”
“He should have finished picking by now; he’s likely in the middle of comprehending them.”
Zhaoye narrowed his eyes and stared at Chen Zhou in the void for a long time before turning to Xuandu.
“Do you think he can pass?”
Xuandu didn't answer immediately. He remained silent for a few breaths before saying slowly, “Based on his performance in the first two stages, the third stage likely won't stop him either.”
“But the real question is—how many sticks of incense will it take?”
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