LABMY CH123

Mu Jingzhuo watched helplessly as, in front of tens of thousands of people, Jian Yuanbai walked toward him step by step. Each step felt like it was stomping on his heart—thump, thump, thump—his heartbeat was so heavy it was as if someone were beating a drum against his chest. All other sounds faded away, leaving only the deafening sound of his own heartbeat.

He swore that even when Jian Yuanbai confessed his feelings to him, even when their hearts had connected, his heart had never pounded this intensely.

Nervous, uneasy, clinging to one last sliver of hope.

When the voice transmission reached his ears, Mu Jingzhuo clearly heard a crack—the sound of hope shattering.

This process—he was all too familiar with it. So familiar that, at this moment, he wished he could dive headfirst into the deep sea of the Falling Water Domain and drown himself.

Jian Yuanbai transmitted his voice: “Little Spoon, do you still remember that young man who mocked you just now?”

By now, Mu Jingzhuo had already reached the Golden Core stage and could also perform voice transmissions. But he didn’t speak. He simply stared at Jian Yuanbai, his expression taut.

Jian Yuanbai continued, “It’s simple. You just need to say this to him: ‘My fate can only be decided by me. You have no say in it.’”

Mu Jingzhuo inexplicably felt relieved—this wasn’t too difficult. But the moment that thought arose, he realized that his threshold for humiliation had been steadily rising.

Then he heard Jian Yuanbai add, “And tell the Grand Elder this:

‘So what if you’re a Great Golden Immortal? Even if an Immortal Emperor or Immortal Sovereign were here today, I would never bow.

That so-called Spirit-Suppressing Turtle Stone? It won’t stop me, and neither will you.

I seek my own path. The entire Ninefold Continent shall bow at my feet.’”

Mu Jingzhuo’s mind went blank.

No matter how high his threshold was, it couldn’t possibly withstand something like this!

He struggled to push out his voice, so shocked that he even forgot to use voice transmission. But even if he had, it wouldn’t have made much difference—his cultivation level was too low, and those with higher strength could hear his transmissions anyway.

“I’m only at the Golden Core stage…”

Mu Jingzhuo clenched his teeth. “And you want me to say something like that?”

A Golden Core stage cultivator, standing before tens of thousands of people—before a sea of experts including those in the Mahayana stage, Mortal Immortals, Earth Immortals, Profound Immortals, and Great Golden Immortals—declaring that the entire Ninefold Continent would bow at his feet.

What kind of concept was that? Mu Jingzhuo didn’t even dare to think about it.

Jian Yuanbai said nothing, merely patted his shoulder in silence—his intent clear without words.

The scene was silent, yet several bolts of lightning struck down. It was noisy, yet among the hundreds of thousands of people present, not a single one spoke. Tens of thousands of eyes were all focused on Jian Yuanbai and Mu Jingzhuo.

Mu Jingzhuo was not foolish—on the contrary, he was very smart. He naturally understood that for someone to be, at the same time, a notorious wastrel in a small city, the cousin of his former fiancée, the sect master of the top sect in the Asriga Empire, and also possess strength that could crush a Great Golden Immortal—by all logic, such a thing was absolutely impossible.

He had asked Jian Yuanbai about it before, and from Jian Yuanbai’s silence, he could guess that this person might not even be from this world.

Moreover, he knew that every time Jian Yuanbai insisted on making him say all kinds of things, there had to be a reason—perhaps Jian Yuanbai had no choice but to make him say them.

So, deep down, Mu Jingzhuo understood that he probably couldn’t escape this.

But no matter if he looked forward or turned back, he just couldn’t bring himself to say it.

He covered his eyes in distress, his lips parting and closing repeatedly. After much internal struggle, he still didn’t utter a single word.

Time stretched on so long that people began to grow puzzled. Curious and confused gazes fell upon Mu Jingzhuo, making him instinctively turn to look at Jian Yuanbai.

Mu Jingzhuo’s ears were flushed red. His delicate, beautiful face clearly pleaded for mercy. His watery eyes carried a hint of hope as he stared at Jian Yuanbai.

Jian Yuanbai inwardly admired his soft and lovely wife, pitied his poor wife for a brief moment, and then heartlessly commanded, “Hurry up and say it.”

Say what, exactly?!

The cultivators all had keen hearing, able to pick up even distant conversations. Tense and curious, they scratched their heads in anticipation—what was it that needed to be said?

Mu Jingzhuo closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and walked toward Lan Shaoyu. “My fate can only be decided by me. You have no say in it.”

Lan Shaoyu, who had instinctively glanced at Jian Yuanbai in wariness as Mu Jingzhuo approached, was momentarily confused upon hearing these words.

It took him a second to realize—oh, right. Earlier, he had mocked this guy, saying that just uttering a few words wouldn’t change his fate.

Lan Shaoyu’s expression twisted for a brief moment. After an earth-shattering battle, this guy still remembered to come back and throw sarcasm at him. How petty could he be?

Then, under the watchful eyes of the crowd, Mu Jingzhuo walked toward the Grand Elder.

The Grand Elder usually didn’t even bother with people of such low cultivation. But with Jian Yuanbai standing behind Mu Jingzhuo, watching like a hawk, he had no choice but to focus every bit of his attention on listening.

He had to hear what this person was about to say to him.

He held his breath, straining his ears with more effort than he ever had—even more than when listening to his teacher’s lectures in the past.

And then… the Grand Elder saw Mu Jingzhuo’s lips move.

Jian Yuanbai, merciless as ever, ordered, “Louder.”

Mu Jingzhuo’s face turned red at a speed visible to the naked eye. He slightly parted his lips, his voice as soft as a mosquito’s whisper, “So what if it’s a Great Golden Immortal? Even if an Immortal Emperor or Immortal Sovereign were here today, I swear I would never yield.”

“That damned Spirit-Suppressing Turtle Stone cannot block my path, and neither can you all stand in my way.”

The last sentence was spoken quickly and vaguely: “I… Dao, the entire Ninefold Continent will… at my feet.”

The Grand Elder: …

He never would have imagined that in his advanced age, as a highly respected figure of the Immortal Spirit Island and an influential presence across the entire Ninefold Continent, he would one day stand here, listening—like a disciple being reprimanded—to a low-level cultivator speaking such words of contempt toward him.

Moreover, under that man’s cold and menacing gaze, he had no choice but to ask, “Fellow Daoist, your last sentence—I didn’t quite hear it clearly.”

Dark clouds gathered densely in the sky, pressing down heavily. Thick bolts of purple-black lightning continuously crashed down. Mu Jingzhuo reached up to cover his eyes. At this moment, it wasn’t Jian Yuanbai undergoing tribulation—it was him. It was him who was being put to the test.

Mu Jingzhuo had thought that he would face his first lightning tribulation when breaking through from Foundation Establishment to Golden Core. But later, when the Spirit-Suppressing Turtle Stone shattered, tribulation lightning below the Mortal Immortal level ceased to exist.

He had also thought that he would face his first lightning tribulation when attempting to break through from Mahayana to Mortal Immortal. But now, he realized he had been wrong.

The tribulation he was experiencing was not an ordinary one—not even tribulation lightning could compare to this.

The first trial of his tribulation was to cast aside his sense of shame, endure overwhelming embarrassment, and remain unfazed.

Mu Jingzhuo pressed his lips together, feeling an urge to cry. Truthfully, he would have much preferred to face actual tribulation lightning. Really.

For some reason, something Jian Yuanbai had done had formed a barrier around him, allowing Mu Jingzhuo to stay close without being struck by the lightning. Unable to help himself, he turned around, grasping Jian Yuanbai’s sleeve. His eyes were slightly red, his tone both pleading and coquettish, “Shizun, can’t you just…”

He hesitated, his gaze shifting to the tens of thousands of people present. “Like that time in Qingyun Fudi?”

Back in Qingyun Fudi, Jian Yuanbai had used an almost terrifying ability—something akin to stopping time—so that only Shen Zhilan could hear what Mu Jingzhuo was forced to say.

Jian Yuanbai spread his hands, looking somewhat helpless. “This time is different. Back then, their cultivation levels were all too low.”

What he had done before wasn’t truly stopping time but merely slowing the flow of time in a certain area. But now, with a Great Golden Immortal present, if he couldn’t control the entire scene, the others would remain unaffected.

So, he truly was powerless this time.

The malicious man looked at his beautiful and utterly humiliated partner, urging him, “Hurry up and say it, little spoon.”

“If you speak too softly, you’ll have to repeat it.”

Mu Jingzhuo murmured, “You don’t have a ‘little spoon’ anymore.”

Your ‘little spoon’ is dying of shame today.

If Mu Jingzhuo hadn’t known that Jian Yuanbai had no choice but to make him say these things for a reason, he would never, ever have agreed.

The Grand Elder was growing increasingly impatient, his mind in torment. Just what was he going to say? It felt as if an invisible sword were hanging over his head, and all he could do was wait helplessly for the moment it would fall.

Under the watchful eyes of tens of thousands of people, Mu Jingzhuo shut his eyes, gritted his teeth, steeled his heart, and spoke:

“I seek my Dao. The entire Ninefold Continent will bow at my feet!”

For a long moment, not a single person made a sound. Even the lightning tribulation around Jian Yuanbai seemed to halt at the perfect moment. It was so quiet that the sound of a pin dropping could have been heard.

Mu Jingzhuo’s face was bright red, while everyone else’s expressions were frozen in disbelief.

Having finished speaking, Mu Jingzhuo turned around and deliberately slammed his head into Jian Yuanbai’s chest, burying his flushed face in his embrace. It was a pitiful attempt at playing dead, hoping to hide himself from the world. Secretly, his pale hand reached for Jian Yuanbai’s waist and gave it a vicious pinch.

Jian Yuanbai sucked in a cold breath, the pain sharp—but his expression remained unchanged as he calmly held Mu Jingzhuo in his arms.

The Grand Elder’s face turned green, then purple. He had never imagined that a cultivator of such a low realm would dare to say something so outrageously arrogant right in front of him. Yet, because of that man, he couldn’t even utter a word of protest.

What was going on with these two? The one who had actually defeated them was clearly that terrifying man, yet after everything was over, the one humiliating them was this young cultivator?

The Grand Elder’s gaze landed on Jian Yuanbai’s smiling face, his mind spinning with suspicion upon suspicion. Was this intentional? Had he deliberately made the weaker one deliver these words as an even greater humiliation—to stomp their dignity into the ground?

At that moment, the thoughts of the Immortal Spirit Island cultivators were nearly identical. However, the thoughts of the tens of thousands of onlookers were vastly different.

Especially the ones on the shore—those who were familiar with the relationship between Mu Jingzhuo and Jian Yuanbai.

A group of rugged, muscular men and women, their faces momentarily blank, then shifting into an expression of indescribable complexity.

If they remembered correctly, these two were soon to become Dao companions.

Jian Yuanbai had single-handedly turned the tide of battle, crushing the invading Immortal Spirit Island cultivators. Yet, when it came to boasting, he made Mu Jingzhuo do it instead.

This behavior… it was hard not to read into it, to think carefully about its implications.

For some, an idea suddenly emerged in their minds—abrupt, yet oddly fitting:

Are the tens of thousands of us present here… just unwilling participants in your little couple’s game?