The oil lamps of Nightwind City's Underground Market flickered like the eyes of a drowsy demon.Lin Feng walked slowly among the crowded stalls, his robe collar pulled high, his hood covering most of his face. Thirty-one chapters—and three full months—had passed since his first meeting with the Grand Elder. Three months of intensive training, political intrigue, and unimaginable growth in power. He was now at Qi Refinement Stage 4, with five major meridians fully reconstructed. His gauntlet, which he had named "Starforge's Echo," now possessed 12% functionality—enough for stable analysis projection and small-scale material modification.But tonight, he was not Lin Feng, the rising Inner Court disciple. He was a shadow.His goal was simple: purchase "Void-Iron Dust" for his personal research on teleportation formations. The Underground Market was the only place in three kingdoms that openly sold such prohibited goods—or as openly as possible in the underwor

The alley behind the Nightwind City Underground Market was no ordinary alley. It was the slow-pulsing vein of the underworld—a narrow artery filled with damp shadows, the musty stench of contraband stored too long, and the faint hiss of sound-dampening formations embedded in the brick walls. Lin Feng crept along the wall, breath held, Deconstruction Eye active at low intensity to avoid detection. Fifteen meters ahead, his target moved with suspicious leisure. That merchant—the same man he had observed using Night Phantom Sect hand signals at the antique stall—walked with the heavy gait of a fat man unaccustomed to long journeys. But the quick movements of his eyes and the way his hand periodically touched a concealed pouch at his belt revealed a vigilance unsuited to his careless appearance. --- [Target Analysis: Unknown Merchant - Status: Tailied] · Cultivat

That wall was not a wall. It was a frozen giant formation.Lin Feng stood atop the final hill before the lowlands, and for a moment, his breath caught in his throat. Below him, stretching as far as the eye could see, lay Vermilion Bird City—a metropolis he had never imagined even in his wildest dreams.The city walls rose fifty meters high, crafted from polished red jade, but this was no ordinary stone. His Deconstruction Eye, now razor-sharp after months of battle and research, saw what ordinary eyes could not: every jade block was infused with complex, interconnected energy patterns, pulsing with the same rhythm as a giant heart. The entire wall was a single formation artifact.---[Analysis: Vermilion Bird Rampart Array]· Grade: Low Earth-Grade (Equivalent to Great Sect Formations).· Primary Functions: Multidimensional defense, automatic structural regeneration, spatial intrusion detection.· Power Source: Powered by three ma

Vermilion Bird City never slept.Even on a cold night with twin moons hidden behind thick clouds, this metropolis pulsed with life. Spirit stone lamps along the main thoroughfares emitted steady golden light, illuminating crowds that never seemed to ebb—merchants closing their stalls, cultivators returning from expeditions, servants scurrying between tea houses and bordellos. The air was a mixed brew: roasted meat, cheap incense, expensive perfume, and beneath it all, the faint metallic scent of hundreds of active artifacts.Lin Feng stood before the gates of the Vermilion Bird Imperial Academy, his hand gripping tightly the crystallized memory core left behind by Old Man Ku. That stone felt warm in his palm, pulsing with the same rhythm as when he first received it at Ghost Whisper Canyon, when the old man had drawn his final breath in his arms.Three weeks. Three weeks since he had promised to find Xiao Lan, the sole granddaughter of a mad researcher who

The silence in the small, stuffy room felt like the tension before a storm. Xiao Lan stood frozen in the doorway, her fingers still gripping the door handle tightly as if it were the only thing keeping her from collapsing. Her face, which had moments ago been filled with resentment and bitterness, was now a blank canvas, all emotions erased by the single name Lin Feng had just uttered. Old Man. Her grandfather. "You met him?" Xiao Lan's voice broke mid-sentence. "You... you saw him before he...?" Lin Feng nodded slowly, his eyes never leaving the girl's face. In his hand, the crystallized memory core still emitted a faint blue light, pulsing gently like a heart beating for the last time. "He saved me. At Ghost Whisper Canyon. And he asked me to find you. To give you this." Xiao Lan took a step back, her back hitting the doorframe. "I don't want it." The words came out like a hiss, but her eyes—