Chapter 3 — Secret Realm
Realms.
As it is known, a space where life thrives is a world of Heaven, and a space where life ends is a world of Hell. Together, they form a complete World.
When such worlds coexist within a particular space-time, they become a Realm. The word itself is arbitrary — it may describe a state, a place, or even an emotion.
In the most fundamental sense, a complete Realm is one where physical, metaphysical, and unphysical laws are whole, holding to a certain order, and shifting with perspective.
For cultivators, the creation of a realm is the closest thing to immortality and absolute power. It is why, at the higher stages of cultivation, the pursuit of Realm creation becomes all-consuming.
But a Realm is no child's play. Even those who have reached unparalleled heights of cultivation — even they cannot simply will one into existence.
Their efforts, however, are not without fruit. Even if a full world is beyond them, they can produce something lesser. A pale imitation. A fragment.
A Pocket World. A Primary Realm.
These Primary Realms, when preserved past the death of their creator, carry a rare chance of becoming self-sustaining. These abandoned realms hold profound insights into the Great Dao and have a high likelihood of producing rare treasures and artifacts over time. Every great power knows this — and every great power watches for them.
When one of these realms surfaces in the world, it signals two things without fail. First: a great cultivator has died. Second: a bloody contest over what they left behind is now inevitable.
In recent ages, the common folk have taken to calling them Secret Realms — a name rooted in the simple truth that the organizations who find them do everything they can to keep the discovery quiet.
So what happens when a Secret Realm appears out of nowhere, unannounced and uncontrolled?
The answer is straightforward.
Chaos.
Like a stone dropped into still water, the ripples move outward instantly. Every force that catches wind of it drops everything else and moves — before anyone else can get there first.
Today was no exception.
★ — ★ — ★
In a certain luxurious manor.
An intoxicating fragrance hung thick in the air. Sweet laughter and soft sounds drifted from somewhere within.
It was very... lively.
Then hurried, heavy footsteps shattered the mood — and an old man in butler's attire pushed open the door.
What greeted him gave him immediate pause. Several beautiful figures lay draped over each other in various states of dishevelment, expressions dreamy and distant. Jade-smooth skin. Soft curves. A heady, captivating warmth still lingering in the air.
The old man stared for a moment longer than was strictly professional.
"...Aaahh..."
A lazy yawn cut through the silence. Then a drowsy, unhurried voice.
"Butler Zhang. What is it? Aaahh... If it isn't something to do with the Royal Family... you do understand what follows from disturbing me at a moment like this, yes?"
Butler Zhang snapped back to himself and dropped to his knees.
"Master, please spare me. I would never disturb you without cause. But this matter is beyond anything I can decide on my own. I beg your forgiveness."
He had seen what happened to people who got on the Master's bad side. His own Zhang family had served the Dan family for generations — he himself had been in service since he could walk. His loyalty was unimpeachable. And still, even he believed he might share the same fate as those others if he mistepped.
"Well then. Go ahead. But if it isn't interesting..."
The voice trailed off. The implication was clear enough.
"Yes, Master. A Secret Realm has appeared. Believed to be the remnant of a great cultivator from thousands of years past. We are still investigating the records to determine which ancient force or cultivator it belonged to."
Butler Zhang delivered it without flinching.
From within the tangle of unconscious beauties, a slender hand slowly emerged. It shifted a few of the sleeping figures aside with practiced ease, and then the rest of the body followed.
He was a slender young man — evenly muscled, unhurried in every movement. His skin held a diamond-like sheen that caught the light with quiet arrogance. His short silver hair was ruffled, as though a galaxy had been loosely tucked into it. His golden pupils shone with a depth that outpaced everything around him. Every part of him was perfect in a way that somehow still felt hollow — as though something essential was missing from behind all that brilliance.
"And where has this Secret Realm appeared?"
Master Dan Shi asked, his gaze drifting lazily toward Butler Zhang.
"It's... it's in the Jade Lotus Auction House."
"Hehe... This is getting very interesting."
Master Dan Shi chuckled softly. He looked back at the unconscious beauties around him with something approaching fondness.
"My dear ladies. Forgive your loving husband for having to take his leave. But don't worry — I'll return as swiftly as I can."
The half-awake ones trembled faintly and did not look at him. They had, in every sense of the word, been conquered.
Dan Shi rose and vanished from the spot — then reappeared a few moments later in flowing purplish-white robes, intricately designed. Added to his already impeccable appearance, he looked precisely like a lord born to wear them.
"Butler Zhang. I have a feeling this trip is going to be very, very entertaining."
His eyes held a flicker of genuine anticipation — the kind that only surfaced when something truly worth his attention had arrived.
He stepped out and left his wives to their dreams.
Butler Zhang followed without delay.
★ — ★ — ★
Jade Lotus Auction House.
It was one of the most reputable establishments in the Luo Kingdom — a place where cultivators could bring their goods to auction anonymously, walking away with coin or trades without anyone being the wiser. It had branches throughout the kingdom, with one of its key locations sitting in Mist City.
Manager Mao oversaw the Mist City branch.
Being the manager of a Jade Lotus Auction House, and having reached the Middle Stage of Golden Core Realm himself, he occupied a position of genuine prestige in the city. He was accustomed to being treated accordingly — composed and aloof with most, attentive and gracious with VIPs.
Two days ago, however, that composure had cracked.
He had been preparing for the upcoming auction when a letter arrived — sealed with a green stamp bearing the image of a saber-toothed tiger. He read it once. His eyelids did something he had not experienced in years.
They trembled.
"M-Madam Feng... is coming in two days... to auction her paintings... What do I do?"
He sat with it for a long time, feeling genuinely uncertain whether to celebrate or mourn.
On one hand, Madam Feng gracing the Auction House with her presence was an honor. On the other hand, she intended to auction her paintings — her best ones, no less — and Manager Mao had been in Mist City for over two decades.
He knew exactly what that meant.
Madam Feng, for all her delicate and graceful appearance, possessed a taste in art that could only be described as... unique. So far outside any recognizable norm that previous audiences had reportedly suffered genuine mental disturbances — even after being warned in advance.
Manager Mao pressed his temples at the memory.
Nevertheless. He was the Manager of the Jade Lotus Auction House. Something had to be done.
"Even if I have to turn all of Mist City upside down, I will stop those paintings from going up for auction."
Two days later, Madam Feng arrived with her son, Feng Han, and Manager Mao discovered that no amount of preparation had been sufficient.
He had no way out.
And then — three hours into the auction — a deep reverberation rolled through the building, and a blinding, otherworldly light flooded the premises.
The crowd went still, confused, looking for the source.
In that moment, Manager Mao felt a profound and unexpected peace wash over him.
Thank you. Whatever this is — thank you.
★ — ★ — ★
Hong Jun, standing at Feng Qian's side, stared into the dazzling mystical light. Through it, at its source, he could make out the shape of an enormous ancient door.
Something shifted behind his eyes — eagerness, sharp and bright. A slow grin spread across his face.
"It's time."
Feng Qian, already turning the sudden change over in her mind, caught the words.
"Did you say something, Jun'er? What time is it?"
Hong Jun looked at her and gave a light, composed bow.
"Madam. The time has come for the show to begin. After all... one must wake up eventually, after a long enough slumber."
"...Are you trying to speak in riddles again?" Feng Qian rolled her eyes.
Then someone in the crowd screamed.
"—I-It's—! The Secret Realm—! The Secret Realm has appeared!!!"
Boom.
Like a tide breaking over everything at once, the hall erupted.
"W-What?!"
"Is it real?"
"A Secret Realm? Actually here?!"
"Could this be staged? Some kind of trick?"
"No — I've seen records. I've read about what it looks like when a Secret Realm manifests. I even saw an illustrated depiction in the Grand Library of the Royal Palace. This matches. Eighty, ninety percent."
Silence followed that last voice.
People wanted to argue — but found they couldn't. Several of them had also encountered descriptions in ancient records. And nothing else fit the mystical light and the resonance that had just rolled through the building.
Slowly, reluctantly, a consensus formed.
This was a Secret Realm.
"A Secret Realm, appearing inside a city..." Feng Qian murmured. "Inside an Auction House, no less. That's... unprecedented."
She didn't dwell on the strangeness for long.
"Hong Jun. Find Feng Han. We're leaving immediately."
She had enough experience to know how quickly this situation would escalate. The Royal Family would mobilize the moment word reached the capital — a Secret Realm had surfaced within their territory. That was not something they would overlook. Other factions would follow.
Feng Qian could handle herself. But Feng Han had no cultivation. Even the shockwaves of battles between Foundation Establishment cultivators could be enough to severely wound or kill him.
The decision was immediate and final. Get Feng Han and leave.
But before Hong Jun could move, a lavish carriage descended from above, drawn by spirit horses to the tune of a peculiar, self-satisfied melody.
A figure stepped out.
"Oh ho. Madam Feng. It's been quite some time. You look as cold and beautiful as ever. Has your heart softened at all toward my last proposal?"
Then, without missing a beat, the same voice turned elsewhere.
"Hong Jun! It's been a while. As manly as ever — though obviously not more so than me. I trust you've been well? I heard you've been keeping close to Young Mei. I'll say it plainly: she is mine. If a single hair on her head is harmed, I will end you and whoever caused it."
Dan Shi stepped fully off the carriage, adjusting his expensive robes as though none of that had required any particular effort.
"Ugh. This insufferable narcissist." Feng Qian did not look at him. "Hong Jun. Go find Feng Han. Don't waste another breath on this fool."
"Ouch. Madam Feng, you wound me. A maiden's heart is the most delicate thing in this world, you know." Dan Shi pressed a hand to his chest with a pained expression.
"Hong Jun. Why are you still standing there? Do you want me to endure another second of this?"
Hong Jun bowed — left hand held at his chest, right hand clasped behind his back — and did not move.
"Madam. Young Master Feng... is nowhere to be found."
A beat of silence.
"I have already scanned the entirety of the Auction House and its surrounding area. There are no traces of Young Master."
He bowed lower, as if offering himself for punishment.
"What?"
Feng Qian went very still. Her thoughts began moving at a different speed entirely.
"Hmm? Is Little Han not with you?" Dan Shi said, tone shifting from theatrical to something more attentive. "I sensed his presence near the Auction House not long ago. Heh. Sounds like someone may have gotten themselves swept up in something~"
★ — ★ — ★
A short while earlier.
When the Secret Realm appeared.
There was perhaps no person in the world at that moment who embodied both extraordinary fortune and extraordinary misfortune in equal measure — except one.
Manager Mao of the Jade Lotus Auction House.
He had spent days dreading the auction of Madam Feng's paintings — the kind of dread that doesn't ease with time, only deepens. When the Secret Realm's appearance brought the auction to an abrupt halt, he had felt, just for a moment, the genuine peace of a man whose prayers had been answered.
Then he remembered that the Secret Realm had appeared directly beside his Auction House.
Which meant every faction within range — and plenty from well outside it — would descend on this exact location and possibly tear each other apart over it.
And the one left holding the wreckage would be him.
His face went pale. He stepped forward and raised his voice over the chaos.
"Dear Guests. Due to the emergency, today's auction will be postponed. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience. As for the Secret Realm — the Jade Lotus Auction House has no intention of involvement in any conflict that follows. We maintain our neutrality, as always. We ask that your personal disputes remain precisely that — personal."
He delivered it with a full bow and more composure than he felt.
Experience counted for something. The crowd read the room, nodded in various directions, and held back from any immediate confrontation.
Then the dazzling light from the Secret Realm faded.
And the gate became visible.
It was enormous — ancient, coiled in dark vines, its craftsmanship rough and weathered to the point of looking like it might crumble if touched. It looked less like a doorway and more like something that had been buried for a very long time and had only just clawed its way back to the surface.
"Is that the entrance?"
"It looks... unsettling."
"It won't just collapse when it opens, will it? It looks half-rotten."
"Whose Secret Realm is this? Which cultivator?"
Discussion spread through the crowd as more people filtered in from the surrounding streets, drawn by the light and the noise.
★ — ★ — ★
Meanwhile, somewhere in the crowd, Feng Qian had gone quiet.
She had used a bloodline tracking method. It was a technique widely used by clans to locate blood relatives — accurate to ninety-seven percent under normal circumstances.
What it told her now, she could not accept.
"This can't be right... How is this possible?"
Even with a Secret Realm separating them across dimensions, the entrance of the realm maintained a partial passage between worlds. Thin, but present. Enough for the bloodline method to reach through and locate him.
If there had been no such gateway — if the passage had been fully sealed — the result would have told her Feng Han was either dead or no longer in the same world entirely.
But it wasn't telling her that.
It was telling her something far worse.
"Feng Han... he's inside the Secret Realm."
She said it out loud, as if hearing the words might make them less true.
They didn't.
★ — ★ — ★
After a few minutes.
Manager Mao let out a long, shaking breath.
"So that's final?"
"Yes."
"No objections here."
"Agreed."
"We're in — just don't go back on your word."
Agreements came in from all sides, one after another.
After a heated back-and-forth between the assembled factions, the terms were settled. The Secret Realm would not be claimed by any single force. It would instead function as a shared training ground — a competitive arena where young talents could enter and fight over whatever resources lay within.
The rules were announced.
1. The Secret Realm shall be jointly managed by all involved factions. No single force holds ownership.
2. Conflicts inside the Secret Realm shall have no bearing on the status quo in the outside world.
3. Whatever is obtained inside the Secret Realm belongs to whoever brings it out.
4. Entry is restricted to young talents only.
5. Entry requirements: cultivation must be below the Golden Core Realm. Age must be below forty.
Several older cultivators who had been nursing quiet hopes felt those hopes quietly die. They cursed under their breath and said nothing else.
Master Dan Shi accepted the terms with visible reluctance and chose not to enter personally. He dispatched a group of capable youths in his stead.
Feng Qian had no choice but to hold her position outside. She sent Hong Jun in alone to find Feng Han.
The other factions moved similarly — mostly sending Foundation Establishment Realm talents, with a handful of Qi Refining disciples among them, though those attracted little attention from anyone.
★ — ★ — ★
When the last participant had entered, only the factions remained outside, waiting.
Dan Shi wandered over to Feng Qian and began talking.
"Madam Feng. If I recall correctly, Hong Jun is at the Late Stage of Foundation Establishment — which is solid, but not unrivaled. There are Peak Stage Foundation Establishment cultivators in that group as well. Are you truly confident sending him alone? My people could assist, if you'd only say the word."
Feng Qian was not listening. Her thoughts were somewhere else entirely, turning over every possible way to get Feng Han out of there safely.
Dan Shi continued talking to himself.
★ — ★ — ★
Inside the Secret Realm.
The land was alive in every direction.
Trees thick as fortress walls rose to impossible heights. Dense undergrowth pressed in from all sides, layered and unbroken as far as the eye could reach. A great river moved through the forest like a living creature — slow, enormous, unhurried — fed by dozens of smaller streams that cut through the green in silver threads.
The sound of rushing water. The chorus of birds. The low, rolling growls of things unseen. The steady percussion of insects. Wet air, heavy and warm, carrying the smell of earth and bark and something older underneath it all.
It hit like a memory of a world that had existed long before human hands reshaped anything.
A grand equatorial rainforest.
But beneath all that wildness, something else breathed — a strange, deep energy woven into the ground and the air alike. Unfathomable. Pervasive. As though the entire place ran on something that had no name yet.
★ — ★ — ★
Somewhere in the Secret Realm.
Several individuals materialized out of nothing, the disorientation of sudden teleportation still written across their faces. They blinked, steadied themselves, and began assessing their surroundings the way cultivators did — quietly, quickly, reading the environment before committing to anything.
They had survived this long. Recklessness was how you stopped surviving.
"The humidity... the tree structure... the airflow..." one cultivator said, pressing a hand to the bark of a nearby trunk. "If I'm reading this correctly, we're in a rainforest."
"A rainforest." Another groaned. "I just bought these robes for my anniversary. Wore them in a rush when the realm appeared. They're going to be ruined." He paused. Then a gleam appeared in his eyes. "Wait — unless I find a spare set in here. Hehehe..."
"Everyone — do you hear that?" A third cultivator went still, head tilted. "Wild animals. A lot of them. What does that tell us?"
"What kind of question is that?" came the immediate reply. A tall, muscular man cracked his knuckles with an eager grin. "It means this realm has developed inhabitants. They're just wild beasts. We're Foundation Establishment cultivators — we kill them and move on."
He looked exactly as he sounded.
Short black hair. Steel-dark skin. A grin full of bright teeth and zero hesitation. Dark brown eyes burning with the particular fire of someone who considers every obstacle a personal invitation.
Indigo clothes, comfortable cut, sleeves rolled up to display arms that had clearly been used for exactly the kind of work he was describing.
This was Lu Ji. Son of the Crimson Cloud City Lord. A reputation preceded him everywhere he went — warrior, muscle-head, and one of the most genuinely talented cultivators of his generation. He had broken through the Qi-Refining Realm at six years old. Now nineteen, he had long since reached the Late Stage of Foundation Establishment and showed no signs of slowing.
Talent, charm, status — he had all of it, and paid attention to none of it. What he paid attention to was fighting. Friends, rivals, strangers passing through — it didn't matter. He challenged everyone, because everyone was an opportunity to sharpen himself further.
Over the years, the titles had accumulated naturally.
Battle Maniac.
Muscle-Headed Genius.
Human Honey Badger.
His peers feared him. His seniors quietly respected him and quietly avoided him.
★ — ★ — ★
The moment Lu Ji finished speaking, everyone in the group became very focused on not making eye contact with him.
Nobody wanted to be the one who volunteered for an argument with a battle maniac.
"Charging straight in would be suicide." A calm voice cut through the silence.
The speaker wore an oversized white jacket with a hood pulled loosely over white robes, black sunglasses, matching boots. The clothes were covered in dark green designs with gold trim — soft, clearly expensive material, clearly not from anywhere local. They had appeared with the others but hadn't been noticed until just now.
"This is a Secret Realm with no prior records — we don't know whose it was, what faction built it, or what type of cultivator it belonged to. Charging in alone means facing the realm's dangers and watching your back against each other simultaneously. Splitting into groups just shifts the problem — distrust doesn't disappear because you're standing next to someone."
"Oi." Lu Ji stared at them. "Who are you? You're not from around here. Where did you come from?"
"Who and where don't matter much." The voice was neutral, unhurried. "You can call me Wan. I happened to be in the area when the realm appeared and took the opportunity."
From the glimpses of Wan's face visible beneath the hood and sunglasses, both the men and the women present found themselves looking a second time. Nobody could quite determine why. Nobody could quite determine anything else about Wan either — including something as basic as gender.
"So, Wan." The cultivator with the gleam in his eyes leaned forward. He had been staring at Wan's clothes since they started talking — specifically at the material. "You've identified the problem clearly enough. I assume you have a solution?"
"I do. Though I don't expect everyone to agree with it."
"Don't worry about that." He waved it off with confidence. "I'll support you. Speak freely."
He wasn't operating on blind faith. He had already thought it through. Someone who could read the situation that clearly and speak that calmly wasn't going to suggest something idiotic. And those clothes — that material didn't come cheap. Wealth of that level didn't survive without the power to protect it. An eccentric background and quality clothing together pointed to someone worth standing next to.
That assessment mattered to him, because standing next to the right person was, at this point in his life, something he understood very well.
His name was unimportant. What was important was that he was thirty-eight years old, at the Early Stage of Foundation Establishment, and had arrived at both of those facts through a road that most people in this group would not have recognized as a cultivator's path at all.
He had been born ordinary — poor family, no backing, talent so unremarkable that even decades of grinding hadn't moved him past where he now stood. He had done dark work for a long time. Jobs that paid and jobs that cost. He'd spent years telling himself the next thing would be the thing that changed it.
It never was.
He had finally stopped.
He was married now. Had a baby boy. He had come to the Jade Lotus Auction House hoping to find something — anything — that might give his son a better start than he'd had. And then a Secret Realm had opened up and swallowed the afternoon whole.
When they announced the age restriction was forty, he had gone very still — and then quietly thanked whatever was listening, because his fortieth birthday was still just around the corner. He had walked in here with more hope than he'd carried in years.
The plan forming in the back of his mind was simple. Find a group. Wait. When something valuable turned up, act.
He was confident in his ability to handle anyone at the same realm level. No Golden Core cultivators were permitted. That meant the only variable was Hong Jun — and even that, he believed he could manage if it came to it.
So yes. He would support Wan's plan. Whatever it was.
★ — ★ — ★
All ten cultivators were watching Wan now.
Hong Jun, positioned among them, took in each face in turn with quiet amusement. He had read the room in the first thirty seconds. He decided to see how this played out.
Wan adjusted the sunglasses and swept a calm gaze over the group.
"This Secret Realm is unknown to all of us — its origin, its nature, its dangers. If we proceed alone, we face the realm and each other. If we form small groups, backstabbing becomes the next problem. Distrust doesn't disappear with proximity."
Nods around the group. No one disagreed.
"So — a Blood Pact."
Silence.
Then, almost simultaneously:
"A Blood Pact?!"
"Are you out of your mind?!"
The cultivator who had just pledged his enthusiastic support went very quiet and began reconsidering Wan's entire ancestry.
Lu Ji, however, went thoughtful. That was more unusual than anything else that had happened so far.
He wasn't without a brain — his father had made sure of that. Being the son of a city lord and running around challenging everyone in sight would only reflect poorly on the family name if the son in question was purely brawn. Lu Ji had enough functioning intelligence to recognize that. It had taken some years, but it was there.
"A Blood Pact..." he said, slowly. "That's actually not a bad idea."
Everyone turned to look at him. The expressions ranged from disbelief to genuine concern for his wellbeing.
★ — ★ — ★
The Blood Pact was not something anyone used lightly.
Its origin lay in an age when betrayal had become so commonplace that a certain king — himself a great cultivator — had developed a method to bind people to their word through force of law that no sword could cut. Those who broke the binding paid for it with something worse than death. Many had.
Later scholars and cultivators had discovered the method buried in old records, stripped out its most lethal mechanisms, and produced a gentler form — one that spread quietly through black markets as a tool for establishing trust between parties who had no other reason to trust each other.
It was still widely disliked. Mostly because no one wanted to be bound.
But there was more to it than that. The deeper reason was in the name.
Blood essence.
Blood essence was not simply blood. It was the distilled product of a person's life — closely entangled with their karma, with the shape of everything they had done and been. Using it in a pact meant linking that karma to an oath.
Break the oath? The karma backlashes. In the best cases, severe physical damage. In the worst — a crack in the dao path. And a cracked dao path meant a future in cultivation that was effectively over. In the very worst cases, the cultivator would turn fiendish, losing everything they had held onto, eventually destroying themselves and those around them.
Even the party who didn't break the oath wasn't entirely spared. Playing with blood essence meant playing with karma regardless of which side you stood on. Those who kept the oath generally fared far better — but still faced some degree of consequence.
So Blood Pacts were only invoked when there was genuinely no other choice. And no one involved walked away from one entirely clean.
There were said to be ways around it. A Dao Realm cultivator, the legends claimed, could separate themselves from their blood essence entirely — rendering the pact toothless. But Dao Realm cultivators were not the sort of people you approached with experimental proposals. Doing so was another name for courting death.
No one had ever confirmed whether the legends were true.
★ — ★ — ★
Back in the group, the reaction to Lu Ji's endorsement was exactly what one might expect.
"Battle maniac to the end..."
"A good idea, he says. I want to ask your parents — was having you a good idea?"
"He probably doesn't actually understand what a Blood Pact means. Poor thing."
These were whispered. Lu Ji heard every one of them. His face went red.
"What are you all muttering about?! If you've got something to say, say it to my face and we'll settle it properly!"
They looked away. Some with contempt, some with wariness, all of them with a shared interest in not escalating.
The cultivator who had vouched for Wan cleared his throat and tried to recover the situation.
"Sir Wan. It seems no one here is willing. Let's leave these people to it — why don't you let me accompany you instead?"
Wan looked at him. Something unreadable moved beneath the sunglasses.
"My apologies to everyone for the suggestion. I didn't mean to cause offense." Wan cupped their hands in a polite bow and turned to leave. The cultivator fell into step beside them without hesitation.
★ — ★ — ★
After the two had gone, a short silence settled over the remaining group.
"Fellow cultivators — pardon me. I'll take my leave as well." Hong Jun said pleasantly, and departed in his own direction.
One cultivator moved to speak, then held back. He wore the Dan family's insignia on his clothes — almost certainly dispatched by Dan Shi himself. He understood what his master wanted, but he wasn't sure this was the moment to approach Hong Jun and offer goodwill. He let it sit.
A moment later, he too left.
Lu Ji exhaled through his nose, looked around at the remainder, and walked off in whatever direction seemed most promising.
The group dissolved.
Each went their own way into the rainforest.
The Secret Realm swallowed them one by one, quiet and indifferent, the way it had swallowed everything else.