Seeing this, Ethan calmly left the Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets and made his way to a nearby inn where he decided to stay for the time being.
In the privacy of his room, he summoned Onyx Orchid into his mind. "Are you there?" Ethan asked.
"What are you doing?" Onyx Orchid’s voice echoed clearly in his mind.
"Manifest," Ethan replied casually.
"Fighting?" she guessed.
"No, just hiding my identity," he answered with a faint smile in his voice.
Onyx Orchid sighed in mild annoyance. "If you really don’t need to call me for something , why not just silently recite the mask in your mind to manifest it yourself?"
Ethan nodded internally and uttered the incantation mentally.
Almost immediately, a black liquid surged from the base of his ears, spreading across his face and forming into a mesmerizing black mask. He then changed into a black robe, carefully shrouding his presence and concealing his true self.
With his disguise complete, Ethan returned to the Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets, stepping through the light curtain once more.
Just moments before, Ethan’s eyes had caught his own name on the list of geniuses.
The realization dawned on him—the Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets was not as simple as it seemed. Despite his deliberate concealment, someone or something had discovered his identity and ranked him eleventh among the geniuses.
There was undoubtedly something special about this place.
Still, Ethan had no desire to fight for these superficial titles or dwell on rankings.
"Any tree too beautiful in the forest ends up destroyed by the wind," he thought.
"Isn’t it better to quietly grow as the sixth child?"
Gazing again at the light curtains above him, he noted two others that were also ranked. One was the Skyreach Territory Mahayana List, and the other was the Skyreach Territory young genius List.
The Mahayana List, he knew, was reserved for the most powerful cultivators in the Mahayana Realm. Much like the Heaven’s Prodigy List, it was capped at thirty-six names.
His attention caught on a familiar name—the empress, Lyralei. She ranked sixth, which was respectable given that it was a list encompassing the entire Skyreach Territory.
"The people ahead of her must be Mahayana experts who have reached the seventh turn or beyond," Ethan pondered.
He found it fascinating that such detailed records existed. Someone had to devote vast manpower and material resources to compile these rankings, a feat nearly unimaginable.
Moving toward the reception desk inside the Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets, Ethan noticed the girl behind it. She wore a blue dress, her figure elegant and her features delicate. While perhaps not as striking as Lyralei, she could nonetheless be called beautiful.
"May I have your name, sir?" she asked, her eyes sparkling with an inquisitive light as she extended her mental energy, probing for his depth.
To her surprise, Ethan’s true strength was masked completely. Neither the intensity of his cultivation nor the truth behind the mask was visible to her.
The girl widened her eyes in astonishment.
She was an inscription master—not a high realm, residing in the Void Amalgamation realm—but possessing mutated mental energy. Her mental perception exceeded even some cultivators in the Body Integration realm, making her sensory prowess extraordinary.
Logically, she should be able to spy on realms as high as Tribulation Transcendence, yet Ethan’s ghost mask blocked her at every turn.
"This..." she murmured in disbelief, unable to comprehend the deflection.
Taking the opportunity, Ethan casually invented a name. "I am Aether."
"May I ask, where is Mr. Aether from?" the girl inquired.
"An unknown place. I am a wandering cultivator, the whole word is my home," Ethan answered fluidly.
The girl, named Ava, tilted her head with a subtle smile. "I’m curious, Young Master Aether, to know your intentions upon coming to our Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets."
Leaning slightly forward, Ethan sought clarity. "I want to know how these rankings are created." He gestured toward the hanging light curtains in the atrium.
Ava’s pride was evident as she responded, "It seems Mr. Aether hails from a remote place. Even our Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets knows little of it."
Her youthful tone carried a hint of playful arrogance.
Ethan allowed a faint sneer to touch his lips behind the mask. No one could see it, but the moment pleased him nonetheless.
Mental energy surged quietly as Ethan extended his Heaven-piercing Mind Eye, sweeping across the Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets in detail.
Within the small attic above, he identified a formation of the middle level of the heaven rank—far stronger than the formation at Sun Moon Lake.
Moreover, seven potent auras lingered there, each no weaker than a third-turn Mahayana realm cultivator, and one emanated a terrifying presences.
Ethan’s breath hitched slightly—the presence dwarfed his current strength. While he could contend with those below fifth-turn Mahayana, this singular aura felt like the weight of seventh or even eighth-turn power pressing down on him. For origınal chapters go to 𝓷𝓸𝓿𝓮𝓵※𝓯𝓲𝓻𝓮※𝓷𝓮𝓽
Sensing danger, he quickly withdrew his mental energy, cloaking himself once more from the watchful cultivator hidden in the attic.
The realization settled in coldly: the Pavilion of Heavenly Secrets’ top-tier combat power surpassed even that of the Azure Origin Dao Sect.
"This is no small force," Ethan thought. "Why have I never heard of them before?"
Shaking his head, he diverted his focus back to Ava.
"I come from a remote place. I hail from the mountains," he said, regaining composure.
"I see," Ava responded with a nod.
"Everyone knows the information about Sun Moon Lake," she said generously, speaking in a tone free of reservation.
"I’ll tell you for free."
"Sun Moon Lake is jointly owned by the three major families of Sun Moon City," she explained.
Rich with spiritual power, it is an exceptional place for cultivators to practice. Its unique terrain absorbs the breath of the sun and the power of the moon—two forces that harmonize and enable cultivators to break through bottlenecks.
It is indeed a rare treasure among practice lands.
Ava continued, "However, to maintain the magical effects of Sun Moon Lake, the three major families have stipulated it opens only every three years. Each time, a total of ten slots are made available."
Of these ten slots, seven belong to the families, while three remain free, to be claimed by those with sufficient ability.
Ethan’s brows furrowed slightly with curiosity. "Three families, and seven places—how are the slots allocated?" he asked.
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