Eight Hexagrams’ Challenge
Formation Gate didn’t forbid entry. The scenery started revolving once Mu Yu stepped into the formation, displaying different scenery. Besides the warm-white light on his skin, there were eight quaint, heavy timber doors. The eight doors opened in unison, revealing the illuminated passages. The eight paths were labelled, Open, Healing, Life, Death, Wonder, Pain, Limit and View.
“Open the doors according to this order: Ominous Door, Neutral Door, Lucky Door. Once you open them, you can tackle a hexagram. Which door you choose to open will dictate the test you will face, so choose wisely.”
The voice belonged to an elder, presumably. The eight doors slammed shut in synchrony and then swiftly switched places similarly to a fast shuffle. The doors dropped to the ground and revealed a huge Eight Trigrams they created via the aforementioned position switches. Mu Yu was standing on the yin yang symbol.
Solving the hexagrams was child’s play if one was educated on Eight Trigams. Ominous Door included Death, Pain and Wonder. Lucky Door included Open, Healing and Life. Neutral included Limit and View. Once one opened one of the three doors, the next task was to determine the location of the eight gates.
Start Gate was located northwest. Healing Gate was located north. Life Gate was located northeast. Pain Gate was located east. Limit Gate was located southeast. View Gate was located southwest. Wonder Gate was located west.
Each location’s carving was distinct, so it was easy to decipher where each gate was according to the carvings.
“Isn’t it too easy? When Ku Mu forced us to learn Eight Trigrams, he had eight aggressive fiend beasts guard the gates…” Xiaoshuai commented.
“Oi, Rat, must you mention Ku Mu?” the dragon vine scolded.
Xiaoshuai covered his mouth and stole a glance in Mu Yu’s direction. Mu Yu wiped away the melancholy that hit and refocused on the task.
“I was just saying, sheesh. I didn’t mean to mention him. Plus, I’m not wrong. By the way, Earthworm, I remember a water snake almost ate you. Dragon Vine? Pfft.”
“Ku Mu had my qi sealed at the time!”
“Earthworm, must you mention Ku Mu?!”
“You started it…” The dragon vine’s voice tapered off.
The memory of stepping into Death Gate on his first try came to Mu Yu’s mind. The “water snake” Xiaoshuai mentioned was a wyrm. It was better considered a lesser dragon species. At the time, the wyrm was a level five fiend beast, to be fair on the dragon vine. Ku Mu rescued Mu Yu from the wyrm’s jaws and hung him upside down for an entire day as punishment for slacking.
“I’m planning to choose Life Gate, Limit Gate and Death Gate. My ability seems attached to life and death,” Mu Yu uttered in a soft voice.
Mu Yu pushed open the three doors he said he would and returned to the yin yang symbol. The five doors he didn’t push turned into formation patterns and receded into the Eight Trigrams. The three doors pushed fused into one and opened up a dark passageway.
Mu Yu inhaled and stepped into the humid passageway. The walls were made from stone and littered with moss growing in the gaps. A candle would float through the air at fixed distances travelled, providing a pitiful amount of white lightning. He soon reached the end of the short passageway and went through the door to enter the second hexagram.
Going from a dark and humid passageway to a grass plain that embodied the glory of nature required time for Mu Yu’s mind and eyes to adapt. The most bizarre part was the sky was an identical copy of the plains he was standing on. It wasn’t just the static scenery that was identical; even the dynamic components were in sync and identical, except mirrored. There was a mountain close by that was touching its mirrored version. The only missing piece in the overhead version was Mu Yu’s absence.
“Interesting,” Xiaoshuai remarked, checking the scenery out. “Is that a mirror overhead?”
“If it was a mirror, you’d be visible, silly rat.”
“Hey, shut up! I’m too handsome for the mirror, that’s why!”
Mu Yu hopped onto his sword and took to the sky. Assuming the scene above was a mirror, he reached his hand out, but he couldn’t touch the border after ascending roughly ten metres. Once he ascended over a hundred metres, he was spun one hundred and eighty degrees vigorously, landing on the plains previously overhead.
“We’re on the ceiling’s lawn now?”Xiaoshuai questioned.
“There’s one way to test that. Xiaoshuai, fly up,” instructed Mu Yu.
Xiaoshuai did as he was told. Sadly for him, he flew too fast to land properly when he was spun on his head.
“That hurt, damn it!” Xiaoshuai looked around, then looked up to see Mu Yu standing upside down overhead.
“This is an upside down world,” said Mu Yu. “There’s a formation that’s set a certain place in the sky as a border. I would say that there’s no ground and sky in this world because it’s perspective-based.”
“How do we pass the second hexagram? Come on, where are the hints for new players?!” Xiaoshuai whined, flying back to Mu Yu slower than before.
Mu Yu lied back on the lawn. He fiddled with the grass on the ground and ruminated about everything he’d witnessed thus far. “I know what the task is now.”
“And that is?”
“This is Upside Down Formation, also known as Mirror Formation. Besides us, who are foreign entities, you can see that everything else matches. To defuse the formation, we need to play spot the difference.”
The touching mountain peaks were the passage connecting the two grassy plains, so the border was obvious unlike the first mirror-type formation he encountered at Ku Mu Valley.
“Sounds fun. I’m the best at fun games,” Xiaoshuai cheered. After a long search, he cursed, “I’m done. My neck is aching just looking around. Hey, Mu Yu, don’t just lie there and slack off!”
“There’s no point searching. The two are identical. The only difference is what’s under our feet.”
“Under our feet?” Xiaoshuai had been flying the entire time.
“Blades of grass we’ve stepped on will alter the two lawns. In other words, the difference is always going to be under our feet.” Mu Yu sat up and tried fruitlessly to pluck a blade of grass. He pushed the grass back down instead and nodded. “Xiaoshuai, haven’t you noticed the issue with the spiritual qi on the ground?”
Xiaoshuai descended to the lawn and touched it. “The spiritual qi at spots we step on moves.”
Xiaoshuai took a few more steps. The grass rippled just as water did because of the spiritual qi’s movement.
“So, if we don’t step on the lawn above, there wouldn’t have been any change in the spiritual qi constitution. There’s the difference. I wonder how many people overlooked this fact.”
“What’s next, then?” Xiaoshuai had a large knowledge base, but formations were the one subject he wasn’t well-versed in.
“We need to find a way to set both plains up so that they’re identical.” Mu Yu gestured for Xiaoshuai to fly up with him. He thrust Shadow Splitter Sword into the ground and ascended to land on the other plain. “The first step is to create a difference. The second step is to compensate for the difference we artificially made.”
Mu Yu drew out another Shadow Splitter Sword and thrust it into the mirrored location of the first Shadow Splitter Sword. The two plains began to quake until the one overhead cracked and rained down crumbled sections. Eventually, the entire section descended.
“Nobody ever said anything about raining skies!” Xiaoshuai hid back inside Mu Yu’s shirt.
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