Chapter 929: The Name of the Fallen Immortal

"Fallen Immortal Realm…"

Jiang Ding's heart trembled.

Just reading this name, a heavy and sorrowful feeling welled up within him; his eyes grew red and swollen, his eye sockets brimming with tears, completely beyond his control.

He was forcibly infected by these two characters—characters separated by who knows how many tens of thousands of years—unable to resist.

It was as if every living being had to grieve.

Had to be solemn, had to be reverent.

This was not subject to the will of any individual cultivator.

Rather, some being far, far beyond Void Refinement, far beyond any being above Void Refinement, had once left its will lingering between heaven and earth; heaven and earth changed for It, existed because of It.

The traces left by this supreme will, after who knows how many tens of thousands of years, still profoundly influenced the workings of heaven and earth.

"What kind of existence is this…"

Jiang Ding dared not resist this will.

He immersed himself in it, letting himself become sorrowful, wholly focused, not daring to be distracted in the slightest, letting any scattered thoughts go, his sea of consciousness utterly clear and empty.

Several days later, this forced, sudden grief only slowly faded.

"What kind of existence is the Upper Realm?"

Jiang Ding took a deep breath, not daring to speak that name directly again.

He had a premonition that if he were to come into contact with it again on his own initiative, he would once more fall into this thick sorrow, like the rules of heaven and earth.

And if he were exposed to it too much, he would sink into sorrow forever, until death.

This was not because that supreme will bore any malice toward mere ants; it was simply that Its intense emotions radiated outward, producing a terrifying effect that had not weakened even after countless ages.

"This heaven and earth is no ordinary Minor Thousand World—it's far from simple, and may even… be more terrifying than the Immortal Gate Domain."

Jiang Ding's heart trembled, and he murmured: "I must still be careful, ever so careful; facing such a supreme being, only time and space can shield me."

"Any other concealment arts, clever schemes, or manipulations of the winds and tides are foolish and laughable."

"Only time and space will not deceive me."

Composing himself, Jiang Ding continued to read through the new knowledge obtained from Wangting Wangting Fudi, especially that concerning this Minor Thousand World.

"…The world barrier shattered, the sect shattered, the Ancestral Master's lineage cut off… those two supreme beings, they broke the Minor Thousand World's barrier—they must have invited ill fate, they must not have died well…"

At this moment, a broken stone slab from a Soul Transformation cultivator of the Tianshenlei Sect caught Jiang Ding's attention.

This Soul Transformation cultivator was named Chen Lei, and his words were steeped in intense resentment, for he had died—caught in the aftershock of the two supreme beings' clash—and perished along with countless cultivators of his sect.

Before dying, he used his own bone and blood on a

stone slab to write his curse.

Did those two supreme beings who had clashed know of this?

They probably did.

But just as human children destroy an ant hill with boiling water without a second thought, and would not deliberately seek out the strongest ant to crush it, silencing its faint cry—

this stone slab was thus preserved, passed through many twists, and finally collected by Master Canghai Canghai Tianjun.

"Invited ill fate?"

"What ill fate?"

Jiang Ding was puzzled, perplexed, and searched through the materials.

Regarding this ill fate, Master Canghai Canghai Tianjun had also spent a great deal of time, scouring ancient texts, excavating various ancient inheritances, and finally vaguely guessed it was related to the rank of the Minor Thousand World.

The rank of a Minor Thousand World was extremely, extremely high; even beings above Void Refinement, though powerful, were still somewhat inferior compared to a Minor Thousand World that had existed since time immemorial.

Normally, a Minor Thousand World did indeed appear utterly harmless.

A Jin Dan cultivator could cut off a river, a Nascent Soul cultivator could move mountains, and a Soul Transformation cultivator could deal heavy blows to the surface ecology—anyone could dig at the earth spirit's head.

But this did not mean the Minor Thousand World was fragile.

To a Minor Thousand World, what Jin Dan, Nascent Soul, and Soul Transformation cultivators called moving mountains and filling seas was merely a shift of the hair on its body, not even a minor wound.

From this perspective, a Soul Transformation cultivator's impact on a Minor Thousand World was no different from that of the weakest mortal.

Beings above Void Refinement, however, could truly inflict harm upon a Minor Thousand World.

It might not be a terribly serious wound—just a shattered world barrier, recovered in a few tens of thousands of years, which for an ancient Minor Thousand World was but the blink of an eye, a minor injury.

But the Minor Thousand World had indeed been wounded.

This drew the malice of the Minor Thousand World's Pan-Heavenly Dao consciousness.

This malice, even for beings above Void Refinement, was extremely terrifying; one careless moment could bring the risk of falling.

This was Master Canghai Canghai Tianjun's conjecture.

There were not many materials, only scattered records; he boldly hypothesized this conclusion, and believed it must be very close to the truth.

Because, if supreme experts could casually destroy Minor Thousand Worlds, then after such a nearly endless stretch of time, there should not be many Minor Thousand Worlds left today.

Added to that, the Immortal Art fragments had yet to be retrieved by anyone, which seemed to further corroborate this view.

"It does seem to make some sense…"

Jiang Ding likewise acknowledged Master Canghai Canghai Tianjun's judgment.

But equally, one had to see that this was only a somewhat plausible speculation; Master Canghai Canghai Tianjun had no path left, and as long as there was a sliver of hope, he would charge forward, ignoring the enormous risks.

This was not

something to be emulated.

These were all the gains Jiang Ding had reaped after reading through all the books in Wangting Wangting Fudi.

"Ancient history, especially the history before the era of the Six Paths Ancestral Masters, is extremely valuable and should be collected with all effort."

Jiang Ding said silently.

He issued an order to gather such things—from the Jiu Tian Mi Jing of the Xiang Qiyu Sect of Yue Kingdom, from the ruins left behind across the Minor Thousand Worlds.

Today, as the dominant figure of Master Tushan Master Tushan Zhongting of the Northern Plains, he no longer needed to attend to many matters personally.

Having done all this, Jiang Ding left.

He concealed his form, did not return to the Liu Dao Sect, and at some unknown time and place, vanished without a trace.

……

Within the Black Demon Palace.

"From now on, it's just me alone again…"

Upon the Six Paths Throne, a youth in blue opened his eyes and gave a self-mocking smile.

He looked toward the azure abyss pool not far away.

Within it, yuanci spiritual light flickered, the yuanci qi heavy as a mountain; amid the wave-like yuanci radiance, a dragon-like divine light could faintly be seen, revealing a blurred form, its aura on the verge of the fifth rank.

This divine light writhed and swam like a true living thing, ceaselessly slamming against the Six Realms Departing Yang Array that bound it, causing the nearby mountain peaks to quake and tremble.

This is the heaven-and-earth divine object of the Yin-Yang Yuanci Jueling Mountain — the Yin-Yang Magnetic Pole Divine Light!

Since the array was laid down, it had been nurtured for over a decade; it had now taken initial form, already showing some signs of forbidding the five elements of the myriad heavens. It was an excellent material for sword-forging, capable of causing a flying sword to fully "light-ify."

"It will probably need another fifty-eight years before it can emerge; if one pursues perfection, a hundred and fifty-eight years would also do."

"When the time comes, come take it yourself — I can't do it."

The blue-clad youth upon the Six Paths Throne murmured to himself, closed his eyes to cultivate, and spoke no more.

(End of this chapter)