Xu Ying exhaled a breath of relief. Though the solar divine fire upon the skeletal Golden Crow burned fiercely, his cultivation was strong enough to resist the flame's assault without taking injury.
He took to the air, flying along the chain toward that doomsday sun.
After a moment, Xu Ying followed the chain and plunged into the sun.
As far as his eyes could see, countless ashes of paper money tumbled within the flames of this sun, while others lay in uncanny stillness, coating the fire motionlessly and suppressing even the solar divine fire as if to extinguish it.
Xu Ying flew along the chain, penetrating deeper into the interior of the doomsday sun. The deeper he went, the more ashes he saw and the dimmer the red light became.
After flying for a long time, he felt that the deeper he went, the more abnormal the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth filling this place became, already beginning to affect him.
Xu Ying suddenly halted and raised his hand. A patch of skin on the back of his hand drifted lightly away, turning into the ash of paper money.
"The bizarre Dao here is affecting my physical body. If I go any further, my body will turn to paper money faster and faster."
Xu Ying advanced no further. Releasing his divine consciousness, he transformed it into a voice carrying into the depths of the doomsday sun: "Mister Dongyue, on my journey to Kunlun, fortunately I did not fail your commission. I have brought back the Jade Pool immortal water."
From the depths of the doomsday sun, a grand palace materialized, and an avenue of golden light rolled out, extending straight to Xu Ying's feet.
Before the palace stood a figure, greeting him from afar with a bow: "Fellow Daoist Xu is a man of his word, and I have not broken mine either. I have already imparted the Great Sun True Scripture to Jin Buyi. It is currently cultivating in the Sun Palace of the Yuanshou world. Speaking of the difficulty of this imparting—while not as perilous or arduous as your journey to Kunlun, it caused me no small amount of suffering. Please—"
Xu Ying walked forward along the avenue of golden light, feeling rather puzzled. 'Lord Jin isn't stupid, what could be so hard about teaching it the Great Sun True Scripture? Mister Dongyue certainly likes to exaggerate difficulties.'
Yet he did not know how much grief Mister Dongyue had truly suffered.
When Dongyue had transformed into a winter crow and flown over, the savage bird had treated him as an intruder and hacked at him. After being hacked several times, Dongyue had no choice but to go in person and suppress the wild bird to make it compliant.
Yet teaching the senile Jin Buyi to cultivate the Great Sun True Scripture brought him to the verge of a breakdown; Jin Buyi forgot the previous line as soon as he learned the next, proving impossible to teach.
Unable to bear it any longer, Dongyue threw in the towel and had Jin Buyi's deceased mother teach him herself, only then saving his own Dao heart from collapsing.
Xu Ying approached and vaguely saw a peerless giant behind this grand palace, sitting in the very center of the doomsday sun.
When that peerless giant stirred slightly, countless winter crows took flight from its body, circled once, and settled back down.
"That is my original Primordial Spirit," Mister Dongyue said. "Because I suffered grave injuries, I had no choice but to hide here to heal, which is why the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth here has grown abnormal. You have not yet fully recovered, Fellow Daoist, and were affected by the Great Dao here. That was my oversight."
He had no flesh and blood throughout his body, looking as though he were formed entirely of ashes; with every gesture, flakes of paper money ash fluttered around him. His form was exceedingly peculiar, likely just an avatar of ashes.
Although ashes drifted around Mister Dongyue, the palace remained immaculate, free of a single speck of dust.
Xu Ying took out a jade bottle and handed it to Mister Dongyue.
Mister Dongyue opened the jade bottle and peered inside, unable to conceal his excitement. He chuckled and said, "Fellow Daoist, forgive my discourtesy in not accompanying you further. Please make yourself at home."
Holding the jade bottle, he departed in haste.
Xu Ying relaxed. Over these past days, he had faced far too many battles and had never had time to purge his Dao injuries. Now, within Dongyue's territory, surely no one would dare intrude.
Calming his mind, he carefully inspected the wounds throughout his physical body and Realm of Xiyi, analyzing the Dao manifestations hidden within the Dao injuries and discerning the opponents' techniques to dismantle them.
To others, many of these Dao injuries would have been fatal, but possessing the Nuo ancestor cave-heaven of the Mud Pill Palace, he could preserve his life despite such severe wounds through the cave-heaven's boundless vitality.
Once he had thoroughly cleared away the Dao injuries and inspected himself to confirm no lingering hidden harms remained, he stood up and walked about.
Suddenly, a realization struck his heart, and new scriptures flowed into his mind—the scriptures of the Twelve-Story Pavilion stage of the Taiyi Guiding Technique!
Xu Ying felt a stir in his heart. 'Am I about to break through the second Pass-Breaching stage and enter the Twelve-Story Pavilion stage? Otherwise, why would the scriptures of the Taiyi Guiding Technique emerge?'
The Taiyi Guiding Technique differed from other arts; it steadily refined and completed itself as his cultivation realm advanced.
Originally, the Taiyi Guiding Technique was merely an art for the Qi Harvesting stage, and an incomplete one at that. Yet as his cultivation rose, more and more techniques materialized out of nowhere in his mind.
Now, the Taiyi Guiding Technique was countless times more intricate than before.
What was stranger still was that when Xu Ying comprehended Nuo methods and pieced them together with the Taiyi Guiding Technique, he found the fusion completely seamless, devoid of any obstacle.
'I have already recovered four thousand years of memories, yet I still haven't discovered the origin of the Taiyi Guiding Technique. Could it have been left behind by my first life?'
He had not awakened the memories of his first life, only vaguely recalling certain divine abilities such as the Chaotic Star Sea, Buzhou Mountain, and the Dao Burial Abyss, leaving him completely clueless as to the origin of the Taiyi Guiding Technique.
Xu Ying did not dwell on it. The appearance of the Twelve-Story Pavilion stage technique in the Taiyi Guiding Technique indicated that his breakthrough was imminent; his Golden Core was nearing perfection, and once he stepped into the Twelve-Story Pavilion stage, he would not be far from achieving a Primordial Spirit!
Having finally found a rare moment of peace, he simply settled down to cultivate with an easy mind within Mister Dongyue's palace.
***
On the other side, Mister Dongyue's ash body carried the jade bottle through layer upon layer of palace gates, arriving at the deepest part of the estate.
He unsealed layer upon layer of restrictions, and a coffin met his eyes.
A man lay within the coffin, steeped in divine light like water, preserving his golden body from decay.
In his chest was impaled a horsetail whisk, radiating the luminescence of the Immortal Dao accompanied by resonant Dao chants. Thousands of bristles had pierced through his torso, embedding deep inside his body!
Ash Dongyue drew near, uncorked the jade bottle, and poured down the Jade Pool immortal water within.
The water of the Jade Pool penetrated the divine light, blooming and swirling as it gradually seeped into the body of the man in the coffin.
The divine light in the coffin nearly boiled over. Suddenly, the grand chanting of billions of living beings echoed forth. Along with that sound, with a loud hum, an ash halo appeared behind the head of the man in the coffin, whistling and spinning as it fought against the Immortal Dao of the horsetail whisk!
At the same time, throughout the entire Netherworld, all the paper money and obsessions that carried the grief of living beings suddenly seemed to find an anchor; the paper money burned over the past tens of thousands of years transformed into incense offerings!
The incense gathered into divine power, and this divine power shook the entire Netherworld.
Not only the Netherworld of the Yuanshou world, but the Netherworlds of all the other myriad realms of the heavens were shaken as well!
A divine power destined to unify the Netherworld was taking shape!
In the Nether Court, the Son of Heaven of the Nether Court was combing the hair of his half-corpse when his eyes suddenly snapped open. Looking up at the doomsday sun in the sky, a look of shock appeared on his face.
Then delight took over. Tossing his half-corpse aside, his voice trembled with excitement. "It's here! It's finally here..."
He laughed uproariously, tears of excitement welling in his eyes: "The Three Realms tide is coming, and our chance has finally arrived!"
Every world among the myriad realms had its own Netherworld. These Netherworlds were fragmented and ruled by rival powers, each a domain of its own, concealing untold numbers of old monsters. At this moment, they too were startled by this divine power.
They raised their heads and looked up, only to see the incense divine power formed from countless paper money ashes surging and dancing around the doomsday sun, forming an enormous dark halo.
"That old Dongyue really is crafty!"
From the vast darkness veiling the depths of the Netherworld, a voice called out: "The contingency he laid twenty thousand years ago has paid off at this very moment. Twenty thousand years ago, he had the Golden Crow place an egg in a bird's nest in the tree before the Xu family lad's door. Today, that traded for a ladle of Jade Pool immortal water..."
"His Dao is finally going to reach completion," an aged voice sighed with emotion from deep within the Cangwu Abyss. "Securing the Jade Pool immortal water through the Xu family lad was one step faster than me. Had I known, I wouldn't have been so reserved and would have asked the Xu family lad for a ladle of immortal water myself."
Another voice came from the Cangwu Abyss: "Do you have a bird's egg too, Father God?"
The aged voice replied, "No. But I have a beautiful daughter."
The woman's voice turned embarrassed and exasperated: "Father God!"
On the Wangxiang Platform, immortal light steamed from the bronze palace. Around the hall, Nuo masters and Qi Refiners lacking eyes, ears, mouths, and noses wandered aimlessly like headless flies, only to all freeze in their tracks at once.
Within the bronze immortal palace, veiled in hazy immortal light, a tall woman faintly gazed up toward the Netherworld's sky.
"Has an original god of the Heavenly Dao manifested once more?" she murmured.
At the same time, within various forbidden zones across the Wangxiang Platform, consciousnesses far older than hers were slowly stirring. Obscure and profound, some were so ancient that when they shifted, the geography of the Wangxiang Platform transformed with them—mountains and rivers relocated, and the very stars shifted!
These ancient consciousnesses had merged into one with heaven and earth; their will was so overpowering, and they had lain still for so long, that this movement triggered terrifying transformations across the landscape!
"Is the era of the original Heavenly Dao gods reviving once again?" A relatively young consciousness was the first to awaken and inquire.
No one answered him.
Those ancient consciousnesses were still in the process of awakening.
The sky of the Netherworld suddenly cracked open, revealing another abyss where countless masses of flesh and blood climbed along the cliffs, attempting to escape this chasm.
The woman in palace dress raised the Twelve-Storyed Mansions, illuminating the abyss; seen from afar, she looked like a firefly flying into a sky-swallowing maw.
Just then, she halted and turned back to look toward the doomsday sun in the sky, wearing a puzzled expression. "Why is this divine power so formidable? A power that far exceeds that of a heavenly god... what could it be?"
Baffled, she turned back and flew into the abyss, whispering, "I'll go ask Master."
Meanwhile, around the doomsday sun, the master of the Mud Pill Palace, the man in the bamboo hat, and the others all came to a halt. Looking toward the doomsday sun, their faces were filled with suspicion and dread.
The Netherworld's vast, profound divine power had formed a halo around the doomsday sun, blocking their advance.
They had originally intended to force their way into the sun to track down Xu Ying's whereabouts, willing to try even if it meant confronting the mysterious Mister Dongyue face to face!
After all, the Nuo ancestor cave-heavens were of immense significance; obtaining them allowed one to sever others' cave-heavens and completely refine immortal herbs, possessing a fatal allure for them.
Yet now, this divine power had grown so terrifyingly potent that even they felt deep dread!
They fell silent, each turning to leave without a word.
For them, forcing their way in was no longer the optimal path.
Xu Ying could not live inside the doomsday sun forever; their best option was to wait for him to emerge on his own.
***
Dongyue Palace. Within the jade coffin, the horsetail whisk pierced into the chest of the golden-bodied man trembled slightly. Its three thousand bristles were stained with blood, squirming like tiny tentacles as they burrowed deeper into his body.
The golden-bodied man suddenly opened his eyes, a heavy voice resonating from his throat: "Three thousand Immortal Daos, you could not thoroughly slay me sixty thousand years ago, and today you can do so even less!"
Countless powers of incense flooded in, turning into the thoughts of billions of living beings—roaring, shaking, and eroding the Immortal Dao in return. The whisk's Dao chants fell into discord, and its Dao runes grew sluggish!
The bristles of the whisk were forced outward inch by inch!
The golden-bodied man raised his palm, grabbed the handle of the whisk, and pulled hard.
Suddenly, the whisk broke free of his grasp, yanked its bristles out, and pierced through the dome of Dongyue Palace with a whoosh, flying outside.
The whisk spun, its three thousand bristles whirling with a howl. In the next moment, the bristles grew longer and longer, hanging down like soft immortal swords engraved with arcane, incomprehensible Immortal Dao runes!
The Immortal Dao runes branded upon the three thousand bristles were entirely distinct from one another, without a single duplicate!
Three thousand immortal swords enveloped the entire Dongyue Palace. The radiance of the Immortal Dao runes blazed brilliantly, and immortal chants shook the air—arcane and bewildering, possessing the power to disrupt the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth—poised to grind the palace into fine powder.
The golden-bodied man floated up from the coffin. The gigantic Primordial Spirit filling the entire sun took a sudden stride forward and merged into his body!
The doomsday sun flew backward, appearing behind his head, while the divine halo formed of paper money ash spun around its perimeter.
The immortal swords formed of three thousand bristles were cast out of the doomsday sun. The whisk leaped and bounded with its three thousand bristles, as though an unmatched master held it, darting and weaving around the golden-bodied man to battle him!
The golden-bodied man spread his five fingers, meeting the three thousand bristles head-on.
"You are merely an immortal—do you truly think you can contend with the divine power of the myriad beings across the heavens and realms?"
Exerting sudden force, the immortal swords formed of bristles snapped one after another. Left with nothing but a bare handle, the whisk fled whistling into the distance, escaping far away.
The immortal swords drifted back into bristles, fluttering down slowly.
At this moment, Xu Ying was right at the cusp of breaking through the second Pass-Breaching stage, ascending his Golden Core and entering the Twelve-Storyed Mansions.
Inside his body, his soul ascended and sat upon the first tier of the Twelve-Storyed Mansions. The Golden Core flew over and branded itself upon his forehead; boundless and formless, it gradually melded with his soul.
Channeling the Taiyi Guiding Technique, he was pondering what a Primordial Spirit truly was and how a Golden Core transformed into a Primordial Spirit when he suddenly sensed the supreme deity formed from the divine power filling heaven and earth.
That divine power was born of the people's wishes, pure and endless—a natural Heavenly Dao, radiating ten thousand beams of light, extraordinarily sacred!
As Xu Ying resonated with that deity harboring the pure Heavenly Dao, his own qi unknowingly harmonized with it. The Golden Core and soul melted together, and in a sudden flash, the soul was drawn into the Golden Core!
Golden Core and soul became one unified entity, distinct no longer. And within the Golden Core, a Primordial Spirit approximating the original Heavenly Dao was now taking shape!
Chapter 273