In the Heavenly Immortal Realm, Mingfu Immortal City was also a massive city, even vaster than Longhua Immortal City. While Longhua was situated on the frontier, Mingfu was a gathering place of supreme masters. Supreme cave abysses floated high above the great city, pouring immortal spirit and primordial qi downward like waterfalls, coalescing into rivers through the streets.
The city was assembled from countless immortal mountains of varying sizes, bristling with bizarre peaks, grotesque crags, and rugged precipices. Various immortal palaces and pavilions were nestled amid the mountain ridges and river valleys.
"Xu Ying, barbarian of the Earth Immortal Realm!"
"Mingman, barbarian!"
"We, master and disciple, admire the supreme arts of the other shore in the Heavenly Immortal Realm, and thus have come to your noble lands! We invite our fellow Daoists of the Heavenly Immortal Realm to educate and enlighten us with your supreme arts of the other shore!"
An uproar immediately erupted across Mingfu Immortal City, and many dragon immortals flew forth to issue challenges. Xu Ying had Mingman step forward to meet them.
"Come at me together!" Princess Mingman bellowed with overwhelming swagger.
Soon, they were tangled in a melee—a scene of utter harmony.
"Did your kid pull out your dragon tendons to make a slingshot? Your punches are soft as cotton! Aren't you ashamed to call yourself a dragon?"
"Old dragon, have you even been weaned yet? How dare you come out and challenge this young lady?"
"If you can take a single punch from me, I'll take your surname!"
In the end, swathes of dragon immortals collapsed, leaving only Mingman standing in her original spot. Throughout the battle, cave abysses of all sizes had spun continuously above the dragon princess's head, shining with dazzling brilliance.
Suddenly, an expert of the seventh-fold Dao Realm charged in, intent on taking Mingman's life. All at once, Xu Ying rose to his feet. His ten great cave abysses floated into the air, suppressing heaven and earth. In an instant, the spectating dragon immortals all around were forced flat against the ground by the sheer pressure!
Even that seventh-fold Dao Realm expert failed to reach Mingman's side before being forced out of the air and crashing to the earth. Just as he tried to strike, the ground beneath his feet tilted wildly, and unable to keep his footing, he slid off to the side.
The entirety of Mingfu Immortal City was tilting, pressed downward by Xu Ying's ten great cave abysses. Within the immortal city, atop one immortal mountain after another, many dragon immortals who had been watching the spectacle grew terrified and took flight in droves.
Before everyone's stunned eyes, Mingfu Immortal City slammed into the earth with a resounding crash, sliding several hundred li before barely grinding to a halt.
Xu Ying burst into earth-shattering laughter. "The Heavenly Immortal Realm boasts of being a superior realm possessing the Dao methods of the other shore, yet seeing it today, it is merely so-so! It falls far short of convincing us two barbarians!"
No sooner had his words fallen than powerful auras surged from the cave abysses hanging in the sky. Dragon elders cultivating within those cave abysses had been disturbed by the commotion and were flying out in succession.
Supreme cave abysses spun in place as archaic-looking experts with dragon heads and human bodies manifested in the sky, cave abysses suspended behind their heads, exuding suffocating pressure.
Princess Mingman immediately took to the air, flying straight into Xu Ying's Martial Dao Cave Abyss. A battle of this caliber was no longer something she could intervene in.
"Barbarian—"
An elder had just uttered the word when Xu Ying shot into the sky, barreling toward him. Enraged, the dragon elder instantly mobilized his mystic arts.
Princess Mingman sat at the edge of the Martial Dao Cave Abyss and called out, "'Three Superb Chapters of Cloud Gate', an immortality-grade art! 'Blazing like smoke in the high heavens, radiant as sunbeams glistening bright. The martial citadel bears a divine edge, serenely reflecting, swallowing the azure slopes. The heavenly gate overlooks the cinnabar well, the Cloud Gate stands lofty and immense...'"
Listening to the scripture's teachings while trading blows with the elder, Xu Ying forced him to retreat spitting blood in barely three exchanges.
Before Xu Ying could even catch his breath, a vicious wind struck from behind. Another dragon elder underwent burial transformation, his divine power surging like a tidal wave as he ambushed Xu Ying from the rear.
Princess Mingman spoke at lightning speed: "This is the 'Sutra of Enduring a Thousand Tribulations to Attest Lunhui', also an immortality-grade art! 'No dharma and no charity, no fruits of good and evil, no auspicious karmic recompense. Enduring tribulations, preserve a single thought and hold fast...'"
Xu Ying wheeled around and was instantly swallowed into a halo of reincarnation. Mingman recited without pause, explaining the profound intricacies of the technique.
Slashing his way through the reincarnation cycle, Xu Ying fought the grand master of the Thousand Tribulations art with all his might. Within moments, both of the dragon elder's arms were snapped clean off, and spitting fresh blood, he plummeted from the sky.
"Barbarian, do not think you can run amok!"
Yet another dragon elder charged into the fray. Recognizing the elder's maneuvers and divine abilities, Princess Mingman grasped the path of his cultivation and shouted, "This is 'Attesting the Dao in the Celestial Realm'! 'The primordial sky holds the prime and guards the one...'"
Xu Ying fought his way through, wounding over a dozen dragon elders in succession and giving the dragon elders of Mingfu a thorough thrashing. He let out a long laugh. "The dragon race's supreme arts are nothing more than this! We barbarians have experienced enough. Farewell!"
The master and disciple set off toward Ziqing Dragon City. They had not yet traveled halfway when the dozen or so elders from Mingfu Immortal City caught up in hot pursuit. Determined to preserve their reputations, the elders encircled Xu Ying in a frantic melee. Xu Ying fought as he retreated, their battle rending heaven and earth all along the way.
As they drew near Ziqing Dragon City, the elders of Mingfu Immortal City had no choice but to withdraw out of pride. Everyone in Ziqing Dragon City, high and low, already knew that a pair of human master and disciple from the lower realm—calling themselves barbarians, one man and one woman—had challenged both Longhua and Mingfu, defeating many dragon experts.
Consequently, the moment the Mingfu elders pulled back, Xu Ying faced an ambush by several masked elders from Ziqing Dragon City.
However, the experts of Ziqing Dragon City had clearly underestimated Xu Ying's cultivation. After a bloody clash, the masked elders found themselves unable to do anything to him and were forced to retreat.
Following this campaign, Xu Ying's renown finally shook the Heavenly Immortal Realm.
Dragon cities and immortal cities such as Changxing, Jinque, Chaotian, Shanglin, Lingguang, and Taichong all learned that a barbarian named Xu Ying from the Earth Immortal Realm had arrived to test the dragon race's supreme arts, besting numerous masters without a single defeat. Moreover, this barbarian had a female barbarian disciple who was equally fierce and skilled in combat. Many dragon experts had laid ambushes and attempted assassinations, yet none had managed to bring him down. His cultivation and strength were genuinely shocking.
Five or six days later, Xu Ying entered Jinque City. Instead of challenging the city's experts right away, he took up residence on an immortal mountain within the city.
The mountain originally housed a Daoist temple established by dragon masters. Seeing his arrival, they dared not neglect him; they tidied up the temple for the master and disciple, then fled for their lives.
After days of grueling battles, Xu Ying had sustained wounds of his own. Stealing a few days of leisure amid the chaos, he rested here and consulted Mingman on the scriptures of various immortality arts.
Because Mingman could not directly cultivate the Dao methods of the other shore, she had studied them all. No matter what supreme arts those elders unleashed, she could recite the corresponding scriptures off the top of her head. She was practically a living treasury of immortality-grade techniques.
Xu Ying did not treat her unfairly, either. While Mingman could not directly learn the arts of the other shore, she could cultivate them once they were translated into dragon glyphs.
Xu Ying took on the task of deciphering the various techniques for her, allowing her to select the finest among them to cultivate. In his spare time, Xu Ying journeyed into the Far Ancestor's sea of consciousness, taking over the Far Ancestor's physical body to expound the Heavenly Dao of the Heavenly Immortal Realm to the Ancestral God.
The Ancestral God was the universe's Primordial Spirit. When the Heavenly Dao of the Heavenly Immortal Realm was shattered, his strength had plummeted accordingly. With the Heavenly Dao of both the Mortal Realm and the Heavenly Immortal Realm obliterated by Emerald Rocks, his cultivation in those realms had vanished as well.
He was the Primordial Spirit born in response to the fortunes of the Three Realms' universe; the Heavenly Dao of the Three Realms was equivalent to his own Dao attainment. When Xu Ying began teaching him the Heavenly Dao of the Heavenly Immortal Realm, the Ancestral God struggled immensely over the first few days. Soon, however, he grasped the principles without needing instruction, even pointing out many of Xu Ying's errors and omissions.
"Xu Ying, you were right," the Ancestral God said, an extraordinary resonance quietly stirring within his body. "The Heavenly Dao of the Heavenly Immortal Realm truly never perished."
His cultivation had been entirely sealed, preventing him from communing with the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth in the Heavenly Immortal Realm. Now, relying on the modest amount of Heavenly Dao Xu Ying had imparted, he could finally sense the indestructible Heavenly Dao of this realm!
Seeing him communing with the Heavenly Dao, Xu Ying knew he had entered a wondrous state, complementing and mutually reinforcing the Heavenly Dao of the Heavenly Immortal Realm.
After this, the Ancestral God would be entirely capable of awakening the Heavenly Dao on his own!
'And then, the Ancestral God can teach me,' Xu Ying thought, his eyes lighting up.
Just then, a dragon girl hurried over and announced, "Far Ancestor, His Majesty has arrived and is waiting in the back garden."
"His Majesty?"
Xu Ying's heart skipped a beat. 'The Dragon Emperor who single-handedly defeated the Ancestral God, the Far Ancestor, and that little barbarian Holy Venerable?'
Piqued by curiosity, and seeing that the consciousness of the Far Ancestor Big Dragon was still amusing itself in the sea of consciousness, Xu Ying followed the dragon girl as if possessed.
In the back garden, Xu Ying saw a tall, imposing man of striking and unusual appearance. His attire was opulent and heavily adorned, perhaps slightly ostentatious. He had to be the Dragon Emperor.
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao gave a gentle wave, signaling the dragon maidens and attendants to withdraw. He smiled and said, "Far Ancestor, have you grown accustomed to living here these days? The architecture, the ornamentation, the layout of the gardens, and even the clothes you and I wear all follow the style of the other shore. Tens of millions of years ago, Chao Yuandao, myself, and other prodigies of the dragon race boarded the World-Crossing Golden Ships—forty golden ships in total—heading in different directions across the universe in an attempt to escape the Three Realms. Out of forty ships, we were the only ones who ultimately returned."
His eyes dimmed. "Far Ancestor, when we fled this universe, even as refugees, we were brimming with pride. We believed we possessed the mightiest civilization, the supreme knowledge, the most advanced Dao methods. We traversed the Chaos Sea and sailed into frozen, gelatinous space-time, spending a million years crossing those wastes. Finally, we reached the other shore. Only upon arriving did we realize that the civilization, Dao methods, and knowledge we took such pride in were nothing there! Nothing at all..."
His voice dropped low. The shattering of their pride had struck them with such violent impact that it completely crushed their Dao hearts.
They had begged the supreme experts of the other shore for guidance, kowtowing to them, willing to serve as slaves and lackeys merely to learn the achievements of that advanced civilization.
The dragon race members who reached the other shore had endured hardships beyond imagination. Nearly half of their elite experts had perished on the journey.
Once on the other shore, many more died in all manner of accidents.
The survivors humbled themselves, scraping by as they sought teachings, tracked down scriptures, and recorded divine arts.
"Yet a flame burned in the heart of every dragon: to bring the civilization of the other shore back to our homeland, to save our civilization, to save the Three Realms," Dragon Emperor Ming Dao said. "When the beings on the other shore learned we intended to return to the Three Realms, they took the initiative to grant us many techniques and bestow upon us numerous treasures. At last, we began our voyage home, returning to the Three Realms."
Xu Ying had remained silent, but hearing this, he could not help but ask, "And then?"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao continued, "We spent another million years crossing the frozen space-time, returning to drift upon the Chaos Sea. Yet try as we might, we could not find the Three Realms' universe. Eroded by the Chaos Sea, our World-Crossing Golden Ship grew increasingly battered. Just as we were on the verge of perishing in the Chaos Sea, a great bell came drifting across the waters and struck our ship. That collision sent us tumbling out of the Chaos Sea and right into the Heavenly Immortal Realm."
A strange expression crossed his face. Even today, recalling the events of that time felt utterly bizarre to him. Why had there been a strange great bell drifting on the Chaos Sea? Why had its impact returned them to the Heavenly Immortal Realm?
However, having encountered even stranger phenomena in the Chaos Sea, he simply brushed the thought aside.
"Only after returning to the Heavenly Immortal Realm did we discover it had been utterly destroyed. Dao ash was piled high for thousands of li, burying everything. We survivors became the last of the dragon race.
"And so we endured hardships to rebuild the Heavenly Immortal Realm! Yet this reconstruction was not meant to restore the realm of old." His spirit rallied once more. "It was to forge an entirely new other shore! The Heavenly Immortal Realm shall be the other shore for the Three Realms!
"We must cultivate the Dao methods of the other shore and replicate their civilization!" A fanatical glint appeared in Dragon Emperor Ming Dao's eyes. "We must abandon dragon glyphs and cultivate reason glyphs! We must discard tradition, discard etiquette, discard pride, discard everything of the past!
"We rebuilt the Heavenly Immortal Realm, erecting immortal palaces identical to theirs, constructing dwellings identical to theirs, practicing their techniques, wearing their garments, speaking their language, and writing their script—everything just like the other shore!
"We even summon cave abysses to travel back and forth with the other shore. Far Ancestor! We need to return to the Three Realms!"
He looked intently at Xu Ying, his voice grave. "The Heavenly Immortal Realm has found the true path, yet the Earth Immortal Realm and the Mortal Realm remain mired in savagery. They cultivate decrepit, obsolete Dao methods, practice etiquette from tens of millions of years ago, and speak archaic tongues. They are even weaker than we were back then! The Three Realms must undergo burial transformation."
Xu Ying felt a jolt of shock, but laughed aloud. "Burial transformation for the Three Realms? How will you transform them?"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao's gaze turned fervent. "So long as we blast a path through the gelatinous substance outside the Heavenly Immortal Realm, we can descend upon the Earth Immortal Realm and bring the civilization of the other shore to both the Earth Immortal and Mortal Realms!"
"What if the people there refuse burial transformation?" Xu Ying asked.
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao replied, "They will be willing. Those who refuse are merely troublemakers and stubborn reactionaries. Nip off their heads, execute the old fossils, and bury-transform the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth in the Mortal and Earth Immortal Realms. Wouldn't that accomplish it? Comprehensive burial transformation is just that simple."
Xu Ying said, "How do you know the Dao methods of the Earth Immortal and Mortal Realms are weaker than burial transformation? What if their Dao methods are actually stronger?"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao chuckled. "As powerful as the Far Ancestor and Ancestral God were, did they not still fall by my hand?"
Xu Ying shook his head. "The Ancestral God is the Primordial Spirit of Heaven and Earth; his Great Dao is self-contained. As for what I cultivate, it is merely ancient Dao methods, entirely different from present-day arts."
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao countered, "That little barbarian named Holy Venerable Yuan Yu is the foremost expert of the Earth Immortal Realm, yet in my Heavenly Immortal Realm, there are twenty-seven individuals at the same realm who can defeat him without even undergoing burial transformation! Another eight are still trying to punch through the gelatinous zone and have yet to return."
Xu Ying burst into laughter. "Holy Venerable Yuan Yu is nothing more than a petty barbarian of the Earth Immortal Realm! What qualifications does he possess to claim to be the foremost expert of the Earth Immortal Realm?"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao raised an eyebrow.
Xu Ying declared, "That lad Yuan Yu barely ranks outside the top hundred in the Earth Immortal Realm! The hundred supreme experts of the Earth Immortal Realm are holding their forces back; they merely sent him ahead to test the waters and throw his life away. If you judge the Earth Immortal Realm solely by his Dao methods and divine abilities, I fear you will vastly underestimate it."
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao scrutinized him from head to toe with a look of suspicion. He felt that the Far Ancestor before him seemed somewhat different from the Far Ancestor of days past.
Xu Ying said, "Yuan Yu is a spineless weakling of the Earth Immortal Realm; he won't do. But I know of someone who is truly formidable—he will do! His name is Xu Ying, and he has already entered the Heavenly Immortal Realm. He is merely a cultivator of the seventh-fold Dao Realm, and he came here with a single purpose: to challenge the Heavenly Immortal Realm and test whether the Dao methods of the Earth Immortal Realm or those of the other shore are superior!"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao frowned slightly. He had not heard of this matter.
Xu Ying continued, "This Xu Ying has long proven that he has no equal in the seventh-fold Dao Realm. Besieged and pursued by dozens of dragon elders, he still withdrew unscathed. He is currently marching toward the imperial capital. Your Majesty, what you desire is nothing more than for the Ancestral God and me to help you blast through the gelatinous zone and assist you in ruling the Three Realms. If a dragon cultivator in the Heavenly Immortal Realm can defeat this tough fellow named Xu Ying at the seventh-fold Dao Realm, I shall take the initiative to help you bury-transform the Three Realms!"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao's eyes lit up. "It's a deal!"
"It's a deal!"
Dragon Emperor Ming Dao immediately turned and left, gathering several confidants to instruct, "Go investigate at once whether someone named Xu Ying has entered our Heavenly Immortal Realm!"
At that very moment, Xu Ying relinquished control of the Big Dragon's body and returned to his own physical form, laughing heartily.
Seeing how delighted he was, Princess Mingman asked with a smile, "Barbarian Master, what are you laughing about?"
"I'm laughing at the Dragon Emperor's lack of foresight—he fell right into my trap!"
Xu Ying laid out the entire affair, adding, "That Dragon Emperor will definitely send someone at the seventh-fold Dao Realm against me. Won't they be effortlessly crushed by my hand?"
Princess Mingman hesitated for a moment. "Little Master, there truly are some terrifyingly powerful figures in the seventh-fold Dao Realm... For instance, my older brother is exceedingly formidable."
Xu Ying shot her a glance, deeply skeptical.
Chapter 687