Immortals were unfathomable, and immortal hounds were no easier to deal with. Even when reduced to nothing more than a severed head, it remained tricky to handle.
The flying boat hovered midair over Qingming. Wei Yuan gathered the cultivators from the Palace of Grand Beginning to broaden their horizons, since the severed head of an immortal hound was not something one saw every day. Wei Yuan himself accompanied Immortal Monarch Yanshi on a walking tour of Qingming, surveying the terrain to find an appropriate site.
As Yanshi took in the sights, he marveled continuously, expressing high praise for the myriad ingenious concepts across Qingming. Along the way, he also instructed Wei Yuan on many key considerations when rooting immortal objects within a domain.
All immortal objects possessed spirituality, to say nothing of sentient beings who had achieved immortality. Generally speaking, when immortals fell, they rarely chose a place to pass away and transform their immortal forms and cultivation into treasure land.
Altering heaven and earth in such a manner went against the natural order and inevitably drew heavenly punishment. Moreover, stripped of a lifetime of accumulated immortal cultivation, they lost the vessel to ferry them across the sea of reincarnation, introducing unimaginable uncertainties.
Most likely, their spiritual consciousness would be coated in dust, leaving them ignorant of their past life. They would drift muddleheaded from one reincarnation to the next, never knowing when they might awaken to reclaim their identity as that past life's reincarnation.
Hearing this, Wei Yuan could not help but ask, "Then why have so many immortals of our Palace of Grand Beginning chosen to transform their bodies into treasure land? Did they not wish to reincarnate?"
Yanshi replied, "Our human True Immortals differ from those of foreign races. Originally, when a sliver of our true spirit fell into reincarnation, the odds of awakening were no more than ten percent. For foreign races, it was mostly twenty to thirty percent, and those with distinct heritages like shamans and Heavenly Shamans had even higher chances.
"After the Grand Ancestor of Great Tang unified the world, he reestablished the ancestral order; the Martial Ancestor then selected lineages across the world, granting fiefs and establishing domains.
"Only from then on did our human race see an increase in the chance of awakening in reincarnation, though by my reckoning, it is at most thirteen or fourteen percent. Even so, that was already a massive improvement."
Wei Yuan calculated the timeline, and his heart gave a jolt. "When the Martial Ancestor granted fiefs, there were only four states at first—yet in truth, were there nine bloodlines?"
Yanshi said approvingly, "Many things become clear only after achieving immortality. It is truly remarkable that you could deduce this.
"Back then, the founding patriarch of our Palace of Grand Beginning said: 'Odds this low are pointless.' So the patriarch chose to pass away at the mountain gate, turning a lifetime of cultivation entirely into treasure land to bless future generations, leaving behind only a sliver of true spirit to enter reincarnation.
"After the patriarch, the subsequent three immortals did the same. And today, Tinghai has followed in the footsteps of our forebears."
Wei Yuan pondered carefully and said, "With nine states standing divided, slowly evolving over nearly a thousand years, have children of karmic destiny among mankind correspondingly become more and more numerous?"
Yanshi nodded. "There is indeed a connection."
Thus, Wei Yuan gained a deeper understanding of the immortal path.
Yanshi then turned the topic back to the immortal hound. Tinghai had slain this beast, and before dying, its heart had been filled with resentful obsessions. Planting it directly into treasure land would instantly turn a thousand li into a vicious, blighted death zone. Its rancor and obsession had to be worn away before it could be put to use.
Fortunately, it was merely an immortal dog. In Yanshi's words, it bullied the weak, feared the strong, and was gullible and easily duped. Yanshi had spent several months coaxing, terrifying, and thrashing it into submission. Had it been an immortal like the Little State Preceptor of Northern Liao, that would have been utterly impossible; one could only refine them for other uses.
Having surveyed all of Qingming, Yanshi suggested planting the dog's head in the mountains where the Hall of Heroic Spirits stood, using the power of a million heroic spirits to suppress its residual ferocity. Wei Yuan naturally agreed, so they returned to the flying boat to make preparations.
By now, the cultivators from the Palace of Grand Beginning had all arrived on the flying boat. They were crowded around the head, studying it, and some were even harvesting bits of fur and flesh to take back for research and future use.
Gathering samples and pill ingredients was standard enough, and most behaved rationally, but Perfected Chuhe's face was flushed red, overwhelmed with uncontainable excitement. Looking at this dog's head, the old Taoist felt as if heavenly light were pouring down, an epiphany striking him, revealing an open path to the heavens right before his eyes!
In the past, fellow Daoists had often mocked Old Taoist Chuhe, thinking his cultivation was all show and his path in the Dao severely limited.
Yet the severed head before him proved beyond doubt: even if Old Taoist Chuhe couldn't fight, so long as his godfathers could, it was all the same!
Even if he couldn't ascend to immortality himself, if his godfathers ascended, they would bring the old Taoist right into the immortal gates with them!
At this moment, Chuhe deeply felt his vision in the past had been too narrow, his thinking too rigid. Fortunately, the Little State Preceptor of Northern Liao had paved the way. Seeing this dog's head today, the old Taoist felt an involuntary sense of kinship, which finally swept away the last cloud lingering in his Dao heart.
When Immortal Monarch Yanshi levitated the hound's head to carry it away, Perfected Chuhe rushed straight back to his quarters and entered the Smoke and Fire of the Mortal World. For the first time, he split his focus thirty-two ways, consulting reference materials while picking up a brush to draft his grand blueprint for ascending to immortality.
The old Taoist prepared a two-pronged plan. The first was to seek out new, powerful godfathers. Yet taking a godfather was no simple task; if he wanted one on the level of an immortal hound, he would need to be at least at the Scenery Command realm.
The second plan was to nurture his existing godfathers. His current three godfathers possessed immense potential that could be fully tapped—especially the flying sable. Rumor had it that even Wei Yuan owed it a debt of money. This was not a matter of money; this was karma!
The more the old Taoist wrote, the broader his horizons grew, convinced he had found the true royal road: an awkward bird that flew first was still an awkward bird, so why not find a few more godfathers to carry him aloft?
Having viewed the immortal artifact, each of the Palace of Grand Beginning's cultivators had gained something and returned to secluded cultivation to organize their insights. Wei Yuan accompanied True Monarch Yanshi to the mountains where the Hall of Heroic Spirits was located.
Having long inspected the lay of the earth veins, True Monarch Yanshi placed the dog's head upon the highest peak and unsealed the restrictions.
In an instant, the earth shook, tribulation clouds manifested in the sky, wild winds howled across the wilderness, and distant thunder rolled through the heavens above!
The phantasmal form of a hundred-zhang immortal hound rose from the head. Upon waking, it threw back its head in a long howl, then fixed its gaze on Wei Yuan, eyes glinting with murderous light as it poised to pounce.
Immortal Monarch Yanshi cleared his throat softly. The phantom hound instantly dropped to the ground, whining in terror, not daring to move another inch. Then its form began to fade into translucence as phantom glimpses of worlds flickered into being, one after another, before disappearing.
The residual mindscape worlds of the immortal hound manifested repeatedly, constantly collapsing and merging into Qingming. Specks of light drifted from the severed head, growing ever denser before melting into this heaven and earth.
The Qingming Immortal Stone began to tremble continuously. The domain's outer perimeter expanded once more—and this time, it was no gradual creep, but leaped outward a hundred li in the blink of an eye. Many secret strongholds hidden around Qingming had never anticipated such a sudden shift; unable to flee in time, they were engulfed directly by the domain, their presence reflecting into Wei Yuan's awareness.
Wei Yuan immediately said, "Please wait a moment, Immortal Monarch. I shall go clear out a few pests."
"Go on. It will take some time here anyway."
Wei Yuan flickered into motion and vanished into the distance. At the same time, numerous figures across Qingming received orders and led troops flying in every direction, penning in the spies who had failed to escape right in their hideouts.
Wei Yuan headed straight in the direction of the Bishui domain, trapping dozens of people at the mouth of a cave.
Seeing Wei Yuan arrive, the man leading them paled drastically and said, "I am a guerrilla general of Zhao, and those behind me are my comrades in arms. Greetings, Lord Wei!"
Wei Yuan pointed toward the cave where they had been hiding and said, "Inside."
The guerrilla general's expression shifted again. He stammered, "Lord Wei, we were merely passing through and stopped here to rest. Furthermore, this place does not lie within the Qingming domain, nor have we done anything to offend you—"
Wei Yuan pointed once more. "Inside."
The guerrilla general dared not disobey and led his men back into the cave. The cave was ingeniously constructed, capable of isolating divine sense so that no trace of activity could be detected from outside. Once they were forced back inside, Wei Yuan pointed a finger, and the cave collapsed instantly.
A cleanup force would arrive shortly to dig them out and carry them off, but Wei Yuan was already speeding toward the next location.
By the time the dog's head dissolved completely, Qingming's boundary had extended three hundred li in a single bound. It was now close to a thousand li across, and several months later, it would expand to one thousand two hundred li.
Vibrant vitality surged across the entire Qingming domain. The profound generative power of the Jianmu rose once more, the earthly qi became lush and bountiful, and the growth of flora and fauna accelerated. Within the new city, the youths of the Xu family began yet another round of reproduction.
The inhabitants of each city could likewise scarcely contain their surging vigor, and thus countless new lives began to sprout on this day.
Where the dog's head had rested, a new peak emerged, rising several hundred zhang out of thin air. From afar, it resembled a giant hound gazing toward the northwest. The Hall of Heroic Spirits sat upon the hound's waist, pinning the colossal beast beneath it.
The cemetery hill holding the remains of a million heroic spirits pressed down upon the immortal hound's hind legs.
After the immortal hound merged into Qingming, Wei Yuan sensed countless spirit beasts of all sizes beginning to migrate toward Qingming. At the same time, spiritual energy began to manifest inside many wild beasts native to Qingming, signaling their impending evolution into spirit beasts.
At this time in Qingming, whether ordinary beasts or spirit beasts, their vitality and spirituality began to increase gradually. Before long, a multitude of spirit beasts would emerge.
Beasts possessed instincts, and in certain respects their senses were far keener than humanity's, so many spiritual creatures also began migrating toward Qingming.
Naturally, all these changes unfolded before Immortal Monarch Yanshi's eyes. He nodded slightly and remarked, "This domain of yours can now barely be considered a treasure land."
Domains or minor worlds were graded into four ranks according to their abundance: fertile wild, treasure land, blessed land, and grotto-heaven. Previously, Qingming had been a fertile wild; mortal flora and fauna thrived, but spiritual energy was not yet plentiful. It held only a few spirit fields, and medicinal herb fields required formations to contain the spiritual power.
Now, Qingming's spiritual energy had ascended another tier, enabling spiritual items to form naturally in the wild, thus satisfying the minimum requirement for a treasure land.
As for blessed lands and grotto-heavens, they could already serve as the foundational mountain gates of second- and first-rate sects. However, they were generally sealed minor worlds, isolated from the outside realm so that their spiritual energy would not dissipate.
As the foremost immortal sect, the Palace of Grand Beginning's main mountain and Southern Mountain Gate were grotto-heavens. The Northern Mountain Gate, repeatedly repaired and damaged through ongoing warfare against the Liao Clan, was currently still a treasure land, though only a hair's breadth from a blessed land; once successfully sealed, it would become one.
The Little State Preceptor's immortal hound was no ordinary immortal beast. A single head should have sufficed to transform several hundred li around it into a blessed land. However, the Qingming boundary stone was of exceptionally high status and possessed myriad wonders; elevating it required several times—if not vastly more—resources than an ordinary domain. Thus, it was ultimately elevated only barely into a treasure land, and even that was because Wei Yuan had already nurtured the Qingming boundary stone so well that it was already close to becoming one.
As for the Palace of Grand Beginning's founding patriarch, who upon passing away directly transformed into ten thousand li of treasure land, that had purely been bullying the Wu clan.
With business concluded, Immortal Monarch Yanshi did not leave immediately. Instead, he walked over to Wei Yuan's small courtyard and sat down. Then, with a wave of his wide sleeve, Zhang Sheng, Ji Liuli, Bao Yun, and Feng Tingyu all appeared in the courtyard at once.
They had been somewhat confused at first, not knowing what was happening, but upon seeing Yanshi, they bowed in unison.
Yanshi nodded, then cast a glance at Wei Yuan, leaving him to figure it out for himself.
Chapter 692