"When the real is taken for false, the false also becomes true.
"The transformation between truth and falsehood is infinitely profound~"
Li Fan chanted in his heart once more, overjoyed beyond measure.
Though it had lasted for only a single instant, he had indeed manifested his Soul Formation cultivation from the previous life out of nothingness.
However, this was his first attempt at wielding such a great divine ability after all.
After that fleeting moment of success, the manifested cultivation dissolved like a dream or phantom bubble, vanishing again in the blink of an eye.
Li Fan was not discouraged in the slightest; his heart was still filled with boundless joy.
Creating something out of nothingness was a feat that even the legendary True Immortals might not necessarily achieve.
Yet, drawing upon the insights gained from numerous simulations through Trueness, he had taken the first step toward achieving it.
As the saying went, all beginnings are hard. With this first success under his belt, he would undoubtedly grow increasingly adept at executing this divine ability in the future.
"Not just my own cultivation. The items I once experienced and possessed, and even...
"Every different person, the Xuanhuang Realm, the Pitch-Black Star Sea, and the entirety beyond the High Wall. One day, all of them can be recreated with a single thought of mine!"
Standing above the sea of clouds, Li Fan savored the sensation of shifting between truth and falsehood, his heart surging with emotion.
Only after a long while did he pull himself back from the epiphany.
Turning his gaze to the inheritance options on the Trueness panel, he first chose to inherit cultivation.
The same scene played out once more: the skies above Daxuan rumbled incessantly.
This was the disturbance caused by Li Fan's Soul Formation cultivation being invisibly poured into this pocket world.
Yet compared to the spectacle of him inheriting his cultivation in the previous life, the pocket world of Daxuan did not show signs of being overwhelmed this time, thanks to the world metamorphosis triggered previously by the True Immortal seal character for "Creation."
Dense clouds merely gathered across the sky, accompanied by numerous anomalies.
"Whew..." As the familiar power of his cultivation returned to his body, Li Fan let out a long breath.
Next, his gaze locked onto the second inheritance option.
The option to inherit cultivation had dimmed, leaving only options 1, 3, and 4.
Without hesitation, Li Fan chose to inherit an item.
The items he had possessed throughout his experiences in the previous life—including avatars and divine soul splinters—flashed into Li Fan's mind at once, awaiting his quiet selection.
His gaze swept past them, and after a moment of contemplation, it finally settled upon a seemingly unremarkable white ring.
Before this white ring had been fished up, the Holy Emperor had not yet completely severed ties with Li Fan's true body, so it was likewise counted among the items he had once possessed.
Once his selection was confirmed, light flickered in his hand, eventually coalescing into a plain white ring.
It felt slightly cool to the touch. When his divine sense swept over it, he detected no fluctuation of spiritual energy whatsoever.
It seemed that because it had been manifested by Trueness, there was no need to refine or bind it. The moment he held the white ring, an instinctive understanding arose within Li Fan that he could use it freely.
Moreover, outsiders would be unable to seize it.
Li Fan looked at the name displayed for the white ring on the Trueness panel:
"Descend to Mortal Dust."
Stroking the white ring, Li Fan murmured those words while pondering the proper way to use it.
"Go!"
Li Fan hurled the white ring toward Mount Jieli below.
With a thought, the white ring expanded with the wind, enveloping the entire mountain summit in an instant.
Then, it plummeted downward.
When the white ring touched the ground, the mountain it had encircled decomposed and vanished inch by inch before Li Fan's eyes,
transforming into spiritual energy and dispersing into the world of Daxuan.
The mountain of several thousand zhang vanished into thin air just like that. The countless living creatures dwelling upon it fell helplessly from midair due to the mountain's sudden disappearance. Had the rising spiritual energy from the ring's decomposition of Mount Jieli not buoyed them up, this place would have turned into a living hell in an instant.
Perhaps this area could now be called the Jieli Ring.
The ground looked as though it had been sliced cleanly by a blade, smooth as a mirror.
Having lost their habitat, the creatures of Mount Jieli fled frantically in primal terror.
Before long, the once-vibrant Mount Jieli had turned into a forbidden zone for life.
Li Fan inhaled deeply, swallowing all the spiritual energy released from the decomposition like a whale sucking in water.
For someone at his current level, this tiny bit of spiritual energy was less than a drop in the ocean. His primary purpose was to analyze whether the spiritual energy generated by the Descend to Mortal Dust ring differed from the ordinary energy of heaven and earth.
After carefully tasting and evaluating it, Li Fan reached a conclusion:
There was no difference whatsoever.
In fact, the spiritual energy felt intimately familiar to him, as though it was naturally born from the pocket world of Daxuan to begin with.
"It clearly decomposes matter into energy, yet on the Trueness panel, it bears a name like 'Descend to Mortal Dust.'
"Descend to mortal dust...
"Perhaps this is a punitive treasure specifically designed for immortal artifacts," Li Fan realized with a sudden spark of insight.
"In the previous life, the Holy Emperor avatar didn't get many chances to test it out. In this life, perhaps I can use those quasi-immortal artifacts in the Xuanhuang Realm to test my hypothesis."
Storing the white ring away, Li Fan looked down.
Mount Jieli had vanished into thin air in broad daylight.
To ordinary mortals, this was an unimaginable, terrifying catastrophe.
Believing it to be punishment sent down by Heaven, the mortals at the foot of Mount Jieli had begun organizing sacrificial rituals in sheer terror.
Not daring to approach the massive circular impression on the ground, the people only dared to pray beyond the perimeter of the ring.
Among this crowd, Li Fan, not unexpectedly, spotted Sun Erlang and Wang Xuanba, two of his former disciples.
With a flick of his finger, a figure floated down from the sky, descending into the mortal world.
The figure bore a seventy-percent resemblance to Li Fan, though with a long white beard and white hair, dressed in attire rather similar to Heavenly Venerable Chuanfa's.
"Look, an immortal!"
The common folk dropped to their knees in unison.
With a wave of the figure's sleeve, the kneeling mortals rose back to their feet.
The figure sat cross-legged in midair, chanting softly as he began expounding the Dao to the surrounding mortals.
The faint wisps of spiritual energy born from the Daxuan pocket world's metamorphosis were drawn here by the preaching figure,
forming a vortex visible to the naked eye above the Jieli Ring.
Li Fan casually used this spiritual energy to set up an array. Before long, a miniature array designed to purge miasma from mortals' bodies was formed.
Under the dual effects of the figure's sermon and the array,
in less than the time it took to drink a cup of tea, some of the mortals listening below had already completed the purging of their miasma.
Sun Erlang and Wang Xuanba were naturally among them.
Within the Jieli Ring, the earth rumbled. The ground beneath those who had completed the first step of cultivation flowed like water,
gathering them into one place and then slowly rising and swelling upward.
As a result, these individuals were brought closer to the immortal master preaching above.
The figure's sermon lasted for seven full days.
Over those seven days, whenever someone present successfully drew qi into their body and reached the Qi Condensation stage, the ground beneath them rose further,
forming distinct, tiered terraces.
After seven days, the figure turned into an escaping streak of light and flew off. Simultaneously, a thought surfaced in the minds of every cultivator present:
The immortal master's sermon would resume in one month.
The crowd was profoundly shaken.
Even the dullest among them realized that this was an immense opportunity from the heavens.
And so, word of the immortal master's sermon spread like wildfire, sweeping across every corner of Daxuan at terrifying speed.
Within the Jieli Ring, people also discovered the many wonders of this "Sermon Platform."
"Sermon Platform" was the respectful name given to the Jieli Ring by the mortals who had listened to the immortal master. Inside, it was divided into different tiers according to individual cultivation; the higher one's cultivation, the higher one sat.
Each person's position was fixed and could neither be traded nor seized.
While seated on the Sermon Platform, even in the immortal master's absence, closing one's eyes still brought forth all manner of wondrous insights.
At the highest tier of the Sermon Platform, a glowing platform could faintly be seen floating above.
Upon it, the names of various cultivation techniques seemed to be inscribed.
Sitting on the Sermon Platform, a cultivator needed only a thought to learn the specific details of these techniques.
Every cultivator could choose one technique on their own to practice.
Once someone completed their selection, the technique's name on the glowing platform would vanish, transforming into a ray of light that entered the cultivator's sea of consciousness.
Gazing at the catalog of thousands upon thousands of techniques, Sun Erlang and Wang Xuanba were dazzled to the point of indecision.
"Erlang, which one do you think I should pick?" Wang Xuanba asked, scratching his head.
"No rush. With so many techniques, take your time choosing. It'll take at least several days for folks from elsewhere to hear the news and rush over. On the other hand, once you choose, you can't switch until the next realm, so we have to be prudent," Sun Erlang analyzed calmly without blinking.
...
Above the Sermon Platform.
The preaching figure had not actually departed. He had merely concealed his presence so the crowd below could not see him.
All the techniques here had been obtained in the previous life from the little girl avatar of the Dharma Deduction Jade.
The Dharma Deduction Jade had used simulated personalities to slack off.
The techniques deduced by those simulated personalities were naturally recorded by Li Fan.
At the anchor point of Year 3, these techniques had not yet been deduced by the Dharma Deduction Jade, so there was no need to worry about alerting the Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals' Protector Hall.
The stockpiled reserve gathered from the Dharma Deduction Jade in his previous life would last Li Fan for a very long time.
"In this life, I shall be the Teacher of Heaven and Earth.
"Spreading the Dao across Xuanhuang begins with Daxuan."
Sitting cross-legged in the void, the phantom preacher looked at the multitudes hurrying from all across Daxuan, musing to himself.
Directing the flow of spiritual energy through the Sermon Platform, he expanded the white ring on the ground slightly farther.
...
While the phantom quietly preached, kindling the spark of the Teacher of Heaven and Earth,
Li Fan's true body had traveled deep beneath Daxuan.
Since his plan in this life was to merge with the Dao using the Heaven-and-Earth Essence of a super Xuanhuang Realm, he naturally had to unleash the Xuanhuang Realm's full potential to its absolute limits.
Besides immortal spiritual energy, the hidden powers of the remnant realms, and the Creation Immortal Talisman,
driving the subordinate pocket worlds to return to Xuanhuang and achieve the unification of the myriad worlds could also serve as a major boost.
After all, even a mosquito's leg was meat.
Especially after Li Fan used the True Immortal seal character for "Creation" to first elevate and transform the various pocket worlds, the return of the myriad worlds would undoubtedly provide substantial nourishment to the Xuanhuang Realm.
After all, the stronger the future Xuanhuang Realm became, the more formidable the Heaven-and-Earth Essence it birthed would be.
And that would be all the more advantageous to Li Fan.
"Pushed away by the Realm-Rifting Whales and having evolved over thousands of years, the subordinate worlds have drifted far from the Xuanhuang Realm proper, connected to it only by narrow void corridors.
"To drive them to merge once again with the Xuanhuang Realm, the first step is to reactivate those severed connections."
Li Fan closed his eyes, and an image of the Daxuan pocket world alongside the luminous Xuanhuang cluster surfaced in his sea of consciousness.
Daxuan was like a small bean of light floating on the periphery, flickering intermittently, neither truly attached nor completely adrift.
A thought stirred, and a great array arose.
Boundless spiritual power surged from Li Fan's body, coursing endlessly underground and spreading across every corner of Daxuan.
In Li Fan's perspective, streams of array talisman lines took shape one after another.
Using the array as a blade, he constantly reshaped the pocket world of Daxuan.
Without anyone noticing, the pocket world drifted slowly through the void toward the Xuanhuang Realm,
undoing all the efforts of countless Realm-Rifting Whales over thousands of years.
Just before colliding with the Xuanhuang Realm, the Daxuan pocket world finally came to a halt.
From the world, array synapses slowly sprouted, silently latching onto the Xuanhuang Realm proper.
Like receiving nutrients from a maternal placenta, the Daxuan pocket world's transformation accelerated drastically in an instant.
When selecting the attachment point, Li Fan intentionally altered the junction between the Daxuan pocket world and the Xuanhuang Realm proper.
Instead of choosing the Congyun Sea, he switched it to Shilin Province,
lest he provoke a stress reaction from the Xuanhuang Realm.
Compared to the vast Xuanhuang Realm proper, the size of the Daxuan pocket world was almost negligible.
Therefore, Daxuan's attachment had not yet attracted the attention of the Xuanhuang Realm.
Thus, Li Fan's plan proceeded smoothly.
Wisps of imperceptible array talisman lines crept through Daxuan's synapses, slowly infiltrating the Xuanhuang Realm.
While binding the Daxuan pocket world ever closer to Xuanhuang, they also quietly channeled a portion of a colossal array into the Xuanhuang Realm.
Being merely an incomplete array structure, it was difficult to detect even for Li Fan himself before it was formally activated.
"The day the myriad worlds return shall be the day the array is fully formed."
This time, the array Li Fan laid down was naturally not the All Things Return to Void Array. Instead, it was an array intended to capture the Heaven-and-Earth Immortal Essence that would be born in the future.
As the saying went, take precautions before danger arrives.
Once the super Xuanhuang Realm came into being, the first Heaven-and-Earth Immortal Essence it birthed would be Li Fan's future target for merging with the Dao.
Through a sequence of guidance, he would continually escalate the difficulty of the heavenly duties it had to execute.
The more power it borrowed from Xuanhuang, the more terrifyingly potent this Heaven-and-Earth Immortal Essence would become.
To guarantee complete success and achieve Dao merging as swiftly as possible,
this preemptive immortal array was of paramount importance.
"The strongest Heaven-and-Earth Essence belongs to the phantoms of past Great Heavenly Venerables. With all the Heaven-and-Earth Essence concentrated upon them, just a single one equals more than half of the Xuanhuang Realm's total essence.
"In the 115th cycle, Heavenly Dao Bai was able to slightly resist Chuanfa. In this life, after comprehensive enhancements through my numerous methods, it should reach the limit of the Star Sea.
"If I can also achieve a breakthrough in studying immortal spiritual energy, reaching the half-step immortal realm is not out of the question...
"The only consideration is that the Great Heavenly Venerable phantoms might carry traces left behind by the Immortal Realm. While devouring it, I must remain vigilant." Recalling Heavenly Dao Bai's eerie influence on his mind in the past, Li Fan pondered in secret.
As the bridgehead for spreading the Dao across Xuanhuang and the template for arrays in other pocket worlds to come, Li Fan constructed Daxuan's infiltration array with utmost caution.
In the previous life, the Heavenly Physician and Chuanfa had once joined forces to perform the Soul Sealing and World Substitution technique.
This demonstrated that their control over the Xuanhuang Realm had already reached a meticulous, microscopic degree.
If the array synapses infiltrating from the pocket world were detected by them and the two returned from the starry sky,
Li Fan's plans would be completely disrupted.
Chapter 1305