Li Fan began a new round of experiments.
This time, once a fist-sized chunk of True Immortal flesh burned away, the height he ascended to was sufficient to trigger the Nine Heavens Dust-Descending Finger and effortlessly obliterate a pocket world the size of Daxuan.
"To achieve the effect of obliterating Xuanhuang with a single finger, I would need to burn through at least a person-sized amount of True Immortal flesh..."
Li Fan fell into silent contemplation.
"Compared to the efficiency of a True Immortal, the gap remains immense. Yet this is already the limit of what I can accomplish for now. Perhaps only when my strength increases further in the future will I be able to find a better method of refinement."
With this first and most crucial step resolved, the subsequent deduction work proceeded very smoothly.
Using eight interlocking formations, the Terminal Dissociation Disc successfully replicated the divine ability of the Nine Heavens Dust-Descending Finger.
Aided by the Dissociation Disc, so long as all required materials were on hand, Li Fan could lay down the array in a mere instant. He could make it an instantaneous divine ability.
"Unfortunately, because it is compounded from formations after all, it is not completely seamless like an inherent divine ability. If I face an opponent who is equally versed in the Dao of Formations, they might seize upon a flaw between the interlocking arrays and dismantle the technique without lifting a finger.
"In this Pitch-Black Star Sea, there should be no one whose mastery over formations surpasses mine. But beyond the High Wall, it is hard to say...
"Regardless, the most pressing matter right now is gathering enough True Immortal flesh for research—while also guarding against the flesh developing self-awareness once enough of it congregates."
Li Fan stood suspended in the void high above the Daxuan pocket world, gazing far into the expanse outside the world. Reflecting on his recent experiences, he gained a deeper understanding of fostering the birth of the Super Xuanhuang Realm in this lifetime.
"If the path to immortality is a journey of a single person ascending upward,
"then what I plan is to propel the entire Xuanhuang Realm to ascend to the other side."
Li Fan's eyes flickered, his thoughts surging. "Nowadays, it is impossible for even a single person to ascend to immortality, let alone propelling an entire world to sublimate.
"In truth, had Mr. Bai not left behind that mass of celestial spirit power, I would never have even entertained this thought. It was precisely because I witnessed firsthand in my previous life the changes that occurred after the Xuanhuang Realm was tainted by celestial spirit power that I have some measure of confidence.
"Propelling a world's sublimation might also be what the Heavenly Physician has been scheming all along. Except the world he sought to sublimate was not Xuanhuang, but Tianfa. Only, in this lifetime, he is destined to be preempted by me!"
Li Fan felt not the slightest guilt. "With the Ascent Array, perhaps I can make even more efficient use of that mass of celestial spirit power. But as for whether to mix in and burn True Immortal flesh during the world's sublimation process..."
Li Fan pondered for a moment, ultimately deciding to find a pocket world to experiment on first.
Although in theory nothing should remain after True Immortal flesh was consumed by the array, Li Fan still had a faint intuition that there were changes within it that he could not yet identify.
The pocket world he selected as his target this time was even smaller than the savage pocket world he had crushed with a single finger earlier. It had barely any vegetation—a complete barren wasteland devoid of life.
Using the Nine Heavens Dust-Descending Finger, he severed its connection to the Xuanhuang Realm.
Li Fan dragged it along, traveling rapidly through the void opened by the Realm-Rifting Whale. Only when he was completely far from the Xuanhuang Realm proper and certain that whatever catastrophe occurred would not spread to it did Li Fan finally come to a stop.
"Legends say immortals can pluck the stars and seize the moon. This technique of mine is not far behind."
Substituting formations for divine abilities took no physical toll when executed, and even looked somewhat graceful. Still, the rapid depletion of True Immortal flesh inevitably pained Li Fan.
"After this experiment, my stockpiles will be completely exhausted. I will have to accumulate more over time."
In the void, Li Fan looked down at the pocket world beneath him and began deploying the Ascent Array across its domains.
"On top of that, let us see the effects of the word 'Creation.'"
Out of vigilance against any True Immortals who might be occupying the Dao, even after learning the character for "Creation," Li Fan had never attempted to comprehend the supreme Dao principles contained within it.
He treated it purely as a tool.
For this experiment, Li Fan even intentionally distorted it, using a form of the "Creation" character that differed from what he had fully grasped.
With all preparations complete, the Ascent Array activated in an instant.
Across countless corners of the world, peaks rose one after another, like heavenly pillars propping up the entire world.
As its "height" climbed, all manner of miraculous transformations unfolded across this barren wasteland.
Vegetation and trees seemed to undergo tens of millions of years of evolution in the blink of an eye, transforming from a thin dusting across the terrain into continuous, sky-scraping primordial forests.
The world's monotonous surface topography began to diversify and evolve. Towering mountains, deep canyons, and majestic, scenic wonders sprang into being.
"Such transformations did not occur in us cultivators.
"Until reaching the pinnacle of ascent, a cultivator's body does not undergo any changes as height increases. But for a 'world,' it is different.
"I cannot say it increases linearly, but indeed, feedback manifests at every moment." Watching the wonders unfolding across the world below, realization after realization welled up in Li Fan's heart.
The world's ascent continued as the True Immortal flesh burned.
Evidently, the higher it ascended, the more energy was required. The spectacle of the world's evolution gradually ground to a halt.
"It has reached its limit." Li Fan knew what to expect; he had never counted on this amount of True Immortal flesh pushing the pocket world to any remarkable height.
He stared fixedly downward, watching the changes that occurred once the "ascent" was complete.
The True Immortal flesh was completely consumed.
The previously roaring pocket world sank into an eerie silence.
It was as though someone had pressed a pause button.
The wind, clouds, qi, and even all living things within the world—
were all inexplicably frozen, utterly motionless.
"Hm?"
Li Fan seemed to sense something, his expression shifting slightly.
The phantom of the wooden sword unsheathed, carrying him far away at blistering speed, escaping the void surrounding the pocket world.
Shortly after Li Fan departed, a terrifying catastrophe descended upon the pocket world.
Fissures erupted from within the world.
At first, there were only three or five, piercing through heaven and earth. Then the cracks spread ceaselessly, swiftly covering every corner of the world.
It was like a violent plunge from on high.
However high it had climbed before, that was how horrific its fall was now!
Driven by Li Fan's array and temporarily sublimated, the pocket world ultimately returned to its original position.
In an instant, it was smashed to smithereens!
Unlike the silent obliteration when crushed directly by the Nine Heavens Dust-Descending Finger,
the pocket world falling from the heights collided violently with the void where Xuanhuang resided.
Like a colossal boulder crashing into a pool of water.
Formless ripples surged outward from the pocket world's destruction, spreading rapidly in all directions.
Like a howling tempest, though Li Fan's form remained steadfast and unmoved, his robes whipped and fluttered violently.
Li Fan looked back toward the Xuanhuang Realm.
Although the Xuanhuang Realm itself would not be damaged by such an accidental fall,
the hurricane indeed caused the Xuanhuang Realm to tremble slightly.
"It seems this will draw the flies' attention again."
Sensing an aura from the Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals approaching, Li Fan did not immediately retreat or evade.
He had not forgotten the primary objective of this experiment.
Li Fan swept his divine sense over the crash site; no wreckage seemed to remain. Everything within the pocket world had turned to ash and vanished in the fall.
Yet the black gas—identical to the kind formed when True Immortal flesh was decomposed by the white ring, Mortal Descent—did not perish with the world's disappearance.
It drifted silently in the void.
"Just what is this black gas?
"Using True Immortal flesh as fuel does indeed cause this to remain concealed within the world."
Having obtained the answer he sought, Li Fan waved a grand hand. A golden net swept up the black gas, and he sped away from the location.
Not long after Li Fan left, a figure arrived belatedly.
Had Li Fan remained, he would have recognized this person as the leader of the Dharma Transmitters: Dharma Transmitter Jiang.
Dharma Transmitter Jiang presided over the Guixu Realm and rarely ventured outside. Only when the Xuanhuang Realm faced an apocalyptic catastrophe that ordinary Dharma Transmitters could not resolve would he show himself.
This time, it was merely a minor disturbance caused by a world's fall, yet for some reason it had drawn him out.
Dharma Transmitter Jiang arrived at the origin of the upheaval, staring thoughtfully into the void where not a single trace remained.
Looking all around and finding no clues whatsoever, he could not help but frown slightly.
After searching for a long time without finding anything, Dharma Transmitter Jiang was just about to depart when his eyes suddenly narrowed. He looked back toward where the world had crashed.
A wisp of black gas had actually emerged where Li Fan had clearly collected it all.
The instant he caught sight of this black gas, Dharma Transmitter Jiang's expression shook violently.
As if he had seen it before and knew it intimately, Dharma Transmitter Jiang did not hesitate in the slightest. Opening his mouth wide, he directly swallowed the black gas—and even the entire span of space around the crash site—in a single gulp.
After ingesting the black gas, Dharma Transmitter Jiang's complexion deteriorated at a rate visible to the naked eye.
Lines of black patterns surfaced on his body, threatening to submerge him like a tide of rising ink.
Confronted with such a horrific spectacle, Dharma Transmitter Jiang's eyes remained extraordinarily calm.
A ripple surfaced from his chest. Under this ripple, Dharma Transmitter Jiang's body began to shudder, like a calm water's surface that had been disturbed.
Amidst the rhythmic vibrations, Dharma Transmitter Jiang—along with the black gas and space he had swallowed—gradually faded.
Ultimately, they vanished completely.
No more black gas seeped from the crash site.
It was as though nothing had ever happened from beginning to end.
...
Li Fan naturally had no way of knowing that the Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals "fly" had unknowingly resolved a massive problem for him.
Had Dharma Transmitter Jiang not purged the black gas in time, it was very likely that by the time Li Fan realized it, the black gas would have already quietly corroded the Xuanhuang Realm.
Li Fan's Dao Integration plan for this lifetime would likely have come to an untimely end.
At this moment, Li Fan was pondering the reasons behind the experiment's failure.
"A world's ascent and a cultivator's ascent are fundamentally different.
"This is true not only in the process, but also in the outcome.
"When a cultivator returns to a normal state from the 'heights,' they feel at most a bit of physical discomfort. It would never be as disastrous as a world falling.
"Perhaps it is because the world itself absorbed a massive amount of energy during the ascent."
Recalling the scenes he had witnessed within that pocket world during the sublimation process, Li Fan could not help but contemplate privately.
Having obtained advance verification of the results, a difficult problem now lay before Li Fan.
From the moment he propelled the Xuanhuang Realm to sublimate upward until it evolved the Heaven and Earth Immortal Soul for him to devour, he had to find a way to anchor the Super Xuanhuang Realm's position of height during that interim.
Otherwise, before Li Fan could even achieve Dao Integration, he would likely be smashed to pieces alongside the Xuanhuang Realm and forced to awkwardly trigger Trueness ahead of time.
"An upward ascent only stabilizes upon reaching a certain threshold. That threshold should be the boundary between immortals and mortals.
"I wonder if my arrangements in this lifetime are enough. If not, what method should I use to briefly anchor the Xuanhuang Realm?"
Elevating Xuanhuang to immortality was truly no easy feat.
He had initially thought that simply following the plan step by step would suffice. Yet the divide between immortal and mortal was like a chasm. As the plan unfolded, problems cropped up one after another.
Fortunately, Li Fan possessed sufficient capital to face and resolve them one by one, so he felt no anxiety in his heart.
While Li Fan pondered these issues, the Xuanhuang Realm remained quiet for a short while.
Just as it had in its original historical trajectory.
Yet this rare tranquility was soon broken once again.
The reason was that someone had crossed the Close Horizons Array, returning from the foot of the High Wall.
Noticing the disturbance, Li Fan temporarily set his thoughts aside.
The person who returned was none other than Baihua.
She looked rather disheveled. Her originally pristine glazed body was now marred with gouges and scratches. The light and shadow flickered erratically, looking as though it might extinguish at any moment.
"Saint Teacher..." Seeing Li Fan appear before her, Baihua let out a long breath of relief.
"What happened? When I returned, there was no sign of any of you. The Great Wall of Remnant Worlds even plunged into turmoil, and the accumulated True Immortal remnant power came pouring down..." Li Fan asked with a grave expression.
While questioning her, he did not forget to send forth a strand of Source Power Essence to heal Baihua.
The effect of the Source Power Essence was immediate.
Nourished by it, Baihua instantly regained her spirits. She cupped her hands in gratitude first, then said with some indignance, "That Master Yin—I have no idea what madness took hold of him! Despite our dissuasion, he charged straight toward a certain section of the Great Wall of Remnant Worlds.
"It would be one thing if he only threw away his own life, but soon after, the anomaly suddenly erupted. Caught off guard, we were caught up in the True Immortal remnant power and separated from one another."
Suppressing her anger, Baihua continued, "My luck was slightly better; I slammed directly into the Great Wall of Remnant Worlds. Though I suffered some minor injuries, I managed to keep my life.
"Fellow Daoist Qiaogong, I fear, was not so fortunate."
Baihua's expression looked grim.
"I saw with my own eyes that he drifted toward the High Wall.
"As I see it, he is more likely dead than alive..."
Having listened to Baihua's account, Li Fan fell silent, deep in thought.
"What about Xu Ke?" Li Fan asked again. Xu Ke had always possessed extraordinary fortune; logically speaking, he should have been able to turn danger into safety.
"The situation was too chaotic at the time, so I did not see him. However, on my way back, I saw a communication sigil he left behind."
Chapter 1330