Above the Congyun Sea, aboard the Taiyan Boat.
Having just entered the cultivation world, the excited crowd from the Li Realm was looking around in wonder from the deck.
Meanwhile, Li Fan channeled the Stealing Heaven Changing Sun Art to observe everyone's fate.
Most appeared as if covered in dust, dim and lusterless.
Yet when his gaze fell upon the fat youth Ye Feipeng, a look of wonder inevitably surfaced in Li Fan's eyes.
For his fate was like a swirl of newly born white mist, ceaselessly revolving and evolving.
This kind of destiny...
Li Fan recalled the art's description of it.
"Flows with fortune; one shift begets a hundred changes."
This meant the person's fate was exceptionally susceptible to external influences.
If he met a benefactor to lift him up, he might very well live up to his name—like the Great Peng soaring with the wind in a single day, spiraling up ninety thousand li.
However, if he ran into someone terribly wicked while his own fate was still relatively fragile, he would likely fail to survive the calamity and perish on the spot.
Just like in the previous life, when he had noticed Li Fan acting suspiciously and tried to blackmail him, only to be stabbed to death by Li Fan right away.
Yet if the person he blackmailed had not been as decisive and ruthless as Li Fan, and had truly been ensnared by him,
then with their respective fortunes ebbing and flowing, he might have caught the wind from then on, his luck becoming unstoppable.
Li Fan would describe this kind of person in eight words: "Godlike when ahead, a total feeder when behind."
Among the crowd from the Li Realm, besides Ye Feipeng, only Xiao Heng and Su Xiaomei had unusual fates.
Su Xiaomei's was an intertwining of purple and black, indistinguishable from one another.
Xiao Heng's was the sign of a hidden dragon in the deep.
Even in the ancient cultivation world, any one of these three would have been exceedingly rare.
Often, an entire province would produce only one in a decade.
Yet now, in this tiny Li Realm, they had sprung up all together like a cluster.
This could not help but set Li Fan's imagination racing.
Perhaps it has something to do with the volcano in the Li Realm.
...
Under the threat of death, Xiao Heng had been unable to sleep at night. Faster than in the previous life, he spent a mere eight or nine days expelling all the miasma from his body.
Then, upon entering the cultivation world, in just a single day and night, he successfully drew Qi into his body and stepped into the Qi Condensation stage.
Su Xiaomei was even more outrageous. The instant the Taiyan Boat broke through the Immortal Severing Formation and entered the cultivation world,
Li Fan felt the spiritual energy of heaven and earth swarm and surge autonomously into her body.
And her body, like one starved for an eternity, refused nothing.
Like a bottomless pit, it absorbed all of this spiritual energy.
Even now, this process was still ongoing.
Seeing how rapidly the two beside him were progressing, Su Changyu could not help feeling a bit envious.
Yet his mindset remained balanced; instead, he practiced the Xuanhuang Mind-Clearing Incantation Li Fan had taught him with even greater diligence.
Forgetting food and sleep, he was the spitting image of Li Fan back on Liuli Island.
Watching him, Li Fan could not help nodding secretly.
...
The Taiyan Boat skimmed low over the sea, flying swiftly.
All around was the boundless ocean, and the dull, repetitive scenery quickly stripped the Li Realm mortals of their novelty.
One after another, they returned to the cabins to rest.
Having studied formations for over two years, Li Fan tested his skills by setting up a Sound and Form Concealment Array on the outside of the Taiyan Boat.
This was only a rudimentary, small concealing formation, but its effect was solid, capable of masking both sound and appearance.
Undetected the entire way, Li Fan led the group and smoothly returned to Yelan Island.
After explaining several methods of expelling miasma to the group, Li Fan put Yin Yueting in charge of settling them in.
Afterward, he inquired about the future plans of Su Xiaomei and the other two.
Both Su Xiaomei and Xiao Heng said they would wait until Su Changyu successfully drew Qi into his body before going to Wanxian Island together.
Li Fan did not force them.
He merely made another trip to Wanxian Island to exchange for two Qi Condensation cultivation methods.
One was naturally the Lesser Water Derivation Technique for Xiao Heng.
The other was the Heart Wrath Blazing Flame Technique prepared for Su Xiaomei.
Xiao Heng gingerly received the jade slip and kowtowed to Li Fan.
Su Xiaomei was far less formal.
Taking the jade slip, she grinned from ear to ear and said repeatedly, "Thank you, Master!"
Li Fan paid it no mind, letting her call him whatever she liked.
"While you wait for Su Changyu here on Yelan Island, you can't just idle about."
"Work with that Zhao Erbao to help me collect antiques. I have great use for them,"
Li Fan instructed.
Su Xiaomei and Xiao Heng nodded repeatedly.
"The immortal path is perilous; I can only guide you through the door. Whatever you achieve in the future will depend entirely on your own fortune."
With that, he left the two of them a communication talisman and dismissed them.
Xiao Heng and Su Xiaomei both possess extraordinary fortunes. With their help, the process of collecting antiques with Dao charm should accelerate significantly. Hopefully, the collection can be finished before the Crimson Flame incinerates the sea.
That night, Li Fan used the Cloud Water Illusory Dream Technique to deepen Zhao Erbao's agonizing memories as a warning.
Afterward, Li Fan hurried back to Wanxian Island.
This was because he had received a transmission from Gong Boyu.
He Zhenghao's posthumous work, the Mountains and Rivers Hundred Meridians Array Chart, had been fully restored.
Not expecting them to work so quickly, Li Fan headed straight to the outside of the Formation Planning Hall without stopping to rest.
Gong Boyu had already sent someone there to receive him.
Stepping once more into the metallic cube-like building, this time the small cube moved swiftly and brought them to a large conference chamber.
Inside, besides Gong Boyu, sat six other cultivators.
They all appeared to be in their forties or fifties, their auras inscrutable and their cultivations clearly formidable.
Gong Boyu waved Li Fan over to his side and said with deep satisfaction, "Thanks to these old friends joining forces and pooling their wisdom, after much effort, we've finally completed Fellow Daoist He Zhenghao's posthumous work. Truly a cause for celebration!"
Li Fan nodded. "If Fellow Daoist He has a spirit in the beyond, he would surely be deeply gratified."
Gong Boyu pulled a square piece of jade from his robes and handed it to Li Fan.
Li Fan held this unfamiliar jade block in his hand and examined it closely.
The eight corners of the jade block had all been replaced with metals of different colors.
Across the entire surface of the jade block were engraved intricate, profound patterns.
Fine threads of golden light flowed like rivers between the patterns.
"This is an encrypted jade slip of our Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals. Once crafted, each encrypted jade slip can only be viewed by a specific cultivator. If anyone else attempts to read it by force, it will trigger a pre-set destruction restriction and detonate on its own."
"This one was prepared for you, containing the completed Mountains and Rivers Hundred Meridians Array Chart,"
Gong Boyu explained.
Li Fan nodded and, with a thought of his divine sense, checked the contents of the jade slip.
One distinctive mountain after another instantly materialized in Li Fan's mind.
Looking closely, every handful of soil and every fragment of stone upon those great mountains was startlingly a miniature array.
Stacked together, countless minute arrays formed a complete mountain—a grand array shaped in the form of a mountain.
The sheer volume of information and data it contained made Li Fan suck in a breath of cold air.
This was certainly not something a Qi Condensation cultivator could comprehend.
Chapter 134