After resting for a moment, Xu Ke's vigor was unexpectedly replenished in a short span of time.
The green light flared from the mask once more as he resumed excavating the rift hollow.
"Having received Senior Xing's inheritance, my lifespan limit has increased substantially—a grace tantamount to rebirth. Using this remnant body of mine to complete the subterranean river should be more than enough.
"After all, before Senior Xing passed away, he had already driven the subterranean river across the vast majority of the Star Sea. All I need to do is add a few more bricks and tiles..."
Xu Ke rambled on, seemingly explaining to Li Fan and Mo Rubin, or perhaps more likely trying to convince himself.
His hands never stopped moving as the green light carved out the path ahead.
He was completely engrossed and tireless.
Li Fan did not care whether continuing to excavate the subterranean river was Xu Ke's own will or an urge influenced by Xing Wuque's inheritance. To him, there was no difference between the two.
What caught Li Fan's attention more was the method Xu Ke used to carve out the rift hollows from nothingness with that green light.
The rift hollows were still situated within the Star Sea, yet they formed the lowest point of Momentum.
Currently, with his Ascent Array, Li Fan was able to continually elevate his own Momentum. But as for causing Momentum to plummet, he lacked any good method.
Li Fan faintly sensed that high and low Momentum were actually two sides of the same coin. Comprehending only one side was bound to be incomplete.
If he could fathom the method of excavating the rifts, he would be able to advance a step further in his understanding of Momentum.
Xu Ke appeared to be carving forward, but in truth, he was excavating and bombarding the Star Sea to create a low point of Momentum that had not originally existed.
In essence, it was the exact same nature as the natural high plateaus in the Great Wall of Remnant Worlds—differing only in the height of their Momentum.
"It relies primarily on the green light surging from that mask.
"This mask..." After observing for a while, Li Fan already understood.
To cast the Ascent Array, he needed to use the flesh and blood of a True Immortal as an auxiliary material.
And Xing Wuque's mask played a role similar to True Immortal flesh and blood.
"It's not just an immortal artifact; it also contains another exceptionally peculiar power."
Staring at the eerie green glow on Xu Ke's face, Li Fan, for some inexplicable reason, felt an uncanny sense of familiarity.
This familiarity flashed by in an instant. When he tried to trace and identify it, he found himself utterly without a lead, as though it had been merely an illusion from start to finish.
Yet Li Fan would not give up on this flash of inspiration so easily.
Scenes from everything he had witnessed in the past flashed by rapidly, constantly surfacing and being compared in his mind.
The more reincarnations he went through, the richer and more convoluted his experiences became, and the greater the strain he faced when retracing the past.
As time ticked away, that lingering sense of familiarity was also fading with extreme speed. To successfully pinpoint the target, Li Fan pushed the Dao Transformation Stone's processing power to its absolute limit.
Beads of sweat faintly trickled down his forehead, and fine fissures even began to surface on the Dao Transformation Stone. Under Li Fan's deliberate control, boundless soul power surged into it to mend and repair the cracks, even serving as fuel to be consumed.
Perhaps it was Li Fan's good fortune, or perhaps pushing the Dao Transformation Stone to its absolute limit helped.
Finally, right before that sudden sense of familiarity vanished completely, Li Fan located its origin among his countless past experiences.
"With the remains left behind by the First Great Heavenly Venerable as our aegis, and detonating those few immortal artifacts for propulsion, our combined strength has a tremendous chance of breaching the High Wall!
"We have prepared for so long—how could you suddenly change your mind?!"
Even across such a long time, Li Fan could still feel the endless resentment carried by the voice's owner.
It was precisely...
The scene that would unfold after making the same choice as Su Bai had in the past during the Fallen Immortal Realm's trial to become the Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerable!
The Fallen Immortal Realm was illusory yet true as life.
Everything that took place within the Fallen Immortal Realm was both illusion and reality.
When that split consciousness of the Xuanhuang Heavenly Dao roared in interrogation, Li Fan, occupying the role of "Su Bai" within the illusion, had experienced an inexplicable sensation at that very moment.
The so-called remains left by the First Great Heavenly Venerable...
truly existed.
In fact, at the point in time recorded by the illusion, the First Great Heavenly Venerable's remains had been on Su Bai's person.
Thus, when he experienced it once more in the illusion, Li Fan was able to sense their distinct aura through "Su Bai's" body.
When he first felt it, Li Fan had lacked the frame of reference to conceptualize it. For this reason, across all this time, he had never realized its presence; the Dao Transformation Stone had simply recorded it all in silence.
Returning to the present, once Li Fan carefully sensed the mask left behind by Xing Wuque, that familiar aura finally stirred his perception awake.
"A relic of the First Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerable?"
That was the first thought that sprang into Li Fan's mind.
Yet very quickly, he realized something was amiss.
"The similarity in aura does not stem from belonging to the same person.
"Rather, their natures share the same source."
He felt a slight pang of regret, but soon began pondering what this shared nature could possibly be.
Li Fan's unusual demeanor naturally caught Mo Rubin's attention.
"Did Fellow Daoist also encounter Xing Wuque before?"
"I never met him. I was merely marveling that there could exist in this world someone so..."
Li Fan paused slightly before settling on the word "stubborn" to describe him.
Mo Rubin gave a wry smile. "More than stubborn—it is downright foolish, utterly senseless. Not to mention you, even as a fellow Dharma King of the Xuantian Sect, I could never have imagined he would go to such lengths."
Mo Rubin's tone suddenly grew somewhat dejected.
"Perhaps that is why Big Brother Xuanyuan entrusted this matter to him back then. Were it me, or any of the other Twelve Dharma Kings, none of us could have done what Xing Wuque did.
"It's not that we lacked Xing Wuque's loyalty. But after Big Brother Xuanyuan vanished, to not go looking for him, and instead stay here in this depression's subterranean river, carrying out the mission day after day for ten thousand years..." Mo Rubin shook his head repeatedly.
"Xu Ke's temperament is actually quite similar to Xing Wuque's. Now that he has inherited this mission and chosen to continue opening up the unfinished subterranean river, I cannot dissuade him either. However, Fellow Daoist Mo, do you know of any other deeper purpose behind these rift rivers?" As Li Fan pondered the shared nature, he fixed a piercing gaze on Mo Rubin and pressed for answers.
"If it were merely intended to accumulate vitality for the Star Sea's revival, there would be no need to cover the entire Star Sea completely. Even covering just under half of the Star Sea would achieve that goal.
"A fraction and the entirety are vastly different in terms of workload. What kind of person was King Xuantian? He would never make such a blunder. Just as Xing Wuque said, King Xuantian's instructions must have had a purpose. What on earth could that purpose be?"
Mo Rubin narrowed his eyes, his gaze sweeping over the subterranean rift river.
Stumped by Li Fan's question, he was momentarily at a loss for words.
Li Fan chuckled softly. "It couldn't be that King Xuantian made a mistake when giving Xing Wuque the task, could it?"
"That is naturally impossible!" Mo Rubin firmly shook his head in denial.
Frowning deeply, he could not formulate an explanation either.
When they asked Xu Ke, Xu Ke only said that regarding King Xuantian's instructions, Xing Wuque had always executed them faithfully, never questioning the reason in his heart.
Mo Rubin fell silent.
"It should be... like an array formation that only takes form once fully laid out. Even if nine-tenths are complete, so long as it is not linked into a formation, it is useless.
"Yes, exactly, it must be so." After a long while, Mo Rubin finally offered a seemingly reasonable explanation.
Li Fan neither agreed nor disagreed. "Covering the entire Pitch-Black Star Sea—what a magnificent undertaking. If an array formation of such scale erupted, far from merely reviving the Star Sea, perhaps even overturning the High Wall would not be out of the question."
Though he spoke thus on the surface, inwardly, Li Fan did not agree with Mo Rubin's reasoning at all.
Li Fan believed that with his current mastery of formations, he was not far behind King Xuantian.
These subterranean rift rivers bore not the slightest trace of an array formation. How could he fail to notice that?
"Yet, while it is not an array, the principle may very well be the same.
"Only by achieving completeness can the condition be met and triggered."
Li Fan's thoughts focused slightly.
This feeling—of falling short of building a ninety-foot mound by a single basket of earth—was it not remarkably similar to when he cast the Ascent Array to climb toward the peak of Momentum?
Until one reached the ultimate point of ascending to immortality, no matter how high one climbed before, it was all in vain.
Only by thoroughly completing the final ascension process did everything done beforehand hold meaning.
"Ascent.
"Ascension."
Li Fan stood at the lowest depression in the Star Sea, yet his gaze seemed to instantly break free of all constraints.
The entire Pitch-Black Star Sea, encircled by the High Wall, presented itself before him as a miniature panorama.
"Could it be that what King Xuantian ultimately sought was the exact same plan I have in this lifetime?
"Except that I seek to propel the Xuanhuang Realm to sublimate and evolve into an immortal realm.
"Whereas King Xuantian...
"Was planning to directly sublimate the entire Star Sea?"
Even Li Fan himself felt an overwhelming sense of absurdity at this sudden thought.
Only by experiencing it firsthand could one truly know how immense the gulf between mortal and immortal was.
Carefully count what preparations Li Fan had made in this lifetime to foster the birth of an Immortal Xuanhuang:
The nourishing vitality contained in hundreds of remnant worlds; the explosive Reverberating Astral Force stored using the depressions;
the heritage of the Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerable, the immortal spiritual energy;
the return of numerous pocket worlds, the unity of myriad beings;
and even an intact fragment of the immortal realm crafted by an unknown True Immortal...
With so many elements layered together, even Li Fan could not guarantee with one hundred percent certainty that creating an Immortal Xuanhuang would succeed.
Compared to Xuanhuang, the Star Sea was simply on a completely different scale.
If one were truly to push the Star Sea to sublimate into an immortal realm...
The energy required would be utterly unimaginable!
Even with a supreme treasure like Trueness, which allowed Li Fan to repeatedly collect all available resources in the Star Sea again and again,
before his psychological lifespan was entirely exhausted, Li Fan could see no glimmer of hope for success.
"In the end, it is merely an unfounded fantasy of mine.
"Unless...
"King Xuantian saw something that I cannot yet see."
For some reason, Li Fan suddenly thought to himself.
"Brother Mo, do you plan to stay here and accompany Xu Ke?"
Silence lingered in the rift depression for a long while before Li Fan finally broke it.
Mo Rubin withdrew his gaze from Xu Ke's steadfast back and remained silent for a long time.
"We have already tried every possible method," Li Fan sighed softly. "Though I am reluctant to admit it, as things stand, King Xuantian has most likely vanished into that bizarre pool of water.
"He no longer exists in the present Pitch-Black Star Sea.
"Even though King Xuantian is gone, I will never sit idly by and wait for death. However, saving the Xuanhuang Realm from here on out will rest entirely on our own shoulders."
Mo Rubin, however, remained optimistic. "Since Big Brother Xuanyuan laid down such contingency plans, he wouldn't meet with mishap so easily. I believe the crux still lies in that strange pool of water.
"I need to return to Xuanhuang and continue studying it."
Li Fan nodded slightly and looked back at Xu Ke.
"Rest assured regarding Xu Ke. I will arrange for people to come here periodically to tend to him and ensure he stays in good enough condition to carry out this endless excavation," Li Fan said in a deep voice.
"You heard him earlier—Xu Ke addresses me as 'Saint Teacher.'
"It was merely that while seeking to save Xuanhuang, I happened to rescue a few children and taught them along the way. In truth, I hardly deserve the title of 'Saint Teacher.' It must seem quite laughable to Brother Mo," Li Fan remarked casually.
Mo Rubin nodded, paying little mind to the matter.
Under Mo Rubin's urging, Li Fan first escorted him back to the Xuanhuang Realm.
Standing by the fishing pond, Mo Rubin resumed his meticulous pondering and study.
It appeared that although Xing Wuque had passed away, the traces he had left behind gave Mo Rubin tremendous encouragement.
King Xuantian truly was a man of immense charisma.
Someone labored ten thousand years for him, struggling tirelessly unto death. Someone else remains forever blindly confident in him.
Li Fan sneered inwardly, openly setting up an immortal array for defense beside the fishing pond.
Ostensibly, it was to prevent outsiders from disturbing Mo Rubin's comprehension of the pool's secrets.
In truth, the array's real purpose was to suppress Mo Rubin at a critical juncture!
In this life, during Xuanhuang's sublimation, nothing could be permitted to be reeled up from the fishing pond.
Mo Rubin was unlikely to discover the fishing pond's secret anytime soon.
Li Fan continued to contemplate that similarity in shared nature.
An instinct in the dark told him that this point of similarity between Xing Wuque's mask and the First Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerable concealed an enormous secret.
Li Fan returned to the Daxuan pocket world. Looking at the myriad living beings within the world, he sank into deep contemplation,
even temporarily casting aside the task of fusing the immortal realm fragments.
Suns rose and moons set; in the blink of an eye, three months slipped by.
Li Fan still had nothing to show for his efforts.
Just as he shook his head, preparing to give up, his gaze suddenly fell upon the clouds and mist rising within the pocket world.
"Cloud, mist, rain, ice. They are merely different forms of water.
"This is what is meant by similarity in shared nature.
"And..."
Li Fan's persistently furrowed brows suddenly relaxed.
"I shouldn't be looking for how the bronze mask resembles the First Great Heavenly Venerable.
"Instead, I should be looking for how the First Great Heavenly Venerable resembles the bronze mask.
"The bronze mask's function is to excavate the subterranean rift river at the low point of Momentum. In contrast to ascending, it descends Momentum.
"Therefore..."
Li Fan's thoughts cleared up in an instant, everything suddenly falling into place.
"The First Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerable was the same.
"Descending Momentum...
"From immortal, descending Momentum to mortal!"
Chapter 1370