Within the World-Crossing Mysterious Coffin, the chanting grew increasingly hurried.
An ethereal, otherworldly aura gradually enveloped the mysterious coffin.
The gap left by the coffin lid narrowed more and more. It seemed Qian Ruochang, inside the coffin, truly intended to emulate the Two Immortals Xi and Yi from before and escape this world!
The novice Immortal Hunters—likewise enchanted by the mysterious coffin and eager to seize the chance to fly inside—suddenly found themselves bound by the Dao Net, unable to move a muscle. They could only watch silently as events in the field seemed to spiral out of control.
Just as an inexplicable panic gripped the crowd, Dao Yuan was the first to step forward to steady their nerves. "Don't panic! Trust Boss Qian!"
Yet the truth was that aside from choosing to believe, they had no other choice.
Still, their trust appeared to be of no use.
The sealing of the coffin proceeded at a steady pace, until finally, under everyone's despairing gazes, it snapped completely shut.
In that instant, the mysterious coffin burst with dazzling, kaleidoscopic seven-colored light!
But...
The scene everyone anticipated—the coffin escaping the world and fleeing—did not occur.
Instead, the chanting came to an abrupt halt.
The seven-colored radiance seemed to freeze, hanging motionless.
This pocket of life within the Annihilation Lands plunged in an instant into an eerie, dead silence.
And then, the World-Crossing Mysterious Coffin gave a sudden, violent jolt.
*Thump! Thump! Thump!*
The commotion grew louder and louder. Every tremendous tremor felt as though it struck against the depths of their hearts, like a savage beast trapped inside, struggling with all its might to break free!
Just as everyone was at a loss, they suddenly noticed that the Dao Net's binding had quietly dissolved.
It was not by anyone's design; rather, nearly all the power within the local Dao Net had been mobilized, to the point where it could not spare even a shred of force to keep them restrained.
"Could this be... Immortal Wu has entered the coffin, and Boss Qian is fighting him hand-to-hand inside?" Jin Changyue was the first to react, crying out in shock.
"We didn't notice any sign of his movement at all? We're under the cover of the local Dao Net!"
"Damn it, Boss Qian is facing Immortal Wu alone. Won't he be in danger?"
The crowd exchanged glances.
They were both terrified by Immortal Wu's unfathomable strength and anxious over Qian Ruochang's predicament.
Yet there was nothing they could do.
No matter how boundless their heroic ambitions had been before setting out, now that they were truly confronted with a battle between True Immortals, they realized with stark clarity that without relying on the power of the Dao Net, a clash at this level was not something they could intervene in.
Moreover, the mysterious coffin was now sealed shut. Without knowing how to open it, even if they wished to join the fight, they had no way inside.
"Immortal Wu acts so stealthily that Boss Qian had to use himself as bait, forcing him out into the open with the coffin's impending closure and world-fleeing departure. Now that the lid is sealed, no matter how slippery Immortal Wu is, there's no way to heaven or door into the earth. So what we need to do is..."
After a moment of thought, everyone quickly realized.
"Quick! Transport this coffin back to Immortal Hunt headquarters!"
Even with the entire local Dao Net suppressing it, this mysterious coffin—once bait, now a cage—shuddered with mounting violence.
Even from a distance, the onlookers felt their hearts pound in terror, dreading that the trapped Immortal Wu might burst out at any second.
"This place is far from the Shuoxing Sea. Relying on ordinary flight to rush back won't be in time. Stabilize the local Dao Net and re-establish the connection with the Shuoxing Sea's Dao Net!" A consensus was reached quickly.
After training together for so long, they shared some tacit understanding after all.
Without needing a commander, command after command flew out, gradually stabilizing the local Dao Net that had been teetering on the brink of collapse amidst the battle of True Immortals.
The next step was to reconnect the local Dao Net back into the main Dao Net.
Though the Dao string that previously linked the two had been severed, this location was not terribly far from the boundary of the Dao Net. It would only take one person flying at top speed to serve as a medium and re-establish the link smoothly.
"I'll go!"
Now was no time for polite deference, so Jin Changyue spoke in a grim voice.
She reopened her triple-pupiled eyes.
Perhaps from being used too frequently in a short span, the strange eyes were still laced with blood, resembling crimson cobwebs—an eerie sight. Two pupils stared into the distance toward the objective, while the central pupil of nothingness looked bizarrely all around.
Sword light flared like a rainbow. Before Jin Changyue's voice had finished fading, she had already vanished from everyone's sight.
Yet her next sentence only then drifted back, as if arriving late:
"The headcount... something's wrong with the number of people!"
Everyone froze, then turned to look at one another.
A few breaths later, a spine-chilling cold crept into their hearts.
There had been twenty-eight novice Immortal Hunters on this expedition.
Excluding Jin Changyue who had just departed, and Feng Zengyuan who had died earlier during the True Immortal dissection, there should have been twenty-six remaining.
Yet currently, only twenty-five people were present!
Crucially, after racking their memories and checking among themselves, they could not even recall the name or details of the inexplicably missing person!
It was as though that person had never existed in this world from the very beginning.
In unison, their gazes turned toward the World-Crossing Mysterious Coffin.
An utterly terrifying thought surfaced in their minds: *Was Immortal Wu lurking among us all along?*
Li Fan's expression grew exceedingly solemn.
Even when searching his memories using the miniature Dao Net within his divine sense, he could recall only a vague silhouette, unable to pin down the person's identity.
Li Fan's thoughts raced. *Did he infiltrate the group from the very beginning, or replace someone along the way?*
*Regardless, if he already knew this was a trap, why would he plunge into the coffin at the final moment?*
Recalling the moment the World-Crossing Mysterious Coffin had erupted with dazzling seven-colored light, Li Fan fell into deep thought. *Qian Ruochang must have anticipated Immortal Wu's secret infiltration long ago.*
*Throwing himself into the coffin was an open scheme. If Immortal Wu hadn't shown himself at the end, Qian Ruochang probably truly would have used the coffin to escape the world, just like the Two Immortals Xi and Yi!*
*And seeing the chance to thoroughly escape disaster right before his eyes, Immortal Wu ultimately couldn't resist the temptation. Moreover, after lurking in close proximity and observing Qian Ruochang for some time, Immortal Wu perhaps believed that even if it were a trap, his own strength was sufficient to suppress Qian Ruochang. That was why he made a desperate gamble...* In his contemplation, Li Fan seemed to reconstruct the truth of the matter.
Yet soon, a new question presented itself before Li Fan.
*If so, Qian Ruochang was actually able to resist the allure of fleeing the world. The moment Immortal Wu appeared, he gave up his original objective and turned around to hunt Immortal Wu instead...*
*Is capturing this True Immortal more important to Qian Ruochang than escaping into seclusion?* Li Fan could not help but see Qian Ruochang in a new light.
As time ticked by, the clash within the mysterious coffin showed no sign of subsiding; rather, it grew fiercer and fiercer.
Qian Ruochang seemed inevitably forced into a disadvantage.
Even with everyone combining their strengths, they could no longer stabilize the local Dao Net.
Like duckweed in the wind, it seemed on the verge of being blown apart completely, torn away from the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth to which it clung.
Just as despair began to well up in their hearts, a flash of sword light flared in the darkness at the edge of the sky.
It was speeding toward them!
It was Jin Changyue's valiant, graceful figure.
Behind her, the crowd could faintly see a Dao string shimmering with crystalline white light.
Though the Dao string was as thin as a strand of silk, it remained heavier than heaven and earth. As Jin Changyue dragged it along, the burden was no lighter than carrying an entire world of cultivation on her back.
Even so, her flight speed did not diminish in the slightest, showing just how formidable her strength was.
Seeing Jin Changyue draw nearer and nearer, the reconnection of the Dao Net was in sight.
Yet for some reason, her speed abruptly slowed. The onlookers faintly saw that the eyelids of Jin Changyue's triple pupils were fluttering shut, upper and lower lids repeatedly brushing against each other.
"Oh no, Jin Changyue must have hit her limit! Quick, go meet her!"
The crowd gasped.
Dao Yuan and most of the others remained at their posts, struggling to stabilize the Dao Net.
Meanwhile, Jiang Yuming led three others to meet Jin Changyue and secure the Dao string upon which all their lives hung.
Jin Changyue seemed to have genuinely exhausted every ounce of her strength. Her flight through the dark void grew slower and slower until she came to a complete halt.
Her eyelids closed, and she appeared to fall directly into deep slumber!
Seeing this, Jiang Yuming grew anxious and accelerated toward her.
However...
Before reaching Jin Changyue's side, the four Immortal Hunters sent to assist also began flying slower and slower.
In the end, just like Jin Changyue, they quietly fell asleep.
The rhythm of commands issued by Dao Yuan and the remaining novice Immortal Hunters faltered in unison.
Though they did not know what was happening, an ominous premonition surged in all their hearts.
Before anyone could speak, an eerie, unfathomable power engulfed them.
It was as though every ounce of exhaustion accumulated since birth erupted all at once.
Many of the hunters collapsed into slumber instantly.
Even outstanding figures like Dao Yuan and Nangong Hongzhao could not hold out for long under such an intense onslaught of weariness.
Soon they drifted off into a heavy slumber, sinking into the Dream Paradise.
The "Ma Tiande" possessed by Li Fan was no exception.
Across the entire starry sky, aside from the violently shuddering mysterious coffin, not a single living thing stirred.
While the novice Immortal Hunters slept soundly, the clash between the two True Immortals within the mysterious coffin failed to produce a victor for the time being.
One day, two days...
When thirty days had passed, the occupants within the coffin seemed to finally notice that something might have gone amiss outside, or perhaps an outcome had finally been decided.
The commotion of the battle gradually died down.
Yet still, no one emerged from the coffin.
The World-Crossing Mysterious Coffin merely floated quietly in the void.
...
In the Xuanhuang Realm.
Li Fan observed the drifting mysterious coffin from afar through the power of dreams.
His intervention this time had come after deliberate consideration. He was even prepared to have his true self behind the scenes exposed and to trigger Revert to the True to flee for his life at a moment's notice.
Regardless of whether Immortal Wu, the target of the Immortal Hunt, was Immortal He Gan or not, the immortal was worth resolving or contacting for Li Fan.
Having infiltrated the Shuoxing Sea, he already possessed a preliminary understanding of the various factions there.
Yet regarding the True Immortals opposed to the Shuoxing Sea, Li Fan was still completely in the dark.
As for Li Fan's true self, aside from lacking immortal spiritual energy within his body, he was hardly any different from an "Immortal." He could be considered, however tenuously, part of the same camp.
If he could save Immortal Wu and pry some information from him, it would undoubtedly aid the advancement of Li Fan's plans.
However, Li Fan did not brazenly reveal himself to confront him directly.
Instead, he silently monitored the changes within the mysterious coffin.
Like a hunter waiting for prey to take the bait, he had plenty of patience.
The dead silence within the coffin lasted for a full seven days.
Still sensing no change in the outside world, whoever was inside the coffin seemed to lose their patience.
The sacred chanting rang out once more.
It seemed they intended to disregard whatever was happening outside and flee the world directly!
Yet the chanting did not last long.
In the void, an ethereal whisper suddenly arose in sync.
With a tone starkly different from the chanting, it caused subtle, delicate distortions in the song from the coffin.
The seven-colored radiance also appeared disrupted, flashing erratically without ever cohering into a unified whole.
The occupant inside the coffin did not give up.
After a brief pause, the colored light surged violently, and the volume of the chanting doubled.
Yet as the saying goes, "virtue rises a foot, but vice climbs a fathom." The illusory sounds from the surrounding Dream Paradise magnified by tens of times, completely overwhelming the chanting.
The seven-colored light retreated back into the mysterious coffin, with no further movement.
Having successfully disrupted the process, the whispers vanished without a trace, just as silently as they had arrived.
In this expanse of the void, once again only the solitary mysterious coffin remained, along with the quietly floating novice Immortal Hunters.
Li Fan had personally woven a sweet dream for them. Of course, out of caution—and inspired by the existence of the local Dao Net—this dream realm existed independently of the Xuanhuang Realm's Dream Paradise and could be discarded like a pawn at any time. Moreover, with the Great Wall acting as a barrier, it would leave no flaws or traces behind.
Gathering all the dream power developed outside the Great Wall during this period, combined with the demonic tone sourced from the bloodline memories of the Xuanyuan clan, he was indeed capable of interrupting the World-Crossing Mysterious Coffin's traversal.
Previously, Li Fan had utilized Archmage's Calamity-Averting Mysterious Tone to neutralize the effects of King Xuantian's demonic tone.
Thus, upon hearing that the chanting that activated the coffin bore some similarity to the Calamity-Averting Mysterious Tone, the idea had occurred to him.
Now put into practice, it indeed proved effective.
*It seems these two melodies of the Great Dao are, to some extent, diametrically opposed,* Li Fan mused to himself.
With the mysterious coffin trapped here, the Shuoxing Sea's Immortal Hunt did not sit idly by.
Evidently, Immortal Hunt headquarters was aware of Qian Ruochang's plan to some degree.
They had already dispatched people to the borders of the Dao Net to search for traces of the missing coffin and the hunters.
However, in order to fool Immortal Wu, Qian Ruochang clearly hadn't disclosed too much.
To the Shuoxing Sea, the Annihilation Lands remained an unknown expanse laden with peril.
Furthermore, since Li Fan had already severed the Dao string earlier, they would not be able to find their way here anytime soon.
"Let's see how much longer you two can hold out."
To capture Immortal Wu, the mysterious coffin had likely been tampered with so that it could only be opened from the outside. Unless one possessed strength formidable enough to shatter the coffin outright, there was no escaping the sealed vessel from within.
This was originally Qian Ruochang's virtually flawless hunting method.
Yet unexpectedly, it had now become the very leverage that gave Li Fan the confidence to intervene.
Chapter 1457