In a single thought, another Xuanhuang Realm was reflected as though in a mirror.
The First Venerable even saw his own shadow within it.
Though that shadow lacked the true essence of an immortal, it was nonetheless real and tangible—the mortal self he had once been.
Such immense power left even the First Venerable, a True Immortal, deeply shaken.
...
The final scene in the residual memories of the First Venerable's immortal body was the moment he executed the method of separating immortal and mortal.
Looking at his reflection ahead, mixed emotions welled within him.
In the end, all of it turned into relief.
"There was good reason for all those fellow immortals to flee. Emperor Tianluo's plan has reached its most frenzied peak. I can sense that the day the Dao Annihilation Tribulation erupts on a massive scale draws closer. If this immortal body remains, even in the lower realm, it will inevitably draw Dao Annihilation down upon me. Only by casting off my immortal shell can there be a glimmer of hope..."
The First Venerable pondered in silence. Bidding farewell to his past self, he plunged into the mortal vessel.
"I truly hope that one day, I may still return."
This was the First Venerable's final thought as he transformed from immortal to mortal.
...
Li Fan withdrew from the First Venerable's memories.
Evidently, the First Venerable had failed to fulfill his cherished wish.
Once the heavens collapsed, how could reversing it ever be simple?
"The decisive factor was still the Three Sages' abandonment."
"Because it had nothing to do with the endgame, even if the Three Sages had the power to save it, they would not 'waste' their strength on such a trivial matter. Those powerful figures who could not leap beyond the Primordial Possibility were left with no choice but to save themselves—or simply depart."
Li Fan shook his head slightly. "Speaking of which, who knows what Emperor Tianluo's plan truly was? To completely resolve the Dao Annihilation Tribulation, and have the entire Immortal Realm transcend..."
Previously, Li Fan could not conceive of a feasible method even in his wildest thoughts.
Yet after reading the complete Mountain and Sea Fables, Li Fan had found a possibility.
Born of the sea, standing upon the mountain—thus one could transcend the mountains and seas.
If this theory held true, then as long as one could find a Mountain and Sea Great Dao like Longevity or Revert to the True and merge it with the Immortal Realm, it might allow the whole realm to transcend beyond the mountains and seas.
Naturally, it would no longer be plagued by the Dao Annihilation Tribulation.
Yet this remained mere theory.
Beyond the mountains and seas, another great terror seemed to lurk. The fate of the first creature in the fable who linked sea to mountain—what befell it after uniting the Daos of mountain and sea and gazing beyond—proved the immense danger involved.
"Even if it succeeds, the outcome might be no better than being swallowed by the Dao Annihilation Tribulation."
Li Fan remained somewhat curious about the ultimate fates of Emperor Tianluo and the Immortal Realm. Regrettably, at this point in time, everything was already set in stone and impossible to investigate.
"Perhaps swimming further upstream along the Long River of Time would reveal more clues, but it holds little meaning."
Li Fan collected his thoughts, focused his gaze on the First Venerable's immortal body before him, and stimulated its consciousness.
The First Venerable opened his eyes. After a fleeting moment of confusion, he quickly grasped the situation and bowed to Li Fan.
Using the First Venerable's body, Li Fan observed the state of the Dao Annihilation Tribulation outside the Xuanhuang Realm.
"Mm, it is considerably more stable than it will be ten thousand years from now."
"The total collapse the First Venerable feared before turning mortal did not come to pass. It must be because the bones of the previous Hunger Immortal, buried beneath the Immortal Ruins, are silently holding things up."
After observing for a while, Li Fan retracted his gaze.
For now, he had no intention of provoking the Hunger Immortal.
In the past, he could act with reckless abandon, wiping out the world at the slightest provocation, backed by Revert to the True. But not now.
With this immortal body and the aid of immortal arrays, capturing the Hunger Immortal should pose little problem.
However, Li Fan could not guarantee he could protect the Xuanhuang Realm while the two clashed.
If Xuanhuang were damaged, the anchors he had painstakingly established across this stretch of space-time would all be ruined. At that point, never mind capturing the Hunger Immortal—even his own survival would be in jeopardy.
"Lingering beside the Immortal Ruins is simply too dangerous."
"Next, I must find a way to safely relocate the Xuanhuang Realm."
Li Fan already had experience in this regard, and after brief consideration, a plan took shape in his mind.
"In this era, the Ten Sects still hold a degree of dominance. Trivial matters can largely be delegated to them."
"However, before that..."
With a thought, Li Fan instantly assumed control of the First Venerable's immortal body.
With a flash of his silhouette, he exited the space within the Root of Heaven and Earth and arrived beside the hill where the fishing pool was located.
Standing in midair, he peered down into the depths below.
"Ruomu's life force is still sustaining it."
"Does that mean an Emperor Taitian still exists here?"
Li Fan's gaze narrowed. Taking full precautions, he slowly stepped into the subterranean village.
It was virtually identical to what he had seen ten thousand years later.
It was as if time stood frozen in this small hamlet.
Yet when Li Fan followed his memory to the painting where Emperor Taitian had hidden, his steps halted abruptly.
The painting was still the same painting.
The young King Xuantian, his childhood sweetheart, and the many children of the mountain village were all present within it.
Only the resting old man was missing!
"Gone." For a fleeting moment, Li Fan felt a sense of hollow loss, mingled with a faint trace of relief.
The spot where Emperor Taitian had lain was utterly empty.
Even the counter-current boat had vanished.
Yet the vitality drawn and channeled by King Xuantian's secret art continued tirelessly nourishing the scroll.
Without Emperor Taitian, all the life force was absorbed by the painting alone.
As a result, a rather wondrous transformation took place within the scroll. Li Fan seemed to hear the faint sounds of Xuanyuan Hong playing with his childhood sweetheart long ago.
The two children in the painting even appeared to notice Li Fan approaching outside the canvas.
They slowly turned their gazes toward him.
Witnessing such an eerie scene, Li Fan could not help thinking of the fate that befell Xuanyuan Hong's descendants.
After a moment of contemplation, Li Fan temporarily put the scroll away.
Cutting off the prying eyes within the painting, he turned his thoughts to Emperor Taitian's disappearance.
"It seems that once one masters the Dao of Counter-Current and travels upstream along the Long River of Time, no matter where along the river one falls, one's existence at all other temporal nodes vanishes as well."
It seemed somewhat difficult to fathom.
Yet when Li Fan recalled his own experiences traversing the Long River of Time, understanding gradually dawned on him.
"Originally, I was merely a droplet of water in the river, drifting helplessly with the current."
"Yet once I gained the ability to move against the flow and traveled upstream along the river, I formed a line within it."
"That line is my complete form now. In a sense, I have become a lifeform akin to the Long River of Time itself."
"Only, my primary consciousness is trapped in this particular span of the river's space-time, unable to perceive what befalls other parts of my body. It is as if my five senses are sealed."
"This is because my mastery of the Dao of Counter-Current has only just begun. If I reach great attainment in this Dao, I should be able to leap above the river, with all my experiences throughout its length laid bare to my mind..."
As Li Fan stood motionless where Emperor Taitian had vanished, a cascade of insights surfaced in his mind.
The shattered counter-current boat within his body began a slow recovery.
Though the pace of repair was sluggish, compared to its prior complete inability to self-mend, it was already a qualitative leap.
"Generally speaking, once one grasps the Dao of Counter-Current, ordinary methods cannot kill them."
"What dies is merely a single droplet in the river. As long as the river endures and the droplets form a line, one is undying and indestructible."
"Unless the river's own scour assimilates one's self-awareness, the Dao Annihilation Tribulation swallows the entire span of space-time, or, like Emperor Taitian, one willingly forfeits their own life."
Only now did Li Fan realize what immense sacrifice Emperor Taitian had made to help him comprehend the Dao.
Indeed, because of excessive upstream travel, Emperor Taitian's body and soul had decayed, leaving only a lingering phantom clinging to life.
Yet that did not mean he lacked all chance of complete recovery.
He did not even need a Mountain and Sea Great Dao like Mound-Guarding Lord to intervene. All that was required was for the Long River of Time, severed and swallowed by the Dao Annihilation Tribulation, to flow freely once more.
Once the upstream "waters" cascaded down again, Emperor Taitian would instantly restore himself to his peak state from the preceding era.
Though this appeared even harder to achieve than having a Mountain and Sea Great Dao save him, in truth it was not.
For salvation did not require the entire Long River of Time to be connected—merely a link to the previous span of space-time.
Since Mound-Guarding Lord could cross the Void Realm of Eternal Silence, carrying Emperor Taitian's phantom to the preceding era would easily revive him.
In any case, the backward spark-passing rescue plan was ongoing; doing so would have been purely incidental along the way.
Even if no one were willing to help, Emperor Taitian needed to do nothing at all. He simply had to endure patiently and wait.
Wait until the day the Long River of Time was reconnected.
From a broader perspective, the ultimate fate of the mortal world of mountains and seas came down to two possibilities:
Either completely merge into the mountains and seas and be swallowed by the Dao Annihilation Tribulation;
Or the living beings within would succeed in saving themselves through their sparks.
If the former, everyone met the same end anyway, and death was simply death. If the latter, Emperor Taitian would naturally be revived.
"Emperor Taitian certainly understood this. Yet he deliberately threw that chance away."
Li Fan narrowed his eyes, recalling Emperor Taitian's words of enlightenment before his disappearance.
"Clinging to life here holds little meaning. Today, I might as well pass all my insights into the Dao of Counter-Current to you!"
"If one day you can journey to the Void Realm of Eternal Silence in my stead to lend a hand, my sacrifice today will not have been in vain!"
Emperor Taitian's resolute expression seemed vividly before his eyes.
Li Fan shook his head repeatedly. "Though he saved my life, it remains difficult to comprehend."
"To abandon the sole, yet utterly stable hope of survival just like that..."
"If the river is reconnected in the future, perhaps a new Emperor Taitian will emerge in another space-time. But the one who weathered endless cycles of turning back to save the world in this span of space-time will never return."
"This one showed me grace by imparting the Dao and saving my life. As for the others, that Emperor Taitian is not this Emperor Taitian."
"Perhaps across all of mountains and seas, the only method capable of restoring him is Revert to the True," Li Fan thought with a sudden stir in his heart.
Yet with his current comprehension of the transformation of true and false, restoring his own peak cultivation was difficult enough,
let alone conjuring an immortal emperor who had been utterly annihilated out of thin air.
Helpless, Li Fan temporarily abandoned the thought.
Solemnly sealing the subterranean village entirely with an immortal array, Li Fan left the underground and instinctively looked toward the nearby fishing pool.
At this point in time, no Daoist temple had been built beside the pool.
It was merely a solitary pool of water resting quietly in the mountains. No one would ever suspect that such an ordinary-looking body of water involved existence at the Nameless realm.
"Or perhaps beyond the Nameless realm."
"After all, Emperor Taitian referred to it as the Mountain and Sea Fishery."
Even while piloting the immortal body, Li Fan did not approach. He merely watched from a distance.
"Since it is the Mountain and Sea Fishery, the fishing pool connects to more than a single possibility. It was built cutting through the entirety of Mount Shangfang..."
"What a magnificent undertaking. The Angler Immortal behind this must be a powerhouse at least at the Transcendent realm. I wonder if he can cross the Void Realm of Eternal Silence like Mound-Guarding Lord."
Then Li Fan recalled that aside from the Stone Slab being suddenly sucked away when attempting to comprehend the Dao of fishing, King Xuantian also seemed to have vanished into this fishing pool.
"One with such 'leisure' to fish here should still reside within this span of space-time and has likely not reached the level where they can cross eternal silence. Even so, they are not someone I can afford to provoke right now."
A trace of wariness flickered in Li Fan's eyes.
Even with the protection of Revert to the True, Li Fan kept his distance from the fishing pool and the entity behind it, let alone now, when he had only a single plank of the counter-current boat for protection.
"No rush. Sooner or later, I will face this Angler Immortal."
Suppressing his swirling thoughts, Li Fan returned to the space within the Root of Heaven and Earth.
He handed the scroll to his true body.
His true body slowly unrolled the painting, and almost instantly, his eyes met those of the young King Xuantian in the portrait.
It was as if the other party had long anticipated someone outside the canvas.
Li Fan was not startled. Without Emperor Taitian inside, he was hardly going to be intimidated by a mere painting.
Ignoring the searching gaze of the young Xuanyuan Hong, Li Fan listened closely to the rustling sounds echoing in his ears.
"Indeed, it is identical to the demonic melody resembling a curse that I heard from the Xuanyuan bloodline before, only far clearer."
"Is King Xuantian trying to convey something through this method?"
If True Immortal seal characters inscribed the Dao through words,
then this demonic melody depicted the path through music.
Among those who painted the Dao with music in the Primordial Possibility, Li Fan had only ever seen the Archmage do so.
Most other True Immortals followed the path of the Dao-Inscribing Immortal.
"It seems this Dao of Profound Music might not originate from the Primordial Possibility, but from another possibility—the place where King Xuantian went after his disappearance."
"The Archmage studied under the Three Sages. Given that the Three Sages exist across many possibilities, that makes sense."
Li Fan attempted to decipher the melody transmitted by King Xuantian.
When the three Daos merged, his body had united with the mountains and seas.
Comprehending the Great Daos of the mountains and seas was now vastly easier for him than before.
Moreover, his natural comprehension had never been weak.
Before long, he arrived at a general outline.
Chapter 1547