"Very likely. And very reasonable." Li Fan pondered for a long time before slowly nodding.
This conclusion resolved a question that had puzzled him for ages.
When the Immortal Ruins first appeared, why hadn't it devoured the Xuanhuang Realm immediately?
Why did the cultivators within have enough time to continuously capture the surrounding grotto-heavens and pocket worlds to resist it?
Judging by the terrifying suction exerted by the Immortal Ruins now, the original Xuanhuang Realm alone could never have resisted it.
Moreover, capturing pocket worlds was by no means the work of a single day. The countless surrounding worlds tethered to it were undoubtedly the tireless result of thousands of years of effort by the Profound Heaven Sect and the Ten Sects of the Immortal Dao.
All of this proved that the suction of the Immortal Ruins grew stronger by the day.
As for why the pull grew increasingly powerful...
It was very likely because the Xuanhuang Realm was being drawn closer and closer to the Immortal Ruins.
In an instant, an image formed in Li Fan's mind.
Upon an endless Void Sea, numerous cultivation worlds drifted like ships.
Then, one day, above the Void Sea, a black hole known as the Immortal Ruins appeared.
Its immense suction steadily devoured everything around it, forming a colossal vortex.
Under its influence, the cultivation worlds across the Void Sea were dragged toward the Immortal Ruins, helpless to resist.
At first, because the shifts were minute, the inhabitants of the various cultivation worlds noticed nothing amiss.
Only when their speed of descent accelerated did they realize something was terribly wrong.
Driven by the desperate survival instinct of drowning men clutching at anything within reach, the cultivators of the Xuanhuang Realm began using "ropes" to tether themselves to the relatively stationary "reefs" in the distant Void Sea—the various grotto-heavens and pocket worlds—hoping to stall their descent into oblivion.
Granted, throughout this process, there was no shortage of cultivators who wished to jump ship and flee on their own to seek new vessels.
Yet if everyone did so, the Xuanhuang Realm would only sink that much faster.
Thus, to prevent such a panic, the helmsmen of the Xuanhuang Realm—be it the Profound Heaven Sect, the Ten Sects of the Immortal Dao, or even the present Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals and Five Elders Association—unanimously chose to keep the realm's true predicament an absolute secret.
They had originally believed that, through the resistance offered by these ropes, they could slowly haul the Xuanhuang Realm out of the vortex.
Reality had proven them wrong.
"The 'weight' of cultivators is probably tied to these ropes. Originally, our world was directly connected to those grotto-heaven realms, but once cultivators plundered the heaven and earth, they became part of that binding tether."
"If many die suddenly, it's equivalent to several strands of a rope abruptly snapping away."
"Even though a cultivator's death means returning the Dao to heaven and their grotto-heaven merges back into the world, heaven and earth still require time to mend the rope."
"As long as cultivators fall at a normal rate, it causes no major harm. But once it exceeds a certain threshold..."
Li Fan recalled his previous life, when Ji Hongdao faced Senior Sister Zhao in Tianling Province and used the Heavenly Profound Spirit-Locking Formation to instantly slaughter an entire province of cultivators as a mutual-destruction deterrent.
In the instant so many lives were snuffed out, even the entire Xuanhuang Realm had shuddered faintly.
"Those subordinate grotto-heavens and pocket worlds are vital to the Xuanhuang Realm's survival. Those so-called ropes cannot be cut easily."
"Otherwise, cultivators would surely have fled along the Immortal Severing Passage into the pocket worlds and severed their connection to the Xuanhuang Realm."
"It isn't that they didn't want to, but that they couldn't."
"Meanwhile, the Empire pocket world's deployment of a hundred thousand Realm-Rifting Whales to forge a path through the void isn't so much cutting the rope as it is lengthening it."
"Once the length extends far enough—once their distance from the Xuanhuang Realm is sufficient—then when the Xuanhuang Realm plunges into the Immortal Ruins and is ground to dust, the anchor on the other end of the rope will vanish. Perhaps they really will manage to escape alive."
"Unfortunately, that process takes far too long. The Xuanhuang Realm may not last that long."
Li Fan then had another thought: Since the Xuanhuang Realm could capture grotto-heavens and pocket worlds with ropes, why hadn't they tethered themselves to other cultivation worlds of comparable size farther away?
By all logic, a complete world would be far more effective than mere grotto-heavens.
"Perhaps they tried and failed."
"Or perhaps..."
"They simply couldn't pinpoint the others' locations."
Li Fan's heart stirred.
As fellow vessels sailing upon the Void Sea, other cultivation worlds certainly wouldn't want to be dragged down by worlds already caught in the pull of the Immortal Ruins.
Once they recognized the situation across the Void Sea, they would do everything to avoid being grabbed as lifelines.
In all likelihood, they would actively conceal their worlds.
Grotto-heavens and pocket worlds might lack the capability to do so, but highly developed cultivation worlds certainly could.
Or rather, any world unable to do so had likely already been swept up by falling worlds and dragged down toward the Immortal Ruins.
Furthermore, the presence of the Immortal Ruins had more or less affected the entire Void Sea, causing the relative positions of all cultivation worlds to drift.
The beacons originally used for navigation had all been rendered useless.
Trying to track down other hidden cultivation worlds would be nigh impossible.
This could explain why the Xuanhuang Realm had suddenly lost contact with every other cultivation world back then.
"The once-brilliant Void Sea plunged into pitch-black darkness in an instant. Every world, aside from fearing being devoured by the Immortal Ruins, had to conceal itself to prevent detection by other cultivation worlds."
"What a despairing scene to contemplate."
Yet even as the thought crossed his mind, Li Fan felt little fear.
A faint, inscrutable smile even crept onto his face.
With True Reversion, finding a path to survival among millions of possibilities would never be difficult.
Besides, since the remains of a True Immortal could preserve an intact body within the Immortal Ruins, falling into them did not necessarily mean certain death.
Failing to survive was merely a matter of lacking sufficient power.
***
After a long silence, Li Fan looked up, his gaze piercing through the transparent walls of the Medicine King Cauldron toward the vault of heaven.
"Whether my deduction is correct is actually quite easy to verify."
"I need only fly out of the Xuanhuang Realm again and face the Immortal Ruins in person."
"Thousands of years ago, Liu Ruchen piloted the Medicine King Cauldron through the void for a time before being caught in the pull of the Immortal Ruins."
"So much time has passed since then. The moment one leaves the Xuanhuang Realm and loses its protection, one will probably plunge straight toward the ruins, leaving scarcely any time to react."
"In fact, as we draw closer to the Immortal Ruins, perhaps one day we will be able to look up at the sky and see its remnants with crystal clarity, along with the remains of the True Immortal standing silently within."
Li Fan extended his left hand, summoning the control core of the Medicine King Cauldron.
"Before I revert in this life, I might as well put this leftover tool to use."
"To see what lies out there."
His thoughts surged, and only after a long while did Li Fan put away the diamond-shaped crystal.
"Now that I hold complete authority over the Medicine King Cauldron, the lives of everyone sleeping in the Medicine King Sect hang upon a single thought of mine."
"Among those still alive, there are six at Dao Integration, twenty-three at Soul Formation, and a number of Nascent Soul cultivators and below."
"Aside from these cultivators, the greatest gain from this endeavor is learning of that hidden secret realm."
"The Valley of Longevity."
"I wonder if it still exists after several thousand years."
Chapter 609