The object connected to the golden chains was shrouded in hazy radiance.
Its details could not be seen clearly.
Yet this orb of light was unequivocally a colossal monstrosity.
Judging from the comparison in scale between it and Chuanfa, it was nearly the size of half a province in the Xuanhuang Realm!
Yet Chuanfa dragged this massive entity seemingly without the slightest strain.
Not a ripple of emotion stirred upon his face, which was cold as ten-thousand-year-old ice.
Towing the immense cluster of light behind him, Chuanfa was like a comet flying in reverse.
He sped swiftly through the endless dark void.
After a brief moment, he vanished entirely from view.
...
The imagery of the Water Mirror Technique ended here, but Han Zhong did not stop speaking.
"What I just depicted was only one of the scenes I witnessed during the long years of my entrapment."
"In fact, I saw the Dharma-Transmitting Heavenly Venerable himself more than once."
As Han Zhong spoke, he cast the Water Mirror Technique repeatedly.
In an instant, more than a dozen light screens sprang into view before Li Fan.
The scenes displayed on each light screen were remarkably similar, yet subtly different.
In all of them, Chuanfa was hauling an orb of light behind him with golden chains.
The only difference lay in the sizes of the light clusters.
"These images are all too alike."
"So much so that I even began to wonder whether despair had driven me to hallucinate."
Han Zhong also looked upon the scenes he had manifested, his face marked with doubt.
Li Fan, however, knew very well that this could not possibly be a hallucination.
The Dharma-Transmitting Heavenly Venerable could have been imagined based on stone statues seen in the past.
Yet the golden chains behind Chuanfa...
Given Han Zhong's mere Golden Core stage cultivation and limited worldly knowledge, he could never have conjured them out of thin air unless he had witnessed them with his own eyes!
For Li Fan had seen chains of this very sort before.
They were none other than the golden chains of the Grand Star-Crossing Array from the memories of Ji Yuzhen, a Dharma King of the Profound Heaven Sect!
The Grand Star-Crossing Array could use these golden chains to ensnare grotto-heavens and pocket worlds.
Naturally, Li Fan arrived at a logical deduction.
"What Chuanfa is dragging behind him... are other worlds?"
"Did he leave Xuanhuang and traverse the Pitch-Black Star Sea just to scour everywhere for remaining cultivation worlds?"
In an instant, countless thoughts surged through Li Fan's mind.
"What is the purpose of doing this?"
"Where are these cultivation worlds located now?"
"Could it be..."
"Controlling the Xuanhuang Realm alone wasn't enough for Chuanfa, so he wants to devour even more cultivation worlds to take another step forward?"
"To break through to the realm of a True Immortal?!"
Synthesizing this with the intelligence recently gathered on the Profound Heaven Sect, Li Fan deduced what seemed to be the most plausible conclusion.
Just as Li Fan remained silent, pondering in secret, Han Zhong noticed his prolonged quiet and assumed Li Fan also believed he had fallen prey to hallucinations born of prolonged despair.
After hesitating for a moment, he added, "Actually, besides the Dharma-Transmitting Heavenly Venerable himself, I also saw another person."
"I had never seen that person before. And they only appeared once..."
"That's also why I think everything I saw might not have been a delusion."
With that, Han Zhong cast the Water Mirror Technique once more.
And the image that surfaced upon it gave Li Fan a massive shock!
For speeding through the void was none other than one of Li Fan's lingering psychological nightmares.
The Heavenly Physician!
The Heavenly Physician flew through the darkness, draped in a pure, holy white radiance.
Unlike Chuanfa, he dragged nothing behind him with golden chains.
He merely paused and resumed flight intermittently, pinching his fingers as if divining something.
Once he had successfully discerned the direction, he hurried off once more.
"The Heavenly Physician can break free of the Immortal Ruins' pull as well?"
"How is that possible?"
The moment he laid eyes on the Heavenly Physician, this thought flooded Li Fan's mind.
Shaken to his core, he swiftly darted a glance at Han Zhong.
He even began to wonder whether this was an elaborate ruse concocted by Han Zhong specifically to target him.
Though the Heavenly Physician's true strength remained unknown, Li Fan had never dared underestimate him in his heart.
Even though he could now be considered undefeated beneath the Longevity realm, he still wouldn't dare claim he could come out on top against the Heavenly Physician.
The Heavenly Physician's identity was shrouded in supreme mystery.
He was able to post tasks through the Heavenly Profound Mirror.
Yet aside from that task regarding the Cloud Water Chart and Talismans, Li Fan had never been able to find the slightest trace of him within the Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals across all his reincarnations.
It was as if, although he belonged to the Alliance, his circumstances differed from those of ordinary cultivators.
Much like Di Sanmo, he seemed to hold a role akin to a "guest elder," never showing his face under normal circumstances.
And the Heavenly Physician's abilities were formidable beyond measure.
That secret art of "Looking, Listening, Questioning, and Feeling the Pulse," which could peer into a cultivator's inner heart, was something Li Fan had never seen in any other cultivator.
Yet even though he had estimated the Heavenly Physician's true cultivation as high as he possibly could, Li Fan had never imagined that the Heavenly Physician could ignore the shackles of the Immortal Ruins just like Chuanfa.
To leave the Xuanhuang Realm and roam the Pitch-Black Star Sea!
"To be able to accomplish something that even Longevity realm experts cannot do..."
"Just what..."
Li Fan's heart churned with immense shock.
Yet soon, he calmed down.
"No. This does not necessarily prove that the Heavenly Physician's strength surpasses the Longevity realm."
"As mighty as the Longevity realm is, the price they pay is being deeply bound to the Xuanhuang Realm."
"Unless they achieve transcendence like Chuanfa, they can never leave the Xuanhuang Realm for the rest of their lives."
"Even without the Immortal Ruins, the same holds true."
"Nor does this mean Longevity realm cultivators are unable to resist the pull of the Immortal Ruins."
"As for the Heavenly Physician, he has not attained Longevity. Perhaps that is precisely why he can leave the Xuanhuang Realm and come and go freely."
...
Having slowly reasoned it through, Li Fan's mindset gradually steadied.
Meanwhile, Han Zhong, who had been watching his expressions, was unable to glimpse the shifts within Li Fan's mind.
Li Fan's unchanging countenance gave him no clue to guess at.
Thus, he continued his account with a touch of regret: "Aside from the scenes I just described, I never saw anything else."
"I don't know how long I stayed inside that invisible bubble. For the vast majority of the time, I faced absolute darkness."
"I almost admire myself for not going mad because of it."
"What's more, I discovered that inside that bubble, I didn't even show signs of aging."
"Originally, I thought that if I had to suffer such claustrophobic torment forever, it would be better to end my own life."
"Then, not long ago, for reasons unknown, the bubble seemed to encounter something."
"It shrank amid constant tremors..."
"I thought I was dead for sure," Han Zhong said with lingering relief. "To my surprise, before the bubble completely collapsed, with a loud bang, I was suddenly back in the Xuanhuang Realm."
"Of course, when I saw that boundless plain, I didn't know it was Jiushan Province. It was only after running into cultivators from the Alliance of Ten Thousand Immortals and asking around that I figured it out."
Han Zhong recounted his bizarre adventure in full detail.
While Li Fan was still lost in thought, he suddenly heard Han Zhong speak in a voice filled with shock: "You are..."
Yet it was not addressed to Li Fan.
Startled, Li Fan looked back and discovered that, at some unknown moment, a figure had quietly appeared in the room!
It was none other than...
The Heavenly Physician!
Chapter 910