Intentions

Time flowed on. Core personnel from all across the Southern Domain arrived at the Heavenly Dao Sect one after another through teleportation formations, bustling about to prepare for Yaoguang's succession ceremony. Meanwhile, Yaoguang received numerous responses. Quite a few factions shared an outlook similar to the Taiyi Immortal Sect's, agreeing to part with a pinnacle Dao artifact-grade material to trade with Yaoguang. Furthermore, they all generously indicated that trading at standard market price would suffice. Even though this meant a potential price discrepancy of over a billion... ...at least it formed a bond of goodwill. Should they ever need to ask a favor of that mysterious Artifact Saint in the future, they would have a foot in the door. Naturally, there were also those drawn by the exorbitant prices he offered who were willing to sell their pinnacle Dao artifact materials. However... With plenty of factions eager to establish goodwill, Yaoguang grew selective toward those demanding high prices. Unless a material was of exceptional quality or could even serve as an auxiliary material for an immortal artifact, he barely gave it a second glance. ... "Nine pinnacle Dao artifact materials, two immortal artifact auxiliary materials... That will require an outlay of roughly fifty billion." Yaoguang calculated briefly. Fifty billion to acquire these materials... It was a bit of a loss. Yet considering other factions were fundamentally unwilling to put such materials up for sale, a premium of nearly twenty billion seemed only reasonable. "Aside from these nine pinnacle Dao artifact materials and two immortal artifact auxiliary materials, among the supplies Dao Lord Penglai previously gave me, there are two usable immortal artifact auxiliary materials and sixteen pinnacle Dao artifact materials I can use... As for the rest, unless I intend to forge Dao artifacts aligned with the Origin Great Daos, their affinity is too low." Yaoguang took a quick inventory. Counting the Guixu Profound Crystal, that made one primary immortal artifact material, four auxiliary immortal artifact materials, twenty-five primary pinnacle Dao artifact materials, and hundreds of auxiliary pinnacle Dao artifact materials... That was just about enough. "All that's missing is one more primary immortal artifact material... The Taiyi Immortal Sect possesses one, but they insist on speaking face-to-face with that 'mysterious Artifact Saint'..." This wariness was identical to the Heavenly Dao Sect's. Dao Lord Juntian of the Heavenly Dao Sect also wanted to speak with him. However, unlike the Heavenly Dao Sect, the one the Taiyi Immortal Sect sent to confer with him was not a Dao Lord, but a Void Shattering Artifact Saint! This... ...left room to maneuver. He dared not meet a Dao Lord, but a Void Shattering Artifact Saint... Certain Dao arts derived from the Grand Dao of Truth could keep Void Shattering cultivators who had yet to achieve Dao Integration tight-lipped. The Golden Book of the Grand Dao possessed precisely this capability. As long as an entry was added to the Golden Book of the Grand Dao forbidding the Taiyi Immortal Sect's Artifact Saint from divulging any information regarding the "mysterious Artifact Saint" behind him... ...it should keep things secret for some time. And with just eighty to a hundred more years, once the Dao artifact used to fuse his essence and spirit was forged, he would head into the depths of the starry sky to strike for Dao Integration. By then, even if the news that he was the mysterious Artifact Saint leaked, he would be completely secure. "Dao Integration," Yaoguang murmured the words. He could now glimpse the mysteries of Dao Integration, but... ...the chance of success was far too low. Embarking on the path of a Human Immortal and possessing his own "Dao" before attempting Dao Integration was equivalent to having three pinnacle Dao artifacts helping him withstand the danger of "Dao Dissolution" during the process. Only then would he dare make a genuine push toward the realm of Dao Integration. "Dao Integration can be considered the greatest transformation on the path of cultivation. This transformation will even allow my cultivation base to catch up with the realm I naturally possess for the very first time..." Yaoguang smiled faintly. Yes. Once he achieved Dao Integration, he would try using "Dao Lord" or leveraging the "Artifact Forging" and "Merchant" branches to boost his progress in [Dao Integration · Void]. If things went smoothly... ...he should be able to make it in time for the Great Dao Dispute eight or nine hundred years from now. With these thoughts in mind, he continued his preparations for forging the Boundless Tower. ... While Yaoguang's succession ceremony and the procurement of pinnacle Dao artifact materials were causing an uproar, far out in the extraterrestrial starry sky... On a planet used specifically for communication by the Shadow Moon Sect, two immense divine senses lingered. And the masters of these two vast divine senses... One was the Shadow Moon Sect's greatest patron, Demon Venerable Heiyue, who had become a Dao Lord through the Grand Dao of Darkness. The other... ...was Dao Lord Penglai's greatest adversary, Demon Saint Yulin, whose living space had been compressed to the absolute limit. These two Dao Integration-level existences waited with immense patience. After all... ...their true bodies had yet to reach Beihai Star. Whatever they intended to do, they could only discuss it beforehand. Buzz! Just then, two more powerful divine senses arrived on the planet, one after the other. The unique resonance belonging solely to Dao Integration radiated from both divine senses, enough to compel any Void Shattering cultivator who sensed it to bow their head instinctively. Yet everyone gathered here was at the Dao Integration realm, so no one made a fuss. "Yuanxu, Guangmang, you've arrived?" Demon Venerable Heiyue greeted them. Immediately after, he asked with some surprise, "Yuanyi isn't coming?" "'Claiming the Ten Immortal Sects share common roots and refusing fratricidal strife... Heh, he's just a coward. Beaten once by Penglai, he completely lost the courage to stand against her. Truly unworthy of being a Dao Lord,'" Dao Lord Yuanxu sneered. "If he didn't come, so be it. With the might of our four Dao Integrations, this venture remains foolproof," Demon Venerable Heiyue remarked impassively. "Guangmang won't make it in time either; he is still very far from Beihai Star," Yuanxu said. Immediately, the gazes of Demon Venerable Heiyue and Demon Saint Yulin fell simultaneously upon the God race Dao Lord known as Guangmang. "That Yaoguang slaughtered so many elites of your God race in the extraterrestrial starry sky, and you're just going to watch with folded arms? Completely indifferent?" "If you can wait a century, I will naturally strike in person. But in such a short window, I truly cannot rush back in time," God Venerable Guangmang said. "A century is too long. According to the intelligence I received, Juntian is also on his way back. Over a hundred years... if he returns during that window, it will only introduce more variables," Demon Venerable Heiyue stated. "Guangmang can't make it back in the short term? And Yuanyi refuses to act? Are you expecting Heiyue and me to deal with Penglai? Heiyue cultivates the Grand Dao of Darkness. Once he melts into darkness, even Penglai would find it exceedingly difficult to pin him down; his survival skills are truly formidable. But what about me? Am I supposed to withstand her frontal assault all by myself? Ha, if I could withstand her, I wouldn't be hiding all over the place! Are we done here, then?" Demon Saint Yulin complained displeasedly. "Demon Saint Yulin, calm yourself. I will move with absolute speed. As long as you can hold Penglai off for a moment, capturing Yaoguang—a mere Void Shattering cultivator—will be as easy as turning my hand," Dao Lord Yuanxu said. "Yaoguang has become the Sect Master of the Heavenly Dao Sect and will surely preside over the sect itself. Heavenly Dao Sect has Venerable Golden Book, an artifact spirit nurtured for countless years. With him standing in your way, you expect to breach the Heavenly Dao Sect in an instant and seize their Sect Master?" Demon Saint Yulin retorted bluntly without sparing any face. He then added, "Among you lot, Guangmang and Heiyue are here for revenge, and you, Yuanxu, are after the hundreds of billions in wealth and materials on him, along with that Artifact Saint... oh, and your own petty desire to strangle a prodigy of the Void Dao in the cradle. I am the only one here targeting Dao Lord Penglai. But if spiting her and ruining her investment requires risking my life... then forgive me, I won't play along!" "Demon Saint, while joining forces with Demon Venerable Heiyue to pin down Penglai carries some risk, once Dao Lord Penglai obtains a pinnacle Dao artifact, your situation will become even more unbearable... For the sake of your future days, it's worth taking a gamble..." Demon Venerable Heiyue also chimed in to persuade him. Before he could even finish, Demon Saint Yulin sneered. "The future? Penglai will definitely enter the Gate of the Immortal Realm this time around. If I can't afford to provoke her, can't I just hide? Once she enters the Gate of the Immortal Realm, I will butcher the entire Penglai Immortal Sect down to the last soul! Not a single one will be left alive, and I will wipe away this humiliation all the same!" Hearing this, Demon Venerable Heiyue and Dao Lord Yuanxu frowned. The mysterious Artifact Saint behind Yaoguang was forging a Dao artifact for Dao Lord Penglai, so Dao Lord Penglai would inevitably accompany them throughout to protect them. For them to strike at Yaoguang, at that mysterious Artifact Saint, and at those materials worth a hundred billion or even several hundred billion, clashing with Dao Lord Penglai was inevitable. Without Demon Saint Yulin holding the front line... ...neither Heiyue nor Yuanxu, who were ill-suited for direct confrontation, could prevent her from breaking through. When that time came, she would simply slip away with Yaoguang, the mysterious Artifact Saint, and all those top-tier materials. But every single one of them... ...would likely suffer Dao Lord Penglai's endless vengeance. The Shadow Moon Sect would surely be finished. As for Dao Lord Yuanxu himself... If he failed to seize this opportunity to force that Artifact Saint into forging a pinnacle Dao artifact for a desperate last gamble, he might even be struck down on the spot by Dao Lord Penglai. After all, he was advanced in years and his battle strength had greatly waned, nor did he have the backing of the Nine Demon Immortal Lineages like Demon Saint Yulin with places to hide. For him, this operation permitted only success, never failure. "All right, all right. Since we have gathered here, we clearly share the same stance and want to take this gamble," Dao Lord Yuanxu said, turning his gaze toward God Venerable Guangmang. "The issue now lies with your God race. Does your God race have a solution?" Having said that, he added, "Seven God Emperors dead, including God Emperor Yinghuo—the one with the greatest hope of becoming the next Dao Integration of your Light God race. I refuse to believe you are truly as nonchalant as you pretend to be." Light flickered slightly in God Venerable Guangmang's eyes. Only after a good while did he speak. "In the final analysis, your concern is that you cannot trap Penglai long enough to give Yuanxu sufficient time to breach the Heavenly Dao Sect and capture Yaoguang and that mysterious Artifact Saint. However... whenever a member of the God race achieves Dao Integration, they refine their earthly divine kingdom into the Grand Dao they merged with, turning it into a heavenly divine kingdom. I will have subordinates set up a summoning formation, which can be completed in at most twenty years. When the time comes, I will project my heavenly divine kingdom into the summoned area. Its power will be equivalent to a pinnacle fourteenth-grade trapping formation." As he spoke, he seemed to recall something and added, "This is a classification circulated within the Heavenly Dao Sect that grades formations, alchemy, and artifact forging into tiers. I found it rather accurate, so I adopted it." Yuanxu and the others nodded. Having understood the potency of such a trapping formation... Demon Saint Yulin turned his gaze to Yuanxu. "How much time will you need to breach the Heavenly Dao Sect?" "The time it takes an incense stick to burn will be enough," Dao Lord Yuanxu answered immediately. "Fine! Then Heiyue and I will buy you an hour!" Demon Saint Yulin said resolutely. Seeing Demon Saint Yulin take on this most arduous task, Demon Venerable Heiyue immediately broke into a smile. "Excellent. In that case, everyone, let us sign the Grand Dao Agreement. May each of us attain our desires and return with a full harvest from this operation."