The dark clouds receded. Stars glittered, moonlight spilled down, and the low hill was tranquil. Everything was as though nothing had ever happened.

Ye Fan walked step by step to the ancient tree. This old pine had a lifespan of at least four thousand years — its main trunk hollow, its needles sparse, already on the verge of death.

At the base of the tree lay a flat blue stone, roughly one and a half meters long — just about the same height as the old Daoist — smooth and level, with something distinctive about it.

“Sometimes I rest beneath the pine tree, head pillowed on a stone to sleep. Within the mountains, there is no calendar — and when the cold has passed, I do not know what year…”

Ye Fan stood there in a daze. Could the old Daoist still be alive? The mortal world turns to mulberry fields time and again — his sighs carried the weight of eight thousand years. Just how old was he?

He strode quickly to the back of the small Daoist temple and came to the earthen mound. He activated the Heaven Origin Divine Sense and looked — and in that moment, a shiver ran through him.

Beneath the yellow earth, the tattered Daoist robes were still there. That ancient wooden hairpin lay undisturbed exactly as before, not moved by even a fraction.

“How can this be…” A certain unease crept through Ye Fan’s heart. The old man had clearly dissolved into the Dao and ceased to exist — so why had his form appeared just now?

It could not have been an illusion. When the dark clouds covered the sky, the old Daoist had manifested, then inexplicably vanished. It had felt entirely real — those words still seemed to echo on.

“It was not a lingering divine sense imprint, because I heard a true, physical sound.” Ye Fan returned to the front of the temple and walked about the low hill, troubled and unable to make sense of it.

The night was like water, all the world still and quiet. Apart from the occasional cry of a nocturnal bird, there were no unusual sounds — and not the faintest trace of an unfamiliar presence, nor any ripple of divine power.

His heart was full of questions for which he had no answers. In the end, he had no choice but to resume his seated meditation. He trusted that whatever kind of powerful figure this was, the person bore him no ill will.

Ye Fan took up residence in seclusion here. Half a month passed in a flash. Each day he sat quietly before the Daoist temple, silently seeking the Dao and comprehending its principles.

This was a pure land of simple and genuine quiet, far from the noise of the world — no auspicious mist swirling about it, but entirely natural, like a serene ink wash painting in pale tones.

By day, a woodcutter’s song would drift in occasionally. At times, hunters would come charging out of the deep mountains in pursuit of wild beasts, their shouts shaking the hills. Ye Fan’s heart remained clear and open, absorbing all of it.

Over these days, he had captured a trace of a strange Dao mark. The low hill was imbued with spiritual essence. Even before he had consumed the Dragon Marrow, he had already begun to feel a wondrous sensation — his body and spirit both luminous.

“A place where the Dao has been dissolved into is sacred earth in this world. If any great sect learned of this, they would immediately occupy it, lay out vast arrays, and make it a forbidden ground that outsiders could never enter.”

Another deep night descended. Dark clouds rolled in, pressing almost to the hilltops. Darkness swallowed everything. Before long, lightning crackled and thunder roared as torrential rain poured down.

Heaven and earth vanished behind a curtain of rain. Ye Fan stood within the Daoist temple, watching the rain-drenched world outside. Occasionally, an arc of lightning split the dark sky, and for one brilliant instant, the gleaming rain-world blazed into view.

Boom!

Lightning struck wildly. In a single flash, more than a hundred silver beams pierced from sky to earth, and the torrential rain cascaded down. The hills and mountains in the flood of water were illuminated in a single blazing moment.

But then everything plunged back into boundless darkness. The lightning was gone, leaving only rain — and nothing else could be seen. A terrifying deep night, standing alone — something strange and uncanny charged the atmosphere.

Boom!

Another burst of thunder, and hundreds upon thousands of golden serpents danced across the sky, scorching all of heaven and earth in a blazing brilliance. The distant mountain ranges stood out in sharp, clear relief.

“That is…”

Ye Fan stood at the window. His expression changed at once. He saw the old Daoist again — the same tattered robes, the same wooden hairpin in his topknot.

The old man was sitting cross-legged in the night sky, in the midst of the pouring rain, and as he opened his mouth and drew a breath, hundreds of lightning bolts all poured into his mouth — and vanished.

Boom!

Rain fell like a waterfall from the sky. Water was everywhere across heaven and earth. Lightning grew fiercer still. This time, bolts ten thousand zhang long descended, thousands upon thousands of them falling together.

“This much lightning is comparable to a great heavenly tribulation…” Ye Fan murmured to himself.

Yet what astonished him was that the old Daoist still made the same movement — opened his mouth and drew a breath — and thousands upon thousands of lightning bolts instantly vanished, all of them rushing into his mouth.

“This is… absolutely insane!”

Ye Fan’s expression changed completely. He had passed through several heavenly tribulations himself and could withstand them without fear — but he had always paid a price, and his physical body had sometimes been struck. Never had he seen anything like this, where someone simply opened their mouth and swallowed it all.

This was the stuff of fairy tales. Not a single bolt fell through — all of them consumed by his one breath — not like facing a tribulation, but like drinking water.

Boom!

Endless bolts of light descended. Heaven and earth turned a blinding white. Every variety of heavenly catastrophe manifested — earth, fire, wind, and water calamities struck together, and bolts of primal chaos lightning followed. Above all of it, ancient celestial towers materialized, and human-shaped bolts of lightning appeared within them, weaving together and striking wildly across the vault of heaven.

“Could he truly swallow even a great heavenly tribulation like this?” Ye Fan couldn’t believe it. The magnitude of this catastrophe had reached an incomprehensible level.

He had once seen celestial towers formed of lightning with human-shaped electrical forms moving within them, though he had never faced such a thing himself. He knew full well the infinite terror of it — to be struck was to be reduced to tribulation ash.

Yet the old Daoist remained exactly as before. Regardless of the pouring rain, the lightning flooding the sky, he simply opened his mouth and breathed in — and every last beam of light entered his mouth.

“Is this… even human?!”

Ye Fan felt every hair on his body stand on end. When he had crossed tribulations, all that boundless lightning ultimately dispersed into heaven and earth. This old man had not let a single thread escape — every bit of it absorbed.

The implication was staggering, beyond all reason. Above all, the celestial towers formed of lightning, with their human-shaped electric forms — as terrifying as they were — had been swallowed whole.

The old Daoist appeared before the dilapidated temple out of nowhere. The lightning in his mouth surged endlessly, condensed into a pill, and slid down into his abdomen. His entire body shone briefly with radiance — then became ordinary and plain once more.

Ye Fan stood transfixed. Had the old Daoist refined the tribulation lightning into a pill?

Across heaven and earth, the lightning was gone. Only the torrential rain remained, falling through the dark night sky in curtains of water — the sound of it everywhere.

Ye Fan stood absolutely still, watching the old Daoist in silence, afraid that if he made a single sound, the figure would vanish again as suddenly as before.

“The vast sea turns to dust across ten thousand autumns. As the Dao dissolves and white hair grows, long life brings only sorrow. A single dream and thousands of years pass. The immortal road is rugged — where is there to wander?”

The old Daoist chanted softly, seated on the blue stone, unmoving — merging with the night rain, with no trace of brilliance or divine power. The raindrops fell upon him but did not wet his robe.

This was unquestionably a supreme master. Ye Fan’s heart was moved — he felt he might be in the presence of a saint!

He had once believed there was only one old madman in the world who had achieved sainthood. He had not imagined that within the Central State, there might also be one. Such words of profound, unfathomable meaning — such an immeasurable level of cultivation.

“Senior…”

He walked out into the rain and called out softly, with genuine reverence and respect. But the old man did not stir — eyes closed, still as stone.

Ye Fan approached carefully and tried to sense him, only to find that the slight old Daoist sitting on the blue stone before him, though within arm’s reach, was completely undetectable.

“Strange — it is not a spiritual sense imprint, yet there is no physical substance either…” His heart gave a start, for he had opened the Heaven Origin Divine Eye — and what he saw was a phantom image.

Suddenly, the old man rose and walked straight toward him. Ye Fan was startled but remained motionless. If a saint wished to act, no one in the world — save the old madman — could stop him, no matter how many gathered.

Flash!

The old Daoist walked straight into the Daoist temple, passed through him like air, and slowly faded and vanished.

“Not real — he is after all… truly dead.” Ye Fan stood there, blank and stunned.

Then, in the rain, he examined the low hill with care and found many magnetic stones embedded throughout — it was an iron ore mountain.

“Yes — now I understand…”

He recalled reports he had once seen at the other end of the starry sky: human figures appearing in ancient tombs, ancient soldiers locked in battle appearing in great canyons — all as vivid as reality.

In truth, all such images were simply the past replaying itself. Magnetic rock and similar materials in nature, under certain specific conditions, could play back these “bygone scenes” like recordings.

Ye Fan was overcome with regret. He had come so close to an ancient saint, yet missed him by just two years. This person’s mastery of the Dao had reached an inconceivable level.

To refine a heavenly tribulation into a pill — that technique had no record in any ancient text. One could only imagine what realm of power he had reached. And that had been the tribulation that formed the Ancient Celestial Court — its terrifying degree was beyond all imagination.

“A saint slept here in eternal rest, in obscurity, without a single soul knowing — not even the Five Great Domains. Beside the old madman, there was another saint in the Central State…”

Ye Fan exhaled a long sigh. This perhaps was what a true supreme master was — without any desire to dominate the world, in possession of such peerless cultivation, yet with not a soul knowing of it. He had passed into nirvana in the wilderness, unknown to all.

“This is the realm of a saint!”

By comparison, all other cultivators fell far short. Such a person had long since seen through the red dust of the world. Nothing held them. Only a single heart seeking the immortal remained.

After understanding that what he had seen was a phantom image, Ye Fan paid even closer attention, taking up long-term residence here. If he could witness the old Daoist’s various methods of cultivation, it would be an extraordinary opportunity.

Time flew by. After two months, Ye Fan was in quiet seclusion, silently seeking the Dao, refining and absorbing the Dragon Marrow. A breakthrough was imminent — it could be triggered by a heavenly tribulation any day now.

Yet in these last few days, his heart could not find calm, for he had seen several more phantom images and obtained a startling piece of information.

When the old Daoist had spoken to himself, he had mentioned the Nine Secrets. He had come from an ancient clan that possessed one of them.

Of course, these were only a few words — not enough to constitute proof. Ye Fan had pieced together many fragments and clues to arrive at a deduction, not a certainty.

Yet even so, a wave rose within his heart. The Nine Secrets had nearly had their transmission severed. Only three or four of them still existed in the world. To unexpectedly find a clue to one of them here in the Central State was a matter of great consequence.

“The Cai Family — there is no such ancient clan in the Central State…” Ye Fan murmured to himself. Before coming to the Central State, he had carefully studied the various major powers present, and there had been no mention of any Cai Family.

“Could it be a hidden clan living in seclusion?”

“Or could it be the Cai Family — that clan which, ten thousand years ago, was at the pinnacle of power, and then suddenly collapsed and vanished?”

Over the past few days, thunder clouds had gathered in the sky more than once. Ye Fan felt he might be on the verge of taking that step.

That very night — the moon bright, the stars sparse — he saw the old Daoist’s silhouette again. In total he had seen it only five or six times, and he watched with exceptional focus each time.

“If only I could hear him recite a passage of the Dao formulas, or chant one of the Nine Secrets…”

Ye Fan hoped — but knew it was nearly impossible. This old Daoist had passed into nirvana without leaving a single word. The intent of that alone was plain to see. His state of mind was truly beyond the ordinary.

“How sad are all the things of the mortal world — how gain and loss and fate wear life away. I drank a cup of wine in the hall at home, and when I looked back, eight thousand years had passed…”

This time, the old Daoist had a trace of wistfulness about him — different from his usual manner. He walked three circuits around the Daoist temple in a slow, mournful path, then raised his eyes toward the west, and finally came around to the back.

“His tone… why is it like this — almost as though he is about to depart this world?”

Ye Fan felt his heart move. This old Daoist had lived for at least eight thousand years, away from home for eight thousand years. It was almost too terrifying to take in.

He had to be a saint — there could be no question of it. Only a saint could have such a lifespan, and among saints, one of the highest pinnacle.

The old Daoist found a clear space behind the small Daoist temple and dug a pit in the ground — calmly, naturally — then step by step walked down into it and buried himself there.

This was exactly the spot where the yellow earth mound had been. They were one and the same place.

“Coming, I left no trace; going, I leave none either. Coming and going are the very same. Why ask further about the fleeting affairs of this life? This very fleeting life is a dream within a dream…” — these were the old Daoist’s final words. And with that, he dissolved into the Dao and vanished into heaven and earth.

“This… is the saint of old.” Those few words were all Ye Fan could manage.