Ye Fan expounded on the scriptures and debated the laws of heaven — interpreting all manner of great Dao truths that existed between heaven and earth, explaining many profound mysteries. Many people felt as though a tub of clarifying ghee had been poured over their heads, their minds illuminated, their understanding complete.
For seven full days, Ye Fan sat upon the cliff’s edge. The Dao platform there radiated precious brilliance, while he himself was solemn and majestic — like a Buddha, or like a great demon — his voice reciting scriptures resonating between heaven and above and earth below, a sound that people sank into, unable to pull themselves free.
In empty space, stalk after stalk of Dao lotus grew and bloomed. From the vault of heaven descended petal after crystalline petal. Divine springs bubbled up from the earth below. The entire expanse of Yaochi flowed with shimmering light, submerged in vast, boundless Dao energy.
All who came to hear the scriptures gained something — those who gained the most found their minds clear and empty, and directly comprehended the Dao, breaking through to another realm. Those who gained less still grasped secret arts, canonical laws, and deepened their understanding — an accumulation that would greatly benefit their cultivation for many years to come.
Such was the Dao accomplishment of the Great Completion Holy Physique. A few days of expounding on the Dao allowed an entire crowd of people to break through — all had gained from coming. From domains beyond, many arrived — the open ground outside Yaochi was packed full.
People could not help but sigh with deep feeling. The realm Ye Fan had attained was something they could no longer look up to. He was truly on a level high above all others — comparable in standing to the great emperors of antiquity, a mythical figure of power who could sweep across the cosmos and stride through ten thousand years.
On the seventh day, Ye Fan ceased his expounding. A great crowd surged forward to meet with him. Looking upon the familiar faces of the past — now bearing eyes full of reverence and awe — he knew that time had moved on, and that some things had changed, too deep to be brought back.
Even the Great Xia Imperial Prince and the Sacred Daughter of Yaochi — old friends from years ago — were now constrained and guarded in their manner before him. It was sufficient proof of everything. He did not try to force a correction or change it — he simply treated them as he had always done, drinking with them and talking freely over wine, as he had in the old days.
It was only after a good while that some of the old companions finally relaxed, no longer feeling the same weight of pressure from his identity and cultivation. The Demon Moon Void arrived, laughing heartily, and together with the Great Xia Imperial Prince pressed cup after cup of wine on Ye Fan.
Of course, those who had only a passing acquaintance with him, who were not truly close friends, could not relax in quite the same way. They sat with stiff backs, carefully choosing every word, picking each step with delicate caution.
As for the Phoenix — she left directly, not stepping forward to greet him.
“Elder Brother Ye, must you leave so soon? Why not stay a few more days?” the Demon Moon Void called out, urging him to linger.
Ye Fan drained his cup and said: “Why stand on such ceremony with me? If you truly wish to see me, come to the Heavenly Court. Its gates are open to you at any time. We fought side by side together as brothers — there is no need for any of this.”
In the end, he said it plainly.
“Very well, we’ve been making too much of all this,” the Demon Moon Void and the Great Xia Imperial Prince Xia Yiming both said with great laughter, their faces flushed with wine. “No matter what you become, you will always be our Elder Brother Ye. Even should you one day surpass the Celestial Sovereigns, it cannot change the years we spent roaming the Eastern Wilderness and Northern Domains together side by side. Brothers don’t forget brothers.”
“Brothers ought to be this way. We will certainly come to the Heavenly Court — we might just end up lingering there and never leaving.”
The Demon Moon Void and the Great Xia Imperial Prince Xia Yiming both laughed heartily, a haze of pleasant wine over them, as though they had been carried back to their youth — those days of roaming freely through the Eastern Wilderness and the Central Province, the great stone-gambling battles in the northern domain’s divine city, memories that could never be forgotten.
“Elder Brother Ye, your divine might has shaken the world this time — you have eliminated a Forbidden Zone. The repercussions are immense. You must be careful as well. I imagine the other Forbidden Zones will be exceptionally wary of you from now on. There may be some counter-measure they have prepared to deal with you,” the Sacred Daughter of Yaochi said.
“No need to worry. For at least eight thousand years, they will not dare!” Ye Fan spoke these words, and his gaze shot outward like blazing beams of light, sweeping across the distant Forbidden Zones.
“Senior Ye, after you leave — will they send people out? Like those… Forbidden Zone descendants?” a young person asked with some hesitation.
“Yes, Uncle — my mother was lost during the great turmoil of darkness. An uncle of mine was killed not long ago by one of those very people.” Ye Fan’s porcelain doll — Princess Yudié’s child — now grown up, spoke through welling tears.
This child was breathtakingly gifted. Having cultivated to this point, she was already one of the outstanding figures in the Northern Dipper. Yet she was truly no match for the Forbidden Zone descendants — and she felt nothing but deep, thorough hatred for the Forbidden Zones, a revulsion that could be called bone-deep.
In the time before, among the figures of the younger generation in the Northern Dipper’s stellar domain, two individuals had left a particularly deep impression on Ye Fan: one was the little novice monk from the Western Wastelands, and the other was this porcelain doll. Both of them possessed a gift for cultivation that ordinary people could not approach.
“Rest easy. I will not let them run rampant,” Ye Fan said. He had already risen to his feet and stood upon a cliff’s edge, letting a single wave of sound carry forth — not particularly loud, but enough to sweep across the entire ancient star.
“Should the Forbidden Zone descendants dare to emerge and cause chaos, relying on their powerful backing — I will take up blade and steel, and cut them down!”
These words were not especially stirring — one might even call them calm. Yet they shook all the lands. It was a declaration, and it was a warning. Ye Fan had laid down the law for the several great Forbidden Zones.
“Outrageous!”
Within the Forbidden Zones, someone’s expression changed at once — the descendants of emperor-realm supreme figures. When had they ever been issued orders like this? Not even their own fathers’ generation had ever treated them this way.
Yet Ye Fan showed not the slightest consideration for their face — he issued a stern warning: should they dare to cross the line, violent death awaited them.
Ye Fan paid them no further attention. He rose into the sky, tore a golden rift in the heavens above, and vanished from the Northern Dipper’s stellar domain, returning to the Heavenly Court.
Not long after, people discovered that the Forbidden Zone descendants had come out. Everyone’s heart was seized with alarm — had Ye Fan’s words had the opposite effect, stirring up a defiant impulse within them, causing them to rain blood and slaughter upon the world?
But they had worried for nothing. These people made no move.
Moreover, several days later, a few of Ye Fan’s disciples arrived in the Northern Dipper to undergo trials. Ye Tong and Yang Xi had clearly come for the Forbidden Zone descendants, roaming in all directions — one seeking a breakthrough, the other a battle fanatic who had been sent by his master and had come to stand watch.
“What arrogance — he sends a few disciples here and thinks that’s enough to awe us?” someone fumed, eyebrows slanting upward.
But that was all they could do — mutter. What else could be done? Were they truly going to provoke those of Ye Fan’s lineage? The Great Completion Holy Physique was perhaps just waiting for exactly that excuse.
The Forbidden Zone descendants found, to their sorrow, that ever since Ye Fan had cut down the Carefree Celestial Sovereign, he had truly become a figure who could be called sovereign of this world. Even their own fathers had no desire to provoke him. Should relations truly break down into open enmity, that man would charge into the Forbidden Zones and force the ancient supreme figures to sublimate — and once their lifespan was burnt away at that rate, it would be very difficult for them to continue sustaining their existence in this world.
Ye Fan had killed his way to a fearsome and resounding reputation!
The people of the Northern Dipper discovered that they had worried for nothing. Many days passed, and all was peaceful. And now that Ye Fan’s disciples had arrived — what was there left to be uneasy about? The Forbidden Zone descendants had been completely held in check. They dared not act recklessly.
Hua Hua — the third disciple who had been the most idle, who had squandered the most time — was about to cross her tribulation. She had chosen the space outside the Northern Dipper’s stellar domain as the place to do so.
The little pine tree, meanwhile, had set out with a kind of curious wonder to walk across the lands of the Eastern Wilderness, tracing the footsteps his master had once walked — seeking to understand how he had journeyed through it all.
Ye Fan’s four great disciples had all appeared. People felt completely at ease, for they had noticed something with astonishment: the Forbidden Zone descendants were actively avoiding these individuals. In the end, they chose to travel far away, or returned to their Forbidden Zones — they would not remain in the same domain as these four disciples.
Time flowed gently on, and in the blink of an eye, several hundred years had passed. Ye Fan reached the age of one thousand, joking that he had become one of the old generation. Yet his blood and vitality were more vigorous than ever.
For the Great Holy Physique had been fully completed. As the several centuries of consolidation and contemplation of the Dao continued to deepen, the state of his own being reached its current utmost peak — stronger than he had ever been before, truly deserving the name of one whose divine might overawed all the world!
During this time, he made several determined efforts to advance into the great emperor’s domain — having pushed one half of himself through that threshold was not enough. He wanted to force the other half through as well.
In the end, Ye Fan broke through once more!
He pushed to the extreme of Sublimation, reaching the highest peak of his life — an unorthodox attainment of the Dao.
Yet, as it had been for the predecessors of old — he always had a flaw. He could not step completely into that domain. The great Dao was a shackle around his feet, confining his steps, blocking that final ultimate leap.
Compared to several hundred years before, he was stronger. The Great Holy Physique at its completion and then at its extreme Sublimation — he was truly undefeated between heaven and earth!
“In this life, perhaps I have reached the endpoint that a Holy Physique can attain. To break through into that domain would truly be too difficult. From the path of inference I have mapped out, such a thing would be nine deaths for every single chance of survival — and yet still offer no guarantee of success.”
The road ahead was broken. In those several hundred years, Ye Fan had attained the Dao in an unorthodox manner, standing at the uttermost peak of what was possible at the very forefront of the Holy Physique’s shattered road. Here, there was nothing beyond but an endless abyss of darkness.
The road had ended. Before him was a void. Now it fell to him to continue the road — to figure out how to change it. He was lost in thought. The great holy physiques of antiquity had all stopped here — not a single one had ever broken through.
And now it was his turn. Was he also to be stopped here?
“The broken road of the Holy Physique — I will continue it. I will change it!”
He thought day and night, pouring all his heart’s blood into it, using chaos as his cauldron and furnace — nearly dissolving himself in the process. Still he did not succeed. The road was severed, and could not be crossed.
In those years, quite a few things had happened, among which one had a major impact: Yang Xi and Ye Tong had done battle with the Three Divine Ones from beyond this world — the two master-brothers had met them in the Ziwei stellar domain and wiped them out entirely.
This incident set off a tremendous wave of upheaval. The response was a great hand reaching out from within the Undying Mountain, grasping toward the master-brothers — nearly seizing them both.
Ye Fan was roused by the alarm and appeared at just the right moment. His true body strode across heaven and earth, and a single kick descended — crushing that great hand to dust. The resulting storm was enormous, shaking the Six Harmonies and the Eight Wastelands!
A battle between supreme figures had nearly erupted, sending the tension of the great cosmos to its absolute limit.
In the end, that supreme figure swallowed his anger and let it go — leaving behind a single line: We will meet on the Immortal Ascension Star!
And it was in this terrifying clash that people came to learn that the Immortal Ascension Star was about to undergo a transformation. Perhaps, after hundreds of years, another opportunity would arise — one capable of stirring the ancient supreme figures to emerge from their seclusion once more.
“Stone Emperor — are you truly still alive?!” Ye Fan’s gaze had gone ice-cold in that moment. He had sensed the presence of another person’s energy upon that being — the Stone Emperor.
The storm passed. One hundred years later, Ye Fan stood at the extreme forefront of the Holy Physique’s shattered road. He held no fear of doing battle with the Ancient Emperor, yet he had no choice but to begin making preparations. A world-shaking battle might truly be coming.
On the Immortal Ascension Star, the four great central seals had cracked open. All manner of immortal-ascending light shot outward, auspicious rays casting brilliance across the human world. Dimly, through the light, the great presence of the immortal domain could almost be perceived.
“The cursed land sealed in the Age of Myth — could it be the opportunity to become an immortal?”
“According to legend, immortals once descended upon the Immortal Ascension Star and suppressed several great demon sovereigns. Are they about to emerge now?”
Wave upon wave, trouble never ceasing — at the moment Ye Fan reached one full thousand years of age, the Immortal Ascension Star underwent its transformation, drawing the attention and interest of the powerful races of every great star system. Even the Forbidden Zones grew restless.
“A Golden Age of Flourishing, heh heh, ha ha ha…” someone let out a bitter, broken laugh. So-called kings rising together, a great age of gold arriving — how ironic. Not yet a thousand years, and were the supreme figures going to emerge again?
“A Golden Age of Flourishing will come — but it will arrive several thousand years from now. A spectacular scene of a hundred schools contending, competing on the grand stage, will unfold. Those who attain emperorship will appear in ages yet to come.” So someone prophesied.
And yet this time? The supreme figures were about to emerge once more. Who cared about events several thousand years hence — would a chance to see immortals even exist after one more round of turmoil?