On this ancient star, nothing existed apart from the five-colored ancient trees. Not a single living being was to be seen.

To suddenly encounter a Five-Color Altar here — and a one-armed, green-robed elder — one could well imagine the magnitude of the shock it dealt to Ye Fan.

The Five-Color Altar was not large, for the crystalline stones within it were far too small. It could never compare to the vast blocks of stone — weighing thousands of pounds each — found on the Huoying Ancient Star or in the Desolate Ancient Forbidden Land.

It was difficult to fathom what ancient tree king could produce crystalline stones of that scale. Perhaps a Saint would be needed to fell them — perhaps even a quasi-Emperor would have to personally take action.

The green-robed elder was tall and slender, with lean, refined features. He carried the air of a transcendent being — without a trace of mortal dust, as though shaped naturally by the ancient Dao.

Why was a person like this here, alone, in this place? What cultivation realm had he reached, to be capable of stacking such an altar?

The Black Emperor had once said that the array inscriptions of a Five-Color Altar could only be carved by an Emperor. No one else could manage it — nor could anyone else even comprehend them.

To what level of power had this person attained, constructing the altar alone? It filled Ye Fan with awe and alarm. Could this person actually be an Emperor of the ancient past?

The preposterous notion rose in his mind, and it frightened him. The great Emperors of antiquity had always been the stuff of legend — never encountered in the flesh. How could such a meeting be possible?

He shouldn’t be an Emperor. Otherwise, why would he have lost an arm? A figure of that caliber has long since defied the heavens — never mind a missing limb, even if one were reduced to powder with one’s divine consciousness extinguished, one could still restore oneself.

He speculated quietly, not daring to approach. He only watched from a great distance, fearful of startling the elder.

The Five-Color Altar was small — no more than three meters in length — and yet the number of crystalline stones required was immense. The vast majority were no larger than a pigeon’s egg. To stack them in this fashion, the number of tree kings that must have been felled was impossible to count.

“Such a small Five-Color Altar — perhaps it can only carry one person across. Is he preparing to depart? Where would he go?”

In the black and desolate expanse of the universe, to discover an ancient star with life, to find a living person — that was truly no simple matter. Ye Fan could not remain calm.

He stood a great distance from the Five-Color Altar and was still slowly retreating further, for he had no way to gauge the depth of the one-armed elder’s cultivation, and feared being sensed.

Yet even as he suppressed his own energy signature, the elder glanced over at him. His eyes were dim and lightless, his face expressionless.

Ye Fan’s body stiffened. He stopped moving, then, after a brief hesitation, stepped forward with large strides. It made no difference — he had already come this far. If the other party intended him harm, the odds of escape were slim at best.

Even now he was still turning things over in his mind: was this person an Emperor or not? The Black Emperor’s words had been too deeply etched in him — only an ancient Emperor could construct a Five-Color Altar.

“To return to my homeland… I cannot be buried in a foreign land…”

As he climbed the great mountain and came to stand before the Five-Color Altar, these were the words he heard — repeating like a mantra, echoing ceaselessly.

Ye Fan was bewildered. The elder’s lips were not moving, yet the words rang clearly throughout this place, as though carried down from the most ancient of ages.

“Senior…” Ye Fan called out. Yet the other paid him no attention whatsoever, continuing to make adjustments to the altar.

“To return to my homeland… I cannot be buried in a foreign land…”

The words continued, like an incantation, echoing beside the altar — as though they would never stop.

Gradually, Ye Fan sensed that something was deeply wrong. It was not merely those words — the elder himself was not right. This did not feel like a real person.

“A divine obsession!”

Suddenly, he was gripped by horror. Every hair on his body stood on end. He sensed a peculiar energy — one belonging to a malevolent spirit.

Ye Fan stumbled backward. There was no question — this was the obsession of a supreme divine being, a force very similar to the one he had encountered in the Immortal Mansion long ago.

The former had been born from the malevolent thoughts of the Undying Heavenly Emperor after his death. What existence had sat in meditation here to generate this one?

“How can there be a divine obsession on this ancient star?” From his head down to his feet, Ye Fan went cold. He had no ultimate Dao Emperor’s weapon to suppress a malevolent spirit now — how was he to contend with this?

What is a divine obsession? It is said to be born from the malevolent thoughts of a divine being after death — supremely powerful, virtually without equal.

A legendary divine being — already something half-mythical — and yet here was something born from its malevolent thoughts after death. This boundless strangeness was beyond comprehension.

Ye Fan noticed the missing arm. The residue of heavenly tribulation clung to the wound — it had almost certainly been severed by divine punishment from the heavens above, for it was incompatible with the body’s power, which made it nearly impossible to regrow.

“Who will bury me in my homeland?” The ancient voice continued before the Five-Color Altar — like a flame of undying obsession.

Ye Fan stopped retreating. His Source Heaven Divine Eye emitted a brilliant radiance, and through it he saw a faint apparition — not a solid form — standing ahead. The green-robed elder was not truly real.

“Wait… this is…”

This divine obsession had already dissolved into the Dao. What remained was only a wisp of lingering will — not the invincible corporeal form of a true divine being. This realization left him both astonished and profoundly relieved.

“How many years have passed? A divine being died on this ancient star. After endless ages, a divine obsession was born — and yet even that is now nearly spent, on the verge of scattering entirely.”

Ye Fan felt a deep solemnity. It was difficult to imagine how many ages ago a divine being had descended upon this star and been buried here. Perhaps he could even find the divine corpse!

This wisp of lingering will posed little threat. Even its malevolent side had dissolved away — only a kind of stubbornness remained, still tending to the altar, making adjustments over and over, yet changing nothing.

“The altar has long since been completed. It is only that the divine obsession can no longer act — it has dissolved back into heaven and earth. Without its primary divine will, it is now not even a ghost. It is simply repeating the motions of what once was, mechanically, endlessly.”

After standing here for a long while, Ye Fan finally understood it all. And from the various ancient sounds, he pieced together a startling secret: this divine being had come from the Ziwei Ancient Star Domain.

Its unceasing desire was to return home — to return to the legendary Ziwei Star Domain.

“In ancient Chinese mythology, Ziwei was the Emperor Star, revered as the master of the celestial calculations…” Ye Fan pondered.

The Daoist scriptures recorded that the lord of Ziwei governed the celestial and terrestrial meridians, presiding over the star spirits of the three realms and the gods of the mountains and rivers — the supreme sovereign of all phenomena, capable of summoning wind and rain, commanding the spirits of thunder and lightning.

Ye Fan stood there for a long time. Finding nothing further, he moved swiftly across the ancient star, determined to search for the divine corpse.

This planet was not very large — incomparably smaller than the world in the Northern Dipper Star Domain, perhaps not even as large as a single oasis in the Northern Territory.

It did not take him long to explore the entire star. Yet the divine corpse was nowhere to be found. All that remained was a single wisp of the divine obsession’s lingering will — the green-robed elder.

He spent a full month on this small planet, turning over nearly every patch of ground, and still found no trace of the body.

“It may not be a divine corpse after all — more likely the remains of an Emperor. But it would not have decayed. It may have already drifted out into the cosmos…” Ye Fan sighed softly.

Perhaps, like the Void Emperor, the being had ultimately chosen to be buried in the boundless starry sky. The divine obsession that emerged partway through had entered this ancient star, longing to return to its homeland in the Ziwei Star Domain.

Ye Fan returned to where the Dragon Corpses and the bronze coffin lay, and once more examined that enormous claw print that had nearly split the stone mountain apart. After sensing it for a long while, he was certain it had been left by the divine obsession in ages past.

“Have I become stranded on this small planet?” he murmured to himself.

In the months that followed, he spent each day doing battle with the ancient tree kings, seeking those divine crystals. His purpose was not to construct a Five-Color Altar, but to use the battles as a form of tempering — a means of harsh cultivation.

This ancient star was exceptional by nature, perfectly suited for the growth of Five-Element True Wood. It may have been the last place in all the cosmos where such trees still flourished.

This inference came from certain indistinct meanings within the ancient sounds before the Five-Color Altar — ancient tones that were difficult to decipher, which came not as clear speech but as ripples of divine consciousness, not easily distinguished.

Each day, he spent a portion of his time watching the green-robed elder tend to the Five-Color Altar — a repetitive act in which, in truth, nothing ever changed or improved.

It was only the last lingering attachment of a fading ghost — one who no longer knew even who he was, nor that Ye Fan had arrived.

At last, Ye Fan made up his mind. He would risk leaving this ancient star and venture elsewhere.

For this star was too strange. Its very nature was suited to the growth of Five-Element True Wood, which had absorbed and transmuted the power of the great Dao into itself. It was deeply difficult for a cultivator to comprehend the Dao here.

Finally, Ye Fan resolved to abandon the nine Dragon Corpses and the bronze coffin, and cross alone. The Nine Dragons Pulling the Coffin had truly run aground — they would not move at all.

Using the Five-Color Altar constructed from the divine obsession’s power, he would gamble on reaching the Ziwei Ancient Star. With no path forward, he may as well take the chance.

The Five-Color Altar was nearly complete. Small as it was, it held a certain degree of feasibility. Had the divine obsession not dissolved into the Dao and lost its primary divine will, it would likely have crossed long ago.

“Activation…”

If he could activate it, he could set the altar in motion — which meant he could cross.

After watching for half a year, Ye Fan had already discerned several of its secrets. He channeled a thread of divine power into it, and the Five-Color Altar blazed with radiance in an instant.

It had long been in a half-activated state, needing only the right catalyst to ignite it. He attempted it once, and succeeded.

Ye Fan did not hesitate. He stepped up and stood at the center of the altar platform. A small Eight-Trigrams Gate materialized, its runes flickering, and the gate to the starry sky opened.

Returning to Earth held no particular appeal for him now. What mattered was entering a wellspring of life. The Ziwei Ancient Star Domain was an extraordinarily powerful option.

Suddenly, the green-robed elder — who had shown no awareness of anything until now — snapped both eyes wide open, shooting two brilliant beams of divine light skyward like twin torches. For a moment, he seemed to have regained his senses.

The green-robed elder reached out with one hand. In an instant, he tore the earth apart — all the way down to the core of this ancient star — and from its depths drew out a sealed stone coffin.

Ye Fan’s eyes nearly fell out of his head. The divine obsession, in a last brilliant flare before its end, had regained a sliver of self-awareness. With something close to reverence, it lifted the ancient coffin and stepped onto the altar platform, coming to stand beside him.

“The corpse of a divine being!”

He didn’t even need to think to know. The stone coffin must contain a divine corpse. He had searched long and hard without finding it — never imagining it was buried at the planet’s core. But how could anyone possess the great power to simply reach in and pull it out?!

“He and I are going to the Ziwei Ancient Star together?!” Ye Fan felt his scalp crawl. This was a divine obsession — born of a divine being’s malevolent thoughts. It was no benevolent thing.

“He’s nearly dissolved into the Dao. Let’s hope he dissipates along the way.” Ye Fan was certain: once the green-robed elder faded entirely, the divine corpse would inevitably fall into his hands.

With a tremendous roar, five-colored divine light shot into the heavens. Ye Fan and the green-robed elder — along with the sealed stone coffin — vanished into the Eight-Trigrams Star Gate in an instant, disappearing completely.

“To return to my homeland… I cannot be buried in a foreign land…” Within the star gate, only these words still echoed.

Northern Dipper Star Domain. Eastern Wilderness. The Ji Family.

Another deep night. The stars shone brilliant and clear. Ji Ziyue gazed up at the sky, sitting there for the better part of the night. At last, she let out a soft, quiet sigh.

In the blink of an eye, several years had passed. Whether the Nine Dragons Pulling the Coffin had reached the far end of the starry sky, she did not know. She only gazed up every night, remembering the past, rarely allowing herself to smile.

In the Northern Territory, in important ancient royal clan settlements such as the Spirit Valley and the Ten-Thousand Dragons’ Nest, others also turned their eyes to the stars, engaged in a deliberation of great consequence.

“Are you certain they headed for the Ziwei Ancient Star Domain back then?”

“We could activate the divine platform left behind by an ancient Emperor and attempt a summoning!”

“But the cost of doing so would be enormous.”