The seven great Life Forbidden Zones erupted with light that surged toward the heavens. The aura of supreme sovereigns permeated the air—only the faintest wisps and threads managed to seep through the barrier, and yet even those were enough to make the heroes throughout the world blanch with terror, causing great fear to rise within them. Many nearly fell to the ground in prostration.

Was this the beginning of the great transformation that would span the ages? Every cultivator present was thunderstruck—all were trembling. That day had finally arrived!

No one dared act rashly. All eyes were fixed on the seven great Life Forbidden Zones. If they made any move, then without a doubt, this would be confirmation.

Indeed, roaring sounds emerged from the Life Forbidden Zones. Ancient beasts that had long slumbered were awakening, seemingly preparing to carry their supreme sovereigns forth. Living beings truly had emerged, dominating the land of the Southern Region.

“They’ve come—they’ve truly manifested in the world! Heavens—the immortal path has opened! A rare age of glory unlike anything since the creation of heaven and earth has arrived! We may yet witness figures at the Great Emperor level—and more than one!”

“What age of glory? A great calamity is about to arrive. This is clearly an age of chaos where rivers of blood are about to flow!”

From the peaks of snow-capped mountains to the great abysses below the earth, across the vast wastelands and the endless deserts—wherever people existed, hearts surged and pounded. The curtain was about to be drawn back. The mortal realm of this era was on the verge of opening upon the transformative age of becoming immortal.

That day felt like the end of the world. Every person across all under heaven was gripped with apprehension and unease. The oppressive atmosphere was so suffocating that people could barely breathe.

From the Spiritual Void, a creature emerged: a great silver-backed, crimson-horned qilin, its majesty stretching across a hundred thousand li. Even having suppressed a portion of its aura, it was still this overwhelming!

The entire world was shaken. The qi radiating from it spread in every direction, permeating the path ahead, causing even heaven and earth to tremble and thunder in response—terrifying beyond all description, startling all living beings into trembling.

“This… is the ancient supreme sovereign within the Spiritual Void? To think they truly appeared!”

“No—this should only be its mount. The true master has not yet appeared!”

Long after the awe-inspiring qilin had passed, the sacred beings finally dared to speak among themselves. The blood in their bodies surged, their hearts shaken and stirred to the utmost extreme—it was beyond all expectation.

If nothing unexpected occurred, what they had just seen was an ancient steed that surpassed the Great Sage level. A terrifying creature from within the forbidden zone had emerged—even if it was only a mount.

This ancient beast appeared somewhat indistinct, its entire body enveloped in immortal radiance. No heavenly eye could penetrate it—there was simply no way to see through it. In truth, no one possessed the courage to attempt any transgression against it.

Only when the chaotic energy was scattered and blown aside could one look closely enough to see that the scales of this great silver-backed, crimson-horned qilin were actually stone in some places—an astonishing detail.

And yet, in the end, the world only caught a glimpse of its retreating form. It flashed by in an instant and vanished, appearing in the blink of an eye before the great crack in the immortal path outside the Ancient Forbidden Land.

People had already gathered here, and their numbers were considerable. Tens of thousands were prostrated upon the ground, while only two people stood, gazing into the distance toward the “immortal gate.”

They were true quasi-emperors—truly beyond the Great Sage level!

After so many years, those who bore even a single character of the word emperor had finally appeared in the flesh, standing right there in plain sight. No one could approach them. No one dared offend them.

After the great silver-backed, crimson-horned qilin of the Spiritual Void arrived, the eyes of those two figures became even more profound. Their entire bodies blazed with light, equally placing themselves in a state of indistinctness—impossible to see through.

“Something truly did fall out…”

The great silver-backed, crimson-horned qilin murmured to itself, releasing divine words in a language of immense antiquity—one that scarcely anyone could understand. And yet the fluctuations of divine will were universal, and meaning passed through all the same.

At this place and time, even Great Sages had retreated far away. Those other sacred beings who had not managed to escape in time all submitted from the very depths of their souls. Many could not bear the Pressure Aura and collapsed face-down onto the ground.

The gaze of the two quasi-emperors was profound and deep. Mist and radiance swirled around them, obscuring all detail—they made no comment. And this great qilin, which bore partially stone-like scales, also began to silently observe. It was an emissary from the Spiritual Void, representing the stance of a forbidden zone—no one dared move a muscle!

On the towering mountain peak, the great crack had already expanded to two thousand zhang in length—its sudden growth in this single night was explosive, almost as though it had burst open, astonishing beyond all measure.

From time to time, threads of something resembling aurora borealis flew out, causing all the sacred beings to burn with envy—yet the two quasi-emperors stood at this location, along with that ancient beast, leaving no one daring to stir.

Amid the swirling chaotic energy and blooming auspicious light, objects had fallen out earlier—yet not a single person had dared to pick them up. They were wrapped in immortal fire, burning fiercely upon the ground.

Moreover, the residual power of a terrible tribulation was still spreading outward, shaking hearts to their cores.

“What has happened?” one of the quasi-emperors finally spoke.

Evidently, neither of the two quasi-emperors had arrived much earlier than the great qilin—they had not yet grasped the situation and were still observing. One of them seized a Sacred King and calmly inquired, directing him to explain.

“Just now… the immortal path… collapsed. These things fell out. It seems a tribulation lightning struck this place open…” he said, fragmented and halting, his voice trembling—for it was simply impossible to endure standing in the presence of a quasi-emperor, even with their aura partially restrained. He felt as though an ant were facing the boundless heavens.

The immortal path had broken open. Divine thunder had exploded—and from within, not from without. The thunderous sound was one of the primary reasons the Eastern Desolation had been shaken.

“A heavenly tribulation originating from the immortal domain? How could this be possible?” one of the quasi-emperors, his entire body wreathed in an indistinct glow as though he were a deity, murmured to himself.

And at that moment his mind shuddered further. He gazed in the direction of the Ancient Forbidden Land, catching a vague glimpse of a figure—and quickly turned his head away, refusing to look.

“Yes… it truly did explode from within. It may have been an immortal tribulation—or perhaps… someone had gone in ahead of the rest of us… it’s difficult to say!” That poor Sacred King, held captive in such a manner, could not help but tremble even as he spoke. Suppressed beneath the imperial Aura of Power, his body’s instincts had overridden his will.

Someone had forced their way into the immortal path ahead of everyone else, entering it prematurely? It was not impossible.

At this moment, the two quasi-emperors and the great qilin from the Spiritual Void all opened their heavenly eyes and studied in earnest the object enveloped in chaos and immortal light.

In the beginning, people had assumed it was an immortal being that had fallen out.

“An immortal being? No—it seems to be a remnant body. The torso is missing a section.”

The expressions of the two quasi-emperors changed drastically. The qilin too was seized with shock. Whatever that was—it was either an immortal or a Great Emperor—there could be no doubt. The aura it radiated was of the most supreme and terrifying order.

“The body is destroyed—it died within—truly astonishing!”

Pop!

A soft sound. That mass of chaos broke apart, and the immortal radiance surged upward like steam, revealing what lay within: a mangled corpse, flesh and blood torn apart. And yet, the mere presence of it pressed down upon all living creatures, causing them to bow in unwilling reverence.

Countless powerful beings on the ground were already prostrating themselves, kowtowing—sacred beings included, and perhaps feeling it more acutely than the rest, as they all had the sensation that the end of the world had arrived.

Was this corpse that of an immortal?

That was the question in every mind. It was far too powerful—terrifying beyond all measure. The blood it had shed was so crimson and brilliant that it defied all words. Even a single drop carried an aura capable of shaking the ages.

Moreover, the longer one looked, the more one could feel emanating from it a sense of immense, time-worn vastness—as though it spanned an incalculable number of ages.

What manner of being had this been? Truly an immortal, fallen from the immortal domain?

“No—he was an ancient emperor!” The great silver-backed, crimson-horned qilin spoke, delivering this single sentence that made people’s skin crawl even further. How could it be?

An ancient emperor had fallen out of the immortal domain—what had happened? Could it be that he had been expelled by the immortals within? Had someone actually succeeded in becoming immortal and entered the immortal domain?

Everyone gazed at that deep, unfathomable crack. The more they looked, the more they felt its depth had no bottom—a world behind it that was far too mysterious and unknown. Even the courage to explore it had abandoned them.

“It was not one of the current supreme sovereigns who had forced their way in—nor was it an immortal. It was an emperor from the past—who fell on the immortal path at its very end, lying in a pool of blood, stopped at the threshold.” One of the quasi-emperors let out a quiet sigh, stating the truth of it—making it all the more chilling. How cruel a fate.

This was an ancient Great Emperor level figure who had fought their way in for the sake of surpassing mortality and attaining eternal life—breaching the barrier, treading the immortal path—yet had ultimately fallen at the end.

And now, with the immortal path shattered, they had fallen out of that barrier, manifesting in this present era.

“Is it the demon sovereign, Xue Yue Qing?” Over the course of these many years, as foreign sacred beings had continued to descend, the affairs of the human race’s ancient path had finally spread to this place.

By now everyone knew: one generation’s peerless Xue Yue Qing had walked extraordinarily far along the immortal path, and had she not grown old and weakened in her body, she might well have broken all the way through.

“No—it seems far more ancient. It may even have been a heavenly sovereign from the mythological era.”

This was a staggering conjecture. How many people’s hopes had this path swallowed—not just one or two supreme prodigies had fallen upon it, buried in pools of blood. How brutally cruel.

Buried within for so long, only now falling out—this was a kind of bitter sorrow. To have died in battle upon this path was one thing—but to be entombed there across the ages and only now see the light of day, sealed away across the millennia.

“Why did divine tribulation thunder resound not long ago—and with such power that it cracked open this path?” The second quasi-emperor furrowed his brow. The ancient supreme sovereign was already dead—why could they still undergo tribulation, triggering such a chain of events? Were they helping the people of this world open the immortal path?

People also harbored great hope of finding an imperial weapon—even just a shattered fragment of a weapon left behind by a heavenly sovereign after their battle would be something extraordinary, practically an immortal burial relic.

Before long, answers came to all of these questions. Laws and principles interweaved here; heaven and earth cracked and shook, nearly spreading across the entire ancient star—nearly surging into the boundless cosmos.

This force was overwhelming. It was a Great Emperor level figure undergoing dissolution into the Dao!

Every drop of blood from the fallen remnant body blazed with light. Even the bones were burning—to say nothing of the flesh. All of it was dissolving into the cosmic laws and principles of the universe.

The remnant form was dissolving into the Dao—this had triggered the divine tribulation. It was no heavenly punishment or divine retribution. It was the natural response that occurred when a being of this magnitude had their remains exposed, merging with the laws and principles of this world.

Perhaps this ancient supreme sovereign’s dying wish had been to return—dust to dust, earth to earth—to the world that had given them birth. And so, upon returning, they chose to dissolve here into the Dao.

Boom! All at once, the force of the Dao dissolution inexplicably converged entirely inward. It did not destroy the Great Desolation. It did not surge toward the already chalk-faced sacred beings standing nearby. It did not charge into the outer starfields. Instead, it retracted entirely—back into the remnant body.

At last, a blazing immortal fire erupted. The remnant body became ash. Radiant light drifted like rain in the air, like a butterfly dissolving into transcendence. Only tribulation ash remained in this place. No blood, no corpse—vanished, just like that.

“How pitiable. A Great Emperor spends a lifetime without equal—supreme in both heaven and earth, none other like them—invincible for an entire age. And yet in the end, to arrive at this kind of conclusion. The immortal path leaves even supreme sovereigns with nothing but desolate sorrow!”

The two quasi-emperors departed one after another. The great qilin returned to report as well. Only then did the sacred beings finally let out a long collective breath.

And yet, throughout the several great Life Forbidden Zones, light continued to surge toward the heavens—it had not faded. Their terrifying Pressure Aura no longer swept across the world—but they had indeed all awakened!

Perhaps within a few days, perhaps within a few months… the immortal path was destined to open. Otherwise, there would be no reason for the forbidden zones to exhibit that terrifying spectacle of light columns piercing the heavens. The peerless supreme sovereigns preserved from ancient times had already made their preparations for the ultimate immortal war!