“Squawk…”
A bird’s cry shook the mountains. A golden silhouette swept across the sky, shattering a distant mountaintop and snatching up a primordial ancient elephant over twenty meters long before returning to land atop a cliff.
There was a very large nest there — over ten zhang in size, occupying the full breadth of the cliff, constructed entirely from purple maple wood. The fragrance of maple wood drifted over, purple light shimmering faintly.
A massive Lightning King Bird, magnificently powerful, its body flowing with golden radiance — brilliant and dazzling — was tearing at the primordial ancient elephant, blood flowing freely.
Large chunks of bloody flesh were ripped away; it was feeding its young. Each little Lightning King was already nearly ten meters long, arcing with electrical radiance, golden light flickering.
The cliff had long since been stained dark red, soaked through with dried blood, clearly of many years’ duration.
Ye Fan clicked his tongue in astonishment. This was truly a primordial world — what he was seeing was terrifying indeed. These Lightning King Birds had long gone extinct in the world he came from, with only certain descendants still existing — yet here they still lived.
A creature like this — even a supreme elder from a Holy Land who encountered one would take the long way around. No one would dare provoke it.
The reason Ye Fan had stopped here was that he noticed some carvings on the cliff face — very ancient, yet still dimly visible. He wanted to study them thoroughly.
“A sword art!”
He was greatly surprised. This was a fragmentary sword art. It appeared that a powerful figure had once entered closed-door cultivation here, carving down certain moments of insight — quite disjointed, yet still offering boundless inspiration.
“The nest covers a large portion of it.”
Ye Fan felt a measure of regret. The nest of purple maple wood was packed across the cliff, evidently having stood for many years. The cliff was stained with a great deal of blood — spatters from the Lightning King’s feeding.
“Are there still people in this world?” He murmured inwardly.
Ye Fan waited from a distance for a long while. Only when the Lightning King had departed did he approach the cliff face and carefully study those stone carvings — the handiwork of a powerful figure, all of it ancient methodology.
The cliff face was dim, with a smell of blood assaulting the nostrils. Inside the nest, lightning crackled and swirled; the several young birds were highly alert and kept crying out at him without stop.
Ye Fan paid them no mind. The moment he had arrived here, he was drawn in. The reflections left behind at the time of enlightenment — for someone seeking to break through — were of extraordinary value.
The fragmentary sword art was deeply profound, but he did not dwell on it much. Instead he focused on savoring the insights within, his heart entering a state of emptiness, with a tendency toward sinking into a state of Dao-enlightenment.
“Squawk…”
One of the small Lightning Kings let out a great cry and shot out a stream of lightning as thick as a water barrel, carrying within it the force of the five elements of heavenly tribulation — startling Ye Fan, who dodged quickly to the side.
And these were merely chicks — already capable of unleashing a few traces of heaven-tribulation power. It exceeded his expectations. Not dwelling on it further, he continued to circle around the lone cliff and study it.
Finally, he even lifted up the ten-plus-zhang nest and examined the carvings at the very top of the cliff, studying them earnestly and gaining many insights.
“This is truly a remarkable site. If I could find more places of closed-door cultivation like this, I might advance into the Dragon Ascension Secret Realm at any moment.”
Ye Fan had long since reached the Great Completion of the Four Extremes. Entering the Dragon Ascension Secret Realm might occur at any next moment; what he currently lacked was simply a catalyst.
He did not linger here long, for the Lightning King could return at any time. He memorized those insights and flew to a distant mountaintop, sitting down to quietly contemplate what he had gained.
“Up ahead there’s a nest — golden and brilliant, clearly a top-tier exotic bird. Let’s go take a look and see if we can capture a young one to take back and tame.”
“That is… the legendary Lightning King Bird — a primordial savage bird capable of fighting a flood dragon king.”
A group of young people flew over, all looking with astonished eyes, flying toward the ancient nest on the stone cliff. Each one was powerful in their own right — elite talents from across the Five Great Domains, each carrying their own legend.
“There’s also a sword art — a powerful figure once entered closed-door cultivation here!”
They discovered the stone carvings and all displayed expressions of surprise, rushing quickly forward to study them earnestly. Every single person was deeply focused.
“True to its reputation as an ancient immortal mansion — a single desolate cliff holds a profound text. Heading deeper in, the gains will surely be even greater.”
These people were all committing it to memory, imprinting those ancient techniques within themselves, planning to contemplate them properly upon returning.
“There are four young Lightning Kings in total — let’s capture them first and discuss how to divide them when we get back,” someone suggested.
The others nodded in agreement and moved in together. But just at this moment, a long howl came from the distant sky. Golden light flooded half the sky with blinding brilliance — the massive bird had returned.
A bolt of golden lightning like a mountain range — thick beyond all proportion, shockingly so — came crashing straight down, fast beyond all reaction.
“Ah…”
One of the Hall of Exceptional Scholars’ young disciples cried out and was instantly reduced to ash on the spot — nothing left behind whatsoever.
Ye Fan was greatly shaken. Lightning of this magnitude rivaled a heavenly tribulation. No wonder this bird, once fully grown, would become a terrifying exotic creature capable of suppressing the supreme elders of any Holy Land.
“Crack!”
Another mountain range flew over — and indeed, that is the right word, for the lightning was too enormous, no different in scale from a mountain range, filling the void, destroying everything.
“Ah…”
Another cry of agony — a young woman of flower-like beauty also failed to escape this calamity and was destroyed on the spot, body and spirit alike annihilated.
The others fled at full speed — but how could one outrun a Lightning King Bird? It was not only a thunder-divine bird, but also possessed speed nearly equal to lightning itself.
“Swish!”
Someone brought out the Mysterious Jade Platform and crossed the void, escaping the scene. Three others fled in different directions.
The Lightning King pursued relentlessly, transforming into blazing golden divine fire. The sky was scorched black from lightning strikes in all directions.
From the distant sky came shouting and roaring as several old figures came riding on swords, engaging the Lightning King Bird in battle — yet they held no advantage whatsoever, with signs of defeat and death. Driven back as they fought, their entire bodies had been struck black by the lightning.
“Even a half-step great elite is no match for it!” Ye Fan was astonished. He turned and departed, disappearing into the depths of the mountain range in search of other opportunities for immortal fortune.
“Roar…” A fierce tiger’s howl — a flock of wild geese in the sky were all knocked down by the sound, letting out mournful cries.
Ye Fan was startled. He was already a hundred li away, yet he saw a black tiger — its body as dark as ink, over ten zhang in length — tilting its head back to roar at the sky. The great mountain beneath its feet was split apart by the sound.
“A primordial divine tiger — a match for a great elite!”
After studying it carefully, his heart grew wary. This was a primordial exotic breed that had cultivated for over two thousand years, its blood and vitality exceptionally powerful. Standing where it stood, the terrifying pressure it emanated caused every beast within dozens of li to drop to the ground in submission.
It was absolutely comparable to a demon king of the first rank, yet it had not taken human form. This was a primordial savage beast king, and no one wished to face it.
“Roar…”
It opened its blood-bowl of a maw and shot out a black light several li in length, landing within a deep pool atop another mountain and dredging out a flood dragon over thirty zhang in length.
The moment this flood dragon emerged from the pool, lightning crackled and thunder roared, wind howled, and sand and stones flew — clearly a beast king in its own right, formidable beyond measure.
“This flood dragon is so powerful — someone in the Ninth Transformation of Dragon Ascension would have absolutely no chance of going near it. Anyone who tried would die!” Ye Fan was alarmed. This was a creature of very deep cultivation.
Yet what astonished him was this: the black divine tiger opened its mouth and sucked from several li away, dragging the flood dragon directly before itself in an instant and swallowing it in a single gulp.
“Boom!”
The primordial exotic breed divine tiger, having used excessive force, also sucked the mountaintop where the deep pool sat right over and swallowed half of it in one bite.
“This black divine tiger… is overwhelmingly powerful. Even a Saint Master who came here might not be able to capture it — who would live and who would die, it would be impossible to say!”
Ye Fan quietly withdrew. A formidable exotic beast king like this was not something he wanted to provoke. This was a primordial world, and he had already seen many long-extinct exotic beasts — all of them savage ancient kings.
He had not retreated far when a mountain peak caught his eye — not a single blade of grass growing on it, like a massive piece of black jade: dry, clean, and still.
This place was quiet — no birds or beasts. It seemed to be a forbidden zone for life, as if nothing living would draw near. One look told you it was the lair of some savage beast king.
“Could this be the dwelling place of that divine tiger?”
Ye Fan drew near, and the moment he approached the barren black jade mountain, he was startled. Carved across it like ghost-writing were a great many ancient characters — iron hooks and silver strokes.
“Divine Treasure…” He was immediately stirred with excitement. This was the carved legacy of a supreme figure — recording the deductions of certain secret arts.
Ye Fan studied it earnestly and discovered three supreme-level method seals, filling him with unexpected delight. These were three deeply profound ancient secret arts, whose origins and lineages were difficult to articulate.
The Mountain-Embracing Seal, the Human King Seal, the Heaven-Overturning Seal — a combination of three, bearing names of tremendous boldness, representing the three seals of heaven, earth, and man. Intricate and profound beyond measure, impossible to fully assess.
Among them, Ye Fan had learned the Mountain-Embracing Seal before — yet compared to what was recorded here, what he knew was crude and shallow in the extreme, far from anything that could be called a secret art, let alone perfected.
The Human King Seal and Heaven-Overturning Seal were likewise ancient secret arts, succeeding the Mountain-Embracing Seal and forming a unified whole — abstruse and recondite, absolutely rare sacred arts in the world.
On the cliff face there were also deductions of other secret arts, all quite disjointed — but these three were complete, and the most profoundly mysterious of all, instantly captivating Ye Fan’s heart and spirit.
He sat down before the black cliff face without moving, applying his mind to contemplating them, evolving all three ancient arts with the Sacred Battle Art and transforming them into supreme divine techniques uniquely his own.
“Awooo…”
A tiger’s roar shook the mountains. The primordial black divine tiger came striding across the mountain range, leaping from one peak to another like a dark cloud, bringing with it a wind of devastating force that sent countless grinding-wheel-sized boulders flying.
“So this truly is the savage ancient king’s dwelling place!” Ye Fan was startled, turned, and vanished, activating the Movement Character Art and disappearing in an instant.
He sat on another mountain peak, quietly internalizing those three ancient arts. The Mountain-Embracing Seal, Human King Seal, and Heaven-Overturning Seal revolved in his mind, rapidly being deduced.
Before long, Ye Fan saw the divine tiger depart and returned once more to the black jade mountain. He traced over the three sacred arts with his palm and fingers repeatedly, contemplating them again and again. Three imprints surged into his heart.
This instantly gave him a shudder. He was quietly glad he had returned to contemplate again — what was carved on the cliff was merely the form. The true essence had been transformed into three imprints, and only now had he obtained the complete and undiminished method seals.
“Swish!”
Stone powder scattered; three blank spaces were left behind. Once the imprints emerged, the three sacred arts automatically vanished. The cliff face was smooth as a mirror — as if they had never appeared.
Ye Fan’s heart was greatly stirred. He had always had metaphysical methods at hand but had been sorely lacking in secret arts — during battles, he was frequently stretched thin. With three ancient seals in hand, he would be far more at ease.
“Enlightenment Imprints!”
Ye Fan discovered precious carvings atop the mountain — left behind by a supreme figure during a moment of enlightenment. Fragmentary as they were, they were of immense help to him, and he imprinted them all in his heart.
For a full half month, he sat motionless atop a mountain peak, contemplating the enlightenment traces he had obtained. When at last he opened his eyes:
“Half a step into Dragon Ascension!”
Ye Fan was astonished to discover that by contemplating the enlightenment traces of another, he had placed one foot into the Dragon Ascension Secret Realm. He knew that if he could encounter a few more records of enlightened insight, he would certainly enter the Dragon Ascension Secret Realm at once.
“What kind of place is this? Could it be that many supreme figures once entered here? They have left imperishable traces on certain ancient mountains!”
He began to reflect. In this Immortal Mansion, he had traversed only a small area — and yet the gains had already been this great. One could only imagine how important this place truly was.
An immortal burial ground!
This thought arose in his heart. There were inexhaustible treasures here — and equally immense dangers. One careless step could mean death.
Ye Fan thought of the sounds he had heard within the Ancient Locust Forest of the Deserted Reed Village — could all of them be traced to their origins here? He had heard with his own ears the sound of ten-thousand-strong armies in great battle. And beyond that, he had heard the cries of dragons, phoenixes, and qilins — as well as that name capable of crushing all of antiquity: the Undying Heavenly Monarch.