The lake water sank. Underground immortal light flickered, emitting strange sounds. In a short span of time the entire immortal lake had disappeared, and in its place a great rift valley appeared.

It was formed by cliff faces on all sides, looking as though it had been deliberately hewn out by human hands, its shape arranged to form a lake — elegant and full of vitality, with the dragon-energy of the earth seeping upward from below.

An ancient cave pulsed with immortal light, suffused with dragon-energy that poured outward in a steady, unhurried flow — not violently intense, but possessing a certain immortal resonance. At a single glance it was clearly no ordinary place.

“Ha ha ha…” The fat Daoist laughed to himself. It was quiet here — no one had been disturbed.

From the distance, the crowd was still scrambling and fighting, competing to enter the cave dwelling within the spirit vein. None of them knew that everything had been calculated by the unscrupulous Daoist, merely a matter of borrowing others’ strength.

“Laying out this kind of interconnected cave formation — only this poor Daoist could have seen through it.” Duan De was supremely self-satisfied, thoroughly pleased with himself, chuckling endlessly as he slipped inside.

“This man is truly mysterious — to have such methods. All those others were used as tools.” Princess Yudi was taken aback, not having imagined Duan De could be this unscrupulous.

Ye Fan and she waited for a short while, then descended to the floor of the dried-out immortal lake bed. Cliff faces lined both sides; an ancient cave glittered with radiance, and a set of immortal gates engraved with dense, closely packed runes had already been pushed open.

“This fat scoundrel is truly something. To open those gates he had a great many cultivators toiling on his behalf dozens of li away,” Ye Fan griped internally, always feeling that Duan De was overdue for a thrashing — yet to this day no one had been able to make him suffer a serious loss.

“This place is deeply profound!” Princess Yudi furrowed her brows. Though the stone gates had been opened, the interior still bore many formation markings.

These ancient patterns of lines — impossible to say how many years they had existed — were intricate, hidden, and layered in complexity. The two of them attempted to deduce the meaning behind those Dao-tracings, yet neither could penetrate their meaning. It would be very difficult to see through them.

Neither of them had any particular depth of knowledge when it came to formation markings. They furrowed their brows; entering rashly might result in being trapped inside. This place, just as Duan De had said, was in all likelihood connected to an ancient great emperor.

“You wait here first. I’ll go in and have a look.” Ye Fan decided to use the Movement Rune Art to navigate the ancient formation, to try his luck. If he waited any longer, the entire cave dwelling would have been emptied out by the fat Daoist.

“Be careful!” Princess Yudi urged, her bright eyes and flawless teeth radiating a gentle fragrance.

Swish!

Ye Fan vanished in a flash, moving through the auspicious radiance. This ancient cave was not damp but very dry. No luminescent pearls had been inlaid within its walls, yet many strange rocks were radiating their own rosy brilliance.

Within the cave dwelling, immortal mist drifted and swirled, rosy clouds blazing with color — deeply evocative of a paradise realm. Not far ahead he saw white jade stone steps leading upward toward a more remote and secluded interior.

“Immortal nectar, jade essence…” Ye Fan was surprised. Nearby, beside a spring pool, stood a small altar platform no more than half a foot in height. Atop it sat a small bowl, holding roughly half a bowl’s worth of white liquid.

This was the earth-milk produced by the earth’s spiritual roots — born from an ancestral root, with the power to bring the dead back to life and restore bare white bone, ranked only below the undying divine medicine, a priceless immortal treasure.

“A pity — it isn’t true immortal nectar jade essence. It’s only earth-milk produced by an ordinary spiritual root.” Ye Fan examined it carefully and felt some disappointment.

Then suddenly his expression stiffened. The small altar platform, barely half a foot tall, was remarkable in itself — crystalline and transparent, with threads of spiritual energy seeping from it, carrying a mysterious aura.

“This is… congealed from immortal nectar jade essence!” Ye Fan was startled, deeply shaken.

In the past, genuine immortal treasure had been born here, dripping freely downward, its spiritual energy scattering and dissipating, until it had formed this half-foot-tall little altar platform. It seemed that when the immortal nectar jade essence ran out, all that remained was ordinary earth-milk.

In that moment, Ye Fan felt his heart ache, his liver ache, and his stomach ache all at once. A half-foot-tall altar platform — how much immortal nectar jade essence would need to have congealed to form it? What a waste of outrageous proportions.

Without any doubt, in the endless years of antiquity, a divine ancestral spiritual root had been connected here, producing immortal nectar that had dripped down and pooled in its entirety, never utilized by anyone.

Ye Fan gave a long sigh and ultimately took the small altar platform away. When it landed in his hand it was solidly, densely heavy — like a small mountain peak — which came as quite a surprise.

It looked like a beautiful piece of jade, yet it was heavy as a great mountain. An ordinary cultivator would have no hope of picking it up. A thought took shape in his mind: immortal nectar jade essence of this quantity was something that could not be sought by chance, something no one had ever heard of appearing in such abundance — and certainly no one would have allowed so much of it to dry out naturally. This small altar platform was composed of extraordinary material, and in the future it might well have great uses.

Rosy clouds drifted through the ancient cave, filling it with an almost dreamlike quality. Ye Fan navigated through the formation markings using the Movement Rune Art, passing up the white jade stone steps into the deeper recesses of the cave dwelling.

“Withered spirit herbs — all possessing medicinal age of tens of thousands of years!”

He found himself in a broad stone cave chamber, where he discovered some plants — cultivated within beds of jade, clearly precious at a glance — but long since withered away, after how many years no one could say.

Only an undying divine medicine could persist in the world without end, never dying. Other spirit herbs, after growing for many tens of thousands of years, would ultimately perish, their spiritual energy exhausted.

“Could these have grown for eighty or ninety thousand years before dying?”

Ye Fan murmured to himself. If so, it was truly a matter of divine objects returning to dust and earth to earth — having absorbed so much of heaven and earth’s vital energy over such vast time, only to scatter it all again in the end.

Suddenly his expression went rigid. Just ahead sat a figure, without the slightest trace of life aura. Only as he approached closely did he notice it.

“An ancient great ape!”

Ye Fan was astonished. Seated here was an ancient ape that had passed away in meditation some unknown number of years ago. Its grey-white fur had aged to the point that a single touch would reduce it to dust — only the snow-white bones within still radiated a gentle lustre.

Without any doubt, this cave dwelling had existed for at least eighty or ninety thousand years. The fact that the great ape’s remains had been preserved to this day was testament enough to how powerful and fearsome this creature had been in life.

Ye Fan stood there turning the matter over with some uncertainty, examining the white jade bones within carefully. This great ape had at the very minimum been a supreme-level Sacred Master in strength — yet from the way it was arranged and the layout of this ancient cave, it was clearly here only as a guardian of the cave dwelling, and did not appear to have been its master.

“This… a supreme-level Sacred Master great ape — serving only as a guardian spirit beast?” The moment this possibility occurred to him, his heart began to pound violently. What manner of figure must the master of this cave dwelling have been?

Ye Fan pressed forward, his heart far from calm. This place was in all likelihood the cave dwelling of a primordial saint — or perhaps even the sitting-place of a primordial great emperor’s death, with perhaps a genuine ancient scripture within reach!

“Where has this dead fatty gone off to?” He dared not linger, deployed the Movement Rune Art, and moved swiftly forward in search of Duan De.

In the depths of the cave dwelling, dragon-energy swirled and rosy light flickered. He came to an area of relatively open terrain. Here stood quite a few jade trees, none more than half a meter in height, all shining with a brilliant light.

“Undying Wondrous Trees?!”

Ye Fan was startled. The more he saw the more convinced he became that this was a place of profound mystery. In total there were forty-nine jade trees here, each a different color — some like red carnelian, some as emerald-green as leaves, still others blazing like pure gold.

Forty-nine jade trees, not carved by human hands but cultivated and grown — rooted in jade rock, their trunks and branches like coiling serpent-dragons.

“So the records in the ancient books are actually true!”

After arriving in this world, in his search for the road home, Ye Fan had spent years reading the ancient texts that had survived on this great land, coming across many accounts that had seemed fantastical and far-fetched. Among them he had encountered records about this very thing.

The earth’s core-marrow could give rise to jade trees, seemingly alive with vitality, capable of growth. If obtained by a saint or great emperor, they could be tempered into a supreme weapon of unparalleled power.

If nourished into life by the immortal roots of all the world’s ancestral veins, they could give rise to jade trees comparable to the supreme sacred objects personally used by an ancient great emperor — and once tempered into a treasure, nothing in creation could withstand them.

The great black dog had once spoken of a legend: eighteen or nineteen tens of thousands of years ago, a primordial saint had successfully tempered one such Undying Wondrous Tree. A single branch bore seven leaves, and a light brush of those leaves could break through anything in creation — nothing under heaven could stand against it.

“Seven times seven equals forty-nine jade trees — this was truly an attempt to temper an Undying Wondrous Tree!” The more Ye Fan looked, the more his heart shook.

They were rooted in jade vein paths, arranged according to a system of great sophistication and complexity. What’s more, each tree, if looked at closely, bore markings on it — intersecting and interweaving in patterns of mysterious, unfathomable Dao-tracings.

“Of the fifty numbers of the Great Expansion, forty-nine are put into use. This connects to the great Dao — there must be one more, the one that ‘escapes’ — that is to say, the Undying Wondrous Tree itself!”

Ye Fan’s heart stirred with excitement. All forty-nine of these jade trees had died, transforming into jade stone. The boundless divine and wondrous power they had once contained had been drawn by that “escaped one” into itself, tempered at last into an Undying Wondrous Tree.

He searched carefully and finally found the fiftieth — the one that had “escaped,” the Undying Wondrous Tree!

“It failed — it has dried up and withered…” Ye Fan stood staring blankly. Why had this happened? This truly was a waste of a divine object.

“Wait — no, it hasn’t been entirely ruined. Part of the wondrous tree’s branches must still be here!” Ye Fan noticed that though the entire jade tree had withered, its luster gone and cracks spreading across its surface, part of it was missing — as though a section had been broken off not long ago.

“Duan De!” The thought came to him at once. This had to be that dead fatty’s doing.

At the upper end of the withered jade tree, there had been a flawless section of living Undying Wondrous Tree branch, which had not died. Though the tempering process had failed, that small section certainly still held boundless and wondrous uses.

“A section of an Undying Wondrous Tree!” Ye Fan’s heart was stirred with excitement. That was undeniably a divine object, and the dead fatty had truly stumbled into tremendous fortune — to have obtained such a rare and precious thing.

“I’ll ambush him later — demand he repay the karmic debt. He took so many of my treasures in the past. This is exactly the moment for him to pay it back.” Ye Fan began plotting how to deal with Duan De.

He left this place and pressed forward, entering an ancient cave that had served as an alchemy chamber. Rows of bottles and jars lined shelves of white jade — yet when those jade bottles were opened, all the pills within had deteriorated.

This was the power of time — nothing could withstand it. All manner of precious things had been destroyed by its passage, leaving behind nothing but dust that had not changed.

“Nine-Revolution Immortal Pill?!”

Ye Fan examined every jade bottle one by one, and in the end he came upon a small five-colored gourd, upon which these four ancient characters were engraved. His heart gave a violent lurch. Anything bearing such a name would certainly be a supreme immortal treasure, most likely capable of enduring the ages — yet when he opened it, it was completely empty, nothing inside at all.

“No trace of Duan De’s aura here — he didn’t examine this section. The cave dwelling’s master most likely left no immortal pills behind.”

Ye Fan passed through many ancient cave chambers. Everything seemed ruined. Once many divine objects had been present here, yet all had been swallowed by the passage of ages, reduced to ordinary dust.

He continued on for a great distance, until at last the way ahead was filled with flowing rosy light and profound formation markings. Even with the Movement Rune Art, he could not pass through them — he had not yet fully comprehended this secret art.

At this moment Ye Fan greatly missed the great black dog. If that creature were present, no formation markings could block his path. Most likely the fat Daoist would have been sealed up and captured as well.

After careful deliberation, he decided to retreat. If he simply pushed forward, he would very likely be trapped inside — and there was also a real possibility of falling into the fat Daoist’s hands.

Ye Fan retraced his steps and returned to the outside of the ancient cave. There, in addition to the peerlessly beautiful Princess Yudi, he found a wild-haired savage clad in beast-skin garments, carrying a wolf-tooth great club.

“This is Dongfang Ye…” Princess Yudi introduced him.

Ye Fan learned to his surprise that this wild man with the compound surname Dongfang was a prodigy-level existence — one who had shattered a great expert’s palm with his bare hands.

Dongfang Ye — his name suited his nature, for there was indeed something of a wild and primitive quality about him, a roughness that felt ancient and elemental. Beneath his beast-skin clothing his skin was the color of old copper, his build strong and powerful. The wolf-tooth club he carried was made of stone.

At this moment he was grinning an open, good-natured smile, revealing a full set of snow-white teeth — looking thoroughly simple and honest.

“This place is at the very least the cave dwelling of a primordial saint — and very possibly the place where a great emperor passed into death…” Ye Fan gave a sincere account of what he had seen inside.

“A pity we can’t get through,” Princess Yudi said, her elegant dark brows faintly creased. The formation markings were simply too intricate — there was no way to decipher them.

“We don’t need to go in ourselves — we’ll ambush that dead fatty when he comes out!” Ye Fan said with a smile.

“That seems… not quite right,” Princess Yudi was reluctant.

Dongfang Ye grinned his honest grin and said: “If it were anyone else, I wouldn’t agree — but he always has his eye on my ancestral wolf-tooth club. Once he nearly stole it…”

This wild man who appeared so simple and good-natured raised both hands in wholehearted agreement to ambush Duan De, though he made it clear he would not take his life — only relieve him of his precious items.

Ye Fan gave him a peculiar look. This fellow might look harmless and honest, but it seemed he was not entirely as straightforward as his appearance suggested.

The three of them discussed Duan De’s combat power and concluded unanimously that it was fathomlessly deep and beyond measure. Even after the wild man and Duan De had nearly come to blows, he still had no sense of the man’s true depth.

“We’ll lay a trap with formation markings!” Ye Fan brought out some pieces of jade, arranged them at the exit, leaving no visible trace whatsoever. The moment those jade pieces were set in place, they all vanished on their own.

“Can formation markings really trap him? Bear in mind he broke open restrictive formations to get inside — he must have a very deep understanding of them,” Princess Yudi cautioned.

“Don’t worry — this was prepared by a certain… powerful presence, specifically for this fat Daoist,” Ye Fan said with a smile.

In the past, the great black dog and Duan De had clashed to the bitter end and come out no worse for wear. Afterward the black dog had inscribed these formation markings for Ye Fan, to be kept for whenever they might be needed.

“Will the effect really be that strong?” Dongfang Ye asked with an honest chuckle.

“This is a small formation — deliberately not made grand or elaborate, to avoid being detected by him. The moment he steps into it, his senses will blank out in an instant — and that instant is the only window we have to make our move and subdue him.” Ye Fan explained.

Boom!

A thunderous sound came from within the cave dwelling, and simultaneously a plume of rosy-colored smoke poured outward. The fat Daoist was making a tremendous commotion in there — clearly in the process of breaking through restrictive formations.

They waited with patience, making no move to rush inside and see.

Over the next two hours, various sounds rang out from within the ancient cave at irregular intervals, the disturbances growing larger and larger, and the dense spiritual energy surged and flowed like water.

“I hope he obtained a great many immortal treasures in there — perhaps even a great emperor’s ancient scripture!” the wild man said with his honest smile.

Princess Yudi was left without words. This fellow was far from as simple as he looked on the surface. He was clearly planning to give Duan De a thorough fleecing.

Ye Fan broke into laughter, then put his arm around Dongfang Ye’s shoulders, the two of them discussing at length how best to make their move.

“He’s coming out!”

Ye Fan’s spiritual perception was keenly sharp — he sensed the aura approaching. They concealed themselves within the formation markings, unconcerned about being detected.

Duan De came walking out, muttering and cursing under his breath. His clothes were in tatters — clearly he had suffered considerably inside.

Hum!

The formation markings activated, blazing with light. In that instant Duan De lost his wits. His sea of divine consciousness had nearly been peeled out of him and sealed away forever!

Thwack!

The wild man showed not an ounce of mercy. He swung his great club from behind and brought it down on the back of Duan De’s head. The impact made the fat Daoist’s eyes roll white, very nearly knocking him unconscious on the spot.

Duan De’s legs went soft beneath him. He swayed, turning to face his attacker — and at that moment Ye Fan, half-foot-tall altar platform in hand, met him coming around and slammed it into his face.

Thwack!

“You damned unscrupulous… Heavenly Venerable!” Duan De finally rolled his eyes all the way back. He had been knocked unconscious by two savages, and lurched in a swaying stumble toward the ground.