Crumbled walls and broken remnants. Not a single blade of grass. A vast and enormous abyss stretching over a hundred li — dark and boundless, its depths invisible to the eye — and it was the mark left by a single finger.
Ye Fan stood there in a daze. Had the records in that piece of unofficial history proven true? One person, standing ten thousand li away, pointing from a distance — and an ancient clan comparable to a divine dynasty had been annihilated.
The Azure Emperor!
The sole person to have attained the Dao after the archaic era, of mysterious origins, with cultivation that defied measurement — a Great Emperor shrouded in enigma, shaking both ancient and modern times.
Ye Fan had experienced for himself the terrifying might of the demon emperor: standing ten thousand li away and flicking a single finger, causing an immortal lineage to disintegrate into ash and smoke. What kind of vast and boundless divine power was this?
“I imagine that if he wished to, striking out a finger imprint ten thousand li in length would pose no problem whatsoever…”
The great chasm stretching over a hundred li had been precise in its destruction — it had demolished exactly the Cai Clan’s sanctuary, without spreading a single inch further. The range was controlled with absolute precision, refined to perfection.
“The Great Emperors of antiquity were fearsome beyond measure. In the lift of a hand, erasing a divine dynasty would present not the slightest difficulty!”
The Azure Emperor — what manner of person was he? The sole Great Emperor of the later archaic era, necessarily one of the most brilliantly extraordinary figures since the beginning of time. Would he truly have exterminated an ancient clan for the sake of the Nine Secrets? Ye Fan pondered, yet could not think it through.
The Nine Secrets were the supreme divine arts of Daoism, undeniably captivating to the heart — yet surely not sufficient to lead a Great Emperor to commit such an act of complete annihilation? Ye Fan wrestled with the thought but could not reason it out.
“Could there be some secret unknown to the world? Or perhaps it concerns the mystery of immortality…” Ye Fan turned it over and over in his mind. The reasons that could move a Great Emperor to act were far too few.
He felt certain that the Cai Clan must have held many secrets — secrets weighty enough to draw the Azure Emperor’s personal attention. If they could be found, perhaps a veil of historical mystery might be lifted.
In the present age, apart from that clan itself, there was likely not a single person who knew all that had transpired in those events.
Ye Fan walked through this stretch of ruins and found nothing at all. One could well imagine — how many people in this past ten thousand years had come to mourn here? Any clues that might once have existed would long since have been taken away.
He sank down into the bottomless abyss and felt for himself the power of that one finger — reaching depths of ten thousand zhang, the underground rock and soil all smoothed away in every place, whether it was stone or earth, all made flat.
Ye Fan left this place carrying a faint melancholy and a deep reverence. A glorious clan with a lineage stretching back to ancient times had ultimately been unable to withstand the Azure Emperor’s single finger. It filled the heart with lament.
According to the materials Pang Bo had given him, the Cai Clan had not been entirely annihilated. Some members had been away when it happened, and had surely escaped the calamity.
In these ten thousand years since, several rising sects had come under suspicion of being survivors of the Cai Clan — believed to have changed their identity and appearance while continuing the glorious inheritance of the family.
Ye Fan also believed the clan had not been completely wiped out. Otherwise, how could there be an old saint who, just before transforming back into the Dao, had gazed westward — dissolving his form into the natural world?
In the days that followed, he embarked on a long search and journey.
The Vermilion Bird Sect — a great sect that had risen eight thousand years ago, occupying a vast territory in a stretch of beautiful mountains in the western Central Continent.
This time, Ye Fan crossed the void to get there, for the distance was too immense. He let out a helpless sigh. In the past two months he had traveled to many places, yet every one had yielded nothing.
This mountainous region was predominantly red earth. Without the covering of vegetation, it looked like a blazing fire burning on the land. The Vermilion Bird Sect had been flourishing for several thousand years, its disciples numerous and its powerful figures many as clouds.
This was now nearly the last destination on Ye Fan’s list. If he found no descendants of the Cai Clan here, he would truly be out of options.
Several days later, Ye Fan disguised himself as an earth master and lingered in the area, learning a great deal of detailed information. The sect occupied seventy-two spiritual peaks and had over ten thousand disciples and followers.
Yet, to his disappointment, he had not heard of any particularly extraordinary divine art belonging to the sect — he could not tell whether it was simply well concealed, or whether he had once again come to the wrong place.
A few more days passed. Ye Fan learned that this was the site where a divine phoenix had fallen, its blood staining the mountains and rivers red — which was why the soil here was also red. The sect’s most powerful supreme art was called the Young Sun True Scripture.
“It is a scripture that evolved from a fragment of the True Sun Scripture!” He was greatly surprised. No wonder this sect had grown increasingly prosperous. The fragment of a scripture they held was of tremendous origin.
One-fifth of the True Sun Scripture was enough to allow a great sect to establish itself in one region — testament to how vast and profound the supreme ancient human clan scriptures, the Two Scriptures of Supreme Yin and Supreme Yang, truly were.
Half a month later, Ye Fan spent one piece of divine source and from a disciple of the sect known as “the One Who Knows All Things” learned a secret: the founding patriarch of this sect was indeed surnamed Cai. However, he had not stayed long — after five hundred years of running the sect, he had left and entrusted everything to his disciples.
“Friend, you’re here to seek the Nine Secrets, aren’t you? In these eight thousand years, who even knows how many people have come. Don’t waste your time — there’s nothing here at all.” The one who knew all things clapped Ye Fan on the shoulder and said, with a meaningful look.
Ye Fan laughed as well. It was clear this approach would never work — too many people had already tried it before him.
“I’ll put it to you plainly — our patriarch truly may have been a survivor of the Cai Clan. But he didn’t pass down any Nine Secrets. He only left behind a fragment of a scripture.”
This “One Who Knows All Things” spoke at length. Over eight thousand years, many brilliant and extraordinary figures had come seeking answers, yet all had ultimately departed empty-handed. There was simply nothing here to be obtained.
The Nine Secrets — the nine supreme divine arts of Daoism — contained too many mysteries within them. They incurred the envy of heaven and could not be united as one. Now they were scattered in every direction, and several had been severed from transmission entirely.
Searching this way was no better than dredging the sea for a needle — there was essentially no chance of finding any clue.
“You spent a piece of divine source to buy information, so it seems you’re fairly generous. Let me give you one piece of free advice. Our founding ancestor traveled southward from here and, by what I’ve heard, went to an ancient land called Hanchuan.”
Ye Fan smiled bitterly. Eight thousand years had already passed — trying to track down any trail of someone was enormously difficult. He even found himself wondering whether the sect’s patriarch was the very old saint who had dissolved back into the Dao.
Even so, for the sake of obtaining the Nine Secrets, he could only continue on. Even knowing that many had walked this road before him, he still hoped to uncover some precious clue.
He had traveled all this way westward, and now he would need to head toward the southern part of the Central Continent — a route of tremendous distance, requiring him once again to cross through space.
Fortunately, what was called “the southern part” was the region bordering the western portion — not the southernmost end. Otherwise he would truly have been at his wit’s end.
On his person, he had ample dark jade platforms, and by now he had learned to carve them himself — the simplest kind, naturally, only capable of spanning a few tens of thousands of li with each crossing.
Along the way, Ye Fan crossed the void repeatedly, leaving behind dark jade platforms beyond counting, until he finally arrived at Hanchuan in the southern Central Continent.
This territory spanned a million li in all directions, yet in the vast southern Central Continent, it was only one corner.
Hanchuan was a plains region. Eleven great ancient cities stood there most prominently, each one gathering the dragon qi of heaven and earth, every one of them enormously ancient and at the peak of their fortune and momentum.
Each ancient city was a great power in its own right. Ye Fan felt a headache coming on. He spent half a month making discreet inquiries and obtained only a small thread of a clue — that the Cai Clan’s people had indeed come here once, yet had afterward vanished without a trace.
In the end, by exhausting every method available to him, he finally learned that the Cai Clan had intended to rise from the ashes here and rebuild their glory — yet had ultimately departed, reason unknown.
The next destination was far in the eastern Central Continent, almost bordering the Eastern Wastelands. From south to east was a span of more than half the entire Central Continent — vastly more distant.
Ye Fan wished to continue onward, but ordinary dark jade platforms would not do for this. Unless he carried an entire mountain’s worth of them, there would not be enough to squander. What he needed now was a large-scale divine formation — the distance was simply too immense.
“Is the Cai Clan deliberately toying with people? First to the west, then to the south, and then off to the east. Will the next stop be north?”
Ye Fan felt that searching in this manner would never work. In ten thousand years, who knew how many people had been searching for the Cai Clan’s Nine Secrets. Since nothing had ever been passed down to the world, it proved that nearly all of those people had failed.
If he continued walking the same path as those before him, he too was destined to end in failure.
“I cannot think the same way as those who came before. I need to approach this from a different angle.”
After that, he began spending the divine source in his possession, purchasing information from the three great ancient sects of the Central Continent to deduce where the Nine Secrets might be.
The Hundred-Knower Gate, the Heaven’s Mechanism Pavilion, and the Red Dust Chamber — all three ancient sects were numbered among the hundred schools of the Central Continent, their origins traceable to before the archaic era. They were the best-informed of all and sold intelligence to outsiders, charging a thousand in gold for a single word, with remarkable accuracy.
“I can only hope that Hua Yunfei has found a clue…”
Ye Fan deeply did not wish for this person to obtain the Nine Secrets, yet now he had no choice but to start from Hua Yunfei’s trail. Hua Yunfei had gone to that small Daoist temple ahead of him, and likely had obtained more clues than he had — perhaps even taken something the old saint had left behind.
He abandoned the search for the Cai Clan and instead began spending a great deal of source, relying on these three ancient sects to track down Hua Yunfei’s whereabouts.
First, Ye Fan posted a commissioned task: to compile where the greatest number of holy son-tier figures had recently fallen.
He knew full well that Hua Yunfei cultivated the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Art. To devour superior fundamental essences, those at the holy son caliber were absolutely his preferred targets.
Before long, the Hundred-Knower Gate delivered a sealed letter providing the relevant information. At one glance, he was caught between laughter and tears.
What was written was simple: the area in which the sacred body Ye Fan moved about was the region where the greatest number of holy son-tier figures had fallen — and it listed places like the Fire Demon Ridge, the Extraordinary Masters Mansion, and the Immortal Palace Realm.
“How did the search lead back to me…”
Fortunately, the Hundred-Knower Gate also sent a more detailed set of materials: in the western Central Continent, some outstanding disciples from certain great sects had recently died; in the southern Central Continent, several exceptional individuals had vanished; and in the eastern Central Continent, some astonishingly gifted young powerhouses had disappeared under mysterious circumstances.
Something clicked in Ye Fan’s mind. Over the past two years, some brilliant figures in the Central Continent had vanished without explanation, leaving behind unsolved cases — but since the region was so vast, no one had noticed any pattern.
“Was it Hua Yunfei’s doing? But the distribution is too scattered to deduce his location from…”
He drew a few circles on a map, dividing it into a dozen or so possible territories where Hua Yunfei might have been active.
He spent no small amount of time linking the death times and locations of these individuals together, organizing them into a map of movements.
“Using this to deduce Hua Yunfei’s trail of activity is still not reliable enough — there are too many variables.”
After that, Ye Fan spent a great deal of divine source, commissioning the three great ancient sects to investigate a critical element: gathering records of every place where a Heavenly Tribulation had occurred over the past two or more years.
This was enormously difficult to accomplish. People who underwent tribulation crossing generally sought out uninhabited wastelands where no one would notice.
Yet the three great ancient sects were no ordinary institutions. They truly delivered some extremely valuable information, marking out certain regions with certainty — people had undergone tribulation crossings there.
Working from this, Ye Fan drew out yet another map — but it still could not be taken as definitive. He thought it over carefully for a long time.
This was far from enough. The world was too vast. Even combining all this information, it was not sufficient to deduce where Hua Yunfei was.
Ye Fan had spent time in great detail with the Black Emperor, learning thoroughly about all the characteristics of the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Art — the various difficulties and problems that arose during its cultivation.
This art was at odds with heaven itself — a Demonic Dao of nine deaths and one life. When devouring another’s fundamental essence, one was prone to heavenly punishment and needed several ancient medicinal prescriptions to achieve harmonization.
These prescriptions — aside from the Black Emperor — even the people of the various divine dynasties might not have known about them. Virtually no one alive in the present age understood their purpose.
Ye Fan listed several particularly precious and rare medicinal herbs that were the primary ingredients in the ancient prescriptions — things that were not easy to find in the world. If they appeared for sale somewhere, there would be a traceable trail.
This piece of intelligence was of great importance. Before long, Ye Fan received a document sent by the Red Dust Chamber. Based on the dates and locations of medicinal herb sales, he drew yet another map.
“Once the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Art achieves small completion, in the process of its testing, it becomes capable of devouring mountains and rivers — a black void that shatters all things.”
Drawing on all the specifics that the Black Emperor had described, he posted yet another task: to investigate unusual changes in terrain across various regions — whether certain areas had seen entire mountain ranges disappear.
…
In this way, working from detail after detail, Ye Fan posted eighteen separate commissioned tasks in total, each one requiring the expenditure of a great deal of divine source. Based on the eighteen sets of information returned, he drew eighteen maps.
After that, he organized, synthesized, and merged all eighteen maps into one, creating a final map of movement — representing the trail of Hua Yunfei’s activities.
“Five regions are the most suspect!”
Deep in the night, Ye Fan bent over the map at his desk, thinking carefully, and settled on five regions.
“Hua Yunfei — I am coming for you!”
The next day, Ye Fan set out, beginning his search. The five territories on the map would need to be visited one by one.
It was a tedious process. He spent a full month traveling through four of the five territories and eliminating them. In the end, he arrived once more in the western Central Continent — not at the Vermilion Bird Sect, but at a place called Qinling.
This time, Ye Fan took far longer. After more than a month, he finally discovered some clues, yet could not determine the precise location.
Qinling was a mysterious and profound place, with no small number of ancient sects — all enormously powerful, and most having existed for many tens of thousands of years. Yet none of them had any connection to the Cai Clan.
Even so, Ye Fan discovered traces of Hua Yunfei’s activities in this territory, and they aligned well with the eighteen maps he had drawn.
“I believe you are somewhere in this region. But Qinling is too vast. I can only close in gradually — and I will find you.”
Half a month later, Ye Fan passed through a fallen and diminished small sect. This place had no ancient city to gather the ancestral roots and dragon qi, only a few low and undistinguished mountains with neither spirit nor scenery.
Suddenly, he spotted a familiar silhouette on one of the low mountains, walking alongside several disciples of this declining little sect.
“Li Xiaoman…”
It was none other than an old acquaintance who had come with him from another sky across the starry void. Three years had passed without their meeting, yet she was unchanged — clear and graceful as ever, white robes drifting, carrying with her a hint of otherworldly elegance.
In that instant, Ye Fan knew without a doubt: Hua Yunfei had to be here. He had found the right place.
“The Nine Secrets must be here as well. Remarkable — Hua Yunfei has used only two years or so to locate what others have searched eight thousand years for without finding.”
A fallen and diminished little sect with only a few dozen disciples — could the Nine Secrets truly be here? Ye Fan stood in the distant sky, watching Li Xiaoman, and turned it over quietly in his mind for a time.
“She has become a disciple of this sect. A fallen little sect may not be as unremarkable as it seems…”