“What — a Five-Colored Altar?!” Everyone present was startled. All eyes turned to Ji Ziyue.
“It should be in the Central Province.”
Ji Ziyue had searched through all the records she could find and discovered certain clues and threads. The setting of the scene in her dream bore a strong resemblance to a location in the Central Province, and the more she researched, the more her heart trembled.
The Central Province had once been home to a divine dynasty called “Ascension” — had it still existed, it might have been the foremost dynasty under heaven. At its peak of glory, no other of the four great divine dynasties had yet arisen; more than half of the Central Province’s territory had been under its rule, and all under heaven had obeyed its commands without daring to resist.
From the two characters of its name alone — “Ascension” — one could infer just how magnificent that dynasty had been. What they pursued was the true meaning of immortal life. Everything they did was in service of becoming immortal.
Yet overnight, it had shattered and fallen apart, erased from this world — as if it had never existed at all. Even the ancient records contained no detailed account of it.
Ji Ziyue had searched through every volume in the Ji Family’s scripture pavilion, cross-referencing various ancient maps alongside the present-day map of mountains and rivers, and had discovered that the Five-Colored Altar from her dream was located beside the ancestral temple of the Ascension divine dynasty.
“The Ascension dynasty was that powerful, and they possessed a Five-Colored Altar?” Pang Bo was astonished. In the current age, every altar had become a ruin — not a single person could command one.
“I’ve heard of this as well. It was an extraordinarily powerful dynasty — the foremost in the Central Province in its time. In the end it truly ascended — yet not by becoming immortal. It became ash.” The Black Emperor said.
“If you truly wish to leave, perhaps you could visit the Ascension ruins and see whether there is anything to find there. That place is very mysterious.” Ji Ziyue said softly. She was reluctant to see him go, yet she told him all the same. A faint dimness passed through her beautiful eyes.
Ye Fan did not know what to say. He looked into her beautiful eyes, wanting to console her — yet perhaps that would only be a kind of harm. He wanted to bring her along to the other side of the starry sky — but just as it was for him, she could not bear to leave her parents.
Ji Ziyue forced a smile and said she would gaze at the stars every night and pray for him — and that when all was settled, she would follow his footsteps and go to the other side of the stars to see for herself.
Clang, clang…
The Heaven-Devouring Demonic Lid let out sounds of plaintive resonance, drifting and sinking above Ji Ziyue’s palm, raining down wisps of immortal radiance, resonating with that bronze ring.
Between the two of them, threads of radiance connected — and this wondrous sight shook everyone present. Without a doubt, these were the Fierce One’s relics — they recognized each other, and could merge.
“Do you still remember what the little girl looked like in your dream?” Ye Fan asked.
Ji Ziyue shook her head. Those scenes were too blurry, and the little girl’s face most of all was indistinct. She only remembered that the girl had a pair of bright, large eyes brimming with tears, wore her hair in little pigtails, was no more than three or four years old, and was dressed in tattered little clothes, wearing worn-out little shoes.
Hmm!
The void trembled. A blurry scene flowed before the eyes of several of them — and the Five-Colored Altar actually appeared. A little girl had lost her shoes and was charging forward sobbing — only to catch one last glimpse of that set of bones.
Bang!
The scene shattered. Darkness closed in from all sides. Then, as if a voice were reverberating through the void: “Not to become immortal — only to await your return to this mortal world.”
Everyone was shaken. They all stood frozen. Was this the Fierce One Emperor? She had believed the young man could appear once more — that was her obsession, and the most precious hope in her heart. She had defied heaven and lived across multiple lifetimes, only to wait for that young man’s return?
No brilliant divine halo surrounded her. Only dimness. Yet one could imagine the brilliance of her sweeping through the six directions and eight wastelands, standing unrivaled in the nine heavens — plainly standing at the pinnacle of the mortal Dao, looking down upon the ten-thousand ages of reincarnation, yet not being recognized in her own memory.
The so-called glory of an Emperor — to her, it was worth far less than a stretch of childhood joy and bitterness intertwined. Even unrivaled under heaven, it could not bring back everything from those former years.
At last, everything faded away. Only a ghost-faced mask remained — bearing tear stains, neither quite crying nor quite laughing — the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Lid drifting in the air.
Ding!
The bronze ring in Ji Ziyue’s hand withdrew its luster and sank into her body. The two relics of the Fierce One parted of their own accord, and each grew quiet.
This revered Emperor — the Fierce One — her fragments of memory left people with feelings too complex and tangled to untangle, their hearts surging without cease, unable to name what they felt.
“I somehow feel that I have a profound karmic connection with the Fierce One Emperor.” Ye Fan murmured to himself.
He ran his hands over the things upon his body — one after another, all of them were deeply connected to the Fierce One. First was the Cauldron of the Vital Essence of Ten Thousand Things — retrieved from the Ancient Bronze Immortal Palace — a priceless sacred object for achieving the Dao.
Second was the True Dragon’s Undying Medicine. More than two hundred thousand years ago it had belonged to the Fierce One. He had obtained the True Dragon’s divine liquid twice in succession, and even now still had some left on his person, not yet used up.
Additionally, there was the Immortal Treasure Map — obtained from the Chaos Dragon Nest, once owned even by the Battling Saint Emperor, then falling into the Fierce One’s hands more than two hundred thousand years ago. When Ye Fan obtained this map, the Fierce One’s coffin had sunk into the chaos.
“What is happening to me?” The more Ye Fan thought, the more his heart pounded.
At the same time, he thought of those he knew: Duan De had the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Lid; Ji Ziyue had the ring most dear to the Fierce One in her entire life; Tu Fei’s grandfather had the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Cauldron; and Li Xiaoman had obtained the Fierce One’s legacy.
It was as if a net had been woven — interlacing together, surrounding him in the center — and his connection to the Fierce One Emperor could not be severed. It left him with wave upon wave of unease.
Two days later, Ye Fan, Pang Bo, Ji Ziyue, the Black Emperor, and the others crossed the void and arrived in the Central Province.
The ruins of the Ascension dynasty covered a very large area. Strictly speaking, half the Central Province had once been incorporated into their territory. At that time, the Great Xia and Nine Li divine dynasties had not yet arisen — their domain had been boundless.
The mysterious ancestral temple lay at the very heart of the central axis dragon vein — occupying the most auspicious position under heaven, having seized every last drop of providence from heaven and earth. It had once been a heaven-defying secret land. However, two hundred thousand years ago, the oldest dragon vein in the Central Province had been forcibly severed, its dragon energy dissipating and re-condensing into several ancestral dragon veins in other regions.
And from that moment on, this severed dragon, once a supreme pure land, had instantly transformed into a land of death — the most inauspicious area imaginable. Life had all but ceased.
The heart of the Central Province — now utterly barren, perpetually dim, constantly wreathed in black mist in bands and wisps, unknown to light.
Ahead were visible peaks of shattered mountains — formed from the shockwaves of some great power long ago. What kind of battle had been fought here in those ancient days was impossible to say.
“Look — how tremendous that ancient vein is. Once the longest ancestral vein in the Central Province, placed next to thousands upon thousands of mountain ranges combined, it would still be thicker! ” Duan De said. For him, the geography of every land had to be thoroughly mastered.
Everyone felt their scalps tighten at once. Could this still be called a mountain range? It was far too massive. It was more like a plateau. When they flew up into the endless sky and looked down, they found it truly was a dragon vein.
“A distant ancient Sage once flew above this ancient star and looked down. The Central Province’s foremost dragon vein was broken by a single palm — someone who was an unknowable number of tens of thousands of li away simply pressed down and left five fingerprints, severing the ancestral dragon vein into several sections and shattering all surrounding peaks. The land for a million li in every direction sank into the earth.” The Black Emperor said.
“That can’t be — with a single strike, a million li sank, and five fingerprints severed the greatest ancestral dragon vein the Central Province had ever known? That’s beyond heaven-defying.” Pang Bo exclaimed in astonishment.
Half a day later, they had penetrated deep into the heart of the Central Province and arrived at a barren wasteland — still perpetually dim, still wreathed in banded black mist, as if they stood in the underworld.
“There are ancient structures ahead!”
Just ahead was a complex of divine temples, bearing the weight of immeasurable ages, having existed for an unknowable number of tens of thousands of years — yet not yet decayed and crumbled.
“This can’t be — has this Daoist truly missed out on a great windfall? The ancestral temple of the Ascension dynasty was not destroyed, and I never came to excavate it before.” Duan De murmured to himself, clenching his fist.
Behind the ancestral temple was a stretch of grey mist that shrouded everything from view. According to what Ji Ziyue had seen in her dream, somewhere deep within that area should be a Five-Colored Altar.
Yet now, heaven’s workings gave no sign, and all was strangely veiled — locked within all manner of confounding formations, hiding everything from sight.
“Who goes there?” A sharp challenge rang out from before the ancient temple, as a row of armored soldiers in black-iron garments appeared, each holding iron halberds, faces grave and solemn.
Quickly, more and more figures surged out from all around the ancient temple and from the shattered peaks — densely packed, all of them powerful experts. In addition, various formation markings were activated, blanketing the entire region.
“Who are these people — they’ve occupied this place?” Li Tian was surprised.
“This place was only recently excavated. This is a collapsed small world that they’ve cleared out. It can’t have been long since they’ve opened it. At the very least, no one has entered the ancestral temple — it’s still sealed.” Duan De said with the air of a professional.
“Trouble. These are people we cannot afford to offend — the forces of the four great divine dynasties. They got here first.” Li Heishui said.
Ahead was a joint army — banners of all four great divine dynasties flew together. They were here in joint operation, excavating the ancestral temple of the Central Province from two hundred thousand years ago, seeking something within.
“And Yao Guang’s banner as well.” Ji Ziyue said, recognizing the sacred banner of Yao Guang at a glance.
Five great powers together — who would dare contend with them for this? They were jointly excavating, seeking to clear the Ascension dynasty’s ruins and open up this collapsed small world.
In its day, the Ascension dynasty had been the foremost in the Central Province, its commands obeyed by all without daring to resist, possessing supreme authority — yet overnight it had turned to ash. According to legend, even their divine weapons had been shattered.
Moreover, this was the only known case with evidence of a supreme divine weapon having been destroyed, shattering the myth of the indestructibility of weapons forged to the pinnacle of the Dao.
They had been destroyed too swiftly in their day — all manner of rare treasures had never resurfaced, and had been sealed beneath the earth. According to legend, someone had sealed everything with tremendous divine power.
“Do you see? This collapsed small world was sealed, but someone used a supreme divine weapon to break through one corner of it, causing it to reappear in the world. Otherwise, even if we’d found this place, we most likely wouldn’t have discovered it.” Duan De said.
“The Yao Guang sacred ground is participating in this…” Ye Fan murmured. Then he voiced a speculation he had long held: the Holy Son of Yao Guang may have obtained the legacy of the Fierce One — the Indestructible Celestial Art. Since Ji Ziyue and Duan De had seen certain things in their dreams, perhaps the Holy Son of Yao Guang had experienced the same, and thus tracked down this ancestral temple of the Central Province. Perhaps there was something extremely important in the temple.
“That’s right — the Ascension dynasty’s many sacred objects were enshrined in this ancestral temple. This place is practically one great divine dynasty mausoleum!” Duan De said with professional authority.
Pang Bo stepped forward to negotiate. Several figures came to meet him from the other side — all of them figures of great status and power, imperial ancestral-level figures from the four great divine dynasties. They responded in solemn tones: they had begun excavating this site half a year ago and had only recently produced results. They would not permit outsiders to intrude.
Ye Fan and his group fell back. A forcible assault might allow them to break through — but this ancient temple was too mysterious. Even the four great divine dynasties and Yao Guang had not dared to enter rashly. To barge in recklessly might invite calamity.
“What do we do? The Holy Son of Yao Guang got here first. This place is a real problem.” Pang Bo frowned, exchanging a look with Ye Fan.
Everyone else also felt it was something of a headache. This place was clearly extraordinary — but provoking the four great divine dynasties and the Yao Guang sacred ground could draw out multiple supreme divine weapons.
Ye Fan said: “First, we should have the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Cauldron made whole again. I feel this place will require it — there is some great connection between them. Then — perhaps we should borrow the power of all under heaven: make the secret of this place public, and allow powerful experts from every faction to enter.”
After they left, they fell into earnest discussion.
Only Ji Ziyue sighed softly, gazing at the mist beyond the ancient temple. She murmured: “In those days, that little girl wept and cried, losing her broken little shoes as she ran, to see that young man off — and in the end only saw his bones return to her…”
“That was not her ending. She ultimately became an Emperor.” The Monkey walked over.
“Indeed — unrivaled under heaven, one of the most mysterious and powerful Emperors of antiquity and modernity, with scarcely anyone able to stand beside her.” The Black Emperor interjected.
“But she was not happy.” Ji Ziyue shook her head.
“Yet she still held hope in her heart — she believed she would meet that young man again.” Ye Fan spoke. And then, from that little girl, he could not help but think of Xiao Nannan — equally pitiable and wretched. Where was she now?