This was a cultivator from the Jurchen tribe—one of two guardians of the Primordial Dragon Cave who had been absent for over a hundred years. His attire revealed all of this, and he carried upon him a nature-born wildness.

He gnashed his teeth. Dressed in robes of colossal snake python scales, his hair bound into a single black serpent-shaped knot, he feared Ye Fan—but had no intention of surrendering meekly to death. He lunged forward to strike back.

“Pfft!”

He spat from his mouth a strand of innate blood essence, which transformed into a sky serpent blood sword that sliced toward the space between Ye Fan’s brows—though clearly, this was a futile gesture. With a light flick of Ye Fan’s finger, that innate essence immediately turned to smoke, evaporated completely, refined to ash—utterly insignificant.

This was a person from the Jin Dynasty era. He had rendered great service when the Jin armies destroyed the Northern Song, and had been cultivating ever since—more than a thousand years had passed. His cultivation was deep and formidable, making him one of the supreme experts of the present age.

In those days, the earth’s spiritual energy had not been as depleted as it was now, and he had spent year after year entering the Changbai Mountains. Over the long accumulation of years, he had dug up many spiritual ginseng roots, which greatly benefited his cultivation—allowing him to break through to the Immortal Platform realm.

Though the top of his skull had been sent flying and blood poured freely, a cultivator of this level possessed tremendous life force. So long as his primordial spirit was not extinguished, death would not come easily.

“Hum!”

The void trembled. That blinding sacred arrow came flying again—relentless and unyielding, radiating blazing light, tearing through the sky, pulverizing the mountains below, aimed directly at Ye Fan’s brow.

Such divine might was something virtually no one in the entire world could withstand. It contained a nameless Dao power, shattering all things—a sacred arrow of the same origin as the Great Archer Yi’s sun-shooting arrows of antiquity.

Ye Fan leaned his body backward, his feet shifting. With the Glyph of Traverse activated, his movements became dream-like and lightning-swift—as long as he maintained focus and did not let his guard down, he could avoid the arrow in the short term.

“Come with me to the depths of the nine netherworlds!” This cultivator who had survived since the Jin Dynasty let out a roar, his eyes blood-red, his body covered in cracks, his form ablaze. He lunged at Ye Fan, intent on seizing him and dying together.

“Pfft!”

There would be no suspense whatsoever. For the golden blood energy that radiated from Ye Fan’s body was stronger than any divine protective garment—impossible to breach. When the man threw himself against him, his body shattered, dissolving into blood mist.

Ye Fan reached out and seized the man’s sea-of-consciousness imprint, searching for a method to counter the arrow. Otherwise, this ancient great sage’s arrow—a divine bow treasure born from the same source as Yi’s sun-shooting arrows—was a considerable problem. It would be difficult to endure it for long.

In the distance, that blazing light came shooting again—this time even more powerful than before. Half the sky collapsed, and what existed there was no more. Boundless primordial mist descended; the light beam blazed with intensity, swallowing everything.

Though this arrow’s might was world-shaking, Ye Fan had taken precautions this time and would not suffer such a disadvantage as the first time. His feet active with the Glyph of Traverse, he dodged rapidly and pressed forward.

The Changbai Mountain Celestial Scale Tribe guardian’s eyes were grim. He knew it was over. The ancient slaughter formation and the Nine Dragon Sacred Bronze Seal were already supremely powerful—and the two sacred arrows were even more terrifying. By any reasonable logic, killing Ye Fan should have been absolutely certain. Yet they had still failed.

His opponent’s speed was too great—the sacred arrow had been avoided—and he himself was not a king who had cut the Dao. He could not endure the fight. Once the enemy closed in on him, he would die without question.

“Pfft!”

No suspense at all. Ye Fan rushed to close range and with one raised palm reduced him to a cloud of blood mist, then seized the sea-of-consciousness imprint.

This time he read it carefully, not immediately dissolving the sea of consciousness. Of course, during this entire process he had to maneuver constantly to evade the divine arrow’s relentless pursuit.

“I see.”

The two of them had once set sail in search of Penglai Isle, but had unexpectedly discovered an ancient water palace along the way—receiving a tremendous stroke of fortune there—and had emerged from a century of seclusion.

Ye Fan grasped all of this in an instant. He wiped the man’s sea of consciousness clean, and the black sacred arrow immediately fell to the ground. He collected it.

After a long time, the world grew still. Twenty-odd ancient weapons lay scattered across the ground—the rest having been destroyed in the earlier chaos. The ancient formation had vanished.

Ye Fan released the others from within the cauldron and let them divide the ancient weapons among themselves. These had all come from that underwater palace—none of them were ordinary things.

“Congratulations, Elder Ye, on obtaining two great sacred artifacts of antiquity,” Daoist Riqi said. To them, these were supreme treasures.

Ye Fan held both black sacred arrows in his hands—each weighing tens of thousands of catties, impossibly heavy. When the time came to journey westward, these two ancient relics of tremendous weight might prove invaluable.

He felt that the Western Order most likely had the shadow of primordial creatures behind it—and this westward journey might lead to encounters with something. These ancient, unadorned black arrows might yet be stained with the blood of a god.

He said a few brief words of this, and the several registered disciples immediately found it impossible to remain calm—all of them burning with excitement.

“Long ago, there was a saying that Laozi journeyed west to transform the barbarians. Now Master too is journeying west—is this going to be a transforming of the ancient? I want to set out right away…” Even Long Xiaoqu, with his cold and indifferent nature, could not hold himself back.

“Will the black sacred arrows become the artifacts of transformation?” The others were even more stirred with emotion, unable to control themselves.