“No, that’s wrong!”
Hearing this, everyone turned to look at Zhang Mingyuan.
Lingxuzi asked, “Old Zhang, what do you see?”
Beside them, the Heavenly Dao looked back at the battered body of the woman in purple who had fallen onto the peak of Mount Mu, the divine light in His eyes shifting.
“Look closely. She still has a breath of life left in her!”
“Though her breath is weak, it's like a tiny spark.”
Lingxuzi and Bai Lumian followed the direction of Zhang Mingyuan's finger, looking toward the peak of Mount Mu.
The woman in purple lay slumped on the scorched earth. Although her physical body was ruined, a cluster of purple Dao charm was swirling and condensing over her chest, faintly blooming with auspicious light.
The ultimate end of life is death, and the ultimate end of death is life.
This was the Dao, the "one that escaped" from the forty-nine pathways of heaven, representing the ultimate possibility in all things. Nothing was truly impossible.
Miracles would always happen within that "one."
“The laws of disillusionment allow one to probe the mysteries of space-time and the branches of the universe at the extremes of life and death. She is using this moment to forge ten thousand parallel selves!”
The Heavenly Dao slapped His thigh and exclaimed,
“If she achieves great mastery of this technique, when she fights others in the future, she can manifest clones of herself from ten thousand different space-times and universes. Within the same realm, barely anyone will be able to kill her!”
“Aya, what a genius! If our Xuanling Realm had more talents like you all, and none of you chose to ascend to the upper world, how could we not flourish?!”
“Ah? That's so badass! Holy crap, she's trying to defy heaven!” Zhang Mingyuan looked at her figure, his eyes filled with appreciation for the strong.
“Alright, alright, stop talking about defying heaven every chance you get. Your Big Brother is still right here, you know!”
Days passed, one by one.
The purple light atop Mount Mu grew increasingly brilliant.
On the ninth day.
Above the scorched earth, the purple light suddenly contracted.
The woman in purple snapped her eyes open.
Her ruined shell peeled away inch by inch, revealing a newly born, jade-white Dao body.
Her long black hair regrew, and her purple cloud flowing immortal gown was restored to brand new under the weaving of Dao laws.
She stood alone on the mountain peak, facing the vault of heaven.
Raising her delicate hand, the purple mist in the void collapsed wildly, transforming into an umbrella in her palm!
The ribs of the umbrella were like jade, and the canopy flowed with scenes of the universe's birth and destruction. With every shift of light and shadow, it seemed as if the phantom of a world was born within it, only to return to nothingness.
She pointed the tip of the umbrella straight at the immortal tribulation—
“Come again!”
Tribulation clouds blanketed the sky, and wild purple lightning pythons surged with fury!
Boom!
The immortal lightning materialized and shot straight down!
This time, the falling immortal lightning actually transformed into a ten-thousand-foot-tall lightning Dharma body.
The Dharma body had four arms, each holding weapons like swords, spears, axes, and halberds the size of mountains.
Every divine weapon carried the power to burn and distort space. Instantly, flames danced across the sky, and heaven and earth seethed!
The entire Central Plains shook continuously, and the mountains and rivers nearly melted.
Fortunately, at this moment, the Heavenly Dao used the primordial power of the world's order to stabilize the universe.
At the foot of Mount Mu, Lingxuzi and Bai Lumian covered their eyes.
Zhang Mingyuan grimaced, sucking in a cold breath.
On the mountain peak, the woman in purple remained expressionless and leaped into the air!
Beneath the vault of heaven, the hundred thousand tribulation clouds were as ferocious as a world-destroying millstone.
Yet her purple clothes fluttered, and her celestial face was filled with nothing but fearlessness and determination!
Her Dao body flickered beneath the heavens, and purple blossoms danced with her movements, performing a swan song between heaven and earth.
The two collided.
There was no earth-shattering roar, only the silent annihilation at the level of laws.
Her fluttering figure beneath the lightning was as minuscule as a single grain of millet cast into the vast sea.
...
The blossoms withered away, and the purple figure was swallowed by the lightning.
“No way... I feel like she's a bit dead.”
“You must succeed! My immortal Dao source energy!”
“Even if my spatial laws reached the Mahayana Stage, my 'Spatial Annihilation' would probably be swallowed up by this strike.”
“Too terrifying. Maybe this Valley Master shouldn't become an immortal after all...”
...
The tribulation clouds dispersed, and order was restored to heaven and earth.
However, beneath the sky, the purple-clothed figure was nowhere to be found.
Sunlight spilled over the mountains and rivers of the Central Plains, reflecting the dappled shadows of survival after the disaster.
Suddenly, the withered petals that had scattered across the world gathered in the air, like time flowing backward or the sea of stars surging in reverse.
In the sunlight, amidst the high winds.
A phantom woven from ten thousand space-times coalesced, flickering incessantly.
Then, as illusion and reality alternated, that fluttering, peerless purple-clothed figure actually reformed!
“Holy shit!!!”
“Badass!!!”
“Blooming between life and death, illusion and reality—as expected of the Purple Mist Disillusionment Epiphyllum! Absolutely unmatched!”
Zhang Mingyuan roared in excitement.
This roar was just like back on Blue Star, watching the League of Legends World Championship. Your home team had been suppressed and beaten the entire game, but suddenly, at the critical moment, they had a "near-death enlightenment" and turned the tables in a miraculous comeback!
How could anyone not be excited?
The Heavenly Dao and Lingxuzi also pumped their fists and cheered, declaring Shen Ningyan to be a truly extraordinary woman of the Xuanling Realm.
Right at this moment, Zhang Mingyuan suddenly felt a chill run down his spine.
A cold, familiar voice capable of freezing even a Red Dust Immortal's soul rang out quietly from behind him.
“Zhang Mingyuan, it seems... you're very excited?”
Zhang Mingyuan turned around, only to find his lady's face already as dark as unmelting profound ice.
He hurriedly walked over, wanting to grab his lady's delicate hand, but she dodged him with a sidestep.
“No, Little Xuexue, you misunderstand. I was only...”
Su Jinxue crossed her arms, her red eyes narrowing at this man who had just been hooting and hollering as if he had witnessed his own mother give birth smoothly.
“Only what? You'd better think carefully.”
“I was only... sigh, no matter what, she is still someone from our Xuanling Realm. I was just happy to see one of our own successfully pass her tribulation, so I—”
“Oh? ‘One of our own’?”
“Oh, no, no, no! She's just an outsider. Only my Little Xuexue is my own!” Zhang Mingyuan raised four fingers on his right hand, looking completely serious!
“Then what were you getting so excited about just now?”
?
Zhang Mingyuan's brain suddenly seemed to short-circuit.
Right. Since she wasn't "his own," what had he been getting so excited about?
Was something a bit off here?
It seemed the more he explained, the worse it got...
“Hey! That's not right, Little Xuexue. You're twisting my words!”
“Hmph.” Su Jinxue's rosy lips curved slightly, a hint of disdain in her eyes as she tried her best to look extremely angry.
She couldn't let herself laugh in front of this idiot right now.
...
Zhang Mingyuan was closely examining Su Jinxue's expression.
“You smiled!”
“I did not.”
“You did it on purpose!”
“Who did what on purpose?”
“Hehehe.” Zhang Mingyuan stepped in front of Su Jinxue and domineeringly pulled her into his embrace.
He pried open her crossed arms and firmly squeezed her cool, soft hand.
“I knew my lady is the best. There's no way you'd get so incredibly jealous over this. Once things here are wrapped up, your husband will definitely return the favor by—”
Su Jinxue quickly pulled her hand free and pressed her fingers against his upper and lower lips, stopping him mid-speech.
“Shut up!”
Up in the sky, Shen Ningyan witnessed all of this, and her Dao Heart fell into utter chaos!
“What is going on? Why is Brother Mingyuan so intimate with that fierce woman?”
“Didn't Brother Mingyuan hate that fierce woman the most in the past, loving nothing more than to oppose her at every turn?”
“Why do they look so close today, like a pair of Dao companions?!”
“Could it be that during my hundreds of years of secluded cultivation, Brother Mingyuan and that fierce woman have already...”
She did not dare to think any further.
More than three hundred years ago, she had heard that Su Jinxue attained her Dao and became a Red Dust Immortal...
The very first thing that woman did after becoming an immortal was capture Brother Mingyuan.
At the time, she was far away in the Central Plains and refused to believe it. It wasn't until she later attended the Ascension Ceremony of the Myriad Snow Palace and saw Zhang Mingyuan appearing from afar as a Sword-Bearing Attendant...
Right then and there! She turned on her heel and left the Myriad Snow Palace without looking back, returning to her own Dao arena to enter a life-and-death seclusion!
She swore that she would never emerge until she became a Red Dust Immortal!
Only today, more than three hundred years later, did she finally succeed in attaining her Dao!
Yet she never expected... that things would change so much, and hearts would drift...
She had happily believed that as long as she became an immortal, she would be able to snatch Brother Mingyuan back...
But she had never imagined that on her path to ascension, she would witness such a scene!
“No! This is all fake. There must have been a mistake when I was cultivating the laws of disillusionment, causing me to see a scene from a branch universe!”
“This must be happening in a branch universe! It is definitely not the present!”
She comforted herself in this manner beneath the heavens.
She desperately wanted to go down right now, to see and ask her Brother Mingyuan what exactly had happened...
But for now, she still had to wait for the baptism of the Gate of Ascension.
She sat cross-legged, quietly waiting for the immortal light to arrive.
The void suddenly opened, and auspicious light cascaded down.
Before long, the Gate of Ascension descended in a grand display.
She did not choose to cross the Gate of Ascension to ascend; instead, she wanted to remain an immortal within the mortal red dust of the lower world.
At the foot of Mount Mu, the Heavenly Dao's eyes lit up. “Worthy Brother, now's the time!”
“No problem, Big Brother!”
Zhang Mingyuan drew the Dog Slaughterer with a backhand sweep, the dark red glow on the blade rapidly flickering.
He leaped into the air, charging straight toward the Gate of Ascension!
In the air, Shen Ningyan watched that familiar figure rushing toward her, her eyes instantly filling with joy.
Brother Mingyuan!
But what was Brother Mingyuan doing coming up here right now?
Could he be here for the immortal Dao source energy?
It wasn't that she was unwilling to share some source energy with her Brother Mingyuan, but the source energy descended from the Gate of Ascension would only bless the one ascending.
Zhang Mingyuan had already arrived before her. Just as she was about to open her mouth to greet him—
She saw Zhang Mingyuan swing his sword, pointing it straight at the center of the immortal gate:
“Hey! You old fogeys inside, hurry up and sprinkle some more immortal Dao source energy! Otherwise—”
“The 'Dog Slaughterer' in my hand won't be so easy to deal with!”
Shen Ningyan: !
This was wonderful! She knew that she must be in her Brother Mingyuan's heart!
Look, for her sake, her Brother Mingyuan actually dared to single-handedly defy and threaten the immortal gate!
Rate on N.U.
