Chapter 1265: The Xuanhuang Island Theory
Chapter 1265: The Xuanhuang Island Theory
"Senior, I don't think I can take it anymore!" Sun Luyuan's pained voice, the spirit of the Immeasurable Mirror, drifted faintly from its surface.
"Hmph. You're not going to die." Li Fan, however, acted as if he hadn't heard a thing. Instead of stopping the Immeasurable Mirror's scrying, he cast a technique, compelling it to once again project its eerie glow toward the World-Cracking Great Vortex.
As he spoke, countless runes materialized on the Immeasurable Mirror's surface, perfectly aligning with its web of cracks. Within the serene, cyan glow, the wounds began to slowly mend.
"Ugh... ah..." A strange groan, a sound torn between agony and relief, escaped Sun Luyuan.
Li Fan merely narrowed his eyes, his gaze fixed on the fragmented images flickering ceaselessly within the Immeasurable Mirror's arcane light.
"Let me see what really happened here all those years ago."
In truth, the Creation Stone Slab did have records of the beast race's exodus from the realm.
However, when a power potent enough to shatter heaven and earth erupted from the Nanming Sacred Mountain, the stone slab lost its ability to monitor the area.
Li Fan's purpose in using the Immeasurable Mirror was twofold. While he certainly wanted to know if the beast race had successfully escaped, his primary goal was to analyze the very method they had used to break through the world's boundary.
Space had been pierced by an unimaginably tyrannical force, one that had even shattered the barrier of the High Wall and forged a connection to the void beyond the Star Sea.
In that single moment, it was as if a seal had been stamped upon the fabric of time and space, leaving behind an indelible mark.
Even as ages passed and millennia flew by, this imprint remained embedded within spacetime itself, yet to fade.
By studying and analyzing this world-cracking imprint, he might be able to replicate the only two known instances of a successful escape from the Darkest Star Sea in the Xuanhuang Realm's history.
Like a black-and-white film with a faltering signal, Li Fan glimpsed flashing scenes. He vaguely saw Di Yi revealing his true form, delivering a final rally to the assembled beast race.
He also saw that many beasts were watching from afar, having chosen not to join the exodus.
The image flickered. The giant serpent coiled around Nanming Mountain let out a heaven-shaking roar. It writhed and thrashed in agony, its body emitting an incandescent glow as if something was about to burst forth from within.
Yet Di Yi, the Lord of a Myriad Beasts, merely watched with cold indifference. It was only when the serpent fell limply onto the sea's surface, kicking up monstrous waves, that Li Fan got a clear look at the object that had been inside it.
It was a key, magnified to an unknown, colossal scale!
Ripples suddenly spread across Di Yi's true form—a constantly writhing mass of gray flesh. A moment later, an utterly emotionless and indifferent face emerged from its body.
This face seemed to possess a wondrous, almost demonic, power.
Not only did the other restless heads and faces on Di Yi's body instantly grow still and silent, but around the Nanming Sacred Mountain, the countless beasts who had been watching from a distance could not help but lower their heads and avert their gazes, daring not to look upon it directly.
Even Li Fan, peering at its image through the world-cracking imprint across the long river of time, felt a sudden, instinctual fear grip his heart the moment he saw that face—the primal terror of facing a higher form of life.
"What is this...?" For a fleeting moment, the body formed from a mere wisp of his divine sense wavered under the divine face's oppressive aura. But it was, after all, only an illusion from millennia ago, and Li Fan's own foundation was beyond compare. After a brief moment of adaptation, the formless pressure quietly dissipated.
The subsequent scene from the world-cracking imprint once again appeared before Li Fan's eyes.
After Di Yi's true form revealed the divine face, the colossal key, gleaming with the metallic luster of ancient bronze, instantly shrank by a full circle.
Then, under Di Yi's control, it flew straight toward the towering Nanming Sacred Mountain.
The tip of the key aligned with the mountain's summit.
A dazzling point of light manifested where they met.
From that tiny point, a uniform radiance instantly spread across the entire key and the Nanming Mountain.
As if some form of authentication had been completed, a moment later, both the key and the sacred mountain were bathed in light, becoming ethereal and faintly indistinct.
Meanwhile, the countless beasts surrounding the mountain, including Di Yi himself, were enveloped in waves of white light. One by one, they transformed into streams of thread-like light and flew into the bronze key and the mountain.
And then...
A terrifying light, like the very explosion that birthed the universe, erupted from them.
It obscured all prying eyes.
Even when Li Fan forced himself to keep watching, enduring the white glare that seared his very soul, his vision was filled with nothing but an endless ocean of white.
At this moment, the Immeasurable Mirror truly reached its limit.
In an instant, it was as if all spirituality had drained from it. Unable to even maintain its levitation, it tumbled from the air. Sun Luyuan, the mirror's spirit, had fallen completely unconscious, utterly silent.
Li Fan pondered for a moment before stowing the Immeasurable Mirror away.
His mind, however, continuously replayed the scene he had just witnessed.
"Back in the Fallen Immortal Realm, Di Yi explained the principle behind the Nanming Sacred Mountain's ability to break through the world boundary. He claimed it was located at the very edge of the world, the ends of the earth and the corners of the sea, and had thus accumulated a vast amount of stray energy that had been drifting since the Xuanhuang Realm's creation..."
"Looking at it now, it's clearly not as simple as he made it out to be. The Xuanhuang Realm can't even break through the boundary with its own full power, let alone with some mere stray energy."
"That bronze key and the divine face must be the true key to their escape."
Li Fan was suddenly reminded of the secret his Saint Emperor incarnation had heard from the Salvation Sect in this life.
"The Salvation Sect found a profound power within the world-crack left by the Heavenly Sword Sect—a power that could be used to monitor the Xuanhuang Realm, one that even the Dharma Transmitters would be helpless against once it was implanted. And here, at the second site of a world-crack, another mysterious existence that transcends the Xuanhuang Realm itself has appeared."
"The Xuanhuang Realm was exceptionally special even among the countless cultivation worlds of antiquity. These two locations seem to touch upon the very heart of that key."
As he mused, Li Fan's form flickered, and he carried the Immeasurable Mirror away from the World-Cracking Great Vortex.
"The principles of the world may vary, but their essence remains the same. The very fact that the Immortal Realm established the position of [Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerate] specifically to supervise and inspect this world proves that the Xuanhuang Realm holds some unique, exploitable value in their eyes."
"It's just like the thousands of islands in the Cong Yun Sea. The Ten Thousand Immortals Alliance only dispatches cultivators to guard and build protective arrays around the islands that yield special resources."
"Let's simplify this with a change in perspective. The so-called Xuanhuang Great Heavenly Venerate is equivalent to a Guardian of Xuanhuang. And the Xuanhuang Realm itself is equivalent to one of the many islands in the star sea of the lower realms."
"And the profound power the Salvation Sect discovered, the one used to refine the World-Observing Divine Eye, as well as the Nanming Sacred Mountain that Di Yi unlocked with the bronze key—they are likely parts of the Xuanhuang Realm's [Protective Island Array]."
"This power doesn't originate from the Xuanhuang Realm itself; it was constructed by the upper realm."
"It's just that with the onset of the Great Calamity in the Immortal Realm, this world-protecting array was also affected to some extent."
"The [Floating Starry Sky Grand Array] that the Xuantian King deduced from the many scriptures he obtained in the ascension passage was probably built by modifying this existing world-protecting array. Otherwise, it's truly difficult to imagine how a mere demi-immortal, relying solely on the resources of the Xuanhuang Realm, could construct an immortal-grade array capable of crossing the High Wall."
"And..."
Li Fan's flight accelerated as numerous clues, once shrouded in mist, suddenly snapped together in his mind.
"The Floating Starry Sky Grand Array can traverse the endless void and lock onto other cultivation worlds deep within the distant Star Sea."
"My own skill in the Dao of arrays, enhanced by the Final Dissociation Disc, has already reached the very pinnacle of the mortal realm. Furthermore, I now know three of the Mysterious Origin Primal Spirit Grand Arrays. I could even be considered a novice when it comes to immortal-grade formations. Even so, I've been completely unable to comprehend how the Floating Starry Sky Grand Array used those golden chains to precisely lock onto targets across the endless Star Sea."
"I previously assumed my own mastery of formations was insufficient, causing the Final Dissociation Disc to fail its deductions every time. I thought the Xuantian King was a genius whose knowledge spanned heaven and man, a demi-immortal whose skill in arrays surpassed even a wonder like the Final Dissociation Disc..."
"But now, I think I may have overlooked a crucial factor."
A sharp glint flashed in Li Fan's eyes.
"What if those targeted cultivation worlds and the Xuanhuang Realm all share some common factor? It would be through their mutual resonance that the golden chains of the Floating Starry Sky Grand Array could lock onto them with such precision."
"And that factor is the existence of a world-protecting array!"
"Bai Hua once said that even the primordial Xuanhuang Realm was a behemoth among cultivation worlds. Her home, the Wansheng Realm, was merely the size of a single province."
"To return to the analogy of the Cong Yun Sea islands, the Xuanhuang Realm is like Liuli Island, where I first went—a large-scale entity. The other worlds and grotto-heavens it captured are the smaller islands in the star sea."
"Hmm... perhaps as these worlds were slowly drawn toward the Immortal Ruins, the Xuanhuang Realm captured more along the way. Then, after the fall of the Ten Great Immortal Sects, the Dharma Transmitters and the Heavenly Doctor took over, patching and mending, eventually creating the grand spectacle that is the Xuanhuang Realm today."
"If my speculation is correct, then the regions first captured by the Xuanhuang Realm must have had world-protecting arrays."
At this thought, Li Fan seemed to realize something, and his train of thought paused for a moment.
In the beginning, the Xuanhuang Realm merely captured and annexed worlds, rather than dismembering and reassembling them as it does now.
Therefore, those first consumed regions should actually be located on the periphery of the Xuanhuang Realm.
"The ends of the earth, the corners of the sea. The world's frontier."
"And what's more, Di Yi's words seemed to hint that the beasts of the Xuanhuang Realm originally came from the outside..."
"I see."
Li Fan was suddenly enlightened.
"It seems the bronze key Di Yi used didn't unlock a world-protecting array that belonged to the Xuanhuang Realm itself..."
Li Fan's thoughts spun rapidly.
In fact, there might be a simple way to verify his speculation.
The small world where he had found the golden skull and the [Submerge] character retained clear memories of the golden chains of the Floating Starry Sky Grand Array breaking through its boundary and locking it down.
All he had to do was go and investigate.
With this in mind, Li Fan changed his direction and headed straight for his destination.
Along the way, Sun Luyuan slowly regained consciousness.
"Senior, where are we going?"
Without a single word of complaint about Li Fan's extreme exploitation of his labor, Sun Luyuan simply asked with some confusion.
"To an interesting place. Rest up for now. I may need your help again soon," Li Fan said faintly.
Hearing this, Sun Luyuan's ethereal form in the mirror couldn't help but tremble.
"Senior, I feel... very weak right now..." After a moment of silence, Sun Luyuan mustered his courage and spoke.
The response he received was a glob of thick, golden substance.
Sun Luyuan's attention was immediately captivated, as if he had laid eyes on a peerless treasure.
He knew this was the wondrous substance Li Fan had previously used to draw the Wind of Annihilation out of the Immeasurable Mirror.
It held a fatal, irresistible, instinctual attraction for him, and a deep intuition told him that this substance would be a great restorative for him.
So, Sun Luyuan immediately fell silent and greedily devoured the Source Power Essence.
A moment later, his spirit jolted. The feeling of weakness vanished.
"Hmph."
As he savored the wonderful taste, Sun Luyuan thought about trying to curry favor with Li Fan to get some more.
But a cold snort from the other party brought him crashing back to reality.
He didn't dare make any more requests, merely hoping that he might receive another reward after completing the next task.
Before long, after traversing a long void passage, Li Fan once again arrived at the dead world filled with ash.
"Go!"
At Li Fan's signal, the Immeasurable Mirror once again released waves of its eerie light.
Compared to the attempt at the World-Cracking Great Vortex, this scrying and analysis was undoubtedly much smoother.
With great ease, the images within the eerie glow reconstructed the world as it once was.
A world teeming with life and vitality.
A great river nurtured countless living beings.
When they died, they were reborn in the river, creating a perfect cycle.
...
"Not this. Go deeper."
Just as Sun Luyuan was losing himself in this scene, Li Fan's voice interjected.
Sun Luyuan's mind jolted, and he increased the intensity of the Immeasurable Mirror's scrying.
The scene of life shattered and turned ethereal.
The river, too, became like starlight—dreamlike and insubstantial.
Beneath all these appearances, a network of intersecting lines suddenly appeared on the Immeasurable Mirror's surface.
"Ah!"
However, the instant he saw these lines, it was as if some restriction had been triggered.
Sun Luyuan felt an irresistible, searing heat wash over him.
It was as if he were being roasted by flames, and the Immeasurable Mirror itself felt on the verge of melting.
"Senior, save me!"
Sun Luyuan couldn't help but howl.
But Li Fan remained deaf to his pleas, pouring more golden Source Power Essence into him and forcing Sun Luyuan to endure the excruciating pain and continue scrying.
Amidst Sun Luyuan's agonized screams, the bedrock hidden beneath the world's ruins slowly began to reveal itself.
Unlike the small world that had been reduced to ruins, these lines, though fragmented and seemingly struck by some great blow that coated them in an aura of decay, still ultimately retained their original form.
As more and more of the lines were revealed, the nascent form of an array began to take shape in Li Fan's mind.
Simultaneously, within the space of the Deduction Jade, the Final Dissociation Disc temporarily halted all other tasks and began to record and analyze the fragmented lines of the array.
"Save me..."
Alas, the remnants of the formation were simply too vast. Before even a tenth of it had been revealed, Sun Luyuan was already on the verge of death, his existence about to be extinguished.
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