The Hall of Divine Conference.
Tang Jie was seated on his knees, his eyes closed in meditation.
If one looked carefully, one would find that his face was somewhat older.
His smooth skin now bore wrinkles, his eyebrows and hair were tinged with white, and when he was seated, his back was slightly hunched.
But his eyes remained so sharp that even a cultivator might get cut if they gazed at them.
Above him, stars twinkled on the ceiling, displaying the current state of the war. But as Tang Jie looked upward, he seemed to peer through the stars and past the ceiling, into some far-off unknown.
A page boy entered and prostrated. “Elders Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan have come seeking an audience!”
“Have them come in,” Tang Jie calmly replied. As he spoke, the white on his hair receded and his skin once more became glossy and smooth. Reflections of Floating Life made it so that even a Boundless Gold Immortal wouldn’t notice anything suspicious.
The page boy withdrew, and Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan entered.
The moment Xiao Biehan entered, he asked, “Why were you in such a hurry to call us back? The two of us benefited from all those battles and could already feel some progress. Why not wait a little longer before advancing?”
They weren’t exactly strangers, so he spoke to Tang Jie very directly.
Tang Jie shook his head. “I don’t have that much time. Hong Qianli has already given me the location of Blood River and the others. The last battle is imminent.”
Ling Xiao frowned. “What does this have to do with our Immortal ascension? That Blood River can’t be stronger than you and Martial Uncle.”
Tang Jie shook his head. “It has nothing to do with this battle. I simply hope to settle the Immortal ascension before the battle.”
“Why?”
Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan asked in unison.
After a few moments of silence, Tang Jie answered, “After this battle, I may have to enter seclusion for a long time, at which point I won’t be able to help you.”
At the level of Tang Jie and Yun Tianlan, it was common to be in seclusion for hundreds of years, so Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan had nothing to say. Fortunately, they had reached a stage where the Wish Granting Book could ensure their successful Immortal ascension, with the only difference being how high they could reach.
Of course, they hoped to get as high as they could.
“If that’s the case, when are we going to make the attempt?” Xiao Biehan asked.
“We’re still waiting on two people,” Tang Jie answered.
“Two more?” Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan were taken aback.
“Sect Master Ji and my father-in-law.”
“Ji Qingfeng, Xu Guanghua?” Xiao Biehan said in shock. “You’re also helping them ascend to Immortal Platform? But didn’t you plan to leave them for…”
Tang Jie shook his head. “I can’t wait that long.”
These words felt like an ill omen to Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan.
“Jie’er, just what happened?” Ling Xiao sternly asked.
Tang Jie didn’t reply, but fatigue appeared in his eyes as he waved his hands, dismissing the pair.
When Tang Jie didn’t put on airs, he was their junior. But when he did, he was an Immortal Platform Titan, the supporting pillar of the Basking Moon Sect that other people could only look up to.
Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan knew that there was no discussion to be had here, so they withdrew.
Once they were gone, Tang Jie sighed.
It was an incredibly old sigh.
Old age was an inevitable result of cultivating the World Descender Mantra.
As his body withered, his Divine Soul grew stronger.
One day, this shell would completely die, leaving only a supremely powerful Divine Soul, at which point he would become a soul cultivator.
But in the process, an intense unease gripped Tang Jie, making him feel like danger was approaching.
This was why he had sent away Xu Miaoran and the Mountain River State Diagram and then called Ling Xiao and the others to help them ascend to Immortal Platform.
Meanwhile, the sense of danger had grown stronger and stronger, as if some enormous conspiracy was about to descend on him. Only a little something was missing.
Perhaps it was that very last step.
He didn’t know what this step was, but he sensed that it would be this step that would make the conspiracy break out of its cocoon.
He looked down at himself and muttered, “What are you waiting for? That corpse at the bottom of the Blood River? Or something else?”
There was no response.
Tang Jie slowly closed his eyes.
Three days later, Ji Qingfeng and Xu Guanghua arrived, and what awaited them was an extremely simple welcoming ceremony—unlike the Violet Palace Sublimation Ceremony, this Immortal ascension rite was to be unprecedentedly inconspicuous.
Nobody was informed except the highest of the upper echelons of the sect, plus a few related individuals in the Seven Absolutions Sect and Horizon Ocean Pavilion. No others came.
The site of the Immortal ascension was Gale Canyon.
Gale Canyon wasn’t originally part of the Rosecloud Domain or the Blood River Domain, but was a natural wonder created by the merger of the two worlds. Two mountains intersected from both above and below like clashing blades, creating a bizarre sight in the sky.
This was a special node of the domain merger formation, and the formation’s power manifested here as a powerful gale that ran through the middle of the two worlds. In this region floated rocks and chunks of mountains, with trees growing in every direction. With the gale blowing through the area, the region was exceptionally complex and chaotic.
The geography was constantly changing in this region, which made it the perfect cover for the phenomena produced by the Immortal Platform ascension.
Even so, since four Soul Projection Titans were ascending to Immortal Platform at once, the actual range of the phenomena exceeded that of Gale Canyon.
In the center of the two peaks, four giant vortices of energy formed, greedily sucking up the energy of the world and rapidly expanding their reach.
Each ascension demanded massive amounts of the world’s energy, and when cultivators ascended together, they would start to struggle amongst each other to a certain extent. But for the prepared, things were different.
These four vortices each chose a different direction to pull their energy from.
They required such a terrifying amount of energy that the area for several thousand kilometers around them instantly became an energy vacuum. Fortunately, Gale Canyon’s surroundings were already unsuitable for human life and deserted, or else millions would have died.
Of course, there were exceptions.
Less than fifty kilometers away from the four vortices, a party was watching the ascension: current Basking Moon Sect Master Mystic Moon, Tang Jie, Seven Absolutions Sect Vice Master Wang Juemie, and the Jade Emptiness Immortal Sovereign of Horizon Ocean Pavilion.
As they viewed the ascension, they each had different thoughts.
For Mystic Moon, the successful ascension of Ling Xiao and Xiao Biehan meant that the Basking Moon Sect was once more growing stronger, that the entire sect would prosper. As for Ji Qingfeng and Xu Guanghua, they were becoming Immortals thanks to the support of “the Basking Moon Sect”, so they would also be on their side. Thus, he was in the best mood.
Wang Juemie had very simple thoughts.
He didn’t come here to witness, but to learn!
He stared without blinking as the four ascended, trying to understand every step of the process in preparation for his own ascension. In this process, he gradually began to grasp how the power of Fate was influencing the four. Whenever there was any sign of instability, something strange would happen, smoothing over errors and providing power where it was lacking.
This power might come from the domain-merging power running through Gale Canyon, or it could come from the energy cast off by the other ascenders, their trash coincidentally becoming a helping hand for the others.
Wang Juemie began to realize the function of Fate, and he also began to understand why Tang Jie had the four of them ascend together in Gale Canyon. Not only was it because this was a deserted region where the environment could conceal their ascension, but also because the complicated mixture of energies here was one of the conditions necessary for Fate to work its magic.
Yes, Fate required conditions. In an absolute vacuum, Fate was useless. To work, the Wish Granting Book needed some special conditions.
Wang Juemie experienced sudden enlightenment, and at that moment, the door to comprehending the Dao of Fate opened to him.
The Jade Emptiness Immortal Sovereign had the most mixed feelings.
In terms of status, she was the Sect Master of Horizon Ocean Pavilion. In terms of cultivation, she had reached the peak of Soul Projection many years before Xu Guanghua. In front of her, Xu Guanghua was nothing. A few hundred years ago, he hadn’t even reached Soul Projection yet. Of the three Violet Palace True Lords of Horizon Ocean Pavilion, he was the only one who was not a Dao-entering Celestial Sovereign, so what did he have to be so proud of?
But he just so happened to sire a good daughter, who had married a good son-in-law, and Xu Guanghua had managed to benefit quite a lot from Tang Jie’s prosperity. Just from the inter-domain trade, Xu Guanghua had obtained numerous resources, which was why he had been able to progress so quickly and reach the peak of Soul Projection in just a few centuries.
In truth, with Xu Guanghua’s current cultivation, ascending to Immortal Platform was somewhat forced. Jade Emptiness was a more suitable choice, but because of what happened with the Jewel Immortal Sovereign all those years ago, Tang Jie would never give her that opportunity. Thus, even though Xu Guanghua was somewhat lacking in conditions, Tang Jie still chose him.
This left the Jade Emptiness Immortal Sovereign feeling extremely unhappy and regretful.
Meanwhile, the four reached the key moment in their ascension.
Torrents of wind drew vast streams of spiritual energy into the vortices, and within the vortices, the four ascenders were shattering their bodies and reforming, repeating the cycle of destruction and creation.
In Tang Jie’s Immortal Platform ascension, Tang Jie had sought perfection, so he had reformed his body 108 times, in line with the laws of the heavens and the earth.
For Ling Xiao and company, success was the goal, which only required thirty-six times as a baseline. How many more times they could reform after that depended on their individual ability.
Here, the difference in the cultivation of the four became apparent.
As the former Basking Moon Sect Master, Ling Xiao had the most reformations, going through 84 before his soul finally ran out of energy.
After him was Xiao Biehan. In terms of combat power, this battle maniac had always been on par with Ling Xiao, but in terms of cultivation, he had always been lacking. He ultimately managed to reach 71, one away from medium completion at 72.
Ji Qingfeng was close to Xiao Biehan. He was more talented than Xiao Biehan, but he hadn’t been able to prepare ahead of time like Xiao Biehan, nor had he been able to put aside his sect duties to focus entirely on cultivation. Even Tang Jie calling him over for the Immortal Platform ascension had been a spur-of-the-moment idea. With this lack of preparation, he was slightly worse than Xiao Biehan, going through 68 reformations.
The worst was Xu Guanghua. As someone who barely met the requirements, even with the help of the Wish Granting Book, he barely broke through the standard and ultimately stopped at 41.
This meant that Xu Guanghua not only would be weaker in combat than his peers, but basically had no chance of reaching True Immortal.
However, his aptitude had been limited from the beginning, and even if Tang Jie had given him more time, he might not have done much better. Thus, Xu Guanghua was happy with this result.
On this day, with the help of the Wish Granting Book, the Rosecloud Domain gained four new Immortals, and with this, the decisive battle against the Blood River Domain finally arrived.