The statue’s design was remarkably peculiar.
It had five faces and ten hands, yet shared a single body. Each face displayed a distinct expression:
– One lowered its eyes with compassion, seemingly sorrowful for the world’s plight.
– Another bore a stern countenance, glaring with righteous anger.
– One face was slightly furrowed, appearing fragile and pitiful. Yet upon closer inspection, hints of alluring charm and coquettish seduction emerged.
This last face bore a striking resemblance to Senior Sister Zhao.
Li Fan’s heart warmed, and a rush of emotions blossomed in his mind, his thoughts veering toward indulgent fantasies.
For a fleeting moment, he could even hear the gentle whispers of Senior Sister Zhao in his ears.
“Something’s wrong!”
Looking again, the vivid expressions vanished. What remained were five indistinct and featureless faces on the ten-handed statue.
“What is this?” Li Fan feigned composure as he retrieved the statue.
The black-robed cultivator, upon seeing the multicolored statue in Li Fan’s hands, lit up with fervent enthusiasm and explained:
“This is an Manifestation of Heavenly Sovereign Statue, and it is one of the highest-grade types.”
“It embodies the collective will of the five Heavenly Sovereigns. While it cannot grant you direct audience with them, it does allow communication with the Five Elders Pavilion.”
“Mundane matters are typically beneath the attention of the Heavenly Sovereigns and are managed by the Five Elders Pavilion.”
“When your actions require the support of the Five Elders Association, you may use the Heavenly Sovereign Statue to relay your message to the pavilion.”
“But it can only be used once. Afterward, the statue will naturally disappear.”
…
Li Fan nodded slowly as he listened to the explanation.
After scrutinizing the ten-handed statue one last time, he stored it in the Primordial Void Stone Mother.
With the transaction complete, Li Fan was preparing to leave.
“Wait, Fellow Daoist!”
The black-robed cultivator suddenly called out, stopping him.
“What is it?” Li Fan narrowed his eyes, his expression turning wary.
The black-robed cultivator waved his hands hastily. “Haha, don’t misunderstand, my friend. I merely have a small favor to ask. Of course, the reward will be more than sufficient!”
“What is it?” Li Fan’s expression softened slightly, his tone remaining indifferent.
The black-robed cultivator handed over a slip of paper. Li Fan accepted it and glanced at the contents, which detailed a peculiar request:
About a year ago, the Ten Thousand Immortal Alliance discovered an ancient slumbering cultivator from the ruins of the Ancient Purple Heaven Sect.
The Five Elders Association hoped to enlist the ‘Heaven-Suppressing Society’ to investigate the cultivator’s true identity and current whereabouts.
The name “Purple Heaven Sect” caught Li Fan’s attention, stirring something within him.
“This is a small favor?” Li Fan let out a cold snort, his finger igniting a flame that instantly reduced the slip of paper to ashes.
The black-robed cultivator chuckled awkwardly.
“We’ll do what we can. We make no guarantees—this task is as challenging as deciphering formation diagrams.”
Li Fan turned and left, leaving behind a single echoing remark in the chamber.
The black-robed cultivator’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully at those words.
—
On his return journey, Li Fan remained exceptionally vigilant. After all, he now carried a treasure of great value and could not afford to be careless.
Fortunately, the Ten Thousand Immortal Alliance maintained a relatively secure environment. No one attempted to rob or kill him for his possession.
“Zhou Qingang” smoothly returned to the Congyun Immortal City.
Only once he was completely safe did Li Fan sense the fulfillment of the contract.
The agreement, which prohibited both parties from harming each other, was now void.
Simultaneously, he felt a strange sense of loss, as though something within him had vanished into thin air.
Despite much contemplation, Li Fan could not discern the nature of the “contract’s” power and eventually gave up.
He did not immediately examine the results of the trade stored in the ‘Primordial Void Stone Mother’. Instead, he reflected on the Five Elders Association’s request.
When he first heard terms like “Purple Heaven Sect” and “slumbering cultivator,” the name “Zhang Qianmo” instinctively flashed through his mind.
In fact, Li Fan had long been aware of the Ten Thousand Immortal Alliance’s practice of excavating ancient sect ruins to search for slumbering cultivators.
Around the 11th year, he had commissioned Jiao Xiuyuan to locate the ‘Little Medicine King Cauldron’, but no updates were ever provided. Upon inquiry, Jiao Xiuyuan revealed a scene he had observed and shared his speculations.
Li Fan had instructed him to investigate the identity of this ancient cultivator.
Unfortunately, two years had passed without any results. This alone illustrated the extraordinary difficulty of the matter.
Jiao Xiuyuan, with a cultivation level potentially nearing Dao Integration, had clones spread across the Ten Thousand Immortal Alliance and access to a wealth of intelligence.
Yet even he could do nothing regarding this matter…
“Perhaps it may not necessarily be Senior Brother Zhang.”
“Senior Brother Zhang cultivates the Purple Core Nirvana Technique, constantly reincarnating. By now, he should have reincarnated as that ‘Martial Fanatic Child.'”
“Such a supreme technique shouldn’t have such a glaring flaw.”
“If his original body still exists while he reincarnates, it would be tantamount to exposing his lifeline to danger.”
After analyzing the situation, Li Fan dismissed his previous speculation.
“In that case, besides Senior Brother Zhang, who else from the Purple Heaven Sect could have survived until now?”
Thinking it over, Li Fan couldn’t come to a clear conclusion.
One must know that in ancient times, the Purple Heaven Sect was merely a second-rate sect.
The sect lacked a Longevity Immortal Realm powerhouse, and even Dao Integration cultivators were only a handful.
Based on the memories of Li Chen, whom he had possessed at the time, the elders of the sect didn’t seem like people capable of traversing eons and surviving to the present.
“Currently, I have discarded my identity as a ‘Heavenly Mechanism Sect cultivator’ and don’t carry any items with me, so I can’t contact Jiao Xiuyuan for now.”
“I’ll wait until after the great battle to deal with it.”
After pondering for a moment, Li Fan temporarily set the matter aside.
He retrieved a piece of ‘Human Dao Stardust’ from the Mother Stone and placed it before him.
After swallowing a Dao Enlightenment Pill, he began to examine it.
The seemingly ordinary black stone emitted a silver starlight.
When touched with spiritual sense, countless images instantly appeared in his mind.
It was the story of a female cultivator, who, driven by great determination, spent 500 years cultivating to ultimately win back the affections of her beloved.
It was a mundane tale of unrequited love, common in the world.
However, unlike many similar stories, this female cultivator paid the price of ascending into a star for her single-minded love.
As a result, the male cultivator she pined for finally fell in love with her.
For the remainder of his life, he gazed at the starry sky daily, shedding tears of regret and sorrow.
Li Fan remained expressionless and decisively swapped it for another piece of Human Dao Stardust.
This time, the story contained within the stardust was somewhat more normal.
It was about a cultivator who, after witnessing his close kin suffer due to lack of aptitude, unable to expel the miasma within their bodies and doomed to an early death, resolved to make cultivation accessible to all.
Unfortunately, this ambition was too grand to realize.
So, he narrowed his goal from “all of humanity” to “his family.”
When this cultivator ascended to the heavens, his family flourished, producing countless geniuses.
Within a century, they rose to become a dominant power in the region.
“Reversing aptitude, is it?”
A glimmer of light flashed in Li Fan’s eyes as spiritual power gathered in his palm. He suddenly exerted force, crushing the black stone into powder.
The silver starlight was entirely absorbed by him.
In an instant, countless indescribable insights flooded his mind.
The principles of the heavens intertwined into a vast web, forming the order that governs the world.
One thread in particular stood out vividly in Li Fan’s vision.
It seemed within reach, with even its intricate, profound patterns clearly visible.
In an instant, this “thin thread” filled his entire view.
The “thin thread” became as massive as a pillar supporting the heavens.
The magnificent aura emanating from it intoxicated Li Fan, unraveling many previously incomprehensible mysteries in a flash of understanding.
He also noticed countless fine threads connecting his body to the towering pillar.
As he focused on these indistinct, ethereal threads, an epiphany dawned upon him.
Though he now appeared to be a puppet manipulated by the “pillar” via these threads, someday, if his strength were sufficient, he might reverse the control, using the threads to manipulate the pillar instead.
“So this is what it means to defy the laws of heaven…”
An overwhelming sense of joy surged within him, causing even Li Fan, deep in seclusion within the Congyun Sea Trench, to tremble with excitement.
After reincarnating for a hundred lifetimes, the path to eternal life was now within reach.
Though knowing and achieving were worlds apart, the harvest of this moment filled Li Fan with immense satisfaction.
Immersed in his thoughts, he lost track of time.
When the Human Dao Stardust was completely consumed, and he emerged from his enlightenment, he felt an insatiable yearning.
In a daze, he spent half a day reminiscing before regaining clarity.
When he instinctively checked the time, Li Fan was astonished to discover that what felt like a brief moment to him had been nearly a year in the outside world.
“No wonder Longevity Immortal Realm powerhouses disdain worldly affairs. Now I understand what ‘cultivation transcends the flow of time’ truly means.”
“And this was just a partial glimpse of the laws of heaven through the Human Dao Stardust.”
“If one were to fully comprehend the laws of heaven, they might lose decades in a single retreat.”
Li Fan couldn’t help but sigh inwardly.
After savoring the experience for a while, he began reviewing the events that had transpired during his year-long retreat.
The communication talisman from Zhou Qingang was nearly bursting with messages from He Zhenghao and others.
Li Fan didn’t respond immediately but instead chose to prioritize the important ones.
The war in Tianling Prefecture hadn’t yet concluded but had significantly de-escalated.
Thus, cultivators began receiving news from the battlefield.
The Xuantian Spirit Locking Formation diagram submitted by Li Fan had an immediate effect.
Just ten days after the trade was finalized, during a medium-scale skirmish, the Ten Thousand Immortal Alliance attempted to replicate their earlier tactics, using the ‘Tianxuan Spirit Locking Formation’ to crush and slaughter the Five Elders Association’s forces.
However, they hadn’t expected the other side to be fully prepared.
Every cultivator was surrounded by a red protective glow.
When green and red lights merged, nothing unusual occurred.
While the Ten Thousand Immortal Alliance was caught off guard, a brutal close-quarters battle ensued.
………………………………………………………………
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