Chapter 1184

The new blessed land is a shallow beach, its jade green water under three meters deep, rocks piled across it like ink strokes on a canvas. Its many pools connect through the rocks to one shared source. Most abundant among its fish, prawns and mortal Gu is a pinkish red spirit snake, thumb sized. ^{ch. 1184}

This is Han Dong’s blessed land. Han Dong, one of the Traveling Three Elites, was already dead here when Fang Yuan and the others first came, during Dong Fang Chang Fan’s attempt to revive through Dong Fang Yu Liang with the immemorial ruin bat corpse as a base. The Traveling Three Elites, famous lone cultivators, were Lu Qing Ming, a wind path Gu Immortal whose signature move was entangled wind, Su Guang, a light path Gu Immortal, and Han Dong, a transformation path rank six Gu Immortal. Together they could perform a joint immortal killer move that gathered light into a fast chariot, much as Chou Lao Wu and Hao Zhen’s wind thunder roar works between the two of them. This is a rank six blessed land. ^{ch. 1184}

The land’s spirit snake confronts Fang Yuan with hostility. He learns it will acknowledge only Lu Qing Ming or Su Guang as owner, since Han Dong’s dying obsession centered on the two. Fang Yuan claims to be Lu Qing Ming’s friend, becomes him with familiar face, and the snake accepts him as master, opening the blessed land. As Lu Qing Ming he gives the blessed land to that same friend, then reverts to his true form and is accepted as master again, the snake believing it Lu Qing Ming’s own wish. Fang Yuan then asks it to help him assimilate the blessed land into his own; the snake protests it will disappear, but he says the fusion will skip him several calamities and tribulations. It objects that annexation needs at least transformation path master attainment; Fang Yuan claims grandmaster, and the snake, defeated, agrees to cooperate. ^{ch. 1184}

Immortal apertures can annex one another, but under strict conditions. A smaller aperture cannot engulf a bigger one, and a dead aperture cannot devour another. Annexation also demands a set attainment level in the relevant path: master for a rank six blessed land, grandmaster for a rank seven, and great grandmaster for rank eight grotto-heavens. ^{ch. 1184}

Annexing another’s immortal aperture brings three benefits once conditions are met. Resources transfer completely, the annexer gains a portion of its dao marks, and, most crucial, calamities and tribulations are skipped. Hu Immortal, an enslavement path lone cultivator of Central Continent, died during her fifth earthly calamity to the blue charm lightning shadow, but her blessed land’s fifth calamity still counted as passed. Whoever annexes it inherits all her resources and a portion of the dao marks, skips one to five calamities or tribulations, and resets the countdown to their own next one. ^{ch. 1184}

In Southern Border, Ying Wu Xie’s group descends deeper into Jade Pot Mountain. Bai Ning Bing marvels that the icy interior is a world apart from the surface’s jade soil. Ying Wu Xie senses something and stops. A rank six immortal aperture waits here, left by a strength path Gu Immortal of Shadow Sect. He tells Hei Lou Lan it is meant for her, since her strength path attainment lets her annex it and bypass her coming calamities and tribulations. ^{ch. 1184}

Hei Lou Lan carries the Great Strength True Martial Physique, one of the ten extremes, whose calamities and tribulations run immensely powerful. Annexing would resolve that danger, but only by trading away her future growth for a short term gain. She hesitates, then grits her teeth and steps forward. ^{ch. 1184}

Ying Wu Xie tells her that long term potential means nothing if she cannot survive the tribulation ahead. This blessed land’s strength path dao marks, he says, are no fewer than her own physique tribulation would give her. How much she absorbs depends on her own fortune, since annexing usually yields far fewer dao marks than letting a Gu Immortal’s corpse decompose inside one’s own aperture naturally. He thinks privately that the sovereign immortal body is exempt from that loss. ^{ch. 1184}