Chapter 465

Determined after two failures, the land spirit buys twenty sets of materials from treasure yellow heaven through connecting heaven Gu and divine sense Gu, spending two immortal essence stones, and the third refinement attempt succeeds, producing a pair of oval stargate Gu stones. He hands them to Fang Yuan and declares their agreement fulfilled. Fang Yuan, doubtful, asks how he can be sure they work, needling the land spirit into an offended reply that he may exchange them if they fail. ^{ch. 465}

Fang Yuan asks to leave at once, declining to use his two remaining chances for now. The land spirit teleports the five immortals away, asks whether any recipes remain, and accepts Fang Yuan’s claim that none do, though he suspects otherwise and says he will wait for his return. He sends Fang Yuan back to the stone forest outside. ^{ch. 465}

Under the cold night sky, Fang Yuan finds only one thirty-sixth of his time inside the blessed land has passed outside, and the stargate Gu, divine sense Gu, connecting heaven Gu and two vats of stolen wine in wolf swallow Gu convince him none of it was a dream. Back with the wolf group, he writes to Little Hu Immortal through moving perspective cup Gu and learns she has spent his absence refining twenty dried pond Gu as instructed, drawing his praise. The exchange repeats until he has collected eight dried pond Gu. ^{ch. 465}

Reasoning that all eight crushed together should stack their power to a rank four level, Fang Yuan crushes them while Little Hu Immortal does the same on her end, raising suppressed moving perspective cup Gu from rank four back to its true rank five and letting it carry rank five Gu. He sends connecting heaven Gu through first, then divine sense Gu, the strain cracking the cup worse each time, then, after replenishing his own primeval essence, one of the two stargate Gu stones, which the weakened Gu can barely manage since it is rank five rather than an Immortal Gu. Deformed and on the verge of collapse, the cup has one use left, and Fang Yuan puts it away rather than risk it further himself. Every activation so far has been his own, since Hu Immortal blessed land’s faster time flow means Little Hu Immortal activating first might catch him unprepared, and the final activation is left to her. ^{ch. 465}

Waiting in the cold, Fang Yuan worries the starlight fireflies he needs may already be sold, but the sight of the crescent lake and a memory of catching the liquor worm on Qing Mao mountain ease him. Breathing out under a sky full of stars, he finds his current life beautiful and says aloud, without regret, that the night sky truly is. The moment he speaks it, he feels a thousand jin lighter, as if about to take flight, and his whole bearing changes, the cold gone from him and a clear light in his eyes. The stargate Gu shakes in his open hand, gathers starlight into an enormous door, and he steps through it, emerging roughly a dozen breaths later in Hu Immortal blessed land, where Little Hu Immortal leaps happily into his arms and he tells her gently that he is back. ^{ch. 465}