Chapter 564

The sacred palace falls into shock and fear as a commotion suddenly rises: the second floor that had been condensing into shape grows fainter, its thick aurora shrinking and dimming at a visible speed. Hei Lou Lan grabs elder Hei Pei’s collar in fury. He demands to know what has happened. Hei Lou Lan holds one of the ten extreme physiques, the great strength true martial physique, and only by becoming an immortal can he escape the pressure of death, though an extreme physique needs a matching Immortal Gu’s help to do so. He has placed his hopes on Eighty-Eight True Yang Building to give him the key to immortality, a strength path Immortal Gu, so he cannot let an accident befall it. Hei Pei, only a mortal and shivering in fright, sobs that he does not know, since no historical record shows this ever happening before. ^{ch. 564}

More Gu Masters cry out as the aurora keeps shrinking, wondering aloud whether Eighty-Eight True Yang Building is damaged or unable to compete with the passage of time, while some kneel in pale-faced fear. From far away, Fang Yuan watches with a cold smile, and even at that distance the panicked shouts from the sacred palace reach him. He looks down at Di Qiu’s cave and calls it amazing. He had estimated at most ten percent of the heavenly power would be absorbed, but the backflow has surpassed that estimate. He judges that whoever grasps Eighty-Eight True Yang Building this deeply is no less skilled than himself, and he credits his own fortuitous rebirth and the information the Lang Ya land spirit gave him. ^{ch. 564}

The cave now brims with light, almost overflowing, held back only by a black membrane at its mouth, and the surging aurora inside grows more and more vigorous. Cracks spread across the first floor of Eighty-Eight True Yang Building. Hei Pei and the other elders go pale, and many lower Gu Masters kneel and kowtow, weeping and begging their old ancestor for mercy. Hei Lou Lan, a rank five Gu Master at the peak of mortal strength, stares rigidly at the spreading cracks, gripped for once by bewilderment, helplessness and weakness. He shouts in fury that he cannot allow this, and screams inwardly that he has not yet avenged his mother or won his strength path Immortal Gu. With a soft sound the earth shakes, and the first floor, fully condensed until now, collapses completely back into free aurora light. The light floods out like a broken dam, and within a few breaths it enshrouds the whole sacred palace. ^{ch. 564}

Hei Lou Lan loses his focus as suffocation fills his chest, and he spits stagnated blood that had flowed backward into his throat. He refuses to let it happen and opens his palms to grab at the aurora, shouting for it to come back. The gushing aurora responds, reducing, and the surrounding light begins to fall back, sparking a moment of hope in him. That hope dies the next moment: the light gathers back together but never condenses into the first floor’s shape again, still reducing as if a giant unseen beast is swallowing it. Far away, Tai Bai Yun Sheng mumbles in refusal, his expression turning spiritless. Hei Pei clutches his hair and asks whether the heavens want his Hei tribe dead, since a problem inside Eighty-Eight True Yang Building would finish Hei tribe, with the other super forces and the Huang Jin tribes unlikely to let them survive it. Nearby, Ye Lui Sang grips his chest in fear as the fire path Immortal Gu near his heart, lent by Ye Lui tribe’s Supreme Elder Ye Lui Lai before the Imperial Court contest, trembles without stopping. ^{ch. 564}

At almost the same moment, Fang Yuan’s own expression shifts as Spring Autumn Cicada bares its true body inside his aperture, trembling continuously and giving off an Immortal Gu aura strong enough to make his rank five aperture creak. He recognizes this as the resonance of the Great Dao in heaven and earth. Man is the spirit of all living beings and Gu the essence of heaven and earth, a vessel for the Great Dao. A mortal Gu holds only a fragment of that law, while an Immortal Gu holds an intact piece of it, and so only one Immortal Gu of its kind can exist. Every time an Immortal Gu is born, other Immortal Gu nearby tremble in response, more strongly the more closely their laws relate or conflict. From how strongly Spring Autumn Cicada trembles, Fang Yuan judges the Immortal Gu now being born is not of the time path, and he keeps his eyes on the cave without the least negligence. ^{ch. 564}

Inside the cave, the aurora keeps being absorbed and fading as it nurtures the intense light within, and that light grows steadily more flourishing while the black membrane at the entrance starts to show it cannot hold. Fang Yuan judges that if he does not act now, the membrane will burst and the aurora will shoot skyward and expose him. Being discovered by Hei Lou Lan and the rest would be a small matter next to waking Eighty-Eight True Yang Building’s hibernating will. That hibernating will could turn him to ashes with a single thought. Having held back the urge to move several times already, he judges the timing fully ripe and throws in large numbers of Gu worms from every path, rank one through rank five, sprinkling down like rain. ^{ch. 564}

This is the sprinkler, a high grade refinement technique that drops Gu worms in careful, separate groupings and timings rather than at random. Only a Gu Master skilled in both enslavement and flying can attempt it, and even a gifted one needs thousands of tries to perform it decently. Fang Yuan’s own skill in it goes beyond decent. It is enough to impress other refinement path masters. ^{ch. 564}

After the Gu worms sprinkle down, the aurora slowly turns the color of blue water or open sky and stills, countless white lights inside it swimming like fish and flocking like birds, gathering and scattering like stars until watching it makes Fang Yuan dizzy. He turns his gaze back to the sacred palace. The clamor there has quieted, and after the aurora enshrouding the sacred palace has shrunk by about half, its shrinking slows. Seeing no one paying attention to him and his scattered wolf groups sending no battle signal, Fang Yuan breathes a sigh of relief. He judges everything going smoothly and this the final step, and stays as cautious and vigilant as ever rather than growing conceited. History on both worlds is full of failures at the last hurdle, and this final step is the one most likely to raise a problem. ^{ch. 564}

Fang Yuan flicks his wrist and lets a smelly fart Gu he has been holding fly into the cave, and a peculiar fragrance spreads out from it, even against the wind. In the sacred palace, the Gu Masters grow wild with joy. ^{ch. 564}

The aurora has stopped shrinking and begun to slowly increase again. A Hei tribe elder shouts the news to Hei Lou Lan and is kicked to the ground for it. Hei Lou Lan snaps that he can see that himself, his voice ruthless yet unable to hide his relief. Inwardly he stays deeply unsettled, since the aurora’s shrinking and the floor’s collapse have never happened before, and not knowing why worries him greatly. Eighty-Eight True Yang Building is an Immortal Venerable’s work, so even if he learned the cause he doubts he could solve it with his own ability. Were Hei Lou Lan to learn that Fang Yuan alone caused it all, he would likely risk his life and tear off the seal that Immortal Gu Dark Limit has placed on him, to pit himself against Fang Yuan. ^{ch. 564}