Chapter 1539: Long River Lost Forever

In a flash, another Xuanhuang World was reflected as if in a mirror. The First Generation even saw his own reflection within it. Although that reflection lacked the true essence of an immortal, it was still unmistakably himself, from his mortal days. Such power deeply shook the First Generation, even as a true immortal.

The last scene in the lingering memories of the First Generation's immortal body was the final moment he employed the Immortal-Mortal Dichotomy. He gazed at his reflection before him, a mix of emotions swirling in his heart. Ultimately, these feelings dissolved into a sense of relief.

“There was a reason all my immortal friends fled. Emperor Tianluo’s plan has reached its most desperate point. I can sense that the day the Calamity of Dao Annihilation fully erupts is perhaps drawing nearer. If my immortal body remained, even in the lower realm, it would likely attract Dao Annihilation. Only by shedding my immortal form can I grasp a sliver of hope…” The First Generation pondered silently. After bidding farewell to his past self, he merged into the mortal body.

“I truly hope that one day, I can return.” This was the First Generation’s final thought after transforming from an immortal to a mortal.

Li Fan emerged from the First Generation’s memories. Clearly, the First Generation had not achieved his long-cherished wish. Once the heavens collapse, reversing the situation is far from easy.

“The most crucial factor was the abandonment by the Three Sages. Because it didn’t concern the final outcome, the Three Sages, even with the power to save, wouldn’t ‘waste’ their strength on such minor matters. Those powerful beings who hadn’t transcended the original possibilities could only choose to save themselves, or simply leave.” Li Fan shook his head slightly: “Speaking of which, I still don’t know what Emperor Tianluo’s plan truly was. To completely resolve the Calamity of Dao Annihilation, and then transcend the entire Immortal Realm…”

Before, Li Fan couldn't even conceive of a possible method. However, after reading the complete 'Fable of Mountains and Seas,' Li Fan found a possibility. Born of the sea, standing upon the mountains, one can transcend the mountains and seas. If this theory holds true, then by finding a Great Dao of Mountains and Seas, similar to Longevity or Restoration, and merging it with the Immortal Realm, it might be possible for the entire realm to transcend beyond the mountains and seas. Naturally, it would no longer be troubled by the Calamity of Dao Annihilation.

But this was merely a theory. Beyond the mountains and seas, there seemed to be another great horror. The fate of the first being in the fable, who connected the sea to the mountains and then looked beyond the mountains and seas after their Great Dao merged, proved the immense danger involved.

“Even if it succeeded, the outcome would probably not be much better than being swallowed by the Calamity of Dao Annihilation.” Li Fan was still somewhat curious about the ultimate fate of Emperor Tianluo and the Immortal Realm. Unfortunately, at this point in time, everything was already predetermined and untraceable. “Perhaps by flowing upstream along the River of Time, more clues could be found. But it wouldn’t be very meaningful.”

Li Fan collected his thoughts, focusing his gaze on the First Generation’s immortal body before him, and awakened its consciousness. The First Generation opened his eyes and, after a moment of confusion, quickly understood the current situation. He bowed to Li Fan. Li Fan, meanwhile, used the First Generation’s body to observe the state of the Calamity of Dao Annihilation outside the Xuanhuang World.

“Hmm, compared to ten thousand years later, it’s still considerably more stable. The collapse of the great edifice that the First Generation feared before his transformation into a mortal hasn’t occurred. It must be due to the bones of the previous Hunger Immortal buried beneath the Immortal Ruins, silently providing support.”

After observing for a moment, Li Fan withdrew his gaze. Currently, he had no intention of provoking the Hunger Immortal. In the past, he acted recklessly, ready to destroy worlds at a whim. After all, he had Restoration to back him up. But not now. With this immortal body, and supplemented by an immortal array, capturing the Hunger Immortal should not be a major problem. However, Li Fan could not guarantee the safety of the Xuanhuang World while they fought. If Xuanhuang were damaged, all the anchor points he had painstakingly established in this timeline would be destroyed. At that point, let alone capturing the Hunger Immortal, he might not even be able to protect himself.

“Staying near the Immortal Ruins is still too dangerous. Next, I need to find a way to safely relocate the Xuanhuang World first.” Li Fan had previous experience in this regard; with a slight thought, a plan began to form in his mind.

“In this era, the Ten Sects still hold considerable influence. Any minor tasks involved can be entrusted to them. However, before that…”

With a thought, Li Fan instantly gained control of the First Generation’s immortal body. His figure flickered, departing the Root of Heaven and Earth space. He arrived beside the hill where the Fishing Pond was located. He stood suspended in the air, gazing down at the ground below.

“There is still vitality maintained by the Ruomu tree. Does this mean that Emperor Taitian still exists here?” Li Fan’s eyes narrowed slightly. Fully alert, he slowly walked into the underground village. It was almost identical to what he had seen ten thousand years later. It seemed as if time itself had been frozen within this small village.

However, when Li Fan, following his memory, arrived before the painting where Emperor Taitian had hidden, his steps involuntarily halted. The painting was still the same. The young King Xuantian, his childhood sweetheart, and many other children from the mountain village were all present in the painting. But only one element was missing: an old man lying down to rest!

“Gone,” Li Fan thought, feeling a sudden sense of loss and a touch of relief. The spot where Emperor Taitian had been resting was empty. Even the Boat of Reversal had vanished.

However, the life force absorbed and manipulated by King Xuantian’s secret art continued to diligently nourish the painting. Without Emperor Taitian, all the life force was absorbed solely by the painting. Consequently, the painting underwent a rather mysterious change. Li Fan seemed to hear the sounds of Xuanyuan Hong and his childhood sweetheart playing from days past. Even the two young children in the painting seemed to sense Li Fan’s approach from outside the canvas. They slowly cast their gaze towards Li Fan.

Witnessing such an eerie sight, Li Fan couldn't help but recall the fate of Xuanyuan Hong’s descendants. After a moment of contemplation, Li Fan temporarily put the painting away. After cutting off the prying eyes of the figures in the painting, he first pondered Emperor Taitian’s disappearance.

“It seems that once one masters the Way of Reversal and flows upstream in the River of Time, no matter where along the river they perish, their existence at all other time points will also vanish.” This seemed somewhat difficult to comprehend. However, as Li Fan recalled his own experiences traversing the River of Time, he gradually began to understand.

“Originally, I was merely a drop of water in the long river, only able to drift with the current. But once I gained the ability to reverse, flowing upstream along the river, I formed a line within it. This line is my complete self now. In a sense, I have become a life form similar to the River of Time itself. However, my main consciousness is currently confined to this segment of the river’s spacetime, unable to perceive what happens to other parts of my body. It’s as if my five senses are sealed. This is also because I have only just begun to master the Way of Reversal. If this path were to reach fruition, I would be able to leap onto the river’s surface, fully comprehending all my experiences within the long river…”

As Li Fan stood frozen at the spot where Emperor Taitian had vanished, many insights surfaced in his mind. The Boat of Reversal, which had been severely damaged within him, surprisingly began to slowly repair itself. Even if the repair speed was slow, it was a qualitative change compared to its previous state of having no self-repair capability at all.

“Generally speaking, once one masters the Way of Reversal, ordinary methods cannot kill them. What dies is merely a drop of water in the long river. As long as the river continues to flow, and the drops form a line, they are immortal and indestructible. Unless the river’s own currents assimilate one’s consciousness, or the Calamity of Dao Annihilation swallows the entire segment of spacetime, or like Emperor Taitian, one voluntarily gives up their own life.”

Only at this moment did Li Fan realize the sacrifice Emperor Taitian had made to help him gain enlightenment. Indeed, Emperor Taitian’s body and soul had decayed due to excessive reversal, leaving only a lingering shadow struggling to survive. But this did not mean he had no chance of full recovery. He wouldn’t even need a Great Dao of Mountains and Seas, like that of Patriarch Shouqiu, to save him. He merely needed the River of Time, which had been swallowed and blocked by the Calamity of Dao Annihilation, to flow freely once more. If the 'current' from upstream flowed down again, Emperor Taitian could instantly return to his peak state from the previous period. Although this might seem harder to achieve than a rescue by a Great Dao of Mountains and Seas, it was not. Because salvation didn’t require the entire River of Time to be unobstructed, but merely a connection to the preceding segment of spacetime. Since Patriarch Shouqiu could cross the Void of Eternal Silence, carrying Emperor Taitian’s lingering shadow to a preceding segment of spacetime would easily revive him. The 'Spark of Hope' salvation plan towards the past was already ongoing anyway; it would simply be a detour.

Furthermore, even if no one was willing to help with this, Emperor Taitian wouldn’t have to do anything. He just needed to patiently cling to life and wait until the day the River of Time flowed freely again. If one were to take a long-term view, there were only two possible outcomes for the entire world of mountains and seas. Either it would completely merge with the mountains and seas and be swallowed by the Calamity of Dao Annihilation, or the spark of life among the mountains and seas would successfully save itself. If it were the former, all beings would share the same fate; death would be death. If it were the latter, Emperor Taitian would naturally be resurrected.

“Emperor Taitian must have understood this principle. Yet, he chose to abandon this opportunity.” Li Fan narrowed his eyes, recalling Emperor Taitian’s words of enlightenment before his disappearance: “Lingering here holds no further meaning. I might as well impart the Way of Reversal, which I have comprehended, to you today! If one day you can go to the Void of Eternal Silence on my behalf and provide aid, then my sacrifice today will not have been in vain!” Emperor Taitian’s resolute expression seemed vividly present.

Li Fan shook his head repeatedly: “Although he saved my life, it’s still hard to understand. To simply give up the only, yet very stable, chance at survival…? If, in the future, the long river flows freely again, a new Emperor Taitian from another spacetime might reappear. But the one who continuously went back in time to save the world within this particular spacetime will never return. This one, in particular, imparted the Dao to me and saved my life. As for others, that Emperor Taitian is not this Emperor Taitian.”

“Perhaps, the only way to restore him within the entire Mountains and Seas would be through Restoration,” Li Fan suddenly thought. However, his understanding of the Transformation of Truth and Illusion currently made it difficult even to fully restore his own peak cultivation, let alone creating an Immortal Emperor who had been completely annihilated, from nothingness.

Helpless, Li Fan temporarily abandoned this thought. After solemnly sealing off the underground village with an immortal array, Li Fan left the underground and instinctively looked towards the nearby Fishing Pond.

At this point in time, no Taoist temple had yet been built outside the Fishing Pond. It was just a solitary pool of water, resting calmly among the mountains. Probably no one would have imagined that such a seemingly ordinary pool of water would involve the existence of an 'Unnamed' realm. “Perhaps even beyond the Unnamed realm. After all, Emperor Taitian referred to it as the Mountains and Seas Fishing Ground.”

Even while controlling an immortal body, Li Fan did not approach. He merely observed from afar. “Since it’s a Mountains and Seas Fishing Ground, the Fishing Pond connects not just to a single possibility, but has established a passage throughout the entire Mount Shangfang… Truly a grand feat. The fishing immortal behind this must at least be a transcendent realm expert. I just wonder if they can cross the Void of Eternal Silence like Patriarch Shouqiu.”

However, Li Fan suddenly remembered that besides the stone tablet attempting to comprehend the Way of Fishing and then being suddenly absorbed, King Xuantian also seemed to have vanished into this Fishing Pond. “Whoever has the ‘leisure and elegance’ to fish like this must still be within this segment of spacetime. They haven’t reached the level of being able to cross Eternal Silence. But even so, they are not someone I can provoke in my current state.”

A hint of apprehension flashed in Li Fan’s eyes. Even with the protection of Restoration, Li Fan meticulously avoided the Fishing Pond and the entity behind it. Much less now, with only a fragment of the Boat of Reversal for defense. “No rush. I’ll have to face this Fishing Immortal sooner or later.”

Li Fan suppressed the many emotions in his heart and returned to the Root of Heaven and Earth space. He handed the painting to his main body.

His main body slowly unrolled the painting, and almost instantly, his eyes met those of the young King Xuantian in the painting. It seemed as if the figure had already anticipated someone being outside the canvas. Li Fan was not surprised; without Emperor Taitian within, he wouldn’t be scared by a mere painting. Ignoring the probing gaze of the young Xuanyuan Hong, Li Fan listened carefully to the rustling sounds reaching his ears.

“Indeed, it was identical to the demonic sound, like a curse, that I had heard previously from the Xuanyuan clan’s bloodline. Only clearer. Was King Xuantian trying to convey something through this method?”

If True Immortal Seal Script was about imprinting the Dao with characters, then this demonic sound depicted the path of the Dao through rhythm and melody. One who drew the Dao with sound, Li Fan had only seen such a person in the original possibilities, in the Grand Master. Most other true immortals followed the Immortal Dao of Inscription.

“It seems that perhaps this Way of Mysterious Sound did not originate from the original possibilities. Instead, it came from another possibility, where King Xuantian vanished to. The Grand Master studied under the Three Sages. Since the Three Sages exist within numerous possibilities, this is understandable.”

Li Fan attempted to analyze the rhythm and melody transmitted by King Xuantian. When the three Daos merged, he had integrated himself with the mountains and seas. Now, comprehending the Great Dao between mountains and seas was much easier than before. Moreover, his past comprehension abilities were already strong. Before long, he had a rough result.