Twenty years passed in the blink of an eye after Lin Feng sealed off the Fourth Heaven with the Great Chaos Heavenly Cycle Domain-Locking Formation, cutting it off from the outside world.
Over those twenty years, order in the Fourth Heaven gradually stabilized under the Purple Cloud Palace's rule, and resources were developed in an orderly fashion.
With the Blue Departure Sect's cooperation and Lin Feng's covert support,
a new generation of local talents emerged.
Core experts such as Lin Man, Ding Yun, and the Azure Water Golden Toad also advanced in their cultivation.
However, the complete loss of contact with the Fourth Heaven and the three heavens below it, along with their abnormal state, could not remain hidden from the higher heavenly domains forever.
In the Fifth Heaven, the shadow of the Mystic Ice Palace's destruction had yet to fade entirely, but greed for the lower realm's vast resources and wariness of unknown upheavals weighed more heavily.
After every method of investigation repeatedly failed before the strange Phantom Image Veil surrounding the Fourth Heaven, greater unease began to spread.
The powerful factions of the Sixth Heaven also began to notice the plane below, which had grown a little too "quiet."
Intermittent signals, seemingly both real and false, drew the attention of certain sects skilled in divining heavenly secrets or with particular interests in the lower realm.
The lure of profit, wariness of the unknown, and the arrogance of those above ultimately brought about this joint campaign spanning two heavenly domains.
In the Fifth Heaven, twelve powerful sects, led by the Heavenly Blade Sect, the Blazing Fire Divine Church, and the Mystic Yin Sect, rallied more than thirty factions of varying sizes.
In the Sixth Heaven, eight top-tier factions, led by the Soaring Firmament Sword Pavilion, the Nine Nether Demon