Deep in the void, time flowed at a rate utterly different from that of the outside world.
The white bone lotus spanning the chaos had remained perfectly still for an entire month.
Vast Void Dao Ancestor sat cross-legged atop the lotus dais, his withered hands holding a "pseudo-Dao Pattern" that radiated a faint gray glow.
He had not rushed to devour it, nor had he hurried to cultivate.
As an Ancient God who had survived countless epochs, he had seen too many baits and laid too many traps.
Although the Void Child's successful transformation had tempted him, it was not enough to make him lower his guard completely.
From his single eye shot ten million threads of divine sense, finer than strands of hair.
Like the most precise surgical knives, these threads peeled back the rune in his hands layer by layer.
He was taking it apart.
From the energy framework on the outermost layer, to the laws and logic at its core, to every tiny node of spiritual power.
He let not a single unusual fluctuation escape his notice.
"The structure is perfect."
Vast Void Dao Ancestor murmured to himself.
The rune's construction was flawlessly natural. The five elements flowed in an endless cycle, and yin and yang complemented each other without the slightest obstruction.
"The logic is sound."
He peeled away another layer.
The logic governing the rune's inner workings truly did "discard the false and preserve the true," refining its origin by reversing negative states.
It was unlike any poison curse or restriction he knew.
He had even captured several fiends wandering through the void and forcibly implanted the rune inside them.
The results were invariably the same.
The raging fiends grew docile, and their chaotic demonic energy became pure.
There was no sign of self-destruction, nor any trace of them being controlled.
For thirty whole days.
Vast Void Dao Ancestor had used more than a hundred secret arts and carried out thousands of deductions.
Every result pointed to the same conclusion: this was a genuine, pure, supreme wondrous art, one capable of rewriting the very level of a life.
Could it really be that Li Yan brought out his ultimate secret art for the sake of that female disciple?
Vast Void Dao Ancestor's wariness had finally begun to ease after this long verification.
He looked at the rune in his hand. It remained intact, even repairing itself, and greed gradually drowned out his doubts.
If he could find no problem, then there was no problem.
He trusted his own judgment even more than he trusted his status as an Ancient God.
In this plane, no trap could escape the eyes of Vast Void.
He opened his mouth and swallowed the rune, which he had taken apart and reassembled countless times.
Boom.
A cool, immense power of the laws erupted deep within his origin.
At Listening Wind Monastery in the Central Continent Immortal Realm.
Li Yan remained seated cross-legged, sipping tea.
But in his sea of consciousness, the karmic thread he had kept taut for an entire month finally trembled violently.
You old fox. You finally took the bait.
Li Yan set down his teacup, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
He was not surprised by Vast Void Dao Ancestor's caution.
If the other party had started cultivating the moment he got it, he would not have deserved to be called an Ancient God.
But that month of scrutiny had been doomed to futility.
Because Li Yan had not poisoned the rune or placed any obvious restrictions in it.
He had used a far more advanced method—"making the false real."
Vast Void Dao Ancestor's origin was Yaojue: deception and illusion.
And at the core of Li Yan's Side Effect Law was "reversal."
He had reversed his own law, disguised it as a power of the same origin as the Yao Jue Dao Patterns, and woven it into the rune.
It was like making a fishhook out of solid gold.
The hook itself was real, and so was the gold.
No matter how Vast Void tested it, it was a piece of genuine gold.
But its purpose was to catch a fish by the mouth.
This was a dimensional blow on the level of logic itself.
Vast Void Dao Ancestor was searching for a "false" trap, unaware that the trap itself was made of "truth."
When someone accustomed to lying heard an absolutely true statement, he would instead think it the most perfect lie in the world.
Now that the connection's established, there's no point in sitting idle.
Li Yan's mind stirred, and he lightly hooked a finger through the air.
Deep underground, at the formation's core.
The devouring formation, which had originally connected only to the Heavenly Evolution Pavilion, suddenly burst into a low hum.
Its output surged tenfold in an instant.
Deep in the void, Vast Void Dao Ancestor had just begun circulating his new art when his body shuddered slightly.
He felt that the divine power within him seemed to be draining a little faster.
But he paid it no mind.
It was normal for such a domineering Dao Pattern to consume more energy.
Instead, he increased his devouring of the spiritual energy of the disciples inside the Void Palace, trying to make up for the deficit.
What he did not know was this:
Every bit of energy he devoured was quietly siphoned away after being transformed by that "pseudo-Dao Pattern."
An invisible channel crossed the barriers between countless dimensions.
It connected directly to the furnace beneath Li Yan's feet.
Inside the pit.
The Myriad Manifestations Spirit Fire had originally been the color of seven-colored glass, but now a strange, deathly white tinged its flames.
It was the power of Vast Void Dao Ancestor's origin.
How vast was an Ancient God's cultivation?
Even a tiny fraction siphoned away was an ocean of energy capable of filling seas and moving mountains for a plane on the level of the Canglan Realm.
The flames surged.
The Emperor Lord's severed arm, which had still been dissolving slowly, finally lost its last vestige of resistance before this newly added power.
Crack.
A crisp snap came from deep within the severed arm.
That indestructible Divine Bone split, a fissure opening across it.
Li Yan's eyes flashed with brilliant light.
Now.
His fingers blurred as he cast tens of thousands of seals.
"Three Essences Unite. Forge God Demon."
Boom.
The entire underground space shook violently.
Three utterly different supreme powers converged at that moment.
The first was the "Bloodline" power contained in the Emperor Lord's severed arm.
It embodied the ultimate in physical might, killing, and destruction—the pinnacle of the material realm.
The second was the "Yaojue" power sent by Vast Void Dao Ancestor.
It embodied the ultimate in illusion, chaos, and mental control—the strange transformations of the realm of consciousness.
The third was the power of "turning side effects into benefits," which Li Yan commanded.
It was a neutralizer, an adhesive, and above all, a sovereign that ruled over everything.
It forcibly twisted together the two Ancient God powers, which had been as incompatible as fire and water.
Before their very eyes, the severed arm began to change shape.
Its hideous dragon scales fell away completely, replaced by a new layer of skin that shimmered with interwoven blue-gray and dark-red light.
The skin looked as fine as jade, yet felt utterly indestructible.
Its five fingers grew long and slender. No longer were their tips sharp claws; instead, they became some kind of translucent crystal.
With every slight twitch of its fingertips, black spatial rifts split open in the void.
More terrifying still was its aura.
It was no longer simply violent.
It now carried a bizarre quality that could make anyone dizzy and scramble their sense of reality with a single glance.
It seemed to exist here and not exist here at the same time.
It was real, and it was illusory.
It was a weapon of slaughter, and a vessel for lies.
This arm was evolving into a monstrosity that surpassed its original grade.
It combined the Bloodline Emperor Lord's domineering might with Vast Void Dao Ancestor's cunning.
And it had been infused with Li Yan's unreasonable reversal of cause and effect.
As Li Yan watched the creation gradually take shape before him, his breathing grew heavier.
It was too powerful.
Its strength even exceeded his original expectations.
He had only meant to forge a handy weapon to use against the Emperor Lord.
But now, thanks to Vast Void Dao Ancestor's "generous contribution," the weapon had undergone an uncontrollable but beneficial mutation.
It seemed to have... acquired some kind of living quality.
"Unimaginable."
Li Yan murmured to himself, his voice echoing through the vast underground space.
"If this arm is fully refined into a Magic Artifact..."
"One strike could shatter not only an enemy's body."
"Even the concept of their existence and the logic of cause and effect might be rewritten in an instant."
"This is no longer a Divine Artifact."
"This is... Heaven's Punishment."
Li Yan slowly extended his right hand.
The Myriad Manifestations Spirit Fire below seemed to sense its master's will. It lifted the newly born arm, now reduced to the size of an ordinary person's, and slowly raised it.
The arm floated before Li Yan, radiating a suffocating pressure.
Li Yan could feel that one final core inside the arm had yet to be opened.
It was the Emperor Lord's last vestige of instinctive will.
And the wisp of an Ancient God's imprint that Vast Void Dao Ancestor had left in the energy.
These two powers were still making one last stand, fighting to seize control of this newborn body.
"Just one last spark."
Li Yan's gaze turned icy.
He raised his eyes to the water mirror.
In the image, the immortals of the Heavenly Evolution Pavilion were still frantically feeding their greed.
And deep in the void, Vast Void Dao Ancestor continued circulating the art tirelessly, sending over his origin power.
"Vast Void, since you're working so hard..."
"I can't let you down."
Li Yan brought his hands together sharply.
"Formation, reverse!"
This time, he would no longer passively receive.
He would take the initiative.
He would follow that karmic thread and take one great bite.
Even if it alerted Vast Void Dao Ancestor, he did not care.
Because the forging was at its final juncture.
Once he took this step.
Even if all Four Ancient Gods arrived together—
He, Li Yan, would dare to cover the heavens with one hand.
Before you continue