Arriving at Buzhou Mountain

He flew over a vast expanse of ruins.

The ruins stretched far and wide; from above, one could faintly make out the outline of what had once been a magnificent palace complex.

Now only broken walls remained, charred stone pillars toppled, shattered jade steps cracked, wild grass growing wildly from the gaps, vines crawling over the once ornately carved beams and columns.

Within the ruins lingered an intensely chaotic trail of Dao resonance.

There was the domineering aura of the Dragon Clan, the blazing heat of the Phoenix Clan, and the profound weight of the Kirin Clan.

They tangled, clashed, and tore at each other, and even after countless ages, they had not fully dissipated.

Xuande landed at the edge of the ruins and stood quietly for a long time.

He did not know whether this was a key site of the Dragon Clan, the Phoenix Clan, or the Kirin Clan.

Nor did he know what brutal battle had taken place here back then.

But from those lingering Dao resonances, he could feel the ferocity and tragedy of that war.

The three clans vied for supremacy, stretching across millions of years, only to end up severely weakened, withdrawing from the main stage of the Primordial Wilderness.

He recalled a casual remark Zhenyuanzi had once made:

"The Dragon-Han Tribulation—though called a tribulation, was actually a calamity the three clans brought upon themselves.

Too much slaughter, too deep karmic sin. Heaven grew weary of them, Earth abandoned them. Even with heaven-reaching abilities, they could not defy the Heavenly Dao."

Xuande was silent for a long time.

He suddenly understood why he, along with Jieyin and Zhunti, and Zhenyuanzi and Hongyun, had received such abundant Heavenly Dao merit for repairing the Western Earth Veins—not merely because the act of repairing the veins benefited Heaven and Earth.

But more because... they had avoided that most fatal trap.

Slaughter, karmic sin, the entanglement of cause and effect—all eventually settled by the Heavenly Dao.

And they had chosen construction over destruction, chosen to resolve calamity rather than create it.

This was the true essence of the path of merit.

Xuande faced the ruins and bowed from afar.

Not for any one of the three clans.

But for the countless living beings who had fallen in that tribulation, for this land that had once been glorious and now lay silent. Then he turned and left.

He continued eastward.

One day, he passed through a vast wasteland.

The terrain here was extremely peculiar—the earth showed an unnatural scorched black, and in many places, wisps of eerie mist still rose.

Spiritual Energy here was extremely chaotic, appearing and disappearing, mixed with an indescribable violence and deathly stillness.

For ten thousand miles around, there was almost no living creature, and even the vegetation was sparse—mostly mutated, twisted strange trees.

Xuande immediately knew what this place was.

One of the main battlefields of the Dao-Demon Conflict.

Rahula had detonated the Western Earth Veins as his final strike before defeat, a revenge against the entire Primordial Wilderness.

But before that, the Dao-Demon Conflict had already spread across the Primordial Wilderness, with countless great beings falling, countless Spiritual Veins shattered, and countless living beings suffering.

This wasteland was one of the many scars left by that earth-shaking war.

He did not linger here long. The wounds of this land were too deep to be healed by ordinary means.

Perhaps it would take another eon, after countless storms and rains, for the Earth Veins to slowly recover on their own.

Or perhaps it would never return to its former state.

Such was the cost of war.

Xuande flew silently over this dead land, and the sense of accomplishment he had felt from repairing the Western Earth Veins suddenly gained a deeper, heavier weight.

He continued eastward.

He flew for who knows how long, until a faint but heaven-spanning majestic outline gradually appeared on the horizon ahead.

That outline was very faint at first, like the phantom of distant mountains or the folds of clouds.

But as Xuande drew closer, the outline grew clearer, larger, and more... soul-shaking.

It was a mountain.

A mountain whose grandeur and magnificence could not be described in any words.

It was too tall.

So tall that its waist was lost in the sea of clouds, and above that, there was only chaos, impenetrable even to divine sense.

It was as if it were not a mountain, but a giant pillar growing from the depths of the earth, piercing the sky, supporting the weight of the entire world.

It was too vast.

Even from ten thousand miles away, that mountain occupied the entire field of vision.

Xuande flew for several days, yet the mountain's outline showed no sign of shrinking.

Instead, it grew larger and larger, closer and closer, as if the entire heaven and earth were converging toward it, bowing in submission to it.

It was too ancient.

So ancient that merely glimpsing it from afar, Xuande could feel that vast will rushing toward him, as if it had existed since the very beginning of creation.

It was not the pressure of any living being, but the weight of heaven and earth themselves, the lingering might of Pangu's legacy, the breath of the origin of all things.

Buzhou Mountain.

The spine of the Primordial Wilderness, transformed from the backbone of the great god Pangu, propping up the heavens and supporting the earth, guarding the Primordial Wilderness.

When Xuande was still some distance from Buzhou Mountain, he actively pressed his cloud down and descended.

He could no longer fly.

Not because his magical power was insufficient, but because facing this divine mountain, any living being would instinctively restrain their aura, daring not the slightest presumption.

That reverence, rooted deep in bloodline and soul instinct, was stronger than any pressure.

He walked forward on foot.

The earth beneath his feet grew heavier and heavier, the Spiritual Energy purer and purer, and the air was filled with an indescribable, ancient and sacred aura.

It was not the scent of any immortal herb or spiritual medicine, but the very breath of Buzhou Mountain itself, the Dao resonance of Pangu's fossilized bones, precipitated over countless eons.

Along the way, he also encountered a few cultivators heading toward Buzhou Mountain.

Most of those cultivators moved with haste, rarely speaking among themselves, and when their gazes occasionally met, they merely nodded slightly before parting ways.

Xuande could sense that their cultivation levels were not low; the weakest among them was already at the early stage of Zenith Heaven Golden Immortal.

At the foot of Buzhou Mountain, no one was ostentatious, no one was boisterous.

Even cultivators of the highest realms behaved like pilgrims on a pilgrimage, sheathing all their sharpness and pride.

Xuande found a slightly elevated slope with a broad view, sat down cross-legged, and settled.

He was not in a hurry to do anything. He simply wanted to sit here quietly for a while.

He gazed at Buzhou Mountain, at its towering outline, at its peak vanishing into chaos, and his heart was filled with tranquility.

He recalled the time right after his transmigration, trapped within that inch-wide restriction, training day and night, merely to survive his Form Transformation.

He recalled facing Jieyin and Zhunti after his transformation, treading carefully, as if walking on thin ice.

He recalled joining hands with Zhenyuanzi and Hongyun to repair the Earth Veins, trekking across mountains and rivers for tens of thousands of years, exhausting his heart and strength.

Now, alone, sitting at the foot of this mountain that propped up the heavens and supported the earth, he had nothing to think about, nothing to do—just quietly... exist.

The mountain wind blew, carrying the unique chill of Buzhou Mountain, mixed with the aura of chaos.

Xuande closed his eyes, letting the wind brush his cheeks, brush his Daoist robe, brush through those memories and thoughts that had settled over countless years.

From Mount Sumeru in the West to the foot of Buzhou Mountain.

He suddenly realized that he had been in this era, this Primordial Wilderness, for a very, very long time.

So long that he had almost forgotten that he was once a soul from a later age.

A "transmigrator" who knew the legends of the Primordial Wilderness like the back of his hand.

He did not deliberately cultivate, nor did he deliberately comprehend.

He simply sat there, like a mountain rock, like an ancient tree, like one of the countless living beings silently existing at the foot of Buzhou Mountain.

He did not know how long had passed.

Here, the passage of time seemed to become extremely slow, or perhaps it had completely lost its meaning.

He just sat quietly, feeling the weight of the earth beneath him.

Feeling the majesty of the divine mountain before him, feeling that ancient Dao resonance that was everywhere yet indescribable.

Until a certain moment, he opened his eyes.