So They'd Been Living on Top of a Tomb All These Years?

The Nine Great Immortal Sects of the Eastern Domain were the Yaoguang Holy Land, the Sun Moon Divine Cult, the Yin Yang Holy Cult, the Qiankun Grotto-Heaven, the Dao Yi Immortal Sect, the Kaoshan Sect, the Ghost Nether Mansion (defunct), the Sacred Xuan Sect, and the Immortal Mansion.

The Nine Great Immortal Sects were spread across the Eastern Domain's three great continents and wielded tremendous influence throughout the region.

Among them, the Immortal Mansion in Cangzhou occupied a unique geographical position.

It sat at the juncture of the three continents.

And today, the Immortal Mansion was celebrating a joyous occasion for the entire sect.

Thirty thousand years ago today, the Immortal Mansion had been founded.

Its founding patriarch had established the sect at the edge of Cangzhou, in a mountain range that also happened to border the other two continents.

A birthday called for celebration, so the Immortal Mansion had been bustling since early morning, with feasts laid out for the whole sect to celebrate together.

None of them suppressed their cultivation. They let the alcohol dull their senses, relaxing their bodies and minds like never before.

Normally, they trained hard to preserve their status as one of the Nine Great Immortal Sects, not daring to waste a moment.

But today, the Mansion Lord had granted special permission: drink as much as they liked. He was picking up the tab!

As the festivities reached their height, female disciples sang and danced, while male disciples joined in, creating a warm and merry atmosphere.

The Mansion Lord himself even took the stage and performed a display of Heaven and Earth Dharma from a Great Power of the Heavenly Human Realm, stirring every disciple's yearning for that level of strength.

But just as everyone was lost in the revelry,

the stone statue of the Immortal Mansion's founding patriarch suddenly cracked.

Crack!

A fissure ran from its feet to its head, and the statue split clean in two.

A drunken disciple was the first to notice. He rubbed his eyes and said, "What the hell... The patriarch... cracked?"

As soon as he said it, a fist landed on him. A tall male disciple clenched his fist and scolded him, "Even drunk, you can't show disrespect to the patriarch. You unfilial descendant."

Then he looked at the patriarch's statue and gaped. "Holy crap, it really cracked."

More and more people noticed the strange sight, their faces full of shock, their mouths hanging open.

The statue of the founding patriarch, a symbol of the Immortal Mansion's dignity, had actually cracked.

What... was this an omen of?

The Mansion Lord narrowed his eyes and performed a divination. Then he cried out, "An Ominous omen!"

Rumble!

Before the Mansion Lord's words had even faded, a rumble suddenly came from beneath the earth.

The sound seemed to come from deep underground, deep and resonant, like the tolling of a great bell.

"Mansion Lord, can you determine what caused this strange change?"

A burly elder asked gravely.

The patriarch's statue had cracked, and a rumbling had come from deep beneath the earth.

Something was clearly about to happen!

The Mansion Lord divined again and again, but got no results. He then summoned all his Magic Power and forced the divination.

The patriarch's statue had cracked, foretelling that what was about to happen might endanger the entire Immortal Mansion. He had to be cautious.

Pfft!

The Mansion Lord gave it everything he had, but still couldn't determine what was about to happen. Instead, a mysterious force struck back at him, damaging his heart meridians. He spat out a mouthful of blood, and his aura instantly grew feeble!

What he was trying to divine far exceeded his cultivation realm. He had trespassed against a taboo!

If he hadn't stopped in time, he might have died on the spot!

"Mansion Lord!"

An elder hurriedly caught him, his face full of concern. "Don't push yourself."

The Mansion Lord shook his head, blood at the corner of his mouth. He struggled to raise his head and look at the sky, only to see Nine-colored Rosy Clouds cascading down from above.

"Quick... Go fetch the Ancestor!"

Rumble!

Before he could finish speaking, the earth trembled violently, shaking so hard that the mountains rocked.

The entire mountain range where the Immortal Mansion stood was splitting apart. The cracks widened and widened, stretching a hundred miles across.

Blinding golden light shone up from deep within the fissures.

As the golden light appeared, an almost imperceptible pressure emerged, terrifying and boundless.

It was a force that seemed capable of suppressing the entire cosmos—the very pinnacle of the Great Dao!

"All Immortal Mansion disciples, leave the sect grounds and get as far away from here as possible!"

"Retreat at once!"

Three figures shot into the sky from deep within the Immortal Mansion, unleashing the terrifying aura of the Lin Dao Realm without restraint.

The old man in the middle, whose long eyebrows reached his waist, barked an order.

In an instant, every drunken person in the Immortal Mansion snapped sober.

"Disciples at the Core Formation Realm or above who can fly, lead the Meridian Opening Realm disciples to safety. Move quickly!"

The Mansion Lord soared into the sky and manifested his Heaven and Earth Dharma Idol, towering between heaven and earth.

Ignoring the internal injuries from the backlash, he drew upon all the power of heaven and earth, doing his best to stabilize the ground beneath the Immortal Mansion's sect grounds.

The three Lin Dao Realm Ancestors and all the elders immediately joined forces, trying to steady the terrain.

They had to buy time for the disciples to escape.

The Immortal Mansion descended into chaos. Meridian Opening Realm disciples couldn't fly, so they could only look for nearby disciples at the Core Formation Realm or above.

But Meridian Opening Realm disciples usually made up the largest group in any sect.

There was no way to evacuate them all at once.

"Sleeve Universe!"

One Lin Dao Realm Ancestor abandoned his efforts to stabilize the terrain and rushed into the Immortal Mansion. He used his Dao art, continually drawing Meridian Opening Realm disciples who hadn't escaped into his sleeve.

Only after confirming everyone had been evacuated did he roar, "Get away from the epicenter! Retreat!"

At once, led by the old man with eyebrows down to his waist, everyone charged into the distance, turning into countless streaks of light as they fled farther and farther from the mountain range.

Boom!

The immense shock wave spread farther still. The earth shook violently, and great swaths of the Immortal Mansion's magnificent buildings collapsed, falling into the fissures.

The mountain range split apart, golden light filling the sky.

Nine-colored Rosy Clouds cascaded down from the heavens.

Layer upon layer of heavenly vaults appeared in the sky—thirty-three in all. Above them stood jade palaces and celestial towers, seemingly inhabited by immortals. Auspicious divine beasts galloped across the heavens, leaving everyone shaken to the core.

The Immortal Mansion's people, having fled far away, stared at the sky in horror, frozen with shock.

The old man whose long eyebrows reached his waist looked grim as he gazed at the awe-inspiring heavenly vaults. His pupils trembled.

The thirty-three layers of heavenly vaults exerted an overwhelming pressure!

They blotted out the sun and sky, cascading with radiant Great Dao clouds. Above them, the Heavenly Sound of the Great Dao rumbled, shaking the soul.

As the mountain range where the Immortal Mansion stood trembled, it finally collapsed completely, revealing an enormous structure within.

This was...

"A mausoleum?"

The Immortal Mansion's people stared in disbelief. Wasn't that enormous structure just a burial mound?

There was actually a great tomb beneath their sect?

So they'd been living on top of a tomb all these years?

As the mausoleum emerged, pale yellow gas gradually drifted up from underground, spreading through the air.

The Mansion Lord drew a wisp toward himself and examined it closely, then cried out, "Xuanhuang Qi?"

"What?"

Everyone was shocked. They hurriedly drew in a wisp to inspect it, only to discover that it really was Xuanhuang Qi!

According to legend, Xuanhuang Qi had been born at the dawn of heaven and earth.

When heaven and earth first opened, there were two kinds of Qi!

In the heavens was Primordial Violet Qi!

On earth was Xuanhuang Qi!

The old man with eyebrows down to his waist stared at the mausoleum again and again. A guess he hardly dared believe gradually arose in his heart.

Such a vast scale.

Such a tremendous presence.

Thirty-three layers of heavenly vaults.

Xuanhuang Qi.

The almost imperceptible Imperial Might in the air.

Could this be...

An Imperial Mausoleum!!

He struggled to speak. "This may be... the mausoleum of Great Emperor Xuanhuang!"

Hearing his guess, everyone gaped, unable to believe it.

The Immortal Mansion had actually been built on the tomb of a Great Emperor?

How could something so unbelievable be true?

"The Eastern Domain is about to fall into turmoil. Primordial Races have been appearing one after another lately, and now an Imperial Mausoleum has emerged. I'm afraid this will bring an unimaginable bloodbath!"

One Lin Dao Realm Ancestor said with a frown.

The emergence of an Imperial Mausoleum would undoubtedly spark a bloody battle between powerful cultivators.

Obtaining even a single relic of a Great Emperor would be an earth-shaking stroke of fortune!

And if the mausoleum held Great Emperor Xuanhuang's legacy...

A bloodbath would be inevitable, and an earth-shattering battle would break out!

The three Ancestors were forced to lead the Immortal Mansion away and relocate. A bloody battle might break out here before long.

Meanwhile, the enormous shock wave swept across the Eastern Domain. Countless mortals died in the massive earthquake, while even more cultivators were left bewildered by the sudden calamity.