The Immortal Artifact Sect.
This was a land overrun by ancient trees of flesh and blood.
The ancient mountain gate of the Shangqing Spiritual Treasure Realm had once been renowned as an orthodox Daoist stronghold. It drew pure qi from the nine heavens above and fire from the earth's depths below, while nine-colored radiance surrounded it year-round.
A Spirit Treasure Celestial River had also flowed out from the sect, wandering the cosmic stars to draw in spiritual qi, Dao resonance from the nine heavens, and spiritual energy from distant lands. After five hundred thousand years, it would return to the sect and complete its circuit.
Often, those five hundred thousand years would give birth to a treasure that shook the Fallen Immortal Realm. It had been one of the Shangqing Spiritual Treasure Realm's most glorious moments.
But that was...
All in the past.
The Shangqing Spiritual Treasure Realm of today, the Immortal Artifact Sect of today, had become a land of ancient flesh-and-blood trees and crisscrossing rivers of blood.
Cocoons hung upside down from those trees' branches. Each held a human of extraordinary talent. Even the least gifted possessed a heavenly spirit root, and one or two possessed Dao bodies. Every one of them was exceptional.
These supremely talented fruits of human flesh would become artifact refiners, body cultivators, sword cultivators, and more. They would fight, kill, and toil all their lives for the Heavenly Illusion Immortal Butterfly Clan, only to be devoured by the Heavenly Illusion Immortal Butterfly Clan and the Heavenly Craft Clan in the end. Nothing would go to waste.
Thanks to the births and deaths of generation after generation of gifted humans, the Heavenly Illusion Immortal Butterfly Clan and the Heavenly Craft Clan had grown ever more prosperous.
On this day, a young man in azure