The End of Participation, Corpse Liberation, a Banished Immortal, and a Natal Essence That Knows Not Azure Heaven

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Yu Ke watched the fallen leaf drift slowly from Third Master's hand.

But it had turned from withered yellow to vivid green.

Third Master, meanwhile, slowly changed from a middle-aged man into an old one.

From Xie Guan's memories, Yu Ke knew that the older generation in Bianjing remembered Third Master looking much like this.

He had never aged. Even his clothes had always been the same plain, moon-colored robe, cut in the same style.

Fourth Master had gone from a youth to an old man.

Second Master had become middle-aged.

Everyone's appearance changed. Only Third Master seemed to have remained in white ever since he entered Bianjing City three sixty-year cycles ago.

In the blink of an eye, Third Master became frail and aged, his jade-like warmth gone.

His once otherworldly features had grown old and worn, leaving him looking like an ordinary elderly man.

Third Master smiled. "Watch time, and flowers bloom; look upon a green leaf, and see it wither and flourish!"

"Mortals peer at a million years of Heaven and Earth through the span of a single day. We are frogs at the bottom of a well. Yet to witness another being's brief life—is that not also a gift from creation?"

His voice was no longer clear and bright. It carried the rasp peculiar to old age.

He opened his branch-like hand and let the leaf, restored to life, float away. "A mayfly sees Azure Heaven. Though only for an instant, it has beheld Heaven and Earth."

Yu Ke reached out. The green parasol-tree leaf settled in his palm.

At last, Yu Ke understood—Third Master's Natal Essence was actually bound to that elusive thing called time!

Third Master suddenly smiled. His dry lips pulled back, exposing stark white bone. "Lamp-Lit Yellow