Ji Kun pondered for a long while before speaking. "Junior Brother, this art was passed down to me. This ancient book was originally a gift from me to you. We cultivators have no reason to take back what we have given."
"So that was it." Chen Xun nodded. "This art seems capable of seizing the creation of heaven and earth. Its backlash is a shortening of one's lifespan."
"It seems Junior Brother already knows."
Ji Kun's gaze sharpened. "This art was passed down from the Great Thousand World of the previous Cosmic Cycle. Our Human Race found it within a Primordial Ancient Crane Spirit Tree in a Small Realm."
"So it seems that Human Race Ancestor Longevity was the first Human Race cultivator to master this art..."
Chen Xun murmured, "And because it was a technique of the Great Thousand World, it was rejected by the Great World Origin. Thus, wherever the Great World Origin existed, Ancestor Longevity could not approach—including Small Realms."
A barely perceptible flicker of surprise passed through Ji Kun's eyes. He had not expected his junior brother to know so many ancient secrets.
He nodded. "Yes, but not entirely. The backlash he suffered was simply too severe."
"I understand." Chen Xun smiled faintly. "I once blazed a path through a cultivation art for Old Bull as well. Naturally, I know what it feels like to be the first."
When he formed his Golden Core Realm and opened the Five-Elements Immortal Path, he too had hovered on the brink of death.
Yet afterward, Old Bull had encountered none of that danger and passed through everything wholly unscathed.
It seemed Ancestor Longevity had done the same—carving out a bloody road for the Ji Clan. His end had been to become neither human nor ghost, like a living corpse;