The Eastern Region.
Formless Mountain.
This place was entirely unlike ordinary famed mountains and great rivers.
There were no sheer, solitary peaks towering into the clouds.
There were no endless stretches of untamed forest.
Instead, the entire mountain range lay strangely amid a vast, boundless expanse of water.
Rather than a mountain, it was more like a patchwork of countless stone-forest islands, carved into fragments by flowing water.
Rivers of every size crisscrossed the land, forming the only roads through Formless Mountain.
Moisture lingered year-round, turning into dense white mist.
It shrouded the entire Water Marsh Mountain Range.
Few who traveled through Formless Mountain took to the air.
Not because they could not, but because they dared not.
Deep within the marshes lay great flight-prohibiting formations established by the Formless Lineage.
One careless move, and the aura of weak water within those formations would dissolve all their cultivation.
Thus.
Traveling through these mountains depended neither on one's feet nor on flight.
Instead, people traveled by boat.
On the water, slender skiffs could be seen from time to time, parting the white mist as they drifted leisurely along.
Most of those aboard wore matching blue robes.
Silver thread embroidered rippling-water patterns along their cuffs.
These were all disciples of Formless Mountain.
Some sat cross-legged at their bows, breathing water vapor in and out, while others held fly whisks and spoke in low voices.
At a glance.
It truly had the air of an Immortal Sect, its people bearing the grace of immortals and Daoists, at peace with the world.
At that moment.
Deep within Formless Mountain.
On the largest island in the waters.
Splendid towers and jade-like halls stood beside the water, bronze wind chimes hanging among their sweeping eaves and interlocking brackets.
When the wind blew, their clear notes rippled