Shrouding the Heavens: The Years I Was the Female Emperor's Strictest Master

That was precisely why he had not possessed even a single Immortal Divine Medicine in his previous life.

These were things that had to be seized from the lairs of the flourishing Primordial Emperor Clans. Unfortunately, he had died before he could reach that point...

"At this time, it hadn't fled to Undying Mountain to settle down?"

Having failed to find the Enlightenment Ancient Tea Tree, Tan Lin's remnant soul felt somewhat regretful and puzzled.

Among all Immortal Divine Medicines, this tree had been the unluckiest. Many Ancient Emperors and Great Emperors had repeatedly cut it down, whether to make coffins or for grafting and transplanting.

Yet by this period, it should have temporarily escaped the Sea of Bitterness. Could it have fallen into someone's hands once again?

As thoughts swirled through his remnant soul, Tan Lin controlled the body and hurried toward the outskirts.

The "firefly" light within the Deep Crimson Light Point he had expended today had already exceeded his budget somewhat, and the body was nearing its limit and about to collapse. It was time to prepare to leave.

Hm? Wait...

Just as his remnant soul had already withdrawn from the forbidden zone and his Primordial Spirit body had reached the outskirts of Undying Mountain—

Suddenly, his divine sense, wrapped in deep crimson-gray mist, swept across a broken wall engraved with an ancient battle mural.

His divine sense abruptly halted.

There lay a section of withered branch. Though its vitality was nearly extinguished, the natural Dao patterns concealed within its twigs resonated invisibly with the Great Dao.

"This is..."

Tan Lin's remnant soul showed astonishment, followed by unprecedented delight.

Wasn't this the Enlightenment Ancient Tea Tree?!

"So it was undergoing nirvana amid extinction... To think it was right here on the outskirts—I never expected that..."

Tan Lin calmed himself and immediately began collecting it.

This was the seed form of the Enlightenment Ancient Tea Tree, merely a withered branch. If he had not seen it with his own eyes, he truly would never have imagined it.

The ruler of this forbidden zone, the Stone Emperor, had long been asleep, as had the servants under his command. This worked in Tan Lin's favor...

As he steadied his breath and focused his mind, the body moved as swiftly as lightning.

He did not directly use divine power to retrieve it, instead repeating the same method as before.

The whole process seemed smooth, yet was actually fraught with peril.

This time, even under the Inverted All-Causes Vision, he could sense a terrifying will deep within the forbidden zone, flowing slowly like a prehistoric behemoth, as though it showed signs of awakening.

It was the Stone Emperor's sleeping consciousness. Within Undying Mountain, he was practically the absolute ruler.

"So it still has an owner?"

Just as he was about to put the withered branch away beneath the crimson-gray mist, his brows furrowed slightly.

He discovered a connection between the withered branch and a certain sleeping place deep within the forbidden zone.

But this discovery did not make him retreat. Gritting his teeth, he directly took it!

"Who is it?!"

Almost at the same instant, as the withered branch entered the All Causes Barrier, that intangible connection was severed.

The next moment, the Supreme Being resting in that sleeping place abruptly awakened. A terrifying will ravaged Undying Mountain as though searching for something.

The Supreme Being Remembers the Past

Boom!!!

In an instant, the laws of heaven and earth throughout the outskirts of Undying Mountain violently trembled!

The awakening of that Supreme Being also triggered a series of chain reactions.

The ancient beings sleeping in Undying Mountain awakened one after another. Even several scattered beings within the other forbidden zones awoke and briefly took notice of the present outside world.

Among them, the Stone Emperor's awakening caused heaven and earth to change color. In an instant, he grasped an intangible trace.

It was precisely the route someone had taken while gathering rare treasures. Though he could not see through the crimson barrier under its double-layered state, the disappearance of those heavenly materials and earthly treasures was undeniable.

The scents of rare treasures from over a dozen breaths ago still lingered at the scene. They had clearly been excavated together just moments earlier!

Someone had silently infiltrated the forbidden zone of Undying Mountain and stolen the seed left after an Immortal Divine Medicine's nirvana right beneath the Supreme Beings' eyes. This was undoubtedly a resounding slap across the Stone Emperor's face!

"Outrageous!!!"

The Stone Emperor's furious rebuke shook heaven and earth.

The sound was a hundred times more terrifying than thunder. It exploded from the depths of Undying Mountain, causing even the winds and clouds across the Central Region of the Eastern Wasteland to change color.

Rumble...

Immediately afterward, black, profound chains of order emerged from thin air, instantly crushing the void, mountains, and rivers for a radius of ten thousand miles outside Undying Mountain.

Everything turned into ruins of nothingness.

"The spiritual energy outside the forbidden zone is so thin. Not long ago, an existence at least at the level of a Great Saint was here devouring essence energy..."

The divine sense of the Supreme Being who had lost the Immortal Divine Medicine stirred slightly, having already probed everything outside.

"Heavenly secrets have been obscured. Nothing can be deduced..."

"That person has already escaped? What impressive methods. He actually left us all unaware. Had he not set his sights on that Enlightenment Ancient Tea Tree, I fear we would still have remained oblivious."

"Which outstanding figures have emerged in this world over these years?"

A Supreme Being asked.

"That brat Yuhua passed away twenty or thirty thousand years ago. The suppression of the myriad Daos of the Heaven's Heart has long dissipated. This golden age has yet to begin, and no one has attained the Dao..."

"How strange. Who exactly would dare act so brazenly?"

"..."

Unable to uncover anything, the Supreme Beings who had slumbered for so long held a brief exchange during these moments of wakefulness.

"Hm? Has the Stone Emperor already found something?"

At this moment, a Supreme Being uttered a soft sound of surprise.

The imperial Dao aura that seemed capable of dominating heaven and earth, with only itself supreme, could be seen gathering back from outside the forbidden zone like a tide.

The Stone Emperor had not emerged, nor had he fully awakened. This was merely the fury of one disturbed in his slumber by ants!

A wisp of terrifying divine sense swept through every inch of the ruins outside the forbidden zone like a destructive storm, finally returning with a cloud of blood mist left ten thousand miles away.

Specks of divine light shimmered within the blood mist, and there was even a trace of the aura left behind by a shattered Primordial Spirit.

"That little thief died just like that? Without even causing the slightest ripple..."

A Supreme Being found it hard to believe.

After all, the heavenly secrets had truly been obscured. That person had indeed possessed the ability to avoid alerting them, and his trail had been completely concealed. They could not investigate even the slightest clue.

How could someone with such methods be annihilated merely by a trace of the Stone Emperor's domain-law aura leaking out?

"Something is wrong. Great Saint level... The Primordial Spirit is incomplete, and the body fundamentally does not match this Primordial Spirit... Who exactly is this?!"

"This is clearly just a substitute body that person threw out to avert disaster. Still, the lingering Lunar and Solar power in this blood mist is rather interesting..."

Within the sleeping region, the divine sense of a former Primordial Emperor fluctuated somewhat more strongly.

"Indeed. The Lunar and Solar forces are not distinctly separated, but show signs of fusion... Tsk, I never expected that after that person from the Primordial Era, someone else in this world would achieve this level while cultivating both Lunar and Solar powers..."

"Hehe, listen to yourself. From your tone, could it possibly be that person from back then has come back to life?"

Someone sneered.

"The Dao-Proving Tribulation that person endured back then was unimaginably brutal. It was rare in all the ages. More than one or two people attacked him—first Xiaoyao reappeared, followed by three from the Ancient Mine of Primordial Beginning. Yet in the end, he still died beneath the Undying Heavenly Blade."

"Actually, I was never certain that day. Was the one who wielded the Undying Heavenly Blade in the end the Undying Daoist, or the Undying Heavenly Emperor?"

"Has the Undying Heavenly Emperor truly died..."

"..."

"To draw the attacks of so many people, that person must have carried some great secret..."

"Perhaps they wanted to study the path of harmonizing yin and yang and giving rise to chaos. But what it was truly for, I fear only those involved back then knew in their hearts."

Whoosh...

As waves of divine sense fluctuated deep within Undying Mountain—

A wisp of the Stone Emperor's divine sense swept up the blood mist and tossed it directly into the sleeping place of the Supreme Being who had lost the Immortal Divine Medicine. After that, there was no further movement.

"Has the Stone Emperor gone back to sleep?"

Deep in the forbidden zone, a younger Saint Spirit asked in confusion.

"The Stone Emperor never woke up. This was only a wisp of consciousness transformed from the stone embryo he left outside... Unless something as major as a Great Emperor of the present age coming to attack happens, how could his elder possibly be disturbed..."

A servant explained.

Meanwhile.

Beyond the ten-thousand-mile radius that had already become ruins.

Invisible crimson-gray mist surged, and the glow of Tan Lin's remnant soul within it dimmed somewhat.

Facing a Great Emperor-level existence who had attained the Dao as a Saint Spirit, in his current state, even the aftershock of a mere sweep from a trace of imperial Dao law-domain aura had inevitably destroyed both his incomplete Primordial Spirit and body.

The body was one thing, but a wisp of his remnant soul consciousness had been lodged within that incomplete Primordial Spirit to control it.

With its annihilation, he naturally suffered some backlash. His remnant soul had weakened, and he would likely need to rely on the firefly glow of the Soul Pearl to nourish it for some time before he could recover.

Still, in light of what he had gained this time, everything was worth it.

A rare mutated treasure of Nine Nether Soul-Returning Grass, a fist-sized piece of Dragon-Patterned Black Gold, two supreme Medicine Kings capable of bearing fruit like the Fire Date Tree of Spring Autumn Pavilion, five great Medicine Kings, more than a dozen lesser Medicine Kings, and several pieces of Sub-Divine Gold.

So-called Sub-Divine Gold was the foremost tier of artifact-refining materials below ultimate Dao materials.

It was the preferred choice when one did not possess any of the nine divine metals.

Yet before the withered branch seed of the Enlightenment Ancient Tea Tree, all of those things were really nothing much.

But for Tan Lin's next life after reincarnation, these resources would still be quite important for his early growth.

In truth, if the "firefly" light within the second Deep Crimson Light Point had been more abundant and he had possessed a greater budget, Tan Lin's gains this time would certainly have been far more than this.

This was already the limit of what he could gather during the dozen or so breaths he had controlled the body inside Undying Mountain.

"These things need to be stored somewhere for my next life..."

A faint gleam flashed through Tan Lin's deep eyes, and in an instant, he had chosen a location.

Seeing the Undying Heavenly Empress Naked

Whoosh...

With that thought, Tan Lin showed no hesitation and once more fully activated the Soul Pearl.

Enhanced by the double-layered state, he pushed the concealment effect to its limit. At the same time, his remnant soul, like a wisp of green smoke, sped in the direction from which he had come.

Whoosh!

At that moment, two powerful auras tore through the void and appeared amid the ruins spanning ten thousand miles outside Undying Mountain.

They were Xiaoyao Dao Body and the Undying Daoist, who had arrived at the first opportunity.

"He truly escaped from the Soul-Severing Formation..."

The Undying Daoist's gaze was cold as he swept his eyes over the forbidden zone, whose turmoil had yet to subside.

"Not only did he come here, he even entered Undying Mountain and stole treasures. His audacity is boundless."

Xiaoyao Dao Body looked even more solemn. He tried to deduce the heavenly secrets, only to find chaos still filling everything, leaving nothing to deduce.

"Something is wrong. Why is this scoundrel's concealment method so strange? And that stealth technique, the shell substitute... If he had possessed such methods during the Primordial Era, he might not necessarily have died..."

As they spoke, the two exchanged a glance and both saw a trace of alarm in the other's eyes.