Eighteen Ten Years Ago, Eighteen Again This Year

After what had happened, no one was in the mood to rest. They hurried onward, heading toward the outer reaches of the Desolate Forbidden Land.

After climbing another low hill, they looked toward the distant peak again. The buildings there had become even clearer.

It was vast in scale, with palace halls stretching endlessly, like heavenly palaces that had fallen into the mortal world.

Unfortunately, they were flowers in a mirror and the moon reflected in water. This time, they had no chance of entering them.

After passing a black lake, avoiding a black ferocious beast, and crossing another small hill, they continued onward.

"Why do I suddenly feel like my body is heating up?"

Everyone noticed something was wrong. Their skin suddenly turned an alarming red, as though blood might drip from it. Each of them felt as if a fire were burning inside their body.

"I... can't take it... It hurts so much!"

Everyone collapsed to the ground and rolled about in agony, tears and mucus streaming down their faces as thin streaks of blood seeped from their skin.

"Ah..."

"I don't want to die..."

"Just let me die... This hurts too much..."

Crying and wailing rang out without end.

In the end, a layer of blood-red aura surrounded everyone's bodies, as though they were bathing in flames.

Jiang Yun also felt unbearably uncomfortable all over, but what came from within his body was a tingling numbness. The sensation grew stronger and stronger, as though new flesh and bones were growing from the inside out.

He vaguely seemed to hear the sound of blood rushing through his veins. It grew faster and faster, itchier and itchier, more numb and numb.

It felt as though his entire body was undergoing rebirth, shedding its old shell to give birth to a brand-new body.

Who knew how much time passed before the mountain wilderness gradually fell silent and the pained growls disappeared.

An hour or two later, Jiang Yun slowly woke up in the overgrown grass.

The sky was a brilliant blue. Amid birdsong and insect chirps, he sat up and saw with his own eyes that his skin had become smoother, returning to how it had been when he was eighteen or nineteen.

His body brimmed with endless energy, as though he possessed limitless strength. He felt capable of smashing a huge rock with one punch or tearing apart tigers and leopards with his bare hands.

With a thought, he opened the panel to take a look.

[Panel]

Realm: Mortal

Physique: Mortal Physique (Sacred Physique 1.92%)

Bloodline: None for now (obtained through dual cultivation with a Dao companion)

Cultivation Technique: "Dao Scripture" (pending study)

Reflection Points: None for now (can be obtained with a Dao companion)

Source Space: 30*30*30

Dao Companion: None for now (single)

Mark: None for now (obtained through dual cultivation with a Dao companion)

Descendant Bonus: None

The small red fruits they had eaten earlier had grown from a branch of the Nine Wonders Immortal Medicine. After leaving the Desolate Forbidden Land, their effects had begun to awaken.

They had undergone a transformation, but his physique was still pitifully weak. There was enormous room for improvement.

Jiang Yun felt that Ye Fan's Sacred Physique purity was at least above ninety-five percent. Otherwise, how could he have been called a first-generation Sacred Physique?

His own physique was probably countless generations removed, but it was still better than having nothing. With the panel, perhaps he could nurture it further.

The Source Space had changed the most, expanding by more than three times.

"Source Space... source... Could it be that the space grows as I improve?" Jiang Yun pondered inwardly.

He had obtained the panel too recently. Since he could not figure it out, Jiang Yun stopped thinking about it. He could slowly study it in the future.

He remembered that the Nine Wonders Immortal Medicine had been split into nine by the Ruthless One, and each plant's fruit had a different effect.

Although all of them could transform the body, the small red fruits they had eaten were especially effective at opening the Sea of Bitterness.

The reason Ye Fan had been able to smoothly open his Sea of Bitterness, which was as hard as divine iron, was because the unique energy contained within this sacred fruit had flowed into it. It helped him break the curse that made the Ancient Sacred Body unable to open the Sea of Bitterness, allowing Ye Fan to advance by leaps and bounds.

This time, he had benefited from Ye Fan as well and gained tremendous advantages. He decided that he would cover Ye Fan's early resources for opening his Sea of Bitterness.

After studying the panel,

Jiang Yun looked around. Ye Fan and Pang Bo had also sat up, their bodies much smaller. Wearing clothes that no longer fit, they looked only thirteen or fourteen years old.

Compared to the original story, the two of them had eaten fewer small red fruits. Otherwise, they would have looked eleven or twelve and even younger.

All around the grassland lay a scattered group of elderly men and women, their bodies full of decay. They had gone straight from young professionals to the age of square-dancing retirees, skipping who knew how many years of detours.

"They... aren't they Zhou Yi, Wang Ziwen, Zhang Ziling, Liu Yiyi, Lin Jia, Li Xiaoman, and the others?!"

Ye Fan and Pang Bo stopped examining each other. Seeing those elderly people, they were utterly dumbfounded.

"Why did the three of us become so much younger instead?" Pang Bo asked in confusion.

"It's because the three of us ate the small red fruits," Jiang Yun and Ye Fan answered in unison.

"Compared to getting old, I think becoming smaller is much easier to accept!"

Pang Bo, who had been somewhat depressed about becoming a child, said thankfully.

The elderly men and women gradually woke up as well. They simply could not accept such a change and let out miserable wails, even worse than before.

They had escaped the bronze coffin less than two days ago, only to faint for a while. Now, before they knew it, they were nearly ready to enter a coffin again.

"Ah..." Lin Jia was on the verge of collapse. Her scream startled the birds in the forest into scattering in every direction.

Since ancient times, beauties were like famous generals; neither was permitted to grow old before the world.

A woman in the bloom of youth suddenly becoming like this was even harder to accept.

"Ye Fan, Jiang Yun, and Pang Bo, why haven't you grown old? Why have you become young again instead?"

Zhou Yi stared fixedly at the three of them with his clouded eyes.

The others also suddenly noticed Ye Fan and Pang Bo beside them, now turned into little kids.

Jiang Yun had originally been four or five years older than them. Now that he looked eighteen or nineteen again, it was as though he had beauty filters turned on.

If the timing had not been so wrong, they might even have praised him: "A gentleman like jade upon the road, unmatched beneath heaven."

Meanwhile, they had become a group of white-haired old people. Even if they went square dancing, the lead dancer might find them too old to dare teach them.

The others temporarily put aside their grief and all turned to look over.

Jiang Yun and the other two were suddenly stared at by more than twenty elderly men and women. Their gritted-teeth expressions made one's scalp tingle.

Pang Bo felt uncomfortable hearing Zhou Yi's words and spoke rather unkindly.

"I say, Grandpa Zhou, you aren't suspecting that we did something, are you? If we had such great abilities, why would we still be mortals?"

Jiang Yun did not explain much to them either. He and Ye Fan simply kept comforting them.

"Leave this place... Go to that immortal palace!"

Zhou Yi shakily stood up and pointed toward the distant mountain. Palace halls stretched across it like heavenly palaces descending into the mortal world.

Although their bodies had aged, their minds had not. He clearly pointed out their only hope at present.

If immortal beings lived there, perhaps all of this could be resolved.

Everyone supported one another as they headed down the mountain.

Their bodies were old and frail, all weak arms and legs. Jiang Yun, Ye Fan, and Pang Bo helped look after and support them.

As they headed forward, Jiang Yun and the other two discussed matters.

They believed the small red fruits were too extraordinary and feared they would be unable to protect the branch that grew them.

In the end, they decided Jiang Yun would hide it away. Jiang Yun pretended to leave to relieve himself, then collected everything into the Source Space.

If they merely hid it, it might disappear. Jiang Yun felt it was safer in the Source Space. When the others needed it, he could give it back to them.

The group continued onward.

Gradually, the others noticed something was wrong. They were clearly only separated from the mountain holding that immortal palace by one mountain, yet after laboriously crossing a peak and looking ahead, there was still another mountain between them, as though nothing had changed.

They looked again, moved forward again, and crossed another mountain again, but the result was still the same.

At that moment, everyone understood. They simply could not get close to it.

Just as despair rose in their hearts, a streak of rainbow light cut across the sky and rapidly flew toward them, especially striking against the dim sky.

As the rainbow light drew closer, they could vaguely make out a human figure within it.

Seeing this scene, Jiang Yun's heart stirred with excitement. It seemed his cultivation journey of flying through the heavens and traveling through the earth was about to begin.

Whoosh!

That streak of rainbow light seemed to notice them and suddenly accelerated toward them. Its speed was astounding, like sunlight piercing darkness. It arrived in an instant, reaching them in the blink of an eye.

A figure stood suspended in midair, divine radiance spreading around her body and preventing everyone from seeing her clearly.

They could vaguely tell that she was a young woman of around eighteen or nineteen. Her black hair cascaded down her back like a waterfall and fluttered gently, with a strand falling across her chest.

Her face was like jade, her figure graceful and enchanting, her curves exquisite. Her pale blue dress drifted naturally in the wind, revealing a stretch of long, jade-like leg. She was as beautiful as an immortal maiden untouched by worldly dust.

Everyone was stunned by the woman who had suddenly appeared. On Earth, after living through an information explosion, they could be said to have seen every kind of beauty. Yet this ethereal immortal maiden before them made them stand there in a daze.

Her appearance fulfilled all their beautiful fantasies of immortals. This incomparably beautiful woman seemed to have stepped beyond the mire of the mundane world, like an immortal from the nine heavens.

As everyone observed this "immortal maiden," the lovely young woman was observing them as well.

She paid particular attention to Jiang Yun, Ye Fan, and Pang Bo.

Jiang Yun wanted to seek a Dao companion, but he did not yet dare entertain improper thoughts about the woman before him. He did not dare make a single reckless move.

He wondered whether this woman's Immortal Spirit Eyes could see through his Source Space.

This woman should be Weiwei, the one who possessed Immortal Spirit Eyes.

After leaving the Desolate Forbidden Land, they would arrive in the Yan Kingdom, and the Desolate Forbidden Land lay within Yan Kingdom's borders.

The Yan Kingdom's six great Heavenly Caves were top-tier forces built around the Desolate Forbidden Land. Each had the support of aristocratic clans and sacred lands behind them, serving as eyes watching over the Desolate Forbidden Land.

Weiwei belonged to Spiritual Void Cave Heaven, one of the six great Heavenly Caves. In the Yan Kingdom, she was unquestionably a favored daughter of heaven, a peerless genius seen only once in a thousand years. By now, she should be nearly finished cultivating the Sea of Bitterness Secret Realm and preparing to enter a sacred land for further cultivation.

She also possessed Immortal Spirit Eyes, capable of seeing through falsehood and looking directly upon one's source. Those with Immortal Spirit Eyes were as pure as immortals, naturally detached from the mundane world.

In the future, she would even purge the Ruthless One's Lineage from Shaking Light Sacred Land and take control of the entire Shaking Light Sacred Land.

This woman was far from simple.