Western Pole Mountain reached up to the vault of heaven, lofty and perilous. Its full circumference exceeded forty-three thousand nine hundred li, and countless Small Kingdoms, city-states, and tribes upon it all followed the Western Pole Religion.
This religion had a history of more than five thousand years. Its cultivation methods were neither Buddhist nor Daoist; it had established a creed of its own and excelled in spells of command, prohibition, and binding, which were extraordinarily formidable.
The religion's six elders, in particular, had all attained an immortal body, transcending tribulations to live forever. They were the most powerful figures in the Western Sea region. No traveler dared fly over the mountain; everyone had to go around.
They were sworn enemies of Divine Lord Lesser Yang of Lizhu Palace on Moqiu Island in the Western Sea. Divine Lord Lesser Yang specialized in fire-based Daoist arts and had brought the fire arts of the unorthodox path to their utmost heights. They had surrounded and attacked him several times, and only repeated assistance from his close friend Old Man Cangxu, one of the Six Oddities of the Cosmos, had saved him. Yet even if Divine Lord Lesser Yang joined forces with Old Man Cangxu, they could not destroy the Western Pole Religion. The conflict between the two sides had lasted for hundreds of years.
Western Pole Mountain lay extremely far from the Central Land, and its people had seldom ventured there before the Song and Yuan periods. Only then had they gradually begun visiting. Later, when Shang Heyang, Green-Robed Ancestor, Venerable Poison Dragon, and others traveled west to seek refuge with them, they described the Central Land's customs and landscapes and its uniquely blessed conditions. After so long in stillness, the six elders of the Western Pole Religion grew restless and specifically