Kunlun

"Good. Let's set out and enter Kunlun."

Crocodile Ancestor matched up the eight pieces of the terrain map, then spoke once he had committed everything to memory.

Then he looked at Jiang Zhu. "You're coming too."

Dismay immediately crossed Jiang Zhu's face. Trembling, he said, "Senior, I only wanted to find somewhere rich in spiritual vitality to cultivate. This..."

As he looked at Crocodile Ancestor's expressionless face, his voice gradually dwindled.

"Then I'm sorry for troubling you, seniors."

Crocodile Ancestor said nothing. He merely strode forward, with the other Dao-Slaying Kings close behind, heading into the deepest reaches of Kunlun.

Along the way, gnarled ancient trees spread their leafy shade. Countless old trees, their ages unknown, towered into the clouds. There were also many ancient vines, like wooden dragons, dangling from the trees and coiling around the cliffs, rugged and powerful.

Vegetation flourished within Kunlun Mountain. The spiritual vitality here was abundant, and with their roots sunk into dragon veins, the plants possessed extraordinarily vigorous life force.

Along the way, Crocodile Ancestor swept through everything without an opponent who could stop him. The group dug up many ancient medicinal plants, all of great age, their long years of growth filling them with spiritual energy.

There were even Little Medicine Kings among them.

Two days later, he sensed wisps of immortal qi drifting from ahead. Then he discovered a He Shou Wu with golden roots and flickering azure radiance shining from his vines and leaves. This ancient medicinal being moved extraordinarily fast, his roots and stem resembling an old man.

"Could this be a divine medicine?!" everyone exclaimed.

Crocodile Ancestor struck, but the limitations imposed by the formation allowed He Shou Wu to escape along the earth veins.

This was a genuine treasure medicine, already comparable to nearly half an Immortal Medicine. Unwilling to give up, Crocodile Ancestor gave chase, followed by the many Dao-Slaying Kings.

Seeing them chase farther and farther away, Jiang Zhu seized the chance to leave the group. Sensing the course of the dragon veins, he transformed into a fire vine and rooted himself in one of them.

He Shou Wu could travel through the earth veins. Crocodile Ancestor and the others knew nothing of Source Arts, and after pursuing him for a while, they lost his trail.

As for Jiang Zhu's disappearance, Crocodile Ancestor did not care in the slightest. He was merely an ant in the Dao Palace Realm, brought along as expendable cannon fodder to scout the way. If he disappeared, so be it.

Dangerous terrain lay everywhere in this region. A mere Dao Palace cultivator would not survive long.

Crocodile Ancestor and the others continued onward, while Jiang Zhu stuck to his established routine. Before long, a humanoid He Shou Wu appeared where he had taken root.

Azure radiance flashed, and waves of fragrance wafted out. He Shou Wu, a half-divine medicine, appeared and studied him curiously.

Jiang Zhu explained why he had sought him out, then took a large quantity of precious blood from the Demon-Refining Pot and offered it to him.

He Shou Wu gritted his teeth and raised an arm. His essence blood flew out and landed on Jiang Zhu, his face filled with pained reluctance. Then he looked at the precious blood Jiang Zhu had produced.

He stretched out his rootlets and soaked them in the precious blood. Before long, his previously shriveled old face smoothed out.

Seeing that the precious blood worked on him, Jiang Zhu took out some more and poured it over his rootlets.

Once he had absorbed it all, he hoisted Jiang Zhu up, and they burrowed into the earth veins together, following them in search of other treasure medicines.

He Shou Wu was an old neighborhood loafer here. He knew where almost every treasure medicine had taken root, and before long, they appeared before a Medicine King.

Jiang Zhu first poured precious blood over the Medicine King's roots, then extracted essence blood from it and sent it into the Demon-Refining Pot to refine.

Repeating the process, Jiang Zhu experienced the joy of harvesting crops. As he continuously refined the divine fluids and essence blood of Medicine Kings, Little Medicine Kings, and treasure medicines, his Liver Divine Treasury raced toward completion, while the Nine-Leaf Sword Grass true spirit totem steadily lit up.

The Kunlun Immortal Land simply had treasure medicines in outrageous abundance!

The Ninety-Nine Dragon Mountains had gulped down the Primordial Ancient Star's spiritual vitality like a whale swallowing water for over two hundred thousand years. After the Ruthless Great Emperor shattered their hope of immortal ascension with a single slap, they had settled down on Earth and done nothing but grow plants.

"Three leaves, four leaves, five leaves..."

Just as Jiang Zhu prepared to redouble his efforts, harvest more crops, and light up the totem and complete his Liver Divine Treasury in one sustained push...

Crocodile Ancestor reached the deepest region and saw the Pure Land that nurtured the hope of immortal ascension. Yet he could advance no farther, because he lacked the ninth piece of the terrain map.

Ahead lay a magnificent, utterly astonishing sight.

The terrain defied all common sense. In his long life, Crocodile Ancestor had never seen anything like it. More than ten thousand peaks clustered together, enclosing a valley, and every peak resembled a dragon's head, as though formed by nature itself!

Each peak resembled the spine of an ancient giant god. Jagged ridges loomed in and out of the misty immortal qi, while the gullies in the rock faces resembled weathered Dao marks left behind after a true dragon's scales had peeled away.

Every dragon mouth spewed essence outward. Immortal qi rose in billowing clouds and gathered in the valley, where the spiritual energy was almost dense enough to crystallize into solid form.

The Dao-Slaying Kings were dumbstruck. At first, they thought the dragon heads had been carved by hand with uncanny craftsmanship, but a closer look left them shaken. These shapes had been formed by the power of nature.

More than ten thousand peaks had been nourished by the life essence of ancient stars, one after another. They bore no trace of human workmanship and had developed entirely through nature.

More than ten thousand dragon bodies lay beneath the earth veins, with only their raised heads aboveground, breathing out all manner of heaven-and-earth essence to nourish the Immortal True Beings within the Immortal Ascension Ground.

"Unimaginable!"

Everyone marveled. This terrain was truly unparalleled. Together, the dragons breathed out their finest essence, creating an Immortal Ascension Ground.

These dragon heads had surely been nurtured through nature. What sort of person could have accomplished all this? In an instant, countless thoughts flashed through Crocodile Ancestor's mind.

Only one voice remained in his mind: The Heavenly Court!

"This is the Immortal-Birthing Land. I've actually found the great secret left behind by the Ancient Heavenly Court! Heaven's mandate truly has its rightful bearer. In this lifetime, I am destined to become an emperor!" Crocodile Ancestor's eyes shone brilliantly.

"So what if one piece of the terrain map is missing? In all these two hundred thousand years, I alone have collected nearly the entire map!"

He stared at the more than ten thousand dragon-headed peaks. Great dragons wheeled and soared, winding over one another. Millions upon millions of them raised their heads and roared, all formed from dragon qi. Within the central immortal valley stretched a vast haze, gushing auspicious qi. Hundreds of millions of strands of colored radiance shimmered, and beams of immortal light shot out.

What exactly lay within? Crocodile Ancestor was desperate to enter and see.

They kept circling the area, hoping to find somewhere they could enter.

Along the way, they saw no fewer than a hundred Medicine Kings rooted on the dragon-headed peaks, wreathed in immortal qi.

Medicine Kings were extraordinarily difficult to cultivate. Even with constant watering using earth spirit milk, a medicinal plant needed more than eighty thousand years of growth before it could be called a Medicine King.

Who could wait that long? Eighty or ninety thousand years-even an Ancient Great Emperor's imperial lifespan normally lasted only ten thousand years. Cultivating one would be pointless.

Only a place like this could do it, drawing upon an entire ancient star's life essence for a million years. Only such long ages could give rise to so many.

Before long, they witnessed a miracle: a Miniature Starfield composed of more than a dozen stars.

What sort of heaven-defying means were these? The sight made their hair stand on end.

The moment they approached, the dozen-odd stars rose, unfolding into a starfield while also revealing a succession of images.

Crocodile Ancestor understood when he saw the images. These were events from the time of the Feathered Divine Dynasty, when they had possessed the complete map. He stared fixedly at the images, but unfortunately discovered nothing.

In the end, they left. Crocodile Ancestor kept calculating a route inside, but to no avail. This place seemed to have been laid out by Heaven itself, with every stretch of terrain serving a precise purpose.