Do you mean to make an enemy of me? Cutting open the stone, an incomplete stone tablet

Outside the Immortal Court, the void trembled faintly.

A figure appeared, without the slightest trace of surging divine power.

Yet his presence still made this stretch of heaven and earth tremble, conjuring phenomena on its own as phantoms of the Great Dao emerged.

Ye Mingyuan gazed at the Immortal Court, still shrouded in immortal mist, and sighed.

Over these five hundred years.

He had come here several times, only to return empty-handed every time.

The Immortal Court remained sealed, its supreme Dao formation patterns manifesting. Those terrifying killing formation patterns made his eyelids twitch uncontrollably with a single glance.

Still, this scene was somewhat familiar.

Back when the Immortal Court had first been established, he had built a hut outside and waited for a hundred years.

Only this time, he did not dare do so.

He could only come by for a look now and then, but that wait had stretched into five hundred years.

He knew that Lu Qingyun was probably undergoing a terrifying transformation...

"What kind of transformation takes five hundred years...?"

"Lu Qingyun, just what realm have you reached?"

Thoughts churned in Ye Mingyuan's eyes. He had always known that Lu Qingyun was strong, and not merely ordinarily strong.

But in the beginning, when he had first come into contact with Lu Qingyun.

The gap in that strength had been visible.

Even if he had been someone who went down in three punches from the very start, at least... his health bar had let him take a few more hits.

But ever since Lu Qingyun had attained the Dao.

That gap... had grown unimaginably vast!

Perhaps the Dao-attainment lightning tribulation he had experienced this time had been more terrifying than Lu Qingyun's.

But its power could only have been greater by so much.

Judging by Lu Qingyun's performance back then, he could definitely have survived it safely, and even had strength to spare!

And at that time, Lu Qingyun had cultivated for fewer than eight hundred years!

Eight hundred years of cultivation, yet even riding a horse at full gallop, someone like him, who had lived for over ten thousand years and even lived a second life, could not catch up!

Not to mention that another ten thousand years had now passed.

Had this world not long since become incapable of producing immortals, the one now overlooking the myriad ages and worlds from within the forbidden zone would likely have been an undying True Immortal!

"Someone like him must surely have a Divine Medicine of Immortality following him..."

A trace of hope flickered in Ye Mingyuan's eyes, only to fade quickly.

It had been so long that he had nearly forgotten...

Lu Qingyun truly had the constitution of an unlucky bastard. His possessions were so meager that they were even more outrageous than Ye Mingyuan's before he had married into the Feng Clan!

And for a Divine Medicine of Immortality to follow someone of its own accord, aside from formidable strength.

Deep blessings and fortune were also indispensable. Looking at it that way... hope was slim.

"Ah-!"

Ye Mingyuan sighed.

Just then, the immortal mist that had gathered before him for hundreds of years suddenly parted.

Lu Qingyun's voice rang out from within, carrying a hint of coldness and hostility.

"I've noticed that you seem to be thinking some very rude things..."

"Do you mean to make an enemy of me?"

Throughout the forbidden zone, all the supreme Dao formation patterns vanished, their might no longer manifest.

It was not because their continuous operation consumed too much.

It was merely... that the sovereign within the forbidden zone had awakened, standing high above, reigning over all beneath heaven.

His will could decide everything!

And no one would dare commit any act of defiance while he was awake!

Hearing Lu Qingyun's voice, a trace of joy flashed through Ye Mingyuan's eyes.

Yet a touch of unease arose as well.

After explaining his purpose to Lu Qingyun, he looked somewhat nervous.

He did not take out the mountain itself, which he had briefly refined, because the first thing he needed to confirm was...

Whether Lu Qingyun truly possessed a Divine Medicine of Immortality.

After hearing Ye Mingyuan's account, Lu Qingyun also became somewhat interested.

Back when he had used his Chaos Body to forcibly trample the myriad Daos and become a Great Emperor.

He, too, had seen that corner of the heavenly palace.

But he had not paid it much attention.

Because the moment he finished undergoing his heavenly tribulation, the system had smacked him on the forehead.

So he had not had the mind to concern himself with it.

But now, Ye Mingyuan had actually encountered something with a presence similar to that corner of the heavenly palace, and this piqued Lu Qingyun's curiosity as well.

After obtaining Lu Qingyun's permission.

Ye Mingyuan stepped into the Immortal Court Forbidden Zone, though his state of mind this time differed greatly from his previous visits.

This also made him pay closer attention to the sights within the forbidden zone.

To Ye Mingyuan's surprise, this time he actually reached the Immortal Court's core region and saw Lu Qingyun's true body.

His appearance had not changed at all from Ye Mingyuan's memories.

Only his presence... was incomparably profound, like an endless abyss whose bottom could not be seen at all!

And...

Seeming to realize something, Ye Mingyuan exclaimed in shock, "You've lived a second life too!?"

"What? Is that so strange?"

Lu Qingyun frowned, feeling that Ye Mingyuan was making a fuss over nothing.

Ye Mingyuan also realized that he had lost his composure.

At the same time, he came to his senses.

With Lu Qingyun's unparalleled talent, living a second life just as he had was completely normal and reasonable.

It was only that it had happened far too soon.

With the cultivation he had gained by attaining the Dao with a Chaos Body, Lu Qingyun had a lifespan of tens of thousands of years.

There was absolutely no need to begin his second life in such a hurry.

Unless...

Lu Qingyun had absolute confidence that he could go on to live a third life, a fourth...

That was why he had chosen to begin his second life while at his peak!

And he was not merely trying to stay alive.

He wanted to break through barrier after barrier in his very strongest state, until... he took that step!

After thinking of this, Ye Mingyuan looked at Lu Qingyun with an exceedingly complicated gaze.

He seemed to understand where the gap between them lay.

He also understood why Lu Qingyun had accomplished in just eight hundred years a feat he had failed to achieve in over ten thousand!

"Enough. Stop showing off those contracting pupils of yours."

"Take it out. You'd better pray it's something that catches my eye. Otherwise... forget the Divine Medicine of Immortality, even staying alive might be a problem for you."

Lu Qingyun spoke in an even tone.

That tone made it difficult even for Ye Mingyuan to tell whether he was joking.

Still, without a Divine Medicine of Immortality.

There was actually little difference between him and a dead man anyway...

Thud-!

Ye Mingyuan took the mountain out of his Sea of Bitterness, setting it down before the two of them.

The next moment.

The forbidden-zone Dao laws unique to the Immortal Court Forbidden Zone instantly dissolved the Dao laws belonging to Chaotic God Mountain upon it!

Neither of them chose to intervene and isolate them.

Because the most important, crucial part of this mountain lay inside it!

Next... came the tense and thrilling time to unravel the mystery!

"You open it."

Lu Qingyun had originally intended to do it himself.

But his own luck had already left him with quite a psychological shadow.

When he had first encountered stone gambling, he had been full of high spirits, believing himself to be the reigning Great Emperor of stone gambling, able to casually earn back hundreds of times the resources he spent.

Unfortunately, he had exhausted his entire fortune, only to receive a piece of ordinary source the size of a fingernail.

The wind had been very strong that day.

The mockery from the people of the various holy lands and great clans had been very loud as well.

Fortunately, after Lu Qingyun robbed them all, their wails were even louder.

So he did not believe his luck could cut out anything good.

But a Sacred Body was different.

The Sacred Body lineage all took protecting the living masses as their duty.

They possessed great merit in the grand universe.

Although this merit was of little use when it came to trampling the myriad Daos to attain the position of Great Emperor.

In a small matter like this, it would surely fare somewhat better than Lu Qingyun.

"This..."

Ye Mingyuan hesitated.

It was not that he feared failing to reveal something good.

Rather, he feared truly revealing some earth-shaking secret, or something that would make Lu Qingyun want to silence him.

Given Lu Qingyun's character...

He probably would not be leaving the forbidden zone today.

"To hell with it. I'll open it!"

Ye Mingyuan gritted his teeth and steeled himself as he walked forward.

Golden blood Qi flowed from within him, spreading all the way across the entire mountain.

It dyed the mountain the purest gold.

Scorching waves of air surged, and the mountain's unusual soil was all dissolved by the Sacred Body's blood Qi.

At last...

A stone tablet, not particularly large and somewhat incomplete, fell out.