Chapter 444: A Stunning Reversal! The Forbidden Awakens! The Divine Mountain Appears! The Apricot-Yellow Banner Emerges!

This reversal came so suddenly it caught everyone completely off guard.

The crowd could only gaze in awe at that golden-armored divine general, their hearts filled with reverence and an instinctive sense that this was an existence utterly beyond their reach.

Li Yanchu couldn’t help but chuckle softly. He had originally intended to use his Godspeed to chase the enemy down, but to his surprise, the mysterious Arhat Dharma form had vanished entirely from heaven and earth, as if it had never existed at all.

“What a pathetic, fleeing cur,” Li Yanchu sneered coldly.

***

In a hidden corner of the realm, a young man whose seven orifices still bled suddenly opened his eyes. A golden sacred relic floated above his head, radiating a soft Buddhist glow.

Just moments ago, his wandering soul had returned to his body, all thanks to the power of this sacred relic. Now, his face was streaked with blood, his expression twisted in agony, as he gasped for air like a drowning man breaking the surface.

The mysterious youth’s eyes darkened, the sacred relic spinning above him. Golden light from the relic gradually seeped into his body, healing his physical injuries at a visible pace. Even the wounds to his primordial spirit began to mend beneath that sacred radiance.

Only the essence blood he had burned, connected to his very life source, remained unrecovered.

“This soul’s aura is so young... He’s not some old monster hiding his cultivation. Could it be that he’s like me, a reincarnated cultivator starting anew?” The youth frowned deeply.

Beyond that, he could think of no other explanation of how else could a Daoist barely past twenty wield such divine power, call upon the might of so many celestial forces, and command such overwhelming, ferocious arts of destruction?

“But then... whose reincarnation is he?”

A dozen guesses flashed through his mind, only to be dismissed one after another.

“Forget it. First, I’ll retrieve the elixirs and immortal herbs from Mount Taoyuan's Blissful Land. If I don’t, I may not be able to face that young Daoist again.”

He rose slowly to his feet, the sacred relic sinking back into the crown of his head. That relic was something only the greatest Buddhist sages could condense, a treasure of infinite miraculous use.

With practiced familiarity, the mysterious youth picked a direction and disappeared, using the Divine Foot Art to traverse the land in an instant. He seemed exceedingly familiar with this Blissful Land, moving as though he had walked these paths countless times before.

Moreover, the faint golden light of the sacred relic seemed to veil his presence completely from the heavens and earth, hiding him from even the keenest senses.

Buddhism spoke of the Three Thousand Great Thousand Worlds[1], and even in the sands of the Ganges[2], worlds upon worlds existed.

Now, this mysterious youth was using precisely such a supreme Buddhist art.

***

Meanwhile, Li Yanchu’s own primordial spirit had also returned to his body. He withdrew the divine power granted by the Spirit Officer Summoning Talisman, and once again stood there as a young Daoist with a long saber hanging at his waist.

His features were sharp and striking, his eyes bright as starlight, and his entire being exuded a pure, masculine yang energy.

It had to be said that Li Yanchu’s looks were truly exceptional and handsome to an almost absurd degree, and he carried with him a calm, ascetic air unique to disciples of the Dao.

Especially after Li Yanchu cast the Sun Veil, concealing his presence and veiling his aura, that sharp, blade-like killing intent that once radiated from him vanished completely.

What replaced it was an aura of calm composure, so calm, in fact, that it was hard to believe the towering hundred-zhang golden-armored war god from moments ago had been this very man.

At this moment, the entire place fell into a deathly, absolute silence. Not everyone was like Zhang Wei, who, upon seeing such an awe-inspiring senior expert, would rush up eagerly to flatter him. Most people, instead, chose to keep their distance for the sake of their dignity.

Of course... if the opportunity was right, a little flattery wouldn’t hurt either.

A man of Li Yanchu’s age should, by all accounts, still be a low-ranking Daoist novice sitting in meditation, cultivating his breath, while patiently accumulating spiritual energy. Yet now, he stood proud and radiant, brimming with vigor and spirit!

Before him, even the grand elders and ancient monsters of countless sects didn’t dare to meet his eyes directly, their hearts filled with an instinctive wariness.

The treasure struggle sparked by the Blood-Qi Pill and the ancient alchemy furnace had, for the moment, finally calmed. For reasons they couldn’t explain, everyone felt a faint sense of relief wash over them.

After all, just looking around at the shattered mountains, the cracked earth, the wreckage of heaven and ground was enough to sober anyone up.

Treasure snatching? Perhaps... that wasn’t what righteous cultivators should be doing. Harmony was important, after all.

***

At that moment, the sun hanging high above began to dim; a solar eclipse was underway.

The heavens darkened, and the entire Mount Taoyuan's Blissful Land was plunged into shadow. Under this world-shaking celestial phenomenon, an uneasy pressure settled heavily upon everyone’s hearts. It was as if the earlier great battle had stirred some ancient taboo into awakening.

From deep within a towering divine mountain, a low, thunderous roar resounded, one that shook both heaven and earth! Hearing this, everyone was stunned, their hearts sinking in unison.

Meanwhile, Li Yanchu’s eyes turned cold, his gaze locking onto that distant sacred mountain. Earlier, within that Arhat Dharma form, he had sensed a strange, high-ranking power, an aura so overwhelming it made the heart tremble. It was that power which had kept the Arhat from being completely annihilated.

Using his Spirit Eyes, Li Yanchu had seen a thick radiance of Buddhist light enveloping the Arhat, which was clearly the mark of some great and terrible being. Only a cultivator of unfathomable mastery, one capable of laying formations within the very depths of the soul, could weave such meticulous protection, perhaps even someone beyond the third realm itself.

Just moments ago, he had completely lost track of the Arhat Dharma form’s whereabouts. Its aura had become impossible to trace, clearly due to the influence of that mysterious power.

Li Yanchu gazed toward the divine mountain, thoughtful. For the first time, he began to gain a new understanding of the extraordinary forces that existed in this world.

In the eyes of certain beings, even cultivators of the third realm might be no different from mere Qi Cultivators or Yin Spirit cultivators.

According to Zhang Wei, within Mount Taoyuan's Blissful Land, there should exist five ancient taboos. The battle just now, it seemed, had awakened one of them.

He was still considering whether or not to pursue and strike it down, when suddenly, from the distant horizon, there came the sound of immortal music, as if someone were softly chanting Daoist scriptures right beside his ear.

Then, before everyone’s eyes, a pale apricot-yellow[3] flag appeared, slowly rising into view!

At that instant, the terrifying roars from within the towering divine mountain vanished without a trace.

“That’s the Apricot-Yellow Banner, an immortal artifact!” Li Yanchu’s eyes lit up.

As the Apricot-Yellow Banner manifested, light returned to heaven and earth, and the sun once more shone upon the land. Rich, boundless spiritual energy filled Mount Taoyuan's Blissful Land, at least three times denser than before!

The once-barren divine mountain, where even the grass and trees had withered, now came to life again with lush greenery spreading across its slopes, blood and qi surging everywhere. It stood out in stark contrast to the desolation surrounding it.

When these cultivators had first entered Mount Taoyuan, the place hadn’t been completely dead, but it had certainly felt bleak and lifeless, and this majestic divine mountain had been no exception.

Now, after the Apricot-Yellow Banner suppressed the ancient taboo within, a streak of divine light descended from the heavens and sank into the mountain.

Rumble!

A grand, awe-inspiring palace rose atop the peak, wreathed in drifting clouds and mist.

“An immortal artifact... that’s definitely an immortal artifact!” a cultivator cried out in astonishment. He immediately used his movement technique, darting straight toward the divine mountain.

And not just him, one after another, all the cultivators who had entered this Blissful Land and Blissful Land surged forward, racing toward the mountain in a frenzy.

It wasn’t simply that the Apricot-Yellow Banner, the immortal artifact, was that tempting. Rather, after witnessing the battle over Li Yanchu’s ancient alchemy furnace, they had all come to realize something very clear: trying to seize it from him was utter madness!

That young Daoist had effortlessly suppressed a primordial spirit powerhouse who commanded both the Taotie phantom and the Arhat Dharma form, after all. Among all those present, not a single one had the confidence to challenge him. In fact, they vaguely felt that even if all of them joined forces, they would likely still be slaughtered to the last man by this young Daoist alone!

This place was filled with Yin Spirit–level experts, and even someone as powerful as that Half-Body Daoist[4] would have been reduced to ashes under their combined might.

1. The Three Thousand Great Thousand Worlds is a concept from Buddhist cosmology. It refers to a “Great Thousand World” composed of a thousand Small Thousand Worlds and a thousand Middle Thousand Worlds; one Great Thousand World contains a billion small worlds. Later on, “Great Thousand World” came to be used as a metaphor for an immeasurably vast realm filled with countless strange and wondrous things. ☜

2. The Ganges is a trans-boundary river flowing through India and Bangladesh, rising in the western Himalayas and emptying into the Bay of Bengal. It is a sacred river for Hindus, considered holy and considered a source of life for the region's inhabitants, with a population density of about 390 people per km in its basin. ☜

3. Apricot-yellow is a soft, light orange-yellow color that resembles the fruit it is named after. It is a warm color with a cheerful and optimistic quality, sitting between yellow and orange on the color wheel. The specific shade can vary, but it is generally a pale orange-yellow with soft yellow and sometimes a hint of red undertones. Here is a reference

image

. ☜

4. Half-Body Daoist, who had broken through the Five Realms, is a character from the novel Ever Night. Ever Night is a fantasy novel serialized on Qidian Chinese Network, written by Mao Ni. ☜