Chapter 648 – A Sutra in a Time of Chaos, Wolves of the North, The Celestial Transformation - Part 3

Five more years passed.

The Grand Heavenly Master never found that secret.

He, an ancient being from the long-lost Xia Dynasty, one of the last three caretakers of the Deathless Tomb, had preserved his life by seizing his disciple’s body. He clung to existence, held out through sheer will, but in the end, time still claimed him. His grand plan died unfinished.

And so the Grand Heavenly Master passed away.

The Junior Heavenly Master took his place.

Perhaps it was watching his master struggle that left a lasting impression, but the new Heavenly Master became even more obsessed with unraveling the Human Emperor’s Martial Canon.

He practiced its breathing techniques countless times, but the results were always disappointing, limited, stagnant, never touching the extraordinary. And yet, the Grand Heavenly Master had been absolutely convinced the truth was hidden within.

The young one never doubted his master’s brilliance. He didn’t know what was missing, but he remained faithful to the plan. Spread the Human Emperor’s Martial Canon throughout the mortal world, provoke unrest, and let the chaos draw forth the talents of countless heroes, all to crack the final page.

And the Emperor did not disappoint.

Just last month, he’d personally had the heart ripped out of a senior official who dared to speak the truth, and tossed the corpse into a pit of snakes as a warning to others.

A few days ago, he lured the wife of a scholar into the palace under false pretenses, then defiled her.

𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

A ruler with no virtue. A realm spiraling into madness.

˙·٠✧🐗➶➴🏹✧٠·˙

Far to the north.

A five-year-old boy, draped in furs and carrying a sharpened hatchet on his back, stood with eyes sharp beyond his years.

This was Huyan Hai, the eldest grandson of the Huyan Clan.

Though only five, Huyan Hai already showed extraordinary strength and uncanny skill. He could overpower grown men in sparring matches, and was the pride of the entire clan.

And yet, this fierce young warrior was...reading.

He was poring over Central Plains history, fascinated by tales from the age of transcendence. Ever since the Huyan Clan had established their golden tent in the northern grasslands, he’d pestered his father and sister to collect books and stories from the Central Capital, especially those filled with strange legends and supernatural lore.

Just then, the thunder of hooves echoed from afar.

A man rode in, laughing heartily. “Hai’er! Guess what I’ve brought back!”

Huyan Hai looked up and smiled. “Uncle!”

The man leapt off his horse and pulled a booklet from his coat. “Look at this! The Human Emperor’s Martial Canon! They say everyone in the Central Plains is talking about it, whoever can unlock the last page becomes the strongest under heaven!”

Huyan Hai had heard of the Martial Canon, of course. But he never expected his uncle to actually bring home a copy. For a moment, he was stunned.

“Isn’t it probably a fake?”

“Real!” his uncle insisted. “I just...can’t read any of it.”

Huyan Hai nodded absently and began flipping through the booklet.

But the moment he read the first page, his pupils contracted sharply.

This...this was clearly a soul cultivation technique.

Eyes locked on the text, he read without pause, lost in the pages. Only when the sky had turned to dusk did he reach the final page, skimming its contents in haste.

That last page was unlike anything that came before it. The techniques recorded there felt otherworldly, beyond words, steeped in unfathomable mystery.

Huyan Hai clenched the booklet tightly, his small hands trembling.

Then, slowly, very slowly, a twisted grin spread across his lips.

It was a smile no child should wear.

˙·٠✧🐗➶➴🏹✧٠·˙

Drip, drip, drip...

A faint, crystalline sound echoed from a faraway place.

Li Yuan slowly opened his eyes and let out a long, steady breath.

Finally. It worked.

But then, he realized something was off.

His body was gone.

He existed now in a strange, suspended state, neither fully alive nor truly dead.

After some time, he began to grasp what had happened. He had become something akin to a Starkin, a rare and esoteric form of existence. He could still vaguely hear and see what was happening in the Ancestral Land, and he could sense the surrounding spiritual boundaries.

But he wasn’t like the Dragon Vein. The Dragon Vein possessed vast, active power that shaped the land itself. In contrast, he was only anchored here, his strength stored within the ancestral ground.

As long as the land remained intact, his power remained.

Does this mean I’m dead?

Li Yuan’s thoughts stirred.

No, he rejected that idea immediately.

He glanced inward, at the numbers and states etched into his awareness, 96k~4.5mil.

A significant drop from his peak, down several hundred thousand, but still manageable.

More importantly, he still

existed

, though his status had changed.

「 Name: Li Yuan

Stat Points: 308,686

Realm: Rank 3 (64,000/64,000)

Divine Ability 1: Eternal Youth

Divine Ability 2: Six Paths - Mortal World Transformation, Myriad Beasts Transformation, Wood Transformation, Celestial Transformation (4/4)

Divine Ability 3: Imperial System 3 (?/?) 」

His condition was...peculiar.

Why was his cultivation still listed as third rank?

And that last ability,

Imperial System

,—had advanced from 2 to 3. What did that mean?

Still, he’d gained something.

During the process of transferring his power, he’d also refined and integrated his abilities. His Six Paths were now complete, with the addition of Wood and Celestial Transformations.

He wanted to test them. But as soon as he tried to activate Wood Transformation, nothing happened.

Of course. He no longer had a body. He was only a spirit tethered to the ancestral grounds. Honestly, he wasn’t much different from a ghost.

Even his physical form had been sealed away during the power transfer.

So what now? Should I reincarnate? Or try to reclaim my full power?

He mulled it over.

Reclaiming all his power now didn’t seem wise. Given the current state of the world, retrieving everything at once would mean rapid depletion, unsustainable, with little time before it burned out.

Better to wait for the right moment, or perhaps only retrieve part of it.

As for reincarnation? Li Yuan immediately dismissed it.

Then, a thought occurred.

What about Celestial Transformation?

And with that, he reached for it.

At that moment, Li Yuan felt a strange and profound connection.

Beneath the heavens, it was as if all things, the mountains, the rivers, the grass, the stones, the flowers, had become wombs from which he could be reborn.

This...was

Celestial Transformation

.

Where others needed their souls burned clean in the Soul Furnace, reforged anew, and sent down the path of reincarnation to be born from a mother’s womb, Li Yuan could bypass it all.

He could emerge directly from the world itself.

A rebirth outside the wheel of samsara.

Right...I remember now. There may still be someone working behind the scenes. And now that I can perceive the Ancestral Land and glimpse the domains around it... I should be able to find him more easily.

With that, Li Yuan zeroed in.

He began scanning the world rapidly.

He could hear, see, he had access to every corner of the land. But it was like trying to observe the far side of a foggy field: faint silhouettes, blurred shapes. Everything distant and unclear.

He could just barely make out the outlines of cities, mountain ranges, and massive migrations of people, but their actions were a blur. He couldn’t read the data above their heads, either.

Still, around the Ancestral Land, he spotted many

domains

.

Most of them were dark realms, dim stars that had never fully ignited.

After some time, he drew three conclusions.

Firstly, a great deal of time had likely passed. The Eastern Sea, for instance, now appeared submerged by vast floodwaters, its landmass drastically reduced. The Western Extreme’s frozen tundra had vanished, leaving only jagged peaks in its place.

But without being able to hear the voices of the living, he couldn’t say

how

much time had passed. It could’ve been decades...or millennia. He needed to verify that and also confirm the fates of Sheng’er and Ping’an. If ten thousand years had passed, this whole thing would be a joke.

Secondly, that shadowy figure pulling strings behind the scenes might not exist after all. No ambush had come during his power transfer, which should’ve been the perfect moment to strike. Still, he wasn’t convinced yet. This uncertainty gnawed at him. He needed to get to the bottom of it.

Thirdly, the Underworld was right next to the Ancestral Land.

Like a dark moon turning endlessly beneath the earth, the Underworld had always been nearby, tantalizingly close. And yet, the two remained disconnected.

Li Yuan had never been able to perceive it before. But now, with his spirit entwined so closely with the ancestral ground, he could sense it clearly.

That vague, flickering link reminded him of something.

In his mind flashed the memory of a towering Soul Furnace, veiled in shadows, swarming with tormented spirits. He recalled how a single door had once bridged the boundary between the mortal realm and the cycle of reincarnation.

A door. If I place that door at the precise moment when the Ancestral Land and the Underworld are closest... Maybe, just maybe, I can link the two together.

Ideas surged through his mind. The goal crystallized instantly.

It was time to reincarnate.

For this first rebirth, he would emerge near Herderton.

There, he would gather information, assess the current state of the world and retrieve the

door

.