Author note: Starting from this chapter, Zhuanyu Heng has been changed to Zhuanxu Heng.

Zhuanxu Heng left without any hesitation as he had readily accepted his defeat.

Heng Xiao was relieved.

Judging by the courage and breadth of character shown by Zhuanxu Heng earlier, he would not bear a grudge against Xuanji Dao Sect due to suffering a loss.

After chatting with Lin Xun for a bit, Heng Xiao also said goodbye and left. He never asked what kind of Emperor-grade weapon was sealed in the bronze box left by Zhuanxu Heng.

Lin Xun returned to his cave and opened the bronze box immediately.

A soft divine, silver light that resembled a gentle sun with an amazing sacred aura emerged, making the room bright and glorious.

A round jade plate was quietly sitting in the middle of the bronze box. It was as pristine and crystalline as fresh snow and emitted a sense of complete perfection.

On closer look, he could see that there were two strange dao runes engraved on the plate. They resembled a pair of swimming fish that were the image of yin and yang blending, separating and rotating around each other.

In a trance, Lin Xun felt his mind tremble as he had suddenly appeared in a strange world.

In this world, inexplicable chaos and countless traces of the Great Dao emerged. These strands resembled innumerable, densely packed earthworms that were twisting and turning. They were boundless and immeasurable.

Each trace of the Great Dao emitted a mysterious and mystical dao sound that expounded the essence of the Great Dao, but it all seemed too fragmented and chaotic. Such a cacophony would easily make people dizzy and disoriented to the point of coughing up blood.

Despite Lin Xun's current cultivation and understanding of the Great Dao, he was also bewildered and perplexed when he encountered this, feeling off-kilter.

Even after observing this for a decent period of time, his mind and spirit were still restless and showed signs of becoming destabilized.

In fact, the countless traces of the Great Dao were too chaotic and complicated.

At this time, the round jade plate appeared, bright and crystalline, revealing its full perfection.

As it spun, the two strange dao runes that resembled swimming fish flashed, gathering the countless fragmented traces of the Great Dao and integrating them into the jade plate...

Then, an amazing scene appeared. The chaotic traces of the Great Dao were pulled apart and sorted one by one. As the jade plate rotated, the strands of dao were constantly being deduced and categorized before revealing their most essential truth!

Boom!

At this point, Lin Xun was astounded as the images disappeared from his mind. However, he already grasped the origin of the Emperor-grade weapon in front of him.

The Dao Emptiness Plate!

The Great Dao had no form as it was born from the heart.

There was no self, no form, and no emptiness!

In short, the Great Dao had no form and was nameless. What a cultivator comprehended were actually the traces of the Great Dao that were viewed from their own state of mind and heart.

Therefore, the traces of the Great Dao seen by each cultivator were destined to be completely different.

If a cultivator could reach the state of mind where there was no sense of self and form, then they could comprehend the most essential truth of the Great Dao!

The Dao Emptiness Plate was an Emperor-grade treasure that helped cultivators to comprehend and deduce the dao!

Knowing this, Lin Xun couldn't help but take a sharp breath. While the Dao Emptiness Plate was not a combat weapon, it was still an unparalleled and mythical treasure!

Deducing the traces of the dao and comprehending the essence of the dao was equivalent to helping cultivators comprehend and understand the mysteries of the dao that were in the heavens and the earth.

"With this treasure, I don’t need to worry about getting my Great Dao Field to reach an ultimate perfected form!"

After experiencing that, Lin Xun was now aware of the true value of the Dao Emptiness Plate and was filled with awe and amazement.

If he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, then he would never have thought that there was such a strange and marvelous Emperor-grade treasure in the world.

The fact that Zhuanxu Heng was willing to hand over this treasure in order to adhere to his own morals was impressive. Lin Xun knew he could not underestimate this guy.

It was one thing to be willing to accept defeat, but it was another thing to hand over something as valuable as this. Even an Emperor might not be able to do so.

Now, Lin Xun had five of the nine Emperor weapons created by the Treasure Refining Furnace in the Kunlun Dominion: Dao Immeasurable Bottle, Dao Blameless Lamp, Dao Lifeless Seal, Dao Structureless Flag, and Dao Emptiness Plate![1]

After spending a long period of time carefully inspecting and observing the Dao Emptiness Plate, Lin Xun stored it away and opened the huge bronze box again.

In this box, in addition to the two treasures, the Dao Structureless Flag and Dao Lifeless Seal, there was also a lump of gray soil and a piece of rotten sacred wood.

Lin Xun stared at them for a long time, but he couldn't see through them. Furthermore, his spirit sense could not detect any aura fluctuations from these two objects.

He immediately thought of a specific old thing.

Whoosh~

As Lin Xun waved his sleeves, the spirit refinement ancestral tree, Shenxu, appeared out of thin air.

Shenxu had traveled the starry sky with the Sky Splitting Great Emperor and was well-informed.[2] Moreover, its original body was a divine tree. As soon as it appeared, it excitedly shouted, "Wow! Is…is this primal chaos soil?"

Its voice was full of disbelief.

Primal chaos soil!

Lin Xun was surprised.

In the past, the weapon spirit of the No-Nonsense Bow, Wuque, had once informed him about it.

“Young Master, the Four Sacred Trees of Fusang, Cangwu, Jianmu, and Kunwu were all born from the primal chaos origin and naturally contain primal chaos origin dao runes.

“Rumor has it that once you collect all four of these ‘origin root spirits’ and then cultivate them with the four innate godly materials of primal chaos soil, mythical five-colored dirt, clear and turbid soul star sand, and absolute breath water, you can create a special nursery for the seedling of the Primal Chaos Origin Tree!

“After achieving that, the cultivator can nurture this seedling within their body, and it will be incredibly beneficial for cultivating their Emperor Dao.

“Master Tianque once said that in the race of the Emperor Stage, whoever possesses a Primal Chaos Origin Tree will have the ability to comprehend the ‘Laws of Chaos’ and control the respective dao power, which will place them above all other competitors.”

In his years of journeying, Lin Xun had collected the origin root spirit of the Sacred Fusang Tree in Sunset Current Valley where the Golden Crow Clan was entrenched.

In the Kunlun Dominion’s Peach Utopia Secret Realm, he collected a bunch of mythical five-colored dirt by the Flat Peach Tree.

At this moment, the spirit refinement ancestral tree was actually claiming that the lump of gray soil in the bronze box was actually primal chaos soil. Lin Xun was quite surprised.

He couldn’t help but ask, “Is it really primal chaos soil?”

The branches of the spirit refinement ancestral tree were shaking with excitement while dancing with joy. "That’s right. Doesn't it look inconspicuous and without any spirituality? That's because primal chaos soil is just like this. Only when it is watered with absolute breath water will its true form be revealed!"

The tree was clearly amazed and excited. It had not expected that Lin Xun would find this treasure, because a long time ago, it and the Sky Splitting Great Emperor had traveled around the starry sky to find the soil. They had searched for many years, but in the end they could not find it.

Whoosh!

Lin Xun waved his sleeves and the palm-sized lump of primal chaos soil was stored away. He was worried that the spirit refinement ancestral tree would get overly excited and swallow this treasure.

Sure enough, the spirit refinement ancestral tree begged, "Young Friend, can you give me some? Even a bit of dirt the size of a fingernail will do."

Lin Xun flatly refused, "Let's talk about this later. Now tell me what this is."

He pointed to the piece of rotten sacred wood.

The spirit refinement ancestral tree was obviously unwilling and had a resentful look on its face, but when it saw this piece of rotten sacred wood, its body trembled.

"This seems…seems to be very similar to the legendary Jianmu Tree!"

The spirit refinement ancestral tree was utterly shocked, "The Jianmu Tree is a sacred tree that can connect with the heavens and the worlds. It was born from primal chaos origin, and each leaf contains a world of the universe, and each root can connect to other worlds!

"The ancient Emperors called the Sacred Jianmu Tree the tree that connects the skies. There was a group of Emperors who climbed this tree from top to bottom in order to find the secret of primal chaos origin!

"And among the Four Sacred Trees, Jianmu is the most mysterious!"

Lin Xun's heart thumped.

The Jianmu Tree connected the heavens and the worlds, each leaf contained a world, and each root connected to another. Many Emperors had climbed it to find the secret of primal chaos origin.

This was undoubtedly too incredible.

"What a pity, what a pity, this piece of sacred wood should be a fragment from the Sacred Jianmu Tree, but it has long rotted and the dao runes and spirituality within it have been corroded…”

Immediately, the spirit refinement ancestral tree beat at its trunk chest and stamped its roots, looking distressed, "If not, just a fragment of it would make even Emperors scramble for it."

Lin Xun was stunned. He worked hard to calm himself down before he said, "Are you saying that this piece of wood is worthless now?”

The spirit refinement ancestral tree nodded and sighed, "There has been too much damage, so it is basically a piece of trash now.”

Lin Xun thought about it but still put it away.

If he had a chance in the future, he wanted to try to restore this rotted piece of the Jianmu Tree.

...

At the same time, on a gorgeous treasure ship heading to Central Plain State.

Zhuanxu Heng was healing his wounds while remaining silent the entire time.

This defeat had also dealt him a great blow.

A beautiful woman whispered, "Young Master, you don't have to be discouraged. When we return to the Central Plain State, we only need to leak the news that Jin Duyi has the Dao Structureless Flag and Dao Lifeless Seal, and there will be people to hunt him down!"

Zhuanxu Heng raised his head. His eyes were cold and intimidating as he spat, "If you dare to say another word, I will immediately pull out your tendons and skin you!"

The beautiful woman shuddered all over and her face turned pale.

Zhuanxu Heng ignored her, glanced at the other women, and said, "Don't leak a word about what happened today, do you understand?"

All of the women blanched and nodded in response.

Zhuanxu Heng took a deep breath and emphasized word by word, "Whether it is Dao Emptiness Plate or the other Emperor-grade treasures, I will win them back, so there is no need for any of you to meddle at all!"

The women became more and more panicked.

...

Early the next morning.

When Lin Xun woke up from his training, he received a message from Heng Xiao that the founder of Xuanji Dao Sect, Bo Yazi, had returned to the sect.

Immediately, Lin Xun and Heng Xiao entered the forbidden area in the back mountain again.

"Sir..."

Bo Yazi was thin and dressed in a gray robe. When he saw Lin Xun, he was about to call him Junior Uncle but at the last second he changed his form of address.

After Lin Xun came forward to greet him, he asked, "Is the matter done?"

Bo Yazi smiled and nodded, "I have arranged everything for your request to see the Imperial Jiang Clan. If you want, we can go now.”

"Then let's go."

"Okay."

Bo Yazi was not someone who dragged his feet. He immediately took Lin Xun with him and left Xuanji Dao Sect quietly without disturbing anyone.

Since he was traveling with a person who had become an Emperor in the ancient times, Lin Xun was not worried about encountering any troubles along the way.

In just two days, they successfully arrived at the banks of the Jiangshui River!

Translator note:

Uh yeah, thanks for changing a person’s name and their clan’s name after using it for like dozens of chapters ;_;

1. see chapter 1736 for a refresher on this ☜

2. See chapter 1561 to see when the tree first appeared ☜