Shrouded Sky

Chapter 189 - God King Jiang Taixu

“Taixu” signifies the appearance of the Dao, vast, tranquil, and empty, an allusion to the Great Dao itself.

According to ancient texts, once a God King reaches completion in their cultivation, they can live for several thousand years. Their vitality is so enduring that it's incredibly rare for them to die of natural causes.

“So that’s it... this makes sense now...” Ye Fan instantly grasped the truth. This was a fully accomplished God King, one who truly had the ability to survive for four thousand years.

Once a God Physique matures, it can endure through countless ages, long enough to protect a clan for thousands of years and usher it into an age of unmatched glory.

“I’ve encountered a God King from the Eastern Wilderness…” Ye Fan was utterly shocked. This was a peerless figure in every sense of the word.

If the Jiang Clan found out that one of their own was here, a fully accomplished God King, they would likely go mad and mobilize all their strength to rescue him.

“This is hard to believe…”

It also revealed how terrifying the Purple Mountain was. Even a God King of the Eastern Wilderness was trapped here, struggling to endure without any chance of escape.

“You… come closer…” A frail, aged voice sounded, weak as if it might vanish at any moment.

Ye Fan focused and followed the winding rock tunnel for over a dozen paces before stopping. “Senior, where are you?” he asked.

“I’m ahead…” came the faint response of the God King, Jiang Taixu.

“Is there anything I can do for you?” Ye Fan stood still, transmitting his voice via divine sense within the cave.

But deep within the cave abode, silence reigned. A long time passed with no reply.

“Senior, are you alright?”

Only after half an hour did the weak voice return: “I… am running on fumes… I can’t keep speaking this way…”

Even a mighty God King, trapped for four thousand years, couldn’t last much longer. Any ordinary cultivator would’ve long turned to dust, their remains decayed over millennia.

“What… is your realm?” asked Jiang Taixu.

“Other Shore Stage,” Ye Fan answered truthfully after a moment’s thought.

“You… follow the ancient sages… cultivating a single realm?” the Eastern Wilderness’s God King pressed.

“Uhh... I’ve only been cultivating for four years, and don’t know how to truly cultivate a single realm. I’m currently just at the regular Other Shore Stage.”

A heavy sigh followed, filled with despair. It was as though all of the God King’s strength had been drained. For a long time, he said nothing more.

“Are you alright, senior?” Ye Fan asked again.

Another half hour passed before the voice came, hollow and disappointed: “You… are too weak…”

Ye Fan had no way to respond. How could he compare himself to a full-fledged God King? Since ancient times, hardly anyone could do so without bowing their head.

“With your weak cultivation… how did you get in here?” Jiang Taixu was confused.

“I wore a special stone robe and managed to sneak in by luck,” Ye Fan explained.

“A thousand years ago… another person came in that way…”

“You’ve seen that person? What happened to them?” Ye Fan asked. He had come for the Celestial Source Tome, and though he had nearly given up, hope now rekindled in his heart.

“Died… in the depths of the Demon Mountain.” Jiang Taixu’s words were fragmented and slow, it was difficult to converse. Every sentence required a long wait.

“Can I reach that place?” Ye Fan pursued.

“Don’t know.” The Eastern Wilderness God King did not want to speak further. Each word consumed his limited energy, so his replies were as brief as possible.

During all this, Ye Fan appeared calm, but his mind churned with turbulent thoughts.

The Celestial Source Tome was indeed a priceless manual, but the God King of the Jiang clan was a living scripture himself, holding countless peerless secret techniques.

“Took four years… to reach Other Shore… neither fast nor slow…” Jiang Taixu murmured.

Ye Fan's heart stirred. “Actually, if I could cultivate using the strongest mental techniques, the time could be cut drastically.”

The weakened God King gave no response, as though he had fallen asleep again, his presence completely silent.

This time, it was three hours before Jiang Taixu’s voice came once more: “Come forward… I’ll teach you…”

These six words seemed to drain his final strength. After that, he fell silent again. Under normal circumstances, waiting this long for a sentence would try anyone’s patience.

But Ye Fan remained calm and waited patiently. After a brief hesitation, he strode forward.

The purple rock around him glimmered faintly. Inside Purple Mountain, it wasn’t truly dark, but also not bright, more of a constant dim glow.

The ground was uneven and rough. Ye Fan followed the twisting passage from one abandoned cave into another ancient mine.

Along the walls of the ancient mine, fossilized bones were faintly visible, an eerie sight. Many were ancient primordial creatures, petrified and fused with the Purple Mountain itself.

Ye Fan walked about a hundred feet deeper into the mine, reaching a dead end. Before him was a smooth purple wall, glossy like crystal jade, so polished it reflected his image clearly.

The area was vast and empty. Nothing moved. Silence reigned. He stood there, alone.

“Senior, are you here?” Ye Fan searched, but found nothing.

In the purple jade-like wall ahead, his own reflection was clear. But in the blink of an eye, he felt a wave of dread wash over him.

In the reflection, there was another figure, tall, hideous, with a single horn in its brow, six arms, wings on its back, and its body covered in fine scales.

Ye Fan’s scalp tingled. He quickly dodged and turned around.

But behind him, there was nothing. Just emptiness.

“Normally… you wouldn’t see it…” came the old voice of the God King from within the rock wall.

Ye Fan turned to face the jade wall again and saw the monstrous figure still reflected behind him, fierce fangs and a wide mouth, its gaze cold and deadly.

“Formless baleful intent… visible only through jade walls…” Jiang Taixu’s voice struggled out.

It took him a long time to say those few dozen words, but Ye Fan began to understand.

This was a formless baleful entity, a remnant of an ancient primordial being. It could instinctively lock onto living creatures. The only fortunate part was that it hadn’t awakened yet.

Ye Fan’s heart tightened. He had seen such creatures before, outside the Purple Mountain, etched on ancient stone carvings, kneeling devoutly by divine sources, but ferocious and deadly toward humans.

“Where are you, senior?”

“In the rock…”

Beside the jade wall at the end of the ancient mine was a rough stone wall. From it, Jiang Taixu’s voice echoed.

“I’ll teach you one technique. Let’s see how well you understand…” The God King’s voice was fainter than ever.

Ye Fan calmed his mind and stood still for two hours. Suddenly, a desiccated figure appeared through the rock. Yes, his shadow passed through the rough stone, outlining his emaciated frame. His bones were nearly exposed, barely better than a skeleton.

His long hair dragged behind him, longer than his body. He held a strange posture, and then collapsed backward.

Ye Fan was shaken. What appeared wasn’t the God King’s true body, just his reflected shadow through the rock, but it radiated a realm of the profound Grand Dao.

At the same time, a short but deeply complex incantation entered Ye Fan’s mind, cryptic and unfathomable.

The withered silhouette in the stone faded away, and the wall returned to its coarse and uneven texture.

Ye Fan stepped back several dozen feet, holding the Bodhi Seed in hand, silently practicing the strange stance. Then he focused completely on studying and cultivating it.

In moments, Ye Fan was utterly absorbed. This was an incredibly terrifying offensive technique, with immense power.

It wasn’t limited to fists or fingers, nor to legs, every part of the body could become a weapon. Every inch of flesh could explode with terrifying force.

“What is this secret art?” Ye Fan was stunned. It was strange, yet overwhelmingly fearsome.

His body was already tough as divine iron. If he mastered this method, he’d become even more dangerous. It suited him perfectly.

But it seemed this was only the opening move, an incomplete technique. Even so, Ye Fan caught a glimpse of its mysteries. Its full form would surely shake heaven and earth.

“If just the opening move is this frightening…” Ye Fan was in awe. This had to be a supreme scripture.

In the following days, he trained tirelessly. The more he studied, the deeper he found its intricacies to be.

“Is this recorded in the Jiang Clan’s ancient scripture?” Ye Fan guessed that this technique must have a monumental origin.

He sorely lacked offensive techniques. Though he had three supreme secret arts, the Nine Secret’s, the mad old man’s footwork, and the Grand Void Art, none were specialized in attack. This one filled that gap perfectly.

As for the Void Palm, what he had was only a fragment, making it hard to unleash its full potential.

While practicing this opening move, Ye Fan was startled to feel another secret art within him begin to activate on its own.

“This is…” He was overjoyed.

It was the Nine Secret technique he had obtained on Supreme Mystery Sect’s Dull Peak, capable of multiplying battle power several times to tenfold. And now it was moving on its own.

It hit him suddenly, what Jiang Taixu had taught him wasn’t just a Jiang Clan technique, but one of the Nine Secrets!

Legend said that if the nine techniques were used together, they would enhance each other dramatically, their power magnified.

“He gave me the opening move. If I got the full technique… how powerful would it be?”

The Nine Secrets were immensely powerful, so much so that they were said to be cursed by the heavens. Long ago, they were scattered across the world and lost to time. Some had vanished entirely.

“And Jiang Taixu had one of them, an offensive one…” Ye Fan was overwhelmed with excitement.

Though the incantation was profound, it was short. After seven days of meditating with the Bodhi seed, Ye Fan had essentially mastered the opening move.

But the God King of the Eastern Wilderness had since fallen silent, as if he had passed on. No matter how many times Ye Fan tried to reach him, there was no reply.

These past few days, Ye Fan began to feel uneasy. The demonic summons from deep within the Purple Mountain grew stronger. His body no longer felt like it belonged to him, it longed to answer that call.