Li Fan examined the cavern carefully.

Above, numerous structures hung inverted from the stone ceiling, as though they had grown directly from it.

Li Fan also saw stone statues in the likeness of cultivators.

They too hung upside down overhead, feet fused with the architecture, arms stretched out in a desperate, helpless plea for aid. But their bodies were forever frozen in that moment, faces etched with terror.

This should be one of the mountain peaks of the Heavenly Mechanisms Sect, swallowed by this Origin-Returning Toad through some twist of fate.

Judging by the look of it, the entire place was petrified first, then consumed.

Li Fan raised his guard and flew into the upper space of the cavern.

Ignoring the petrified cultivators, he wove through the ruins, heading straight for the most conspicuous stone pagoda.

The Heaven-Peering Pagoda, a crucial site from which the Heavenly Mechanisms...