Volume 1, Chapter 455 – First Encounter

An incomparably enormous black shadow blotted out the sky, hovering motionlessly before Shi Lan.

A layer of mysterious flowing light wrapped around the mountain range, radiating a heavy Dao aura. It lifted the entire range free, severing it from the earth’s restraints and suspending it quietly in midair.

Dense spiritual mist coiled around it. Even standing at a distance, Shi Lan could feel her Innate Spiritual Body stretching out in delight, almost rejoicing.

With a single step, Shi Lan entered the immortal mountain. What met her eyes were pavilions and jade terraces arranged in pleasing layers, brocade-like clouds and drifting rosy light everywhere, an expanse of endless auspicious splendor.

Shi Lan swept it with her divine sense, and her expression could not help turning a little strange. The entire immortal mountain had been laid out with exceptional order. From the outermost edge inward, the concentration of spiritual qi rose step by step like ascending tiers.

From spiritual herb gardens to halls for alchemy and artifact refining, and even living quarters for people to reside in, everything that should be there was there. The arrangement suited her tastes extraordinarily well and was a delight to the eye.

Shi Lan casually pushed open the door to one of the rooms. On the table inside sat two cups of spirit tea, still giving off wisps of steam.

The entire immortal mountain was like a complete sect headquarters. Its origins could no longer be traced, but they were definitely not aboveboard.

This was the system’s usual style. Shi Lan was already beginning to grow used to it.

At the very center of the mountain range coiled a top-grade spirit vein. Spirit marrow lay everywhere, and spiritual qi so dense it was nearly liquefied drifted through the air like swimming serpents.

Shi Lan cut off the surrounding spiritual power to prevent the injuries within her body from recovering, and let her gaze sweep inch by inch across the space around her.

There was a trace of abnormality in the spatial fluctuations here. There had to be a spatial interlayer.

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After searching carefully for quite some time, Shi Lan’s eyes sharpened. She caught a slight fluctuation at a spatial node, then raised her hand and directly punched through space.

An irregular opening appeared before Shi Lan. Inside was a vast expanse of white, and a thick wave of spiritual qi came rushing toward her. There was another world within.

Shi Lan stepped inside, spread out her divine sense, and swept across heaven and earth.

This was a peerless land of spirit, spanning several thousand li. Its spiritual qi was dozens of times richer than that outside, nurturing no small number of precious medicines, and even immortal herbs were far from rare, with ten thousand rays of rosy light shining everywhere.

Cultivating here would undoubtedly yield twice the results with half the effort.

At the very center of the grotto-heaven was a jade pool six chi square. Immortal qi billowed within it, while rosy vapors steamed upward like clouds. The spiritual qi had already sublimated, transforming into a purer form of energy.

A stone stele stood beside the pool. A layer had been shaved clean from its surface out of nowhere, leaving the inscription blurred beyond recognition. Above and below, one could vaguely make out a shape like the character “仌.”

Only upon seeing this stone stele did Shi Lan suddenly realize that from the moment she had entered this mountain range, every inscription that could have revealed the immortal mountain’s origins had been erased.

After a long silence, Shi Lan stopped dwelling on matters that could not currently be grasped and slowly withdrew from the grotto-heaven.

…

Li Canglan was so busy his feet barely touched the ground. The territories and cultivation resources Tianyan Sect needed to take over were simply too vast.

The private armies previously raised by the various great clans and noble families had nowhere to go. To avoid unrest, Li Canglan simply reorganized them all, dismissed part of their forces, and then merged the remainder into a single body, turning them into another powerful force under Tianyan Sect.

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The governance of Yunyan Star required the assistance of these troops. Otherwise, open compliance and covert defiance would be impossible to stamp out.

Under Li Canglan’s gradual structuring, a completely new system began operating on Yunyan Star in an orderly manner, slowly revealing its edge.

Deep within Tianyan Sect, Shi Lan erected a realm gate and placed it under Li Canglan’s control, beginning to ferry some disciples into the Qiongluo Realm step by step.

The cultivation environment on that immortal mountain was far better than Yunyan Star’s, and more beneficial to Tianyan Sect’s development. The mountain of storage treasures also needed people to sort through them one by one.

After that, Shi Lan gathered the artifact refining masters of Yunyan Star and brought them into the Qiongluo Realm, where they began seeking spiritual materials to forge the array banners for the Grand Zhoutian Star Array.

This was an exceptionally useful means of self-defense, so Shi Lan naturally would not give it up. But neither would she waste time delving into the path of artifact refining, just as she had no interest in learning alchemy. As long as there were people around her who could do these things, that was enough.

With that time, she would rather cultivate.

Before leaving, Shi Lan went to see Zhu Xiyang and asked whether she was willing to enter the Qiongluo Realm. Shi Lan had reserved her a place in the center of the immortal mountain.

Zhu Xiyang thought about it for a long time, but in the end shook her head. She was alone now. Wherever she stayed was much the same. All she sought was a place to live in peace.

After learning that Shi Lan was about to undergo tribulation, Zhu Xiyang drew out more than half of the Violet Spirit Liquid from within her body. It was enough for Shi Lan to temper and refine her physique and gave her a little more assurance in crossing the tribulation.

…

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After properly arranging everything, Shi Lan took Tianbai and left Yunyan Star, heading for Lingyang. She wanted to find a secluded place to undergo tribulation.

The Illusory Star Domain was a place where fish and dragons mingled together, and the situation there was unclear. Undergoing tribulation here involved too many uncertain factors.

Her cultivation was no longer what it had once been. By tearing open spatial passages and traveling directly, she was many times faster than she had been on the way here.

Just as she was about to step out of the Illusory Star Domain, Shi Lan suddenly felt a chill run over her skin. Every hair on her body stood on end, and a powerful sense of danger surged up in her heart.

Following that inner warning, Shi Lan looked over and saw a figure reflected in her eyes.

Purple hair draped over her shoulders, her skin whiter than frost and snow. She wore a black soft armor of scales, while gorgeous pale blue demonic patterns wound around her. She was like a block of black ice that had endured for ten thousand years, cold enough to pierce the bone.

In her hand she held a pitch-black long mirror. Chaos churned within it, and one could faintly see demonic qi surging.

This was a demon.

Although Shi Lan had never come into contact with the demon race, her very first reaction was that this was a demon.

The woman before her radiated a shocking demonic nature. Though she had a human shape, not a trace of her aura could be associated with the human race.

The two stared at one another across the starry sky, an invisible string gradually drawing taut between them.

Suddenly, Emperor laws surged, and several Human Emperors arrived together. Without a word, they attacked at once, launching a killing strike at the demon woman.

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“My name is Imperial Rakshasa.”

A murmured whisper sounded by Shi Lan’s ear. On the far side of the starry sky, the long mirror in the woman’s hand blazed with overwhelming black light, actually blocking the several Human Emperors for a time.

Under the gazes of those present, Imperial Rakshasa openly passed through the array patterns surrounding the Illusory Star Domain and escaped beyond this vault of starry sky.

Beyond the array patterns was a layer of black mist. Within it, one could vaguely make out the bodies of giant demons rising and sinking. The several Human Emperors stopped one after another, their expressions icy, but they did not pursue further.

Shi Lan was not unfamiliar with the name Imperial Rakshasa.

The number one on the Heavenly Prodigy Ranking, the foremost prodigy of Lingyang.

Long ago, she had already possessed the illustrious record of slaying a human Heavenlord. And now, even several Human Emperors had failed to do anything to her and still let her escape. Clearly, her strength had advanced to an even more terrifying level.

At just a little over two hundred years of age, she might no longer count as especially young by human standards, but among the demon race, she was nearly equivalent to a maiden in the flower of youth, astonishingly gifted beyond compare.

Although it had only been a single exchange of glances, Shi Lan had already sensed it: before crossing heavenly tribulation, there was still some distance between her strength and Imperial Rakshasa’s.

If she crossed the tribulation and entered the Heaven-Man Realm, then the outcome would be hard to predict.

…