The egg of a water qilin!

In the ancient world of immortals, qilins were revered as the top of the four spirits and king of all beasts. Even dragons and phoenixes had to bend the knee. However, qilins had suffered a fatal blow in the ancient war, resulting in the extinction of their bloodline. There were no more pureblooded qilins in the world of immortals anymore; there wasn’t even anyone with the bloodline. How fortunate it was for Lu Yun to stumble upon a water qilin egg!

The egg was dead, but it contained great qilin energy. Anyone who refined the egg would gain the divine spirit’s bloodline and talent. According to the ancient texts, water qilins had dominated the world underwater. Their mastery over water manipulation could even rival that of the Black Tortoise.

Although there were no living water qilins in the current world, there remained qilin nests with significant remnants of their energy. Therefore, members of many major factions could still recognize a qilin egg.

Since this particular egg was dead, that made it a corpse that Lu Yun could resurrect. He only needed a single particle rather than the entire egg, and thus arrived his sixth Envoy of Samsara.

Hum.

Deep blue radiance sparkled in hell as a water qilin egg appeared before Lu Yun. He’d surreptitiously cut a small piece from the egg during the confrontation, so it’d been no big deal to give the egg to Fang Feixing. 

He’d even been able to save a million premium immortal crystals while he was at it!

With the egg resurrected by the Tome of Life and Death, the one in Fang Feixing’s hand had naturally gone defunct in fiery fashion. Lu Yun’s breathing quickened; this was the first time he’d ever tried making an egg his envoy!

According to Huangqing and Aoxue’s memories, water qilins were the undisputed king of the ocean with their terrifying innate water talent, making them worthy opponents of the Black Tortoise.

Lu Yun’s sword ocean aura was based on the intent of water. If he could gain the talents of a water qilin, his understanding of the element’s intent would improve greatly. So far, he’d created only three sword techniques using his sword aura as a foundation—Vast Dragon Seaturner, Peng of Kun, and Starstream Sword. He’d hit a bottleneck and needed to improve his command over his sword aura if he wished to create more powerful techniques.

In fact, he had a vague premonition that once the void realm was fully mapped out and contemporary cultivators ascended to that realm, he’d lose all of the advantages he currently enjoyed. By then, even the youth sovereigns and current lists of genius cultivators would be replaced. The void realm was just too significant.

It allowed one to discern heaven and earth and incorporate themselves into nature. Once someone ascended to immortality after experiencing the void realm, not only would the old immortals be made obsolete, so too would the genius cultivators who’d earned a reputation in the Dusk Tournament.

Indeed, a good number of decisive immortals had already severed their own cultivation and started anew. If Lu Yun didn’t want to be eliminated by the times, he had to keep improving.

……

Scintillating blue light dyed everything in the region faintly blue. The dusky qilin egg was now baby-blue colored and releasing ripple upon ripple to transform the area into an inlet of water. A figure in faint-blue slowly walked out of the premises.

“Sixth Envoy of Samsara, Cangyin, greets the master.” A naked girl with blue hair and blue eyes swept a graceful curtsey at Lu Yun. Looking roughly eighteen, the beautiful girl had a quiet elegance to her.

“Cangyin… you...” Lu Yun’s jaw dropped. “How did you grow up so fast? Aren’t you supposed to be a pup?”

He hadn’t gleaned anything beforehand because her mind had been as blank as a sheet of paper. Therefore, he’d thought his sixth envoy would hatch as a pup, not as a charming little beauty. 

“In response to the master.” Cangyin looked up, her body shifting with her motion. “This servant was reverted into egg form by a time manipulation art.”

“I… see...!” Lu Yun paused, then reacted, “Wait, there’s such things as time manipulation arts?”

“There are!” Cangyin answered with great confidence. “This servant is certain that was what killed me.”

Time manipulation!

“Who were you before, then?” Lu Yun frowned. “What level was your cultivation?”

Since she’d been hit with a retroactive time art, everything that had happened in her life had been erased from the annals of time. Even the Tome of Life and Death couldn’t read her experience from her soul. To the book, she was a newborn, and Lu Yun had only recognized the dead egg as a water qilin’s when he’d found it. He hadn’t seen any information about Cangyin.

“In response to the master, this servant was the matriarch of the water qilins, and my cultivation had reached peak principal realm.” Once resurrected, Cangyin could recall her past, and her cultivation returned to the level she’d been born with—true immortal realm.

“The matriarch of the water qilins?” Lu Yun’s eyes widened. He didn’t expect the egg he’d stumbled upon in the streets to be the leader of the water qilins!

“The principal realm? Is that the realm after dao immortal realm?” His mind seized on the new tidbit of information.

During the hundred thousand years after the great immortal war, no one had been able to break through the dao immortal realm, and all records about anything after dao immortal had been destroyed.

“The realm after origin dao immortal is named the ingress realm,” Cangyin explained. “The ingress realm is divided into nine minor levels. After the ingress realm is the primordial realm, then the principal realm.”

“Is the realm after that the nature realm?” Lu Yun asked without thinking. As someone born and raised on Earth, he was no stranger to the progression from ‘ingress’, to ‘primordial’, to ‘principal’. [1]

“What comes after the principal realm is the emperor realm—the realm of an immortal emperor.”

“Alright then.” Lu Yun nodded. “Tell me, what happened in the ancient times? How did the great war break out? Who killed you?”

The ancient war of immortals had forever changed the course of this world, shattering it into the twenty-four facets. Everyone knew there was such a war a hundred thousand years ago, but the reasons behind why the war had broken out had always been a mystery.

“Well...” Fear flashed through Cangyin’s face. “I... I was killed by a silver-haired monster with a silver pagoda when attempting to ascend to emperor realm. The time manipulation art was released from the pagoda!”

“Silver-haired monster?!” Lu Yun tensed. “Are you sure?”

With a wave of her hand, Cangyin manifested an image with her inner energy, showing a monster covered in long, silver hair that held a delicate silver pagoda in its hands. It looked just like the black-haired monsters Lu Yun had encountered; the only difference between them was their color and the weapons they carried.

No wonder she was hit by a time manipulation art, and the Tome of Life and Death couldn’t read her memories. It’s all because of that treasure.

The black-haired monsters could make a swing of the great dao with their black axes, while the silver ones manipulated time with their silver pagodas!

“As for the ancient war of immortals...” Cangyin said with a wry smile. “If there ever was a war, it must have broken out after my death. However...” her focus shifted, “a good number of the world’s powerhouses had already died before me. The dragon, phoenix, xiangliu, and kunpeng patriarchs all encountered the silver monsters when attempting to ascend into the emperor realm.”

“I see.” Lu Yun nodded and dropped the subject. Something this high level was beyond his control at the moment.

……

Soon, the Deaf Prince’s carriage reached Panorama Pavilion territory. The merchant guild was highly efficient. As soon as Qing Xun sent the dao weapon back to headquarters through a formation, a set of ingredients for the damaged pill recipe was sent back.

“There are a hundred and eight thousand in total?!” Lu Yun sucked in a breath when he took the storage ring from Qing Xun.

“That’s right. There were a hundred and eight thousand ingredients in the ancient ruin!” Qing Xun nodded and continued in a wistful tone. “It must’ve been the herb garden of an immortal emperor. The herbs planted there were the ingredients of a powerful pill. Unfortunately, the recipe etched in the ruins was damaged, leaving behind only the herbs themselves.

“The Panorama Pavilion discovered the ruins three thousand years ago. But during this time, our pill dao masters only identified five thousand herbs and their refinement methods. We have no clue as to how the recipe can be restored.”

Qing Han took the ring from Lu Yun. “These are the main ingredients for the Tribulation Surrogate Pill,” he suddenly said. “However, three hundred and eighty thousand more supplementary ingredients and three catalysts are needed to refine the pill.”

“The Tribulation Surrogate Pill?” Lu Yun and Qing Xun were stunned.

“Are you sure?!” The latter asked breathlessly.

1. The characters for these three realms correspond to important Daoist figures. Respectively, they are the Grandmaster of Heaven, the third disciple of the Ancestor of the Great Balance, a Daoist deity; Lord of Primordial Beginning and one of the Three Pure Ones; and the Grand Pure One, who manifested himself as Laozi. 

Lu Yun’s question about the nature realm is logical, as the name for that realm is a variant of ‘primordial nature’ and a reference to the Chinese idiom of ‘first there was heaven, then there was nature’. It is also the name of the Ancestor of Great Balance, whose disciples and students were all named earlier.