A dense beam of virtuous merit collected from the Karmic Tree sapling and melded into Di Jun’s body. He sharpened into focus and gained defined features on his face—Tianqi’s face.

Tianqi was Di Jun!

Or more accurately speaking, Di Jun was one of Tianqi’s reincarnations.

In order to free himself from the body of the Mount Tai mountain god and become a full-blooded human, Tianqi had to utilize the power of reincarnation and be reborn into another life. However, his core essence was so powerful that even when he was reborn as a human, he remained the mountain god of Mount Tai at his core.

Therefore, he had to undergo the process again and again, living and dying through multiple lifetimes before the wheel of reincarnation finally washed away the core essence of a mountain god. He became a personage of stunning ability and power in every one of his lives, rising to the peak each time and becoming a great emperor of the human race.

Di Jun was one such iteration, and Tianqi was about to complete his trials and return to Lu Yun.

The Karmic Tree had shown signs long before, and though only Tianqi’s projection returned for now, it contained all of his thoughts and consciousness. Thus, the sapling that’d split off from the mother tree instantly traveled from hell and arrived in the void to reinforce Tianqi, so that he could project his true form.

“Auntie!” Tianqi bowed at the little fox. “Long time no see!”

“It’s only been a few decades,” grumbled the little fox.

Tianqi was Lu Yun’s disciple and the little fox had been inseparable from Lu Yun when they were in the great wilderness. When Tianqi returned from Mount Buzhou, it’d been the little fox and Lu Yun who’d taught him together. Thus, Tianqi called the little fox his aunt.

He smiled ruefully when he heard this response. The decades that the little fox spoke of had been ten billion years in his eyes! His only goal and motivation during all of this time was the knowledge that in the future, his master the Flame Emperor had need of him. He needed to be able to fight for this realm.

It was also due to Lu Yun’s influence that Tianqi wanted to break away from his mountain god core and become a human. He’d lived his entire life in Lu Yun’s shadow, his drive and standards completely a result of what Lu Yun had conferred upon him. But he also enjoyed operating under such circumstances and never felt an urge to change.

“Where are you?” the little fox asked hurriedly as she looked at Tianqi. “With your current strength, you could’ve smacked the water monkey dead with one blow. Why didn’t you kill him just now?”

She was quite dissatisfied at how the situation had turned out.

“Wuzhiqi is the key to Taiyi and the others breaking free from their tribulation. If they want to fully control Mount Vastpace, they must return to their origins and become connate demon gods of the great wilderness again,” Tianqi responded carefully while looking at the little fox’s expression. “If that wasn’t the case, I would’ve killed that monkey all those years ago. I wouldn’t have let him live until now.”

Though it’d been ten billion years, Tianqi still seemed to be the innocent young boy of yesteryear when he faced the little fox. Everything was as if it’d been yesterday.

“Alright then.” The little fox nodded. “So you’ve become involved in this game as well and are one of the players, not just a chess piece. You’ve really grown up.”

If anyone else had heard a girl of roughly seventeen years old assess the Great Emperor of the Eastern Peak, Emperor Di Jun of the human race, and a few other astounding great emperors in this way, their eyes might’ve fallen out of their sockets.

But for some reason, this unparalleled personage towering at the peak of the multiverse accepted it with a look of enjoyment on his face. He seemed like a child who’d been complimented by his elders after receiving good grades.

“Where is your true body?” asked the little fox. “You seem to be in a state of being both dead and alive.”

She frowned slightly at the projection in front of her. The Karmic Tree was helping him take form, but he seemed to exist between life and death in a zone of great danger.

“The chaos!” Tianqi wiped off the smile on his face. “My true body sits in the chaos. There is a treasure there that can help chaos creatures temporarily withstand the energy of a realm. My body sits where it can be found and fights off those creatures.”

“What?!” Shock drifted across the little fox’s face. “Help chaos creatures withstand the energy of a realm? Something like the dao palace?”

“No.” Tianqi shook his head. “I’ve heard of the dao palaces and how they hold a chaos star within, forming a world system of their own. Chaos creatures can survive in our space when they reside in those systems, but that doesn’t give them the ability to personally set foot into our realm. These treasures, however, help them to temporarily slip into our worlds without suffering an attack from the realm!”

“You said treasures, plural?” The little fox seized on that detail.

“Correct, these treasures. There’s a lot of them, not just one or two. It’ll be a calamitous disaster if the chaos creatures lay their hands on them,” Tianqi responded gravely.

He spread out a hand and released a ball of hazy purple light. “This is it. It looks like purple light and is without form or shape, but it acts like a gas that can be absorbed into the body to confer temporary immunity on the chaos creatures.”

The little fox accepted the purple qi and stored it within her body. “I’ll show this to your master and his wife. They should be able to deduce what this is.”

“Master and… his wife?” Tianqi blinked. “Auntie, are you not my master’s wife?”

The little fox rolled an eye. “Your master’s mind is filled with thoughts of his lady. He has no room for anyone else!”

“Ohhhhhhh. I see~~” answered Tianqi, humming knowingly.

“Shut up.” The little fox couldn’t be bothered with this turn of conversation and threw the Bell of Chaos at Tianqi. “You can’t guard those treasures without a handy treasure at your disposal. You can borrow this bell for now. I’ve undone the last restriction inside it so you can deploy its full strength.”

“Um…” Tianqi hesitated and then thought of the terrifying creatures within the chaos. “Then thank you, auntie.”

“Alright, go back for now. You should be able to hold on until your master comes to rescue you, now that you have the Karmic Tree and Bell of Chaos by your side.” The little fox waved noncommittally.

Tianqi chuckled ruefully. He really was at the end of his rope since the chaos creatures were too strong. If it wasn’t for the fact that this special place was at the intersection of the realm and the chaos, he would’ve been overrun many times over long ago.

He would return to the world of immortals the moment he couldn’t stand guard any longer. This was why the Karmic Tree had split off a sapling, ready to receive him at any time.

“Auntie, you must remember that only the big monkey can help Taiyi and the others. He is the river god of the Huai River and thus embodies the legitimacy of the celestial court in the great wilderness. Taiyi and the others are all connate demon gods. Only by borrowing the legitimacy of that age will they be able to endure their trial,” Tianqi solemnly reminded once more before he left. He really was afraid that the little fox would do something and snap Wuzhiqi like a twig.

Though she’d been confined against her will just now, she’d been wholly without fear. Tianqi had materialized to save Wuzhiqi, not to help the little fox.