Li Mo observed Zone Eleven, noticing that Nascent Soul Great Powers were continuously heading toward the Illusion Realm, signaling that the Ascension Conference had started to reveal its mysteries.
Deeper within the Outer Heaven teorite Crater, the Sub-Device Sect had undoubtedly arranged sothing else.
Li Mo realized that the Sub-Device Sect had indeed been preparing for the Ascension Conference for two to three millennia, as evidenced by the unwavering determination of the Nascent Soul Great Powers.
The Ascension Conference was clearly intensifying, and the Gu Worms in the Illusion Realm were dying off one by one.
At this mont, it had only been over a decade since Li Mo returned from the Inner Sect, yet the Ascension Conference already seed poised to escalate at any mont.
The advanced timing of the Ascension Conference was certainly tied to Li Mo nurturing the special page, but it was mostly deliberate on the part of the Sub-Device Sect.
To them, advancing the conference was not necessarily a bad thing.
After thousands of years of planning, their preparations had already reached their zenith. Even if unforeseen events occurred, they couldn’t be anticipated or avoided completely. Quickly confronting the conference might even uncover vulnerabilities in the Great Mother Furnace.
The ground in the depths of the Outer Heaven teorite Crater trembled violently.
However, this had not yet reached the harbor, and even the Taoist Mountain Sect remained intact. Only the phosphorescent remnants forming the Great Mother were being absorbed by the artificial sun.
The Great Mother’s corpse was disintegrating bit by bit, and the phosphorescence burrowed into the artificial sun.
By now, the Sub-Device Sect was no longer intentionally concealing its operations; instead, they instructed all Artifact Cultivators to return to their respective shops and avoid leaving the harbor recklessly.
Once back in the Seclusion Room, Li Mo began forging the radiant *Zhuozhuo Qihua*, aiming to first complete the artifact’s Hundred Refinents to collect so of the phosphorescence.
As soon as he obtained the phosphorescence, he planned to travel to the Heart Beast Sect through a Nearby Array.
Following Li Mo’s instructions, Futu Hermit had indeed identified a few locations where Demon Cultivators might appear, with a good possibility of results.
"If all else fails, I’ll create the conditions to lure the Demon Cultivators to by force."
In order to save ti, Li Mo directly summoned the Spider Demon’s Multiple-Ard Spine.
Tens of arms flew up and down at an unimaginable speed, completing the Magic Artifact Embryo in just over half a *shichen*.
The subsequent forging process slowed down, as the spiritual materials were sourced directly from the existing resources on Corpse Mountain.
The harbor, though chaotic, had not descended into disorder. The various loose cultivator factions were working together to maintain the harbor’s underlying stability.
After all, leaving the harbor would render their cultivation progress virtually impossible.
No black market could rival the harbor’s prosperity.
Black markets, as a rule, face suppression from certain factions once they reach a certain scale—only the harbor could thrive under the Sub-Device Sect’s protection.
As ti passed, the harbor returned to a state of calm.
However, the blazing light of the artificial sun overhead erased all traces of darkness from the neon-lit sleepless city.
The loose cultivators found this sowhat unsettling, but after two years, they had grown accustod and paid it no mind.
What puzzled them was that, following so unknown chaos, even the other Immortal Sects’ operatives in the harbor dared not act rashly.
It was as if they were wary of sothing.
The so-called Ascension Conference—could it truly involve immortals?
The Sub-Device Sect exuded an air of strangeness at every turn, but at least things hadn’t spiraled entirely out of control, save for the artificial sun above their heads, which looked increasingly ominous.
The artificial sun’s size continued to grow incessantly.
*Creak, creak, creak.*
A sickeningly eerie groan echoed, accompanied by the sound of bones being reassembled.
When the artificial sun had absorbed a critical mass of phosphorescence, its surface beca entirely enshrouded in flesh and blood, revealing fragnted forms of the Great Mother’s body parts.
They were forcibly confined within the artificial sun, their distorted and agonized faces etched with suffering.
Over ti, the Great Mother’s flesh began to pile up upon itself, forming a chilling mound of grotesque at that seed poised to break free from its binds.
The loose cultivators couldn’t help but feel an instinctive, spine-tingling dread.
Even though there was no sign of the Great Mother losing control, their unease remained irrepressible.
So Artifact Cultivators attempted to suppress the Great Mother, but without intervention from a Nascent Soul cultivator, they stood no chance of affecting her at all.
Elder Zhong let out a long sigh. "An era of turbulence indeed."
He vaguely rembered surviving a similar cataclysm a thousand years ago, though he had no concrete mories of it—it had been pure luck that he lived through it.
Elder Zhong knew that the Sub-Device Sect long sought a resolution, yet his growing unease only deepened.
"If Daoist Qingtian had been born five centuries earlier—or even three centuries earlier..."
Suddenly, Elder Zhong thought of Daoist Qingtian. Given the terrifying talent the latter had exhibited, three centuries would have been enough for him to break the Golden Core and beco a Nascent Soul cultivator, potentially altering the Sub-Device Sect’s overly aggressive strategies.
If Daoist Qingtian could be protected until reaching the Divine Separation Stage, the Sub-Device Sect might finally break free from its dire predicant.
Shaking his head with a bitter smile, Elder Zhong murmured, "A flawless Golden Core—what of it? Ti has already run out."
Perhaps it was wishful thinking. Though Daoist Qingtian was a prodigy unseen through the ages, how could anyone possibly shift the culmination of thousands of years of planning by the Sub-Device Sect?
Elder Zhong gazed blankly at the artificial sun, his mind spinning with tangled thoughts.
The Artifact Cultivators who were unaware of the thousand-year-old catastrophe showed no signs of anxiety, and over eighty percent of the harbor’s shops remained open for business.
Suddenly, commotion rippled through the streets.
Elder Zhong’s pupils contracted sharply as he stared skyward, his volcanic temper flaring up with sparks from his emotions.
A figure was slowly approaching the artificial sun.
"Daoist Qingtian?"
The blinding glow of the fake magical treasure made it hard for Elder Zhong to discern their identity, yet the silhouette seed eerily familiar.
Li Mo held a strange and enigmatic Fla Flower in his hands, its stan resembling a human mouth, licking the petals with a writhing tongue.
No longer concealing his movents, Li Mo knew that the approach of the thousand-year catastrophe rendered the matter of his presence in the Inner Sect aningless.
Han Cai was wiping the shelves when he noticed Li Mo, dropping the wine jar he had been holding to the ground.
The potent aroma of wine diffused into the air, but the surrounding loose cultivators took no notice, their eyes fixed on the Artifact Cultivator suspended in the sky.
Li Mo activated the Five Dao Body, his form swelling to over five ters tall.
Daluo Heaven manifested as innurable human hands, endlessly sprouting and vanishing. His half-exposed skin was covered in tattoos, with seven heart beasts stirring restlessly beneath.
The Cave God’s Eye opened.
The Yin aspect of his power dominated his forehead, transforming the Cave God’s Eye into a fathomless black hole.
"Taiyin Star."
Li Mo plucked his right eye from its socket, producing a full moon in his palm, which he casually flung toward the artificial sun.
Tens of thousands of cultivators at the harbor fell into a trance, as if witnessing an apocalyptic *eclipse of the heavens*.
The artificial sun’s radiance was gradually shrouded by the full moon, and the awe-inspiring presence of the Taiyin Star far eclipsed mortal comprehension—it was a feat utterly beyond the reach of ordinary n.
Elder Zhong erupted into wild laughter.
No matter what sches the Sub-Device Sect concocted, as long as Li Mo lived, he was destined to ascend to the Divine Separation Stage.
"Li... Qingtian—how old is he now?"
"Just over a century... one hundred and twenty or thirty, maybe."
"Han Cai, what were we doing at that age?"
"Hahaha, weren’t we busy running a brothel back then?"
Han Cai and Elder Zhong exchanged helpless smiles. It was hard to reconcile the Li Mo now before them with the figure he’d been when he first arrived in Rong Town.
The harbor plunged into pitch-black darkness.
The Taiyin and Taiyang powers, being only divine skills and not fully evolved into a Taoist Body, were unable to entirely suppress the fake magical treasure’s artificial sun.
The distorted light emitted by the artificial sun still lingered faintly, forming halos in the air.
"Dragon."
Li Mo’s figure vanished on the spot.
The Taiyin Star expanded into a colossal eye, and in an instant, a candle dragon spanning over a hundred ters coiled in the skies above the alley.
The candle dragon, with a human face and dragon body, appeared otherworldly and enigmatic.
Its ash-spirit-powered form was streaked with tallic textures, particularly its hollow dragon horns, whose forks emitted thick plus of smoke.
The candle dragon’s scales shimred in dazzling colors, occasionally revealing intricate yin-yang spirit patterns. Its twin eyes reflected the sun and the moon.
"Roar!!!"
The candle dragon lashed its tail in elation—it had been far too long since it last road the outside world.
Most chilling was its ravenous rampage around the artificial sun, devouring industrial fus. In its wake, thunderclouds bood over the harbor.
A downpour began to fall, raising acrid plus of smoke as the rain collided with the smog.
The cultivators all turned their faces away in unison.
Though aware that Li Mo had pioneered the Beast Summoning technique, none had ever seen the Candle Dragon, and witnessing its manifestation left them in awe and dread of his unmatched comprehension.
Daoist Qingtian was destined to beco the Sub-Device Sect’s foremost cultivator.
The candle dragon coiled tightly around the artificial sun, enveloping it in an ocean of swirling smoke and ash. Its jaws parted, swallowing the artificial sun in one swift motion.
The harbor was swallowed in utter darkness. Monts later, the candle dragon regurgitated the artificial sun.
In the blink of an eye, Daoist Qingtian and the candle dragon disappeared, leaving the artificial sun diminished in size.
*Zhuozhuo Qihua*, though rely a Hundred Refinent Magical Artifact, had consud a significant amount of phosphorescence with the support of *Da Ai Mi Tian*.
The Fla Flower in Li Mo’s palm had transford into a grotesque mass of human heads fused together.
He did not retract the spread of cancer cells, instead directing *Zhuozhuo Qihua* into Corpse Mountain, relying on the Fire Attribute Spiritual Veins to suppress and store the phosphorescence within.
The harbor remained stunned by Li Mo’s display.
Li Mo cast a glance at the artificial sun; the gathered phosphorescence should suffice for testing the Taoist Body Fusion technique, and he swiftly teleported back to Han Cai and the others.
After so long apart, their reunion was marked by only a few exchanged pleasantries—much was left unspoken.
"I’ve already shared the details about the Nearby Array with Futu Hermit. If danger arises, imdiately retreat from the harbor."
Han Cai nodded, asking, "Daoist Qingtian, are you leaving the Sub-Device Sect soon?"
"Yes."
Due to his identity as Daoist Qingtian, Li Mo only subtly hinted at the catastrophe, striving to help the Heart Beast Sect prepare in advance.
At the sa ti, he extended his awareness to the Gu Worms in Zone Eleven.
Within the flesh lting caves, only a few Nascent Soul Great Powers remained, with most heading toward the Illusion Realm.
Li Mo noted the human faces etched into the flesh walls, originally resembling Chen Tiangang, but now increasingly resembling Jiang Tianche as seen in his mories.
The *Creation Book* surged with vast related mories.
They revealed the Ascension Conference from seven thousand years past.
On an empty platform stood a monstrous and grotesque giant.
Only the head was Chen Tiangang’s. The rest of the flesh was ford from other disciples, forcibly lded together by the radiant phosphorescence. The flesh constantly decayed into foul ichor.
Li Mo discerned that the Hundred Days Ascension Technique was close to breaking down into deviation. It was unlikely Chen Tiangang could truly beco a celestial being.
"Beco immortal!!!"
The giant laughed madly as Chen Tiangang’s head sank into the chest, taking the shape of a Middle Dantian.
In its place erged Jiang Tianche’s head.
The Dayti Ascension Great thod succeeded instantly.
Cracks tore open along the giant’s back, spawning a form that was part human, part insect, and part immortal. A faintly celestial aura surrounded it as a heavenly ladder appeared, beckoning it upward.
True ascension to immortality had been achieved.
Li Mo reeled in his realization—so this was the truth. The cause and effect beca startlingly clear, the reality beyond imagination...
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