While Mo Yangling's journey was just getting started, another man's story was already at its very climax.
Jia Jianyu was already reaching the end of his lifespan, he had reached the grand 7th Realm of Cultivation, the Mind Palace Realm.
It was a stage that raised his lifespan, internal energy, and strength exponentially. However, the next breakthrough had eluded him for many decades.
In his youth, he was known as the most talented throughout the land.
His tale was one as old as time, a young man once disgraced by his family, rising to power and ending up as their leader after a few years.
He was rumoured to have run into some fortuitous encounter which led to his cultivation raising at great speeds.
He was once thought to be capable of reaching the fabled 'Celestial' stage, the 8th and final Realm of Cultivation, and joining the ranks of the Great 12 of the Zhu continent.
But he had failed. He had never once managed to break into that special stage of cultivation.
He had never truly been able to complete the 8th Harmony and become truly immortal.
But today was going to be the day!
He was finally going to project his soul into the sky and break through the gates of heaven.
His grand Jia Family was finally going to soar and become renowned worldwide.
He was finally going to prove to the world that his great talent hadn't gone to waste.
And there he was now, using up the last of his family's wealth, surrounded by a plethora of treasures and Qi-enhancing relics, energy from the world around him was forced to surge towards his inner world.
His body lit up as his meridians and pathways filled with an exorbitant amount of Qi.
He then breathed out, a thin mist covering the entire pavilion as his breath drew in even more Qi.
He then started his breakthrough properly.
Accumulating all of his energy and remaining life force, he projected his soul outwards, creating an ephemeral body of Qi, coiling it around his soul for protection as he was about to charge the gates of heaven.
And the heavens also felt that such a transgression was taking place, the clouds darkened above the great cultivation pavilion of the Jia family.
The entire family moved in unison as they set up defensive arrays and barriers, blocking the stray lightning bolts and stopping them from reaching their ascending ancestor's real body.
Meanwhile, Jia Jianyu was already flying upward, passing through the roof over his head and looking at the angry skies with a confident visage.
A slight tinge of insanity rested in the eye of the Qi projection he had created around his soul.
"Hahahaha! Is this all that you've got!?!" He taunted the Heavens while still underneath the protection of the barrier.
But just like the last times, his taunts went completely ignored.
Of course, the slightly unhinged would-be immortal wasn't dissuaded by that, he merely smiled wider as he figured that the Heavenly Tribulation seemed less potent than usual.
'Yes! My time has finally arrived! Celestial Realm, here I come!'
With newfound confidence, Jia Jianyu soared to the skies, laughing all along as he reached them without much issue.
To his shock and pleasure, the stray lightning bolts from the Tribulation Clouds were even missing him.
He was so close that he could feel it, his ephemeral hand stretched forward as he saw the theoretical 'Gates of Heaven' an all-consuming void that had appeared above the tribulation clouds.
That was his destination. The Great Beyond. There, his soul would become stronger, and he would finally reach the Celestial stage.
His body at that point, would no longer matter. He would simply be able to get a better one, a younger one.
That was what most of the 'Great 12' did anyway. External Cultivation was a waste of time in the eyes of the truly powerful.
Yes, he was going to finally be able to join their table! To reach true immortality!
...
Or so he thought.
The second he stretched his astral hand towards the void, the clouds around him turned darker.
Jia Jianyu was so blinded by his impending ascension that he failed to notice it.
And only when a blanket of clouds covered the void in front of him did he look around.
He was completely surrounded, from all sides, by dark clouds.
"HAHAHAHA! I knew you were going to pull something like this!" The old cultivator merely cackled madly as he prepared to use his most powerful move.
"Let me see you try! Grand Celestial Mirrors!"
The cultivator's astral body spread its hands outwards, large mirrors appearing around him and forming a shield in all directions.
A soul art that defied the norm of common martial arts, part of the legacy he had inherited all those years back.
Now that he had reached complete mastery over his technique, he just knew that the Tribulation lightning would be reflected back at the clouds, as was the nature of his Soul Art.
He had only failed to block the lighting bolts before because his 'Soul Art' was extremely difficult to master. But now?
'There's nothing in this world I can't block!'
... Yeah. About that.
Just as he was about to put a medal around his own neck and call himself a winner. Jia Jianyu managed to notice that the Tribulation Lightning was acting strange.
Instead of wildly assaulting him, it all formed and gathered in two points, one to his right, and one to his left.
His soul only got to flicker once within his astral body before gigantic hands made of pure lightning formed on both sides.
'Shit!'
The cultivator immediately cursed inwardly as he decided to completely give up on his astral body and use all of his QI, channelling it into his Celestial Mirrors.
They shone brighter as the hands closed in upon his soul.
The mirrors shook, trembled, and eventually cracked.
Jia Jianyu's soul flickered once more, this time in worry, as he watched his 'impenetrable' shield, break around him.
And eventually...
A clap resounded throughout the entire country as the lightning hands clasped together tightly, crushing the cultivator's soul in the middle.
The Jia family on the ground was horrified and quickly rushed to collect what remained of their ancestor's soul, hoping to preserve it, while the Tribulation simply ended, and the gate to the 'Great Beyond' disappeared.
As the Jia family was panicking and trying to salvage the situation. The heavens above breathed a sigh of relief...
Well, to be more accurate, two old bald men dressed in monk's clothing breathed a sigh of relief.
One of them was incredibly tall, twice the size of a normal person and thin with an incredibly long beard.
And the other was short, almost a dwarf, with a body wider than most, filled with muscle but beardless.
They were sitting in a large pavilion, slightly glowing and formless, colourless.
They both were sat down in meditative positions, in the middle of them was a small table, with what looked to be a large lotus flower in the middle of it.
"This time's tribulation was a lot more tiring than usual..." The tall one breathed out a tired sigh.
The short one just snorted, a formless mist of spirituality left his lips and nose as he huffed.
"Those cultivators are getting more and more tiresome by the day. Why can't they just accept the rule of heaven and live in harmony?!?"
His voice sounded a lot more frustrated than his taller brother's.
"You and I both know that it's impossible to make them see reason... We have tried, and here we have ended up."
"Yeah yeah... Nothing but wisps of soul, unable to interfere in anything besides heaven-dammed tribulations."
The short one completed his brother's words, his tone still quite frustrated, but now on the verge of calming down.
As old men always were, the two of them were quite prone to reminiscing about things.
"At least we've managed to stop cultivators from reaching the Celestial Realm in the past few hundred years..." The taller one smiled slightly, trying to find the positive side of the situation they were in.
The shorter one also smiled, but there wasn't much happiness coming out of his features. So instead, he sighed, this time sounding more tired than before.
"Who knows how much longer we can keep this going..."
The taller one shook his head, his beard swaying from side to side.
"We are merely part of the heavens now. We cannot change the course of the world... We can only watch."
It was discouraging and hopeless... Being the watchers of a world with people so far deluded that they didn't even understand what they were doing.
'To go against the heavens is to go against the world...'
But to the cultivators, that was an even better way of putting it. It made them feel more accomplished.
They couldn't wrap their brains around just how serious the order of things was.
They failed to understand how vital the heavens and order were for the world to continue as it was.
Or, maybe they just didn't care. They all only cared about power.
They believed themselves to be special, far too important and above the rest to be affected by the world around them falling into chaos.
But the two old monks couldn't do anything to change that. They no longer had that capability...
Both monks turned their heads towards the table, their eyes blinking slowly with melancholy as the closed lotus on the table glowed slightly, before blooming and unveiling the entire world at its core.
The monks watched regretfully as one more petal fell from the lotus flower, turning to nothing before it even hit the table.
'It's a tragedy... To helplessly watch such a beautiful flower wither and die...'
The regret and shame the two monks felt at not being able to change anything was immensurable.
They both couldn't help the sigh that escaped their mouths collectively.
That was when it happened.
A shining star, brighter than the sun itself seemed to engulf the Lotus, it suddenly seemed to grow two more petals, and both monks immediately shot up, standing straight and looking at the core of the lotus with shocked gazes.
"N-no way..." Both monks gasped as they took notice of one particular part of the world. Within the Zhu continent, where they were also originally from.
In that vast expanse of land, in the middle of a damn near endless forest, the star shined.
Its light dimmed more and more as the seconds passed, but the two enlightened ones both studied it with bloodshot eyes.
"S-someone has reached enlightenment?" The short monk gasped once more, asking a rhetorical question.
It needed no answer, as the two monks could both feel it.
The body of the deceased young man was revived, overflowing with near-endless energy. And inside it was a soul so bright that it matched their own.
"A soul that has gone through the cycle of samsara, has gained enlightenment right before death, just like we did."
The tall old man gulped as his eyes scanned the frail young man who was now housing that soul.
"Heaven's be praised... We may just have another chance..." The short monk clasped his hands together as the young man woke up and...
Proceeded to take the knife out of his own skull with no hesitation?
Both monks blinked a few times, both of them gasping for a moment before looking at each other.
"H-he must've understood that his enlightenment and powerful soul would've kept him safe, right? I'm sure he's noticed that his body is brimming with energy right now..."
The tall one mused as he tried to make sense of the situation.
A mortal wouldn't normally know the benefits of enlightenment beforehand, there was no record of it left in their world.
So the young man must've realised his wounds would heal somehow, right?
'He wouldn't be unhinged enough to pull a knife out of his brain without any reassurance, right...?'
Then, they both watched the young man laugh heartily as the excess Origin Energy within his soul healed his wounds at a hastened rate.
Both monks noticed the grass snake attacking, but neither of them was phased by its presence or hostility. It was merely doing its part in the cycle of life at the end of the day.
A small snake was not going to be able to hurt someone who had reached enlightenment no matter how frail his physical body was.
But what they didn't expect was to see the 'enlightened soul' eat the snake's brain while it was still wriggling in his arms.
"... He really is unhinged, isn't he?" The short one muttered as he stared at the scene with a complicated gaze.
The tall monk didn't outright say anything, but he clearly agreed, nodding with a grave gaze.
One thought was present in both of their minds...
'We really are doomed, aren't we?'