Ranran furrowed her brows and asked, "After experiencing so many twists and turns to finally become an immortal, why would you fall into the demonic way? Don't you know that such actions will inevitably bring forth heavenly retribution?"
Duntian seemed unfazed by the thunderous storm, with a casual wave of his hand, and the protective shield over Kongshan became even stronger.
This action seemed to silently answer Ranran's question — he simply didn't care about the ostentatious Heavenly calamity. After falling into the demonic path, Duntian gained supreme power surpassing gods. Naturally, he acted without scruples and didn't care about right or wrong anymore.
He didn't seem to harbor ill intentions towards the intruding duo, but this puzzled Ranran even more. Many things seemed to have the traces of Duntian's manipulation behind them. What was his purpose in doing all this?
"Dare I ask, Senior, why have you appeared before me several times to guide me? What is your intention?" She didn't believe he was acting on a whim, suddenly wanting to do good deeds. "Moreover, what is the meaning of sending people to capture us?"
Duntian cast a glance at her, seemingly reluctant to answer that question. However, his gaze towards Su Yi Shui became slightly more focused, with strong disappointment in his eyes.
He said mildly, "If I had known this would happen, I wouldn't have alarmed you two so soon. You are not ready yet… You will understand in the future. If you are unwilling to leave, you can stay here. They won't trouble you, but I hope you don't attempt to damage the ancient tower. They won't let you succeed…"
After saying these nonsensical words, Duntian vanished like a gust of wind, leaving no trace behind.
Ranran felt that Duntian's kindness towards her and Su Yi Shui was actually a kind of contempt. When you have absolute power, you don't bother looking down to see what a couple of ants are up to.
Duntian was once an immortal, standing in the clouds. However, in his heart, did the once cherished mortal beings of the world gradually became insignificant, like ants?
Su Yi Shui asked Ranran to wait for him at the foot of Kongshan, as he wanted to try something at the Spirit Tower. However, Ranran refused and shook her head, insistent on accompanying him.
When they arrived under the Spirit Tower, none of the Fantian disciples stopped them, allowing them to come up all the way to the Black Bone Tower.
Su Yi Shui narrowed his eyes at the black bone tower and suddenly tried to push it with his power. Before he could touch it, he was flung out and crashed through the trunks of three thick trees.
The unfinished ancient tower now already possessed a concealed demonic nature, making it impossible for anyone to approach. Even those constructing the bone tower only scattered bones from afar, and the tower would automatically absorb them to gradually take shape.
Suddenly, Ranran began twitching her nose again, as if sensing some unusual scent.
Su Yi Shui knew that this little gourmet's sense of smell was extraordinary. Just as he was about to ask what she smelled, Ranran asked, "What should we do?"
Su Yi Shui's expression turned grave. "Let's leave first, and inform others about the situation here."
Dealing with someone who was once an immortal but now turned into a demon was a precarious matter. They needed to inform the other immortals hovering in mid-air and see if they had any solutions or could bring reinforcements.
When the intermittent thunder from the Heavenly calamity stopped, Su Yi Shui used his old method to take Ranran and the white tiger out of the protective shield.
However, when they emerged, the Heavenly calamity from above seemed even fiercer than when they entered. Lightning mixed with purple light continuously exploded overhead, and the frequency grew denser.
At the moment they emerged, the thundering should have paused momentarily to let them pass through. But the next wave of lightning followed closely.
So, the two, along with the white tiger, had to dodge swiftly, hoping to pass through quickly.
Just as they were about to exit the array, a lightning bolt flashed towards Xue Ranran.
Seeing that Xue Ranran couldn't dodge in time, without any hesitation, Su Yi Shui instinctively changed direction and quickly knocked Ranran out of the thunder array.
And the lightning, glowing with purple light, struck Su Yi Shui directly.
After Xue Ranran was knocked out of the thunder array, she turned around and saw Su Yi Shui being struck by lightning, and couldn't help but cry out. She turned to enter the array again, but the white tiger that had just leaped out seemed to know how powerful the thunder array was and used its body to block Ranran.
Seeing the light in the white tiger's eyes, Ranran instantly understood that Su Yi Shui's primordial spirit had already possessed the white tiger's body at the moment of the lightning strike.
So, the one blocking her from entering the array now was Su Yi Shui's himself. However, his physical body was still inside the array. If they didn't pull him out quickly, Su Yi Shui would be stuck as a tiger for the rest of his life.
Ranran didn't have time to think. She just remembered how Su Yi Shui had guided the lightning with silver needles. She took out something she had on her, and threw it hard towards the lightning bolt.
What she had thrown out, was the box she obtained on Dragon Island which could not be opened. This was left behind by Mu Qingge, but she had never been able to open it.
The item was made of a metal similar to refined iron and was indeed conductive. The lightning in the sky was instantly attracted to the box, sparing the man from being struck by lightning.
At that moment, the white tiger leaped quickly into the thunder array, threw the body onto its back, and turned to run. After being struck by lightning, the iron box actually did not turn into smoke but was bounced out with a crack, the lid opening and falling at Xue Ranran's feet.
But at this moment, Ranran didn't have time to look at it. She just put it back in her pocket, then hugged Su Yi Shui's body, which was covered in wounds from the lightning strike, and looked over him anxiously.
Just then, the Medicine Immortal and the others hurried over. They had seen Su Yi Shui's body being struck by the Heavenly calamity from afar.
Ordinary cultivators wouldn't dare to face heavenly thunder unless it was their ascension time. There were even those unscrupulous masters who used their disciples to attract thunder for their own benefits during tribulations.
What Su Yi Shui had faced was not ordinary heavenly tribulation but the Ten Thousand Tribulations Heavenly calamity. So, after being struck, his chances of survival were slim.
But Xue Ranran didn't care about all that. She desperately stuffed medicinal pills into Su Yi Shui's mouth and activated her technique to protect his heart meridians.
The Medicine Immortal, who had been on the path of medical immortality, also quickly extended his hand to protect Su Yi Shui's heart meridians.
However, he couldn't help but exclaim in surprise, "His body hasn't been destroyed yet. Why is there no primordial spirit?"
Ranran felt the body under her hands slowly resumed breathing, and she let out a sigh of relief. She pointed to the white tiger beside her and said, "His primordial spirit is in this tiger."
The Medicine Immortal furrowed his brows without speaking. Although they had extended timely treatment and the girl's pills was potent, according to common sense, Su Yi Shui's body should have been badly charred.
Why was he only slightly injured with no major problems?
Thinking about how this mortal had once managed to guide Mu Qingge's soul to be reborn on the tree, the Medicine Immortal found this man attached to the tiger was even more difficult to figure out than before…
Because Su Yi Shui's body had suffered a heavy blow from the lightning, his primordial spirit needed to return to his body as soon as possible.
However, at the moment he returned, the pain from the lightning strike immediately invaded his senses. The man, who should have fallen into a coma, immediately moaned quietly in pain.
Ranran held his hand tightly with tears of distress in her eyes, and gently applied a cooling ointment to his wounds to ease the pain.
Wei Jiu circled many times around Su Yi Shui, seemingly weighing the chances of killing his archenemy, and the pros and cons of retaining or breaking alliances.
Xue Ranran glanced at the corner of her eye and immediately understood Wei Jiu's intentions. So she immediately threw out the shocking news, disrupting Wei Jiu's plans.
She briefly explained the situation inside. When she mentioned that Duntian, who should have passed into Nirvana, had turned into a demon and was the mastermind behind the Fantian Sect, everyone's expression changed. Even the immortals looked at each other, and their indifferent faces finally showed some changes.
Wei Jiu looked at the immortals with a cold gaze and said, "A god from the divine class willingly fell and stirred up unrest in the Three Realms? Don't tell me none of you noticed anything?"
The Medicine Immortal's expression was solemn, and he suddenly spoke, "I remember when Duntian passed, the four tools of the Four gods of time had suddenly disappeared. Could they be… taken by Duntian?"
*四值功曹 four deities in charge of time, Year, Month, Day and Hour
The Four gods who managed time, had four tools, coronas, that had the power to adjust the seasons.
When the four coronas had disappeared, the Four deities were indeed panicked for a while. In the end, they barely managed by using the Eye of Zhu Long, which also could control the changes of time.
*烛龙 : 钟山的山神,无足之龙,开眼为昼,闭眼为夜
The mountain god of Clock Mountain, a dragon with no feet; when its eyes opened its day, when its eyes closed its night
If that were really the case, Duntian's ascension had been a long-planned conspiracy. The four bone towers he built corresponded to the four coronas, thus, they indeed had the ability to reverse time!
When the Medicine Immortal mentioned this, the other immortals also became agitated.
Two of them exchanged looks and immediately turned and hurried back to the Heavenly Realm to report what was happening here to the higher gods.
They were just minor lower gods and couldn't make decisions on such major events.
The Medicine Immortal, along with the white-haired immortal who had previously taught Wei Jiu a lesson, stayed behind to continue monitoring the situation at Kongshan.
According to the Medicine Immortal, other mountains were also experiencing thunderstorms. Duntian seemed to have the ability to split himself and had protective shields on all four mountains, resisting the Ten Thousand Tribulations Heavenly Calamity.
At this moment, Su Yi Shui seemed to have recovered well. After a long period of silence, he slowly stood up and asked, "Other than the Ten Thousand Tribulations Heavenly Calamity, is there any other way to dismantle the bone tower?"
The Medicine Immortal sighed, "I have never seen such a tower that defies the heavens, so how would I know how to unravel it? Now we can only wait for the higher gods' response and see if they can come up with a strategy."
That's all they could do for now, so they patiently waited under Kongshan.
The Medicine Immortal's character was still not too bad. During the time they had while waiting, he cleared the black rain mud around Kongshan and treated the wounds of the injured. With a wave of his hand, the medicine healed their wounds, earning him the people's respect, who bowed repeatedly, wanting to build temples and statues for him in the future.
However, true immortals seemed uninterested in earthly offerings and he quickly erased the memories of the people with a wave, sending them back home.
According to the Medicine Immortal, after becoming a god, if there were too many people thinking of them in the mortal world, it would actually be a burden on their cultivation. After all, responding to too many worldly desires would keep them very busy.
Most people who ascended to immortality, other than seeking eternal life, desired inner peace. If immortals were like magistrates who managed all kinds of trivial mundane affairs, won't that only add to their troubles?
So, many ascended immortals even abandoned their secular names, seeking a state of pure tranquility without any attachments.
Xue Ranran listened to all this in astonishment. Clearly, these true immortals were far from the benevolent saviors of mankind as she had imagined. Thinking about those who constantly bothered the immortals with offerings, perhaps the immortals were gritting their teeth while accepting offerings and cursing from their caves!
After applying ointment to Su Yi Shui's wounds, although the pain eased, the wounds healed very slowly. The usual methods of rapid recovery for cultivators seemed ineffective against the thunderous tribulations of the Ten Thousand Tribulations Heavenly Calamity.
Before sunset, another heavy rain fell. Xue Ranran was afraid that the rain would wash over Su Yi Shui's wounds, so she chose a spot under a low tree on a hillside, used her spiritual power to create a spirit shield to block the rain, and then moved Su Yi Shui, who was resting in a state of recovery, under the tree.
Afterward, Xue Ranran sat silently beside him, gazing at the bone tower under the dark clouds of Kongshan.
It was unclear how much time passed, but Su Yi Shui finally woke up. Slowly opening his eyes, accompanied by the pouring rain, he looked at the girl sitting quietly beside him. He sat up and draped the cloak on him over her, then asked softly, "What are you thinking about?"
Ranran turned to look at him, carefully avoiding his wounds, reached out to hold his arm, and whispered, "I'm thinking, if Duntian really reverses time and changes everything, maybe we won't get to meet again?"
Such a reversal of fate, if it happened, would likely cause a chain reaction. By then, with the world undergoing tremendous changes, they might become two insignificant specks, never to meet again, strangers forever…
Thinking about this, Ranran couldn't help but feel a bit melancholic.
Su Yi Shui didn't seem to like her hypothesis. He just held her hand gently, then said softly, "Don't worry, he won't succeed…"
Listening to Su Yi Shui's firm tone, Ranran's rare moment of uncertainty instantly dissipated. She raised her spirits and said, "I won't let him succeed either. He doesn't know how difficult it was for me to take you all in as disciples back then. So, no one should think of making me start over!"
Her words made Su Yi Shui frown, recalling the mischievous look of this little demoness when she used various tricks to take him as a disciple.
He couldn't help but ask in a low voice "You're only reluctant to part with your disciples?"
Ranran tilted her head, looking uncertain "Of course, a few less disciples probably wouldn't matter. Maybe… it would be better if you… hadn't met me… ah!"
Before she could finish her sentence, Su Yi Shui had already pulled her into his arms. "Bad habits die hard! You first provoke me and then say such nonsense. Tell me, which disciple do you want to abandon if you were to reverse time?"
Ranran looked at his stern face, couldn't help but laugh softly, and said as if coaxing a child, "Alright, even if I don't want the others, I will still accept my little disciple Shui'er… ah… um…"
Su Yi Shui clearly didn't want to hear his carefree master's nonsense anymore, so he simply sealed her remaining words with his lips… In the meantime, between kisses, he whispered, "If you dare say such things again, don't blame me for making you copy the sect rules…"
Xue Ranran had originally closed her eyes to accept his passionate kiss. When she heard this, she gradually opened her eyes, looking at Su Yi Shui with disbelief, and slowly said, "You… remembered?"
Making his disciples copy sect rules was something that Su Yi Shui loved to do the most before he lost his memories. She almost had swollen wrists from being punished by him back then…
As she looked up to closely examine the man in front of her, Su Yi Shui's facial features remained unchanged, but the gloominess and cynicism between his brows disappeared, replaced by a calmness honed by the passing of time…
After being struck by lightning just now, her… her Shifu had finally returned! Su Yi Shui reached out and embraced Ranran, ignoring the pain in his wounds, and tightly held her in his arms.
When he was struck by that heavenly thunder, the effectiveness of the Soul-cleansing talisman was completely nullified, and memories of Mu Qingge and Ranran rushed into his mind like a torrential river.
No one could know what Su Yi Shui felt at that moment, only his lingering fear.
Fear that he had almost killed Ranran, fear that Ranran would distance herself from him because of this, fear that he had endured for twenty years, only to face such a twist of fate…
Fortunately, Ranran did not give up on him. Otherwise, he would definitely be strangling himself now, killing the reckless and selfish self who had lost his memory…
At this moment, heavy rain poured down. the two who had been together day and night but felt like they had been apart for a long time, were under the cover of the spiritual shield, with many things to say…
Wei Jiu lay diagonally on a large rock, able to see from afar through the heavy rain, beneath the tree on the hillside, where a pair was partially obscured.
Although raindrops splashed on the spiritual shield, making it impossible to see clearly inside or hear what they were saying.
But Wei Jiu wasn't a naive child; he could naturally imagine what a man and a woman alone could do.
Those imagined, sickeningly sweet Xishan styles had obviously repulsed Lord Wei Jiu.
He couldn't help but glare at the other disciples of Xishan and said, "What are we doing at this critical juncture? Your Sect Leader, who was just struck by lightning, still has the mind to enjoy romantic moments. Do you expect such a person to change the current disadvantaged situation? I think we might as well wait for our doom."
Gao Cang and Bai Baishan didn't like to engage with this devil, but thinking that if Duntian succeeded, causing chaos in the world, they were both worried and anxious.
Especially Gao Cang, he didn't want the world to start over again. Whether it was his master, his junior siblings, or his loved one, Qiu Xier, he didn't want to miss any of them.
Now the distant tall tower seemed to be almost completed. No one knew what earth-shattering events would happen next.
But at this moment, the Medicine Immortal and the white-haired immortal who had been sitting there suddenly opened their eyes, their faces serious, and their lips trembling slightly.
Wei Jiu knew they were probably communicating with someone, but as immortals, their ability to communicate over long distances was extraordinary. They could sense each other even from thousands of miles away.
The white-haired immortal was still fine, but the Medicine Immortal seemed to be arguing with someone. However, in the end, he seemed to have been persuaded by someone. Helpless, he sighed deeply and said to Su Yi Shui and Xue Ranran, who had just come over, "I'm leaving, and you should leave quickly too… Activate all your spiritual power and go as far as possible!"
Su Yi Shui looked at the Medicine Immortal's serious expression and narrowed his eyes, saying, "Would the Immortal please explain clearly, what decision has the divine class in the Heavenly Realm made regarding the Tower of Reversal?"
The Medicine Immortal looked at Su Yi Shui. He originally didn't want to reveal the heaven's mandate, but for some reason, he decided to speak up in the end. "…The Towers of Reversal must not be allowed to be completed. Otherwise, there will be chaos in the Three Realms. Since the Ten Thousand Tribulations Heavenly Calamity cannot destroy the tower, then we must activate the earth's veins and level the four mountains…"
Wei Jiu, hearing this, glared angrily, "Are you all mad?! This way of doing things is even more like the demonic path compared to my actions! Once the earth's veins are activated, the entire surface within a radius will be overturned! By then, not just the four mountains, but even the manors and farms within a thousand miles will be destroyed! It will be a scene of extensive devastation, with great suffering… From what I can see, you immortals are not any wiser than Duntian in your actions!"
Faced with Wei Jiu's accusations, the Medicine Immortal also sighed deeply, "You're right, but if there were any other way out, the Heavenly Realm wouldn't make such a decision. But now that the towers are about to be completed, if Duntian succeeds, the chaos caused in the Three Realms will be much worse than the destruction of the four mountains. Given the lesser of two evils, sacrifices must be made to stop Duntian's madness."
There was another part that the Medicine Immortal didn't say out loud. As a lower immortal, his opinion was insignificant, and the higher immortals only informed him to evacuate quickly, and did not consult with him. By himself, he could not reverse the decision of the higher immortals.
"What I can do to help you ends here. Tomorrow at noon, when yin and yang intersects and the tower is about to be completed, the earth's veins will tremble, and the entire surface will be overturned… Find a safe place to take refuge yourselves…"
With that, the Medicine Immortal turned to leave.
But at that moment, a cold voice came from behind him, "You once aspired to become an immortal wholeheartedly, just to be the Heavenly Realm's lackey and messenger? How did that spirited cultivator who was full of ideals and wanted to save the masses, end up being such a submissive person?"
The Medicine Immortal's body jolted, and he slowly turned around to look at the cold woman standing behind him, whose presence he hadn't noticed until then.
She had golden hair and dragon horns, with a heroic aura, but unfortunately, a prominent scar on her face made people overlook her lively phoenix eyes…
"Fengmou!" the Medicine Immortal recognized the woman in front of him and cried out involuntarily. She was his lover before he ascended to immortality—Fengmou, the guardian god of Dragon Island.