Chapter 270: The Second True Person!

In that moment, countless consciousnesses awakened inside and outside the Immortal Gate. They cast their gazes toward the Eight Trigrams Furnace, filled with scrutiny and appraisal.

"It's actually the Xun Trigram?"

"To think a True Person who cultivates this trigram's image still exists. Who could it be?"

"Which fellow Daoist is this?"

Voices echoed one after another. The stars of the Cosmos dimmed beneath their will, yet no one heard them. Even Qi Refining practitioners could barely detect them.

This wasn't even intentional; it was simply a difference in levels of existence. It was like the gap between two and three dimensions. Characters in a novel could never hear the sighs of a reader in reality. How could fakes, who failed to cultivate truth and lived their entire lives as fleeting illusions, ever hear the voices of True Persons?

Even so.

A handful of Qi Refining practitioners with profound enough cultivation could still faintly perceive a sliver of the truth through the sudden changes in the Twenty-Four Qi of heaven and earth.

At Bliss Immortal Peak, within Sun and Moon Lake.

"They made their move!"

Mingyou abruptly stood and gazed into the distance toward the Eight Trigrams Furnace, catching sight of the fierce gale that suddenly howled to life in Cosmic Deep Space.

"It's the Xun Trigram!"

In an instant, Mingyou felt as if he had been plunged into an ice cave.

Among yin and yang and the five elements, the Xun Trigram corresponded to yin wood. The life-stealing plan he had previously orchestrated utilized the image of this very trigram as its foundational layout.

Yet now, a True Person who cultivated this exact trigram had actually emerged. And by some sheer coincidence, they had chosen Wang Ping as a pawn in their game. Could some True Person governed by wood qi in the Immortal Prescription Courtyard be dissatisfied with him and intervened? If so, how would it affect him?

For a moment, Mingyou felt deeply unsettled.

This was an ironclad rule of the Immortal Gate: while you could strike ruthlessly at your inferiors, you could only bow subserviently before your superiors.

"Rumble!"

Within the Eight Trigrams Furnace, Wang Ping felt the fierce wind scraping against his body, his expression complicated. 'To think a True Person is actually laying out a scheme?'

Xianfu was not wrong.

Even though the First Seat and the current Martial Dao had exhausted their foundations just to push him to this level, fundamentally, someone still wanted to use him as a pawn.

'Does the First Seat know this True Person?'

The thought flashed through Wang Ping's mind. She might know them, or she might not. After all, it was entirely possible that the First Seat had merely catered to the True Person's layout purely on intuition.

Regardless, this was a good thing.

Because at this moment, as the Xun Trigram hung high above, a fierce wind kicked up beneath Wang Ping's feet. His locked Divine Powers once again showed signs of loosening.

Xun represented wind. When wind follows, all things proceed smoothly!

The Xun Trigram belonged to wood, and its yin-yang attribute was yin. Yin wood was represented by Yi; in the heavens it was wind, on the earth it was trees, and in humanity it adapted to changes and yielded to things, naturally possessing the distinction of being bent or straight.

In an instant, the myriad ignorances deep within Wang Ping's mind seemed to be blown away by this fierce gale. Sudden realization dawned in his eyes, and the layers of profound scenery became clear and bright.

"They are helping me!"

"Using the Xun Trigram to help me lift my Divine Powers and fly into the torrent of destiny!" Wang Ping immediately circulated his Divine Intent with all his strength, elevating the profound mysteries alongside the gale.

The great roc rises on the wind in a single day, soaring ninety thousand miles straight up!

For the first time since his Divine Powers had been locked down, Wang Ping felt this kind of ease and exhilaration. It was as if a mountain had been lifted away, leaving the mighty power in his body completely unrestricted.

He raised his head.

Wherever his gaze fell, Wang Ping could already see the torrent of destiny encompassing the Cosmos, and his consciousness was rapidly drawing closer to it.

To break through to the Tribulation Transcending Third Layer, the first step was to cast one's divine sense into the torrent of destiny. Then, one had to maintain this soaring state for a prolonged period until they could trace out their own physical form—their destiny form—within destiny. Finally, they had to let that destiny form withstand the scouring wash of destiny itself.

Only then would it be considered a success.

Before this, Wang Ping could not even accomplish the first step, let alone maintain it for a long time. Now, however, this step was no longer an insurmountable hurdle.

The ceaseless gale blew in from above his head.

Wang Ping no longer needed to exert any effort to lift his Divine Powers. The fierce wind beneath his feet acted like the sturdiest of bricks and tiles, allowing him to stand firmly within the torrent of destiny!

'A great opportunity!'

Wang Ping did not hesitate in the slightest. He immediately circulated his Divine Powers and poured in his magical power. Yet, just as he began to lay down his brush in destiny, a Daoist voice interrupted him:

"Which fellow Daoist is this?"

This was a voice Wang Ping should not have been able to hear. He was only able to catch these few words because he was situated right in the center of the Xun Trigram, lifted by the gale and wrapped in profound mysteries.

Whose voice was it?

Wang Ping's pupils shrank abruptly, and he received his answer almost immediately. The moment the voice rang out, Cosmic Deep Space was illuminated by a radiant glow.

Its colors numbered twenty-four, corresponding to the Twenty-Four Qi of heaven and earth. It was boundlessly magnificent, shifting between truth and falsehood, reality and illusion. It looked weightless, lacking form or substance, but in reality, it acted like a towering divine mountain, pressing down heavily upon the Twenty-Four Qi. Even the fierce wind surrounding Wang Ping was forcibly pinned in place!

'A True Person has made their move!'

Wang Ping widened his eyes in shock, and then his eyeballs violently ruptured. He could not look upon the profound mysteries of a True Person, and his divine sense was even less capable of bearing the supreme might of True Persons clashing in battle.

He could not see, could not hear, and could not speak!

This was the true reason why True Persons rarely appeared in the Immortal Gate and mostly remained in seclusion. It wasn't that they were actually hiding from the world, but rather that no one could perceive them!

'The one helping me is the Wood Qi Daoist Master.'

'And the one attacking must be Daoist Master Hanguang Danyang!'

Wang Ping speculated, a myriad of thoughts swirling through his mind:

'The Xun Trigram corresponds to yin wood, yin wood... The era of this True Person is likely quite ancient. They might even belong to the group that died at the hands of the Great Rebellion!'

The reason was very simple. Among the Ancient Qi of the Six Heavens, the Tianqu Wind-Riding Soaring Qi and the Heavenly Virtue Appropriate Restraint Qi both corresponded to yin wood. One was in the heavens, and the other was on the earth. Within the entirety of yin wood, only the Human Yin Wood, the Adapting to Changes and Yielding for Wholeness Qi, had luckily escaped and was not purged.

In addition to that, yang wood had also lost its Earth Yang Wood, the Heavenly Pillar Immortal-Bearing Undecaying Qi.

In other words, during the Great Rebellion's Purging the Stale Qi of the Six Heavens, three of those paths had been wood qi. It was no wonder that the Supreme True Lord of wood qi was heavily injured and still hadn't recovered to this day.

By the same logic.

'After the Great Rebellion carried out the Purging the Stale Qi of the Six Heavens, two of the three yin wood qi were lost. Cultivating the Xun Trigram became practically impossible; this path was effectively severed.'

That was why Wang Ping guessed that the era this True Person belonged to was exceptionally old. There was a high probability they had attained the True Person realm before the Purging the Stale Qi of the Six Heavens, and it was highly likely they had deep ties to the Great Rebellion. But that brought up a question: why would such a True Person go out of their way to help him?

There was also Daoist Master Hanguang Danyang.

He also seemed to be paying close attention to Wang Ping.

'As expected, it must be because of the Ten Thousand Gods Terrestrial Chart.' Wang Ping felt heavy at heart. 'This Divine Power has ultimately dragged me into the chess game of True Persons!'

'No, that's not right.'

'More accurately, Daoist Master Hanguang Danyang might have simply left behind this Divine Power as part of a layout, but the one who truly chose me was actually Mingyou.'

'I understand now. Mingyou's previous life-stealing of wood qi was actually just him creating his own small scheme within the grand layout of Daoist Master Hanguang Danyang. The master needed a cultivator whose Divine Powers were locked down, and Mingyou used that opportunity to assault the wood qi and extend his own lifespan for a cycle.'

He had simultaneously accomplished the True Person's task and fought for his own benefit.

Killing two birds with one stone, achieving the best of both worlds!

However, there was one thing he could not figure out.

What exact secret did the Ten Thousand Gods Terrestrial Chart hold? In the current game between the two True Persons, one had locked his Divine Powers, while the other was helping him break through.

What difference would the outcome of either side make?

'My cultivation is still not enough...'

Wang Ping reined in his thoughts. Now that things had reached this point, he surprisingly regained his calm. He stopped caring about the result of the two True Persons' clash, because no matter which one won, his subsequent actions would not change.

Whether the mysterious True Person won, or Daoist Master Hanguang Danyang won, it didn't matter. After gaining clear insight into his original heart, he would no longer pin his hopes on others.

In the end, one still had to rely on oneself.

"Boom!"

Finally, a deafening Daoist voice carrying a tremor that seemed capable of tearing heaven and earth apart exploded beside Wang Ping's ears, sending him tumbling down from destiny.

The fierce wind that had gathered around him shattered and scattered. Thanks to this, he once again heard a faint sliver of a voice from the True Person:

"So it is a remnant of the Great Rebellion... You deserve death!"

In an instant, the world spun wildly. Wang Ping's consciousness plummeted from the torrent of destiny and crashed back into his body. His head threw back as his entire frame suddenly emitted a series of fragmented, explosive cracks. Immediately after, his figure fell from the domed canopy of the sky like a streak of heavenly fire, smashing into the Eastern Sea for the second time and boiling up a sky full of mist and clouds.

Meanwhile, inside the Eight Trigrams Furnace.

The First Seat's figure had long since disappeared. Only Xianfu and Kunlun remained, their eyes closed as trails of bloody tears streamed down their cheeks.

When True Persons fought, fakes could not look directly at them.

Qi Refining practitioners merely couldn't see them, but for those in the Tribulation Transcending realm, even if they actively closed their eyes and refused to look, they would still be burned by the boundless, majestic light of True Persons.

However, although they could not see the result of the True Persons' battle, they could see the changes in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. This was a method many lower-level cultivators of the Immortal Gate used to guess the outcomes of clashes between True Persons and True Monarchs. After all, every action, word, and deed of such majestic existences was enough to leave an impact on the Cosmos.

"The wind has stopped," Kunlun muttered softly.

Xianfu pinched their fingers to calculate. "Among the Three Powers of heaven, earth, and humanity, the yang qi of the human position has been converted into yin qi. The original two yang and one yin have become one yang and two yin."

"The Xun Trigram has been broken and turned into the Gen Trigram."

"That's right. Daoist Master Hanguang Danyang won."

The two waited for another moment. It wasn't until the turbulent spiritual energy of heaven and earth regained its stability that they finally opened their bloodshot eyes.

'Senior Brother Gan...'

Within Kunlun's mind, the figure of the Heaven-Stealing Thief also surfaced. Though their face was blurry, it still revealed a hint of solemnity. "I do not recognize that person."

"Oh?" Kunlun stared blankly for a moment.

However, the Heaven-Stealing Thief's tone was serious as they continued, "There is no such Xun Trigram True Person in the Immortal Prescription Courtyard. I have never felt this qi signature before either."

"So you're saying... it's a True Person from before the Great Rebellion?"

"That isn't right either."

The Heaven-Stealing Thief shook their head. "I have browsed through the ancient records. There were no Xun Trigram True Persons in the Immortal Prescription Courtyard of that era either, but the Great Rebellion did have one."

Kunlun was instantly filled with horror. "If that's the case..."

"Indeed."

The Heaven-Stealing Thief looked up at the sky. "This True Person who made a move might just be a remnant of the Great Rebellion."