Fang Yuan landed in the valley, found a cave, and casually set up a mortal Gu house before quietly cultivating.
Shadow Wu Xie and the others had remained on Stone Lotus Island, familiarizing themselves with the Future Body killing move.
Having been reborn, Fang Yuan naturally skipped that step.
The Future Body's greatest benefit to Fang Yuan was not in cultivation or combat power, but in the Fixed Travel Gu.
With the Future Body killing move, Fang Yuan could utilize it to teleport across the Five Regions and Two Heavens.
Of course, places like the Dragon Whale Blissful Land could not be entered directly.
Immortal Gu were unique — the true Fixed Travel Gu at this very moment should be in Feng Jiuge's hands. However, as long as an Immortal Gu Master developed the corresponding killing move, they could unleash similar power to substitute for the Immortal Gu they desired but could not obtain.
This was the profound art of using Gu.
Fang Yuan's Time Path avatar, bathed in the Wisdom Halo, continuously performed calculations.
One of the main focuses was improving the Yama Battlefield, adding Time Path Immortal Gu into it so that it would possess the special advantages of a Time Path Immortal-level battlefield.
In his previous life, Fang Yuan had been too pressed for time — he not only needed to raise his cultivation, but also had to deal with Heavenly Court, and furthermore sought the Red Lotus True Inheritance. Heavenly Court had placed enormous pressure on him, and while resisting, he also had to manage his own Immortal Aperture.
Under such circumstances, it was already pushing his limits that Fang Yuan had successively calculated killing moves like the Yama Battlefield, the Soul-Losing Seal, the Ten Thousand Swords Ghost Flood Dragon, and others.
For an Immortal Gu Master to calculate an ordinary killing move, it would take at least three to four years.
Fang Yuan possessed the Wisdom Halo, superb methods of the Wisdom Path, and an extraordinary level of attainment across multiple Paths, which was why he had been able to create miracles in killing move development during his previous life.
Now, in this life of rebirth, these killing moves naturally came back with him.
Fang Yuan directly possessed the killing move results of his previous life, and could continue to improve these moves in this new life.
This back-and-forth naturally created an enormous advantage.
"The Yama Battlefield is a fusion of the Soul Path and Servitude Path."
"The Servitude Path excels in wars of attrition — Yama Soldiers are numerous, they can charge to their deaths, and before dying, they can self-destruct, drawing out and consuming vast amounts of the enemy's combat power."
"The Soul Path's strength lies in using kills to fuel more kills — in a pure Soul Path battlefield, every enemy slain causes the battlefield's power to increase."
Fang Yuan's Yama Battlefield possessed both of these advantages. However, the latter was somewhat weaker — the rate at which Yama Soldiers were transformed was not fast, and because Fang Yuan often faced individually powerful enemies, the Soul Path advantage was not particularly apparent.
"When I add Time Path Immortal Gu into it, the Yama Battlefield will gain the special traits of a Time Path battlefield."
The special trait of a Time Path battlefield was the manipulation of time — most classically, extending time within the battlefield. One day outside might correspond to a full month inside. This gave the battlefield's owner ample time to slay powerful enemies.
For example, an enemy trapped in a Time Path battlefield has allies who sense something wrong and come to help. The allies arrive after the time it takes to burn one incense stick, but within the Time Path battlefield, three days and three nights have already passed! The battlefield owner has long since eliminated the enemy and departed.
In his previous life, although Fang Yuan had trapped Feng Jiuge within the Yama Battlefield and even stolen his Fixed Travel Gu, he ultimately had not been able to kill him. The reason was: Feng Jiuge had used the Life Armor Immortal Gu to adopt a stalling tactic, buying time, while Fairy Ziwei had broken through and destroyed the Yama Battlefield from outside.
If at that time Fang Yuan's Yama Battlefield had possessed the mysteries of the Time Path, extending the time inside by three days and three nights, then even if Fairy Ziwei had eventually broken through, she would only have been able to collect Feng Jiuge's corpse.
Fang Yuan was eager to see the results of improving the Yama Battlefield.
Particularly since his Time Path attainment had reached the quasi-supreme level — adding Time Path Immortal Gu into the mix posed little difficulty.
The more Paths one cultivated simultaneously, the more powerful one became in the later stages. The Ten Thousand Swords Ghost Flood Dragon killing move was the best proof of this.
Facing such composite killing moves that fused multiple Paths, a Gu Master who only cultivated a single Path would often find it extremely difficult to decipher and defend against.
Fang Yuan stayed in this nameless little valley for four days and five nights, until finally, he caught his opportunity.
Rumble!
At dawn, the earth trembled and split open.
The valley collapsed, dust and smoke billowing everywhere, forcing Fang Yuan to rise into the air.
The cracks on the ground grew larger and larger — the valley was swallowed up entirely, and a massive earth rift gradually formed before Fang Yuan's eyes.
The Boundary Walls of the Five Regions were gradually diminishing, and the earth veins of the Five Regions were progressively merging.
The earth veins were in upheaval. Massive rifts were forming everywhere, and in the Southern Border, where Earth Path dao marks were most concentrated, this phenomenon of rift formation was most violent.
Fang Yuan waited patiently until the rift stabilized, then immediately descended into it and began searching.
The newly formed earth rift had churned up vast quantities of Gu materials and exposed creatures that had lived underground.
Of course, corpses were the majority.
The deeper Fang Yuan ventured, the more valuable his discoveries became.
Before long, he spotted the first Desolate Beast corpse.
A single Desolate Beast corpse was equivalent to a mountain of Sixth Transformation immortal materials — though damaged, the key point was that it cost him nothing to acquire!
With virtually no effort, Fang Yuan collected the Desolate Beast corpse.
What brought him a faint touch of joy was that this corpse still contained a soul. This Desolate Beast soul would serve as a Yama Soldier.
Fang Yuan activated his scouting killing moves and continued searching.
His harvest grew ever larger, but it was all done without effort. Occasionally, when he encountered some ancient Desolate Beasts that were not severely injured, Fang Yuan proactively avoided them.
"Why hasn't it appeared yet? Could the rumors be wrong?"
"If the Luo Family deliberately spread false information, then this trip would have been for nothing."
After another stick of incense had burned, Fang Yuan grew somewhat anxious.
This earth rift was located within the Luo Family's sphere of influence in the Southern Border. The more time passed, the more likely it was that the Luo Family's Immortal Gu Masters would arrive.