The Sovereign Immortal Aperture, Small Central Continent.
Fang Yuan stood beneath the Thousand Wish Tree, gazing up at the sky. Scorching points of light rose overhead—clusters and specks, flickering in and out of existence, dazzlingly radiant.
A glance at the ground revealed rolling dust and howling wind.
Cold light flickered in Fang Yuan's eyes.
The number of Heavenly Dao marks was growing!
He had originally obtained over three thousand Dao marks from refining Gu, but now they were approaching thirty-five hundred.
Alongside the growth of Heavenly Dao marks, the various other Dao marks within his immortal aperture were steadily diminishing.
This sight inevitably reminded Fang Yuan of what he had witnessed in the Mad Demon Lair.
In the second-to-last layer, he had observed the evolution of worlds. Countless worlds collapsed and condensed into Heavenly Dao marks. These Heavenly Dao marks connected with one another, or spread out on their own, transforming into brand-new worlds.
At this moment, the Sovereign Immortal Aperture had not been destroyed and converted into Heavenly Dao marks. But the Heavenly Dao marks were ceaselessly altering the various other Dao marks within the aperture.
Of course, the Heavenly Dao marks did not only increase. Sometimes they decreased as well—one Heavenly Dao mark dissolving into numerous other Dao marks that dispersed between heaven and earth.
Through these changes in Dao marks, the Heavenly Dao was effortlessly rewriting the entire environment of the Sovereign Immortal Aperture.
Just like the scene unfolding before Fang Yuan's eyes: the light points appearing in the sky proved that the Dao marks of Light were rapidly increasing. And the howling wind and rolling dust on the ground meant that the Dao marks of Wind and Earth were multiplying.
"If this continues, everything around the Thousand Wish Tree will turn into a desert." The trend was so obvious that Fang Yuan couldn't help but let out a cold laugh.
He had previously assumed the Thousand Wish Tree grew in a desert. Now it seemed that while this understanding wasn't exactly wrong, it was incomplete.
The Thousand Wish Tree was an ancient wild plant of the Human Dao. It absorbed human willpower and condensed fruit from it. The places best suited for its growth were bustling city centers and large cities—anywhere with abundant human willpower.
However, the Heavenly Dao did not want the Thousand Wish Tree to flourish. So the Heavenly Dao marks evolved, gradually creating an environment of blazing suns hanging high, sand and dust filling the sky, and total isolation from the world.
To survive, the Thousand Wish Tree had been forced to alter its nature, struggling to adapt to such harsh conditions.
But now it had been relocated by Fang Yuan into the Sovereign Immortal Aperture, where the immortal formation already contained a desert environment—letting it conform to its natural inclinations without perishing from a sudden environmental shift.
Beyond the immortal formation, however, the land was lush with water and grass, the soil fertile, and the sunlight gentle.
The immortal formation was not self-sealed. The Thousand Wish Tree's Human Dao aura was sensed by the Heavenly Dao. And these Heavenly Dao marks had not yet been mastered by Fang Yuan. They lacked intelligence, knew nothing of the gold within the immortal formation, so they spontaneously evolved the environment outside the formation, attempting to stifle the Thousand Wish Tree's development.
This was precisely what allowed Fang Yuan to discern the pattern.
"The Thousand Wish Tree fully matures in three hundred years, flowers once every six hundred years, and bears fruit once every nine hundred years. It produces exactly one thousand fruits—no more, no less."
"This understanding is universally accepted. But now it seems that isn't the whole truth."
"The Thousand Wish Tree has been suppressed by the Heavenly Dao. Its true potential is far greater!"
"In the future, if I continuously nourish it with human willpower while gradually improving its living conditions, its yield will undoubtedly increase dramatically!"
This was naturally a plan for the future. Fang Yuan had come to the Thousand Wish Tree now for an entirely different matter.
With a thought, the Boiling Fortune Pot manifested above his head.
The Seventh Transformation Boiling Fortune Pot—large as a water basin, entirely golden in color, enveloped in a layer of pure white luminescence, exuding an air of incomparable nobility.
The pot's rim was thick, the width of a thumb. Eight carved dragons adorned its exterior, their tails converging at the pot's base where they intertwined, then extended downward to form an eight-clawed stand. The pot's mouth gaped wide, and within it lay Fang Yuan's fortune—a drab, ashen hue.
Though the Boiling Fortune Pot was only of the Seventh Transformation, a somewhat low level, and could not contain all of Fang Yuan's fortune in a single vessel, it was enough to gauge the broader picture.