The two had previously deduced certain things, so they joined forces, pushing ever deeper into the Roaring Qi Mural, seeking to make contact with the enemies of the Heavenly Court concealed in its innermost reaches.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
But no matter how hard Shen Shang and Fang Tichang struggled, they could not reach the deepest layer.
The Roaring Qi Mural's territory was vast. Fang Tichang's strength had already hit a bottleneck, and though Shen Shang possessed Eighth Transformation cultivation, he was severely restricted here — the gap between immortal and mortal was barely perceptible.
The only consolation was that Shen Shang's madness had been greatly alleviated in this place. Since entering the mural world, he had not suffered a single episode.
According to Shen Shang's deductions, the dense Human Dao environment here was what had helped him.
"Sigh, the Ten of Human Path are gone. Without their help, when will the two of us alone manage to cut through this mural and reach the target imprisoned at its deepest layer?" Fang Tichang sighed heavily.
Shen Shang was about to reply when his expression suddenly changed. "What is this?!"
Immediately after, Fang Tichang also sensed the aura of an Eighth Transformation Immortal Gu, rapidly spreading toward them.
The two abandoned the Roaring Qi Mural without a second thought and rushed back to the town center of the original mural.
At the same moment, they both saw an Eighth Transformation Immortal Gu hovering high in the sky, blazing with brilliance.
"Divine Emperor City has been hiding its depths all along — to possess such a legendary Immortal Gu!"
"If my guess is correct, this must be the Learning Gu explicitly recorded in the Records of the Human Ancestor!"
They exchanged words, each seeing the shock mirrored in the other's eyes.
"The Learning Gu is a Human Dao Immortal Gu. This is likely the highest-Transformation Human Dao Immortal Gu in existence today." Fang Tichang marveled.
"I understand now!" Shen Shang's eyes suddenly flashed with insight. "The reason Beast Tamers and Qi Refiners could appear before — it must have been the Learning Gu operating secretly behind the scenes. Of course, it's certainly not just this one Gu alone; there must be a killer move involved as well. Immortal Venerable Yuan Lian's vision was remarkably far-reaching, his arrangements remarkably deep."
Fang Tichang frowned. "But right now, why is the Learning Gu activating on its own? Could something have happened in the outside world?"
Shen Shang was troubled — he had no knowledge of events beyond the mural.
But he quickly realized: "This is a once-in-an-age opportunity! The Learning Gu must be one of Divine Emperor City's core components. Regardless of what change occurred outside, Divine Emperor City has extracted a core piece for independent use. That means its originally flawless structure now has a gap. We might be able to find that gap and exploit it!"
"Brilliant!" Fang Tichang's pupils dilated as he fixed Shen Shang with a burning gaze. "Let us join forces and probe Divine Emperor City's secrets with everything we have."
Meanwhile.
The Demonic Madness Abyss.
Eighth level.
The Green Lotus Dao Ground, atop Book Mountain.
Fairy Yuxiu sat cross-legged at the summit of Book Mountain. Within her immortal aperture, the radiance of the Learning Gu from Divine Emperor City spread outward, combining with Fairy Yuxiu's other Immortal Gu to form a Human Dao killer move —
Learning Without Limits!
Gu Masters lined the slopes and base of Book Mountain.
The killer move's radiance glowed a pale blue, cascading downward and enveloping every last one of them.
Their bodies trembled violently.
"What is this?!"
The assembled immortals' faces drained of color, their minds shaken to the core.
Streams of ineffable Dao profundity, like a clear spring murmuring over smooth stones, flowed into the depths of every immortal's heart.
The path realms of these Gu Masters began climbing steadily!
"There truly exists such an exquisite killer move in this world — had I not experienced it firsthand, I could never have imagined it!"
"This is a sage imparting the Dao! The sage's compassion!"
Many Gu Immortals shed tears of emotion on the spot. Some sank to their knees on the ground, bowing in reverence toward Fairy Yuxiu at the mountain's peak.
These Gu Immortals were all of unusual backgrounds, yet what they received was orthodox Gu cultivation methodology.
They understood better than anyone how difficult it was to advance one's path realm!
Before them lay absolutely a once-in-a-millennium opportunity of legendary proportions!
"In this world, beyond dreams, there truly are other means to directly elevate one's realm. Human Dao… Immortal Venerable Yuan Lian had already calculated this far ahead. The Heavenly Court's development of Human Path was absolutely the right choice!" Qin Dingling's heart surged with excitement.
The Heavenly Court members led by her sat in a circle, closing their eyes in quiet contemplation.
Fairy Yuxiu kept her eyes gently shut, peering down through the narrow slits of her lashes.
Sweat beaded on her forehead as she poured every single thought in her mind into sustaining the move.
Learning Without Limits was a strategic-level Human Dao measure. Its benefit to a superpower was beyond imagination.
Its greatest advantage lay in the fact that it did not consume the true meaning of the Gu Immortal casting the move — instead, it generated true meaning within the hearts of others.
Gu Masters of the Rules Path and Wisdom Path were more adept at extracting their own true meaning than those of other paths.
When other Gu Masters absorbed that true meaning, their corresponding path realms would advance rapidly.
But the Gu Masters who extracted their true meaning would see their corresponding realms plummet — an enormous loss that was nearly impossible to reverse.
This was precisely why true meaning was so scarce in the world.
Learning Without Limits relied on Fairy Yuxiu's own realm, the Book Mountain secret realm, and the Learning Gu to form the killer move.
This move could create brand-new true meaning within the hearts of those it struck.
These freshly minted true meanings were instantly absorbed by the Gu Masters, producing corresponding leaps in their respective path realms.
This was the killer move's greatest advantage — it did not deplete the casting Gu Immortal's own realm.
But this same advantage was also its weakness.
Because the true meaning created by the move was subject to limitations.
Those limitations were the Gu Masters who were struck.
A Gu Master's aptitude, talent, comprehension, and personal experience and wisdom — all of these constrained the true meaning they could produce.
Different people grasped different amounts from the same Dao profundity. When they reached the limits of their comprehension and could not extract any further insight, the Gu Masters would begin experiencing illusions.
Sure enough, before long, some Gu Masters on Book Mountain began to hallucinate.
Some saw golden lotuses erupting from the ground, some saw azure rain falling from the heavens, some saw blood water spreading as bone forests grew in its wake, and some saw five-colored radiance forming the shape of phoenixes that cried out shrilly.