The sky was dark and gloomy, great winds howling.
An invisible, majestic force of heaven and earth lifted Tai Bai Yunsheng gently upward.
He laughed wildly, his white beard dancing frantically in the wind. Gone was his usual gentle and benevolent demeanor—his face was all madness and contortion.
The entire Holy Palace was thrown into panic. Gu Masters scrambled in terror, converging into several massive streams of people, all fleeing outward.
Only after fleeing tens of thousands of miles did people cautiously come to a halt.
The stronger Gu Masters occupied hilltops or hovered directly in the air, activating their scouting Gu to gaze at the scene above the Holy Palace with varied expressions.
The remaining Gu Masters all craned their necks to watch Tai Bai Yunsheng in the sky, their faces reflecting admiration, awe, devotion, worry, and envy.
Word of Tai Bai Yunsheng's ascension to Gu Immortal had already spread like wildfire.
Ascension!
This once impossibly distant word was now playing out before everyone's very eyes.
"Incredible! Tai Bai Yunsheng hasn't even activated any Gu, yet he's already triggered a change in the heavens!" Many Gu Masters cried out in astonishment as they watched the turbulent winds and clouds in the sky.
Soon, the wave of cries threatened to crest once more.
This was because it wasn't just the sky that was shifting—the very earth beneath their feet had begun to tremble ever so slightly.
At first it was just a thin layer of dust, but soon enormous plumes of gray smoke rose from the ground.
"This is the stirring of earth energy!"
"According to our clan's records, for a Gu Master to ascend, the first step is to shatter the orifices! Once the orifices are shattered, one can draw upon heaven energy and earth energy!"
Yelü Sang, Hei Loulan, and the others hailed from supreme clans—they knew far more than the average person. And now, what they saw before them shook them to their core.
The first step of ascension was shattering the orifices.
One would use True Essence to bombard the Empty Orifices with everything one had, destroying them completely, reducing them to powder. In doing so, the sealed orifices that had been enclosed by crystalline walls would become openings in the Gu Master's body.
"Just this first step alone requires tremendous courage. Once the orifices are completely shattered, there is no turning back." Gu Family Patriarch Gu Guolong sighed.
"Ascension is impossibly difficult. Not one in a hundred survives! Tai Bai Yunsheng truly has extraordinary courage to dare take this step. He has our deepest admiration." Nie Family Patriarch Nie Yaqing's face was full of admiration.
Hei Loulan's expression was complex.
He knew the truth behind this—Tai Bai Yunsheng's ascension had likely been spurred, at least in part, by his own actions.
"It was precisely because of me that Tai Bai Yunsheng was pushed to the brink, risking ascension with his mental state in shambles. Fortunately, while I'm well-versed in the texts, I also desperately need to witness this with my own eyes. Tai Bai Yunsheng's ascension will be of immense reference and help to me. But if he fails, that's one thing. If he truly becomes a Gu Immortal, how should I treat him then?"
At this thought, Hei Loulan furrowed his brow, a headache settling in.
Fang Yuan sat atop the Azure Sky Wolf King, surrounded by the Azure Sky Wolf pack.
"Ascension..." His gaze was deep and unfathomable, tinged with both excitement and nostalgia.
Activating the Luck Observation Gu to look again, he could see Tai Bai Yunsheng's fortune—it blazed like fire, already a vivid crimson like a sunset ablaze, now burning even more fiercely, as if raging!
"His fortune burns bright. In his previous life, he successfully ascended, and in this life there should be little problem either." Fang Yuan nodded to himself.
Unlike Hei Loulan's hesitation and indecision, Fang Yuan already had a firm plan regarding Tai Bai Yunsheng's ascension.
But as he continued to observe, the Luck Observation Gu could not bear the burden and was actually damaged.
His own eyes began to sting with a burning pain.
Fang Yuan immediately ceased activating it, unsurprised.
Tai Bai Yunsheng had already shattered his orifices, drawing upon the heaven and earth energy within a radius of ten thousand miles. Activating Gu within this range would inevitably trigger a chain reaction, causing violent turbulence in the ambient energy and generating a backlash force.
If one persisted stubbornly and forced their use, even Immortal Gu could be damaged or even destroyed. Ordinary Gu went without saying.
This was precisely why Fang Yuan had never considered using Gu to secretly sabotage or restrain Tai Bai Yunsheng at this moment.
Acting rashly now could very well backfire on himself.
In the span of a few breaths, black clouds roiled across the sky, forming a colossal vortex.
In correspondence, yellow-brown dust and smoke churned ceaselessly on the ground, forming a matching vortex as well.
"This Tai Bai Yunsheng has accumulated such vast reserves and such tremendous vitality that he's attracted this much heaven and earth energy! This spectacle is even more magnificent than that of my clan's Supreme Elder." Yelü Sang's heart pounded at the sight.
Tai Bai Yunsheng possessed an Immortal Path legacy. He had traversed the Northern Plains his entire life, his experiences extraordinarily rich, and he had now nearly lived out his full span—his accumulated reserves were utterly profound.
The two massive vortexes spanned a hundred miles.
Tai Bai Yunsheng looked upward at the violent, majestic vortexes, like the gaping maws of colossal beasts.
Compared to them, Tai Bai Yunsheng's body was minuscule, like a gnat beside a pond.
Yet Tai Bai Yunsheng continued to laugh wildly without cease.
"Come, come!" he roared, his body trembling—there was fear, excitement, and release all at once. Even failure, for him, would be a liberation.
As if hearing his call, the vortexes, having gathered momentum for a moment, began to slowly rotate.
Heaven and earth, the two great vortexes rumbled and turned like millstones.
In the sky, the black-cloud vortex crackled with lightning and rolled with thunder. On the ground, the dust vortex billowed purple smoke and rumbled with explosive roars.
As if grinding away, the black-cloud millstone showered down a stream of clear, radiant energy, while from the dust millstone below, a current of golden energy surged upward.
These were heaven energy and earth energy!