Chapter 68: A Millennium-Long Dream, the Realm of Integration

When Jiang Xiuyuan led Jiang Yiyi and Jiang Xiaobai through that familiar, invisible barrier that isolated the inner and outer worlds, stepping once again into the courtyard of the Returning Ruins Abode, a tranquility that seemed to permeate the very depths of their souls instantly enveloped them.

The storms of a thousand years in the outside world, along with the shifting tides of mortal affairs, seemed to have nothing to do with this place.

In the courtyard, the bluestone pavement remained immaculate. The branches and leaves of the ancient tea tree were even more lush than a millennium ago, with every single leaf appearing to harbor a faint, ethereal glow. The stone table and stools beneath the tree sat in their original positions, as though they had just left them only yesterday. The bamboo building stood in quiet solitude, every blade of grass and every tree exuding an eternal and unchanging peace.

This place was a safe harbor in the currents of time.

"Father, we are home," Jiang Yiyi said softly, her cool, limpid eyes filled with an indelible, tender attachment.

"Yes, we are home." Jiang Xiuyuan took a deep, lingering breath. The familiar fragrance of grass and trees in the air allowed his mind and spirit, tense for nearly a thousand years, to relax completely.

A wanderer returns home; where the heart finds peace is the native land.

Jiang Xiaobai transformed into a snow-white fox, frolicked around the courtyard in a joyful circle, and then expertly leaped up onto the thickest branch of the ancient tea tree, curling herself up into a ball and letting out a tiny yawn. This was her favorite throne; having spent a thousand years without taking human form, she thoroughly enjoyed savoring the present moment.

Jiang Xiuyuan did not rush into seclusion.

He first spent several months reinforcing and upgrading the array formations spanning the entire Returning Ruins Abode. With his elevated realm of cultivation, his understanding of array Dao was no longer what it used to be. He integrated all his insights into arrays—gleaned from the East Sea Dragon Palace, the altars of the Western Holy See, and his travels along the way—into this grand formation.

The newly forged guardian array not only increased its concealment and defensive capabilities a hundredfold, but it also incorporated many profound functions such as "Spirit Gathering," "Purification," "Early Warning," and even "Temporal Micro-adjustment." Today's Returning Ruins Abode, even if visited in person by a cultivator at the Tribulation Transcendence stage, would find it utterly impossible to pry even the slightest secret from it without Jiang Xiuyuan's permission.

After finishing all of this, he finally spoke to Jiang Yiyi: "Yiyi, my seclusion this time is aimed at breaking through to the Integration stage. It may take a hundred years at the shortest, or perhaps longer than we can anticipate. I have already transferred a portion of the array's core permissions to you. You and Xiaobai should cultivate diligently right here, and do not venture out into the world casually."

"Understood, Father." Jiang Yiyi nodded solemnly. She knew that the Integration stage was a formidable chasm on the path of cultivation, its significance no less critical than a mortal undergoing heavenly tribulation to attain immortality. She must protect her father, and from this day onward, she would also begin practicing the sword to shield him.

Jiang Xiuyuan walked into the quiet chamber of the bamboo building and sat cross-legged.

Instead of immediately assaulting the cultivation bottleneck, he first sank his consciousness into his sea of awareness, beginning to organize and reflect upon the experiences of the past millennium and more.

From his initial arrival in this realm to the peaceful life in Bluestone Town; from instructing Yiyi to his cooperation with the Hundred Herbs Valley; to his ten-thousand-mile journey wandering the Eastern Domain... Scene after scene, event after event, flowed slowly through the depths of his heart like a unfolding scroll.

His Dao was the Dao of Guardianship, the Dao of Order.

This path could not be traversed simply by sitting in dry meditation and realization. It required entering the mortal world, experiencing life firsthand, witnessing the joys and sorrows of sentient beings, and feeling the rise and fall of civilizations.

These nearly a thousand years of wandering were precisely the greatest tempering and validation of his state of mind.

When the very last trace of stray thought was soothed and his state of mind became as clear and untroubled as a mirror, Jiang Xiuyuan began to circulate his cultivation technique.

In an instant, the spiritual energy of the entire Returning Ruins mountain range boiled over!

Boundless spiritual energy, as if summoned by an emperor, transformed into visible, multi-colored torrents that surged madly toward the Returning Ruins Abode, forming a colossal spiritual vortex spanning a hundred miles in radius.

Outside the abode, this heaven-shaking, earth-shattering phenomenon was perfectly concealed by the grand array, without leaking even the slightest trace.

Inside the quiet chamber, Jiang Xiuyuan's body seemed to have transformed into a bottomless black hole. At this moment, his physical form and primordial spirit began a profound fusion of the deepest level in a mysterious and mystical manner.

Integration meant thoroughly merging the primordial spirit—which had communicated with heaven and earth and verified its own Dao—with the thoroughly refined physical body, leaving them completely undivided and indistinguishable. From then on, the body was the Dao, and the Dao was the body. Every movement and action would invoke the laws of heaven and earth, with words becoming law and carrying boundless might.

This was a long and perilous process.

Time slipped away silently.

Spring departed and autumn arrived, cold winters gave way to scorching summers.

The leaves of the ancient tea tree in the courtyard turned green then yellow, and yellow then green, repeating through countless cycles.

Jiang Yiyi and Jiang Xiaobai stood guard quietly all the while. Jiang Yiyi meditated and practiced her cultivation every day, comprehending the heavens and the earth. Under such a dense concentration of spiritual energy, her cultivation realm was also advancing by leaps and bounds, gradually approaching the threshold of the Soul Formation stage. As for Jiang Xiaobai, she spent most of her time sleeping, occasionally waking up to chase butterflies in the courtyard or resting her head on Jiang Yiyi's lap, looking exactly as she had when they first met at Penglai.

The years were peaceful and serene, feeling almost eternal.

...

A full five hundred years had passed since Jiang Xiuyuan entered seclusion.

On this day, Jiang Yiyi, who was meditating beneath the tree, suddenly felt a stir in her heart and opened her eyes.

She saw that the space surrounding the quiet chamber of the bamboo building, which had been tightly sealed for half a millennium, was beginning to show slight ripples like water waves. A vast, majestic aura that seemed to merge seamlessly with the entire universe slowly permeated outward from the quiet chamber.

This aura was no longer as sharp and restrained as it used to be, but had instead become incomparably profound and harmonious. It felt as though simply by sitting there, he was the center of heaven and earth, the very embodiment of the laws of this realm.

"Father..." A trace of joy flashed across Jiang Yiyi's eyes.

Father had succeeded.

At that very moment, the spiritual power within her body—which had long reached a critical tipping point—was drawn by this harmonious Dao rhyme and erupted with a roar!

An equally powerful aura surged into the sky from Jiang Yiyi's body. Behind her materialized a towering phantom holding a giant sword that pierced through the heavens and the earth, radiating an supreme, unmatched sharpness capable of cleaving everything asunder!

The Soul Formation realm was attained naturally as the conditions matured!

Father and daughter achieved the great leap in the hierarchy of life at the very same moment.

A few months later, when all anomalous phenomena subsided, the door of the quiet chamber slowly opened.

Jiang Xiuyuan stepped out from within.

His outward appearance remained that of a refined and courteous young man, but his entire temperament had undergone a heaven-shaking transformation. If he had previously resembled an peerless divine weapon concealed within its scabbard, he now appeared as the fertile earth bearing mountains and rivers, as the boundless firmament embracing the sun, moon, and stars.

His gaze was gentle yet profound, as though capable of piercing through the long river of time.

"Yiyi, congratulations." He looked at his daughter, his eyes filled with gratification.

"Father, congratulations to you too." A rare smile bloomed on Jiang Yiyi's face as well. She could sense that after breaking through to the Soul Formation stage, her comprehension of heaven and earth had increased by more than tenfold. Yet even so, when facing her father, she still felt like a tiny stream gazing up at a vast, boundless sea of stars.

Father and daughter exchanged a smile, and everything needed to be said was understood without words.

After emerging from seclusion, Jiang Xiuyuan habitually swept his divine sense toward Bluestone Town outside the mountains.

With this single glance, he was taken slightly aback.

The former "Chen Family Market" had vanished entirely. In its place stood a much more prosperous yet chaotic gathering place for cultivators, jointly administered by several minor sects and clans, with constant friction and clashes among them.

As for the once-prestigious Lin family of the Beast-Taming Valley, their magnificent estate no longer existed. In its original location, only a few dilapidated courtyards remained, housing some Lin descendants with impure spiritual roots whose highest cultivation was no higher than the mid-Qi Condensation stage, making a living by doing odd jobs for other cultivators.

Jiang Xiuyuan's divine sense lingered for a moment before a solitary grave at the back of the Lin family estate.

Carved upon the tombstone were three characters: "Lin Zixun."

That former Nascent Soul ancestor had ultimately failed to withstand the erosion of time, passing away more than two hundred years ago. With his death, his descendants possessing mediocre aptitude and lacking a powerful protector, the Lin family had inevitably drifted toward decline.

Going from a powerful aristocratic clan to barely scraping by today—all within a mere two hundred years.

Such was the destined fate of cultivation families. The rise of a single individual could bring hundreds of years of prosperity. Yet the decline of a single generation was enough to let past brilliance scatter like smoke and vanish into thin air.

Jiang Xiuyuan merely looked on silently before withdrawing his divine sense.

He did not intervene.

To forcefully interfere would only disrupt their own causality and destiny.

"To view the rise and fall with indifference is to attain true freedom," Jiang Xiuyuan sighed softly, turning his gaze back toward his own courtyard.