The Ascension Pool had been integrated into the World Gates after the great war a hundred thousand years ago to prevent anyone from breaking the curse in it. But when Fuxi visited from the great wilderness, he set up a plethora of plans and extracted the treasure’s essence from the World Gates, bringing it back with him. He took it into the chaos and quietly awaited Lu Yun’s arrival.

However, the actual treasure itself was still in the World Gates. If one wanted it, they would have to enter the gates proper.

The gates were an ultimate treasure born of the immortal dao and even more domineering than some connate treasures. Lu Yun hadn’t been able to do anything about them at first. But with the Ascension Pool’s core essence in hand, he could utilize it to summon the rest of the treasure to him instead of having to break into the gates.

Though someone had integrated the two treasures together to prevent the curse on great emperors from being broken, their efforts were null and void now that the curse was no more. There would be no further resistance to Lu Yun restoring the Ascension Pool and the ascent protocol.

The protocol could forcefully call immortals in the lower realms to the world of immortals. Though that would strengthen the world, it would also allow the yin spirits to completely pulverize the last ruined bits of the lower world, erasing the final tendril of the land’s energy.

……

The core essence of the Ascension Pool slowly floated out of Lu Yun’s hand, illuminating the premises with faint jade luster.

An answering glow sparkled from the World Gates. Something that resembled an ink stone flowed out of them, gradually becoming one with the core essence. This ink stone was the physical form of the Ascension Pool.

Everything had gone extraordinarily smoothly. Off to the side, Violetgrave lowered her poised hand with surprise. In her eyes, though the originator of this plan couldn’t stop Lu Yun, neither would it so easily allow him to obtain the Ascension Pool.

“It looks like the creatures of the chaos have made foolproof preparations. They expected that you would break their curse.” Worry flashed through Violetgrave’s pale violet eyes when she saw the treasure land in Lu Yun’s hand.

Clang!

Clang!

Before she could react, two crisp collisions rang through the locale as extremely profound auras flared before the World Gates.

Worldcarver and Heavenfall!

“What…” The nine celestial emperors gaped at the two weapons. They’d taken note of everything when Lu Yun battled the Dao Tree and the big akasha ghost. Worldcarver and Heavenfall had come from the hands of the two creators themselves!

But Lu Yun was taking them back out?

“Surely I’m setting off a chain reaction somewhere in extracting the Ascension Pool and rebuilding the ascent protocol. The presence of these two treasures might sway would-be attackers from harassing the World Gates.” With a quick thought, he used his nascent spirit in hell to project a copy of Pangu and God. They walked out the door to take up a position in front of the World Gates.

Lu Yun wasn’t so confident that he would leave without reinforcing this land. His projections were a product of the six paths of his nascent spirit, imparting to them the same cultivation level as him, but with sufficient strength to utilize the two treasures of the chaos.

Most importantly, Lu Yun trusted that if this outpost really was in danger of being overrun, Pangu and God could manifest through his projections at any time. He didn’t want to impose on the two creators, but he would have to in moments of great need.

……

He entered hell instead of returning to the world of immortals. If he wanted to rebuild the ascent protocol, the Ascension Pool would have to be situated someplace safe. Hell was the most suitable option as Lu Yun didn’t dare erect it in the Dao Academy.

Who knew what kind of strange and uncanny creatures might be mixed in with the immortals traveling through the treasure?

He had to keep an eye on this himself. With his nascent spirit holding down the fort and melding with the power of hell, he could inspect every life form in the netherworld. Nothing would slip past his eyes into the world of immortals.

Hell was no longer what it’d once been, particularly after Lu Yun returned from the great wilderness. He’d refined the entire netherworld with the strength of a near-creator, harmonizing the balance of yin and yang within hell. Now it was possible for living entities to enter and not die from the death and yin energy in the netherworld.

This was also why Silverblaze had been able to cultivate here for a hundred years.

However, the Ascension Pool belonged to the world of immortals. It was only temporarily placed here. Once the great disaster passed, he would return it to the world.

The core essence and physical form of the Ascension Pool slowly became one in front of the Gates of the Abyss. A bizarre ripple flowed out of the treasure, through the gates, and integrated into the world of immortals.

This was the ascent protocol, a vital part of the immortal dao.

Granted, it was the old protocol, one that required a life form to ascend to the world of immortals after they became an immortal. Under the old protocol, it was impossible for denizens of the world of immortals to visit any other world.

The world of immortals a hundred thousand years ago was essentially a giant tomb. Only entrance was permitted, and that was the principle around which the ascent protocol was formed.

The world’s layout of burial had been destroyed now, but it was still a tomb, albeit a ruined one. If Lu Yun wanted to thoroughly upend the status quo, he would also have to modify this ascent protocol.

The world of immortals was an all-encompassing term. If interpreted narrowly, it referenced this planet of the nine majors, ten lands, four immortal seas, and four great oceans. If interpreted broadly, it was the realm of this planet and the stars beyond.

The world of immortals sat at the highest peak of this realm, with the multiverse stretching out beyond the local cosmos. This was a marked difference to the age of the great wilderness. The realm now was infinitely more vast than the great wilderness, and the planets it produced infinitely more complex.

Just as Fuxi had said, this realm continuously ate away at the chaos and constantly grew stronger. It would ultimately evolve into a world without end if given free reign to expand.

The current world of immortals and its night sky was derived from the previous world of celestials and its night sky. The rest of the multiverse was a result of hundreds of millions of years of evolution in this realm, one propelled by the great dao.

Under the primitive great dao, there was only the great wilderness and world of celestials. Once human dao was established and perfected, the realm took a step forward and crept further into the chaos, giving rise to more planets and galaxies. When it came to the immortal dao, another six hundred million years passed for the rest of the multiverse to form.

But in the eyes of the immortals, these newly born planets were the lower worlds. Though they knew of these worlds’ existence, very few of them had ever visited. They didn’t know what other galaxies or the multiverse looked like.

The cosmos outside the world of immortals and most of the multiverse had been destroyed by the relentless tide of dead spirits. Lu Yun now wanted to build a new ascent protocol to not only allow those of the lower worlds to rise up, but for immortals of his world to visit them.

It’d never been his plan to give asylum to every single life form out in the multiverse. The immortal dao was the dao of all living things. If the lower worlds lacked life, then the immortal dao would never be able to reach there. These planets would then truly die, and akasha ghosts could do whatever they wanted in the majority of the universe.