Chapter 549: History Repeats Itself

"Want to visit the Patriarch's place of enlightenment?" Qiu Jin'an was momentarily dazed upon hearing the words of the Elder of Transmission.

One hundred thousand years ago, when the Patriarch had just successfully achieved enlightenment, the fairyland was a forbidden zone, inaccessible to any below the Tribulation Transcendence Stage; as time flowed on and a hundred thousand years passed, countless young geniuses and peerless paragons of the Five Elements Sect had entered the fairyland seeking opportunities and insights to recreate the Patriarch's grand feat, yet not a single one had succeeded.

As for the immortals playing chess, that scene of history repeating itself had never appeared again, and even now, there was no definitive conclusion as to who those three ancient immortals actually were.

Qiu Jin'an lifted his gaze, just in time to see an ancient painting hanging on the wall, a painting overflowing with immortal aura, harboring infinite mysteries, incomprehensible and inscrutable.

Though it was an ancient painting, it was protected by a mysterious power, making it completely impossible to tell that this was a painting from one hundred thousand years ago.

In the ancient painting, two immortals sat on stone chairs, locked in contemplation; though their features were obscured, one could well imagine that these two immortals must be staring down in deep thought with slightly furrowed brows, while a third immortal bore firewood on his back, his eyes fixed immovably upon the chessboard, his appearance likewise unclear.

Upon the board, black and white were locked in a stalemate of pursuit and blockade, failing from beginning to end to connect into a single whole, the slaughter fierce and inextricably knotted.

Mister Tiankui was a Confucian cultivator whose painting skills verged on the divine; this was the scene he had captured in splashed ink after emerging from the fairyland, depicting what his eyes had beheld.

Beside this ancient painting hung another, likewise from the hand of Mister Tiankui.

In this other ancient painting, Mister Tiankui wore a white Confucian robe, high-spirited and exuding the full majesty of a great paragon, stepping beneath his feet two renowned, peerless figures of supreme might, who were none other than the ancestor of the Meng family and the ancestor of the Jiang family.

These two supreme paragons were covered in wounds, evident survivors of a life-and-death struggle, yet they had still proven no match for Mister Tiankui.

Mister Tiankui was a Confucian cultivator whose painting skills verged on the divine; this was a scene born entirely of his imagination.

Qiu Jin'an withdrew his gaze from these two paintings and, after a brief moment of reflection, granted his assent.

"It is likely the children have never encountered an immortal relic before and wish to broaden their horizons, which is understandable enough."

"Very well, then let me take them to have a look."

It was the Patriarch's place of enlightenment after all, and though it now retained only commemorative significance, it still demanded the respect it was due.

...

When Lu Yang and the other four learned they were permitted to enter the fairyland, and that Qiu Jin'an would personally lead them, smiles graced every one of their faces.

This was, after all, the legendary fairyland.

Among all publicly known secret realms, not a single one had been definitively confirmed as a fairyland, which was proof enough of its precious rarity.

Of course, to Lu Yang, who carried an entire immortal realm within his own body, a fairyland was nothing to marvel at.

Under Qiu Jin'an's guidance, the five of them quickly arrived at their destination.

The fairyland was situated at the boundary where the fire vein met the water vein.

"What a lofty mountain," Man Gu exclaimed in awe; the mountain peak towered into the clouds, its midsection obscured by white mists, making it impossible to discern its true height.

What was certain was that the height of this mountain was surely no less than that of Heaven's Gate Peak.

Qiu Jin'an offered a casual explanation: "The fairyland resides within a cave of the mountain; the Patriarch worried that merely moving the cave would disrupt the immortals' arrangement and the integrity of the fairyland, so he relocated the entire mountain."

To a cultivator of Mister Tiankui's caliber, moving mountains and filling lakes was a mere triviality.

Lu Yang noticed a ring of fencing surrounding the mountain, forming a faintly visible barrier, likely meant to protect the fairyland and prevent disciples from sneaking in to disturb the immortals' chess game.

Lu Yang's gaze caught half a very inconspicuous yellow talisman not far from the fence entrance, stubbornly affixed to the barrier and fluttering in the wind.

"The drawings on this yellow talisman form a highly sophisticated seal," the Immortal of Eternity remarked with a casual glance, reconstructing the entire talisman and its contents based on just that remaining half.

Lu Yang was startled at her words; could it be that the fairyland contained not only an immortal's chess game, but also some peerless, ancient demon?

A scene flashed through Lu Yang's mind: Mister Tiankui chanced upon a peerless demon and fought a desperate battle, only to lose by a single misstep; in his helplessness, he could only seal the demon within the fairyland, using the immortals' chess game to suppress it.

As time passed, the people of the Five Elements Sect forgot this piece of history, and the demon had already broken through the seal, escaping from the fairyland!

Or perhaps the demon possessed something akin to the Fruit of Karma, causing people to forget its very existence?

Observing Sect Master Qiu's reaction, however, it seemed he hadn't even noticed the existence of this half-shredded yellow talisman.

Lu Yang raised his hand, pointing at the inconspicuous half-talisman nearby, and asked, "Sect Master Qiu, what is that?"

"Is it a seal?"

"It is a confiscation strip."

Lu Yang: "..."

"The Patriarch was in a hurry when he moved the mountain back then and did so without the imperial court's permission; naturally, the court was displeased, so they sealed off the fairyland and slapped a confiscation strip on it."

"After paying the fine and bailing the Patriarch out, the court agreed to lease the mountain and the fairyland to our Five Elements Sect, rendering the strip useless."

"They didn't scrape the strip entirely clean back then, and later generations felt it was a historical relic of sorts, so it was preserved."

A confiscation strip capable of sealing a fairyland was, naturally, no ordinary object.

Seeing that the group had no further questions, Qiu Jin'an led them across the perimeter fence to the foot of the mountain.

The closer they drew to the mountain, the more they felt the oppressive weight it exerted; without lingering, the party stepped into a damp cavern.

The moment they entered the cave, the restless hearts of the group suddenly grew still, as if the state of mind of the immortals playing chess thirty thousand years ago was influencing them even now.

The cavern was silent, dark and deep, with only the hollow echoes of their footsteps reverberating through the passage.

The deeper they ventured, the drier the environment became, as though the inside and outside of the cave were two entirely different worlds.

"We are here," Qiu Jin'an said.

Presented before everyone was a stone table, with black and white pieces filling the entire board, leaving no empty space; counting carefully, neither side had managed to connect five pieces.

The outcome of the immortals' chess game was unexpectedly a draw.

The stone table, stone chairs, and Gobang pieces were all utterly mundane things; it was only because the immortals had used them for a century, infusing them with a trace of immortal aura, that these mortal objects could endure the long passage of epochs without being eroded by the river of time.

Qiu Jin'an shook his head in regret; as expected, no matter how many times one entered, it was impossible to recreate the scene of that bygone day.

The Patriarch's stroke of fortune was a serendipitous immortal encounter that could be sought but never demanded, impossible to duplicate.

What Qiu Jin'an failed to notice was that Lu Yang's eyes had gone completely blank, as if he had lost his consciousness.

Lu Yang's head dropped slightly, as if he were dozing off, before he suddenly snapped his head up; met by his eyes was a completely empty chessboard, alongside two strangers who were reaching into their token jars, preparing to play.

Meng Jingzhou, Tao Yaoye, and the others were all gone, leaving Lu Yang as the sole spectator of the game.

Lu Yang felt a jolt of alarm; how did this scene look exactly like a re-enactment of Mister Tiankui's tale?

Before he could react, he heard the two players converse.

The voices of the two players carried a peculiar power, capable of soothing the mind and focusing the spirit.

"Immortal Ying Tian, you first?"

"Very well."

With a crisp click, a white piece landed squarely in the center of the board.

Immortal Ying Tian had placed his piece.

The second update will be at eleven o'clock.

(End of chapter)