Chapter 9: Heaven Never Seals Off All Roads

Looking at Kou Hong's confession on the table, Li Fan felt somewhat disheartened.

Kou Hong hadn't lied to him; he truly didn't know a way to allow Mortals to leave the Immortal Extinction Land.

"Immortal Extinction Land…" After five Reincarnations and three hundred years of anticipation, it all turned into an unattainable bubble.

The dream of Immortal cultivation and eternal life shattered, and Li Fan seemed to have aged completely overnight.

Not only physically, but also mentally.

"Immortal Extinction Land…" He silently recited the name again, an endless unwillingness surging in his heart.

"Why did I transmigrate and be born in such a place? If I had transmigrated to the outside Cultivation World, with the power of [Huan Zhen] to simulate Reincarnation infinitely, I would surely have hope for eternal life. But hatefully, it had to be this Immortal Extinction Land!"

The information from Kou Hong's confession flashed through Li Fan's mind again.

The so-called Immortal Extinction Land, as the name suggests, is a place where Immortals are extinct. Thousands of years ago, the ancient Cultivation World underwent a great upheaval.

Initially, it was just a plague sweeping through the entire Human Realm, and no Immortal Cultivator paid it any heed.

But later, when an Immortal Cultivator accidentally contracted this unknown plague, things spiraled completely out of control.

After infecting this Immortal Cultivator, the plague seemed to have been inexplicably strengthened, becoming capable of spreading among Cultivators.

The mode of transmission was none other than the Spiritual Qi that Cultivators relied on for survival.

The plague spread rapidly throughout the entire Cultivation World via the Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi. Immortal Cultivators infected with this plague would, at best, experience a regression in cultivation and a drop in Realm; at worst, they would lose all their cultivation overnight, becoming no different from Mortals, and then die within a few days, returning their Dao to heaven.

With the massive deaths of Immortal Cultivators, a sense of despair began to spread among the Cultivator community.

In desperation, some Immortal Cultivators vented their anger on the source of it all—the Mortals.

Thus, a large-scale massacre began.

Facing the lofty Immortal Masters, Mortals had almost no power to resist and could only be slaughtered.

But soon, this massacre was forcibly halted.

Not because the Cultivators had a change of heart, but because they were horrified to discover that as they slaughtered and large numbers of Mortals died, the plague within these Mortals did not disappear with their deaths. Instead, as if unbound, it spread entirely through the Spiritual Qi permeating the world.

For a time, the concentration of plague in the Cultivation World skyrocketed.

This, in turn, led to the fall of even more Immortal Cultivators.

With no other choice, the Immortal Cultivators abandoned this slaughter of Mortals.

But sitting idly by was clearly not the style of Immortal Cultivators. On one hand, a group of Immortal Cultivators began researching ways to treat and resist this plague. On the other hand, the Cultivators proposed the infamous "Great Migration Plan."

Although this plan faced opposition from a considerable number of Immortal Cultivators at its inception, most Cultivators voted in favor for their own survival.

The so-called "Great Migration Plan" was based on the following considerations:

The Mortals could neither be killed, nor was there any prospect of finding a complete cure for this plague in the foreseeable future. If Mortals were allowed to reproduce freely, as the plague increased, the Immortal Cultivators would find life increasingly difficult.

Moreover, this strange plague could only spread through Spiritual Qi. Thus, a seemingly obvious solution was proposed.

Exile all Mortals from the Cultivation World to nearby Small Worlds or fragmented grotto-heavens that lacked Spiritual Qi, and then use Formations to permanently seal them off, preventing these Mortals from returning.

This would solve the problem of Mortals once and for all, allowing the Cultivators to focus on researching ways to combat the plague.

After all, there were nearly infinite undeveloped Small Worlds, so there was no worry about not having enough space for these Mortals.

Thus, under the unified will of the entire Cultivation World, all Mortals in the Cultivation World began a migration that lasted hundreds of years.

As for how many Mortals would die during the migration over these centuries, that was not within the consideration of these Immortal Cultivators. After all, in the face of the Cultivators' power, Mortals had no room to resist.

And so, after hundreds of years of great migration, all Mortals from the Cultivation World were relocated and dispersed to various surrounding Small Worlds. Nearly a thousand years later, the concentration of plague in the Cultivation World finally dropped to a relatively low level.

Over the millennium, through continuous research, the Immortal Cultivators finally found a way to purify this plague.

It then took several thousand more years for the Immortal Cultivators to completely eliminate the threat of this plague.

However, to the Cultivators' embarrassment, this plague proved to be tenacious, lurking hidden within the Bloodline of Mortals.

Originally, the entire world had no Mortals, but not every offspring born from the union of Immortal Cultivators had the Aptitude to cultivate immortality.

Thus, over time, a large number of Mortals were born again in the world. All these Mortals carried traces of this plague within them.

And because this plague had a special lethality towards Immortal Cultivators, the descendants of Mortals who wished to cultivate immortality had to cleanse the plague from their bodies.

Over time, this plague became synonymous with the distinction between Immortals and Mortals, and people named it the Immortal-Mortal Miasma.

The rampant spread of the Immortal-Mortal Miasma had left a huge psychological shadow on all Immortal Cultivators. To prevent the Immortal-Mortal Miasma from making a comeback, the Cultivators established an unwritten rule to avoid, as much as possible, the places where these Mortals had been exiled.

Over time, these places became known as the Immortal Extinction Lands.

There were countless Immortal Extinction Lands of various sizes, and very few Immortal Cultivators were willing to take the immense risk of entering these places.

It was already fortunate that Li Fan had encountered two.

Now, since these two Immortal Cultivators had no way for Mortals to leave, how could Li Fan expect another, higher-Realm Immortal Cultivator to break in?

Moreover, as a Mortal, his lifespan was limited. Even if he could continuously simulate Reincarnation, it would only repeat within the bounds of his lifespan.

This year, he was already seventy years old, and his physiological lifespan limit was eighty-six.

In these sixteen years, the possibility of encountering another Immortal Cultivator was essentially zero.

Given this, how could Li Fan not feel despair?

He had clearly seen the hope of cultivating immortality and seeking eternal life, only to realize it was all a false joy in the end.

Could it be that he was truly destined to repeat the life of a Mortal, lifetime after lifetime?

Li Fan truly couldn't accept it.

The path to eternal life was right before his eyes, within reach, yet also far away, beyond hope.

How could Li Fan be willing to accept this?

Thinking of everything he had experienced through several Reincarnations, nearly three hundred years of bitter waiting, Li Fan was unwilling to give up the path to eternal life.

Was there really no way?

Suddenly, like a bolt of lightning piercing the fog, Li Fan thought of something he had overlooked before.

Thousands of years ago, how had the large groups of Mortals migrated here?

Although the Small Worlds were adjacent to the Cultivation World, they were still different worlds.

Surely these Mortals didn't walk here, did they?

There must have been some tools to carry them over, right?

Are these tools still around now?

If he found these tools, could he then travel to the Cultivation World?

Even if it was just a faint possibility, it gave Li Fan hope for cultivation.

His mood became excited, and he immediately headed to the prison where Kou Hong was held.

He wanted to ask Kou Hong to verify the feasibility of his idea.