Throughout the history of the Eight Sects, most True Disciples are selected and promoted from among the Foundation Establishment cultivators.

They either serve their term and abdicate voluntarily, or they are challenged and unseated by their successors.

Gu Changling came from the Lower Courtyard and wasn’t from the Direct Lineage of the Eight Monarchs’ descendants. However, his foundation was profound and his innate talent was extraordinary. He was noticed early on by True Monarch Luo and secretly cultivated.

Later, at the Dragon Gate Assembly, Gu Changling outshone all his rivals and made a name for himself.

Once he reached the Qi Cultivation Twelfth Layer, he was promoted to the upper courtyard, breaking with convention.

A few years later, with his First Grade True Qi and a superior Dao Foundation, he successfully ascended to the Flying Foundation Establishment Realm and officially entered the Gen Peak Grotto-Heaven.

’A Foundation Establishment True Master enjoys a lifespan of five hundred years. As long as they don’t reincarnate prematurely, they gain another hundred years of life for every layer they ascend. They’re said to be immortal for a millennium.’

Jiang Yi’s eyes flickered, his thoughts turbulent.

’Gu Changling has reached the Fourth Layer of Foundation Establishment. He has only been cultivating for five hundred years, so he still has three hundred years left. That’s enough time to polish his Merit, achieve Perfection in the five techniques, and seek to attain the Golden Position...’

An outstanding figure like him was exactly the kind of vessel for the Dao that an Ancestral Sect would value most.

Thus, when the previous Daoist, Ning Hechu, perished, the calls for Gu Changling to fill the vacancy were extremely high.

If Jiang Yi hadn’t appeared out of nowhere, Gu Changling—backed by True Monarch Luo, supported by the disciples of Gen Peak, and endorsed by the descendants of the Eight Monarchs—would not have been without hope of presiding over the Changming Heavenly Pond.

This was precisely why many disciples from the Eight Peaks’ Grotto-Heavens believed that Gu Changling should harbor a mortal enmity toward Daoist Jiang.

Obstructing one’s path to the Dao is a far greater offense than killing their parents!

But Gu Changling did not act as the vanguard blade. Instead, he gracefully declined the Yellow Dragon’s Gall gifted by True Monarch Luo, indicating his desire to stay out of the turmoil.

’Based on the fragments I obtained when I beg the Celestial Book, combined with the fact that Huang Yuanzhou was instigated by the Luo clan to try and kill me at Crouching Dragon Ravine, and Gu Changling’s subsequent reaction...’

Jiang Yi’s mind was sharp. He quickly straightened out the sequence of events and arrived at a conjecture:

’Gu Changling was cast aside as a pawn by True Monarch Luo of Gen Peak Grotto-Heaven.’

His Divine Sense was fused with a golden attribute, allowing him to borrow a sliver of the Shao Yang Divine Technique to illuminate his body and mind, perceiving the hidden and subtle.

That was how he was able to notice that something was off about Gu Changling.

"But who could have injured Senior Brother Gu?"

Shao Guansu, who was managing the formation flag, was startled. Gu Changling stood proudly above all the True Disciples of the Eight Peaks’ Grotto-Heavens; how could his Dao Body have been damaged?

Jiang Yi pondered this silently. He had a suspicion but didn’t voice it, only letting out a quiet sigh.

’A True Disciple of an Ancestral Sect, a vessel for the Dao with the potential to attain the Golden Position, still can’t escape being treated as mere "material"?’

’To be free and at ease, without ties or restraints... Such simple words, yet a goal of immense difficulty.’

After his moment of reflection, Jiang Yi turned his gaze to the magical mirror. Within the Skandha-Avicci Heaven, the two True Disciples had already begun to unleash their Daoist Techniques.

Gu Changling’s expression was composed, his spirit full and his energy ample. He showed no sign of injury whatsoever.

He was seen standing on a plume of long smoke, positioned mid-air. A turbid yellow brilliance radiated from his body, and in an instant, over a hundred mountain peaks rose from the ground, stretching out into the distance.

Witnessing this scene, Yue Ziqi praised him in his heart. ’As expected of the top True Disciple who looks down upon the Innate Sect’s Eight Peaks’ Grotto-Heavens. His first move is so vast and majestic, its aura soaring to the heavens.’

"Daoist Yue, if you please."

Gu Changling performed a Daoist salute, then formed a hand seal and grasped. A powerful terrestrial qi surged up like a flock of writhing dragons, coiling and soaring into the sky!

The Cultivation Technique he practiced was one of the Innate Sect’s nine skills, the Great Society Treasure Jun True Skill.

Although it was related to the Earth Virtue, that path had been blocked off by the various Daoist Lineages and was no longer passable.

Therefore, following True Monarch Luo’s guidance, Gu Changling used the "mountain form" to cultivate Merit, one of the Five Virtues.

As the saying goes, the Gen trigram symbolizes the mountain. Overlapping peaks connect, representing combination, connection, and union.

True Monarch Luo of Gen Peak Grotto-Heaven’s honorific title was True Monarch of the Unbroken Mountain Transformation.

"Clouds emerging from the symbolic mountain, an endless, unbroken chain. I have long heard that the Innate Sect’s True Monarch of the Unbroken Mountain Transformation has completely altered the Earth Virtue True Skill. Today, it seems I will have my eyes opened."

True Monarch Guangzhao Jinghai stood above the Skandha-Avicci Heaven, a strange look in his eyes.

’That True Inheritance Gu from the Innate Sect... something seems off about his condition.’

"Yue Ziqi of the Taifu Sect, here to witness your supreme techniques!"

Yue Ziqi shouted in a clear voice. With a tremor of his body, three auspicious clouds appeared above his head, spinning violently as he channeled his Magical Power!

Surging black water gushed out from beneath his feet, ROARING as it swept out to cover a hundred-li area.

Yue Ziqi raised a hand and pointed. The endlessly churning ocean of black water, like ten thousand rivers flowing into one, instantly began to roil and boil.

Thousands of waves surged one after another, bringing forth a multitude of demons and monsters. Some had green faces and sharp fangs, others looked like vicious fiends. Like a dense swarm of locusts, they shrieked and lunged toward Gu Changling!

"The Life-Stealing Calamity Water of Universal Flow! This Yue Ziqi is no ordinary cultivator. To think he combined the ancient Demon Dao’s ’Demon-Raising Art’ with the ’Ren Water Dao’!"

Before Jiang Yi could ask, True Master Xuanmiao took the initiative to explain:

"Xiao Jiang, if you encounter a Daoist Technique like this in the future, you must be extra cautious.

That surging black water is condensed from the ’Essence of Ren Water’.

Ren Water is of the Yang attribute. It flows endlessly, encompasses rivers and seas, and is fierce and hard in nature, capable of irrigating all things.

But Yue Ziqi uses it in the opposite way. He uses yang water to nourish demons, causing the Ren Water to take on the aspect of a flood."

Jiang Yi pondered for a moment, exclaimed at the ingenuity, and said softly:

"Once Ren Water floods, flows wantonly, and spreads across the land, its yang attribute is then stolen, and it transforms into ’dead water’.

Dead water conceals yin and holds a chilling intent. Using it to nourish demons creates an inexhaustible source. What a profound understanding of Daoist Techniques."

The prodigies and Dao Materials of the Eight Demonic Sects were truly as numerous as crucian carp crossing a river!

For Yue Ziqi of the Taifu Sect, only at the Third Layer of Foundation Establishment, to dare challenge Gu Changling, who was at the Fourth Layer—he truly came prepared!

’Ren Water turning into dead water, nourishing demons and concealing yin... This is indeed a bit tricky.’

Gu Changling grasped the powerful terrestrial qi. With a sweep of his great sleeve, the flock of dragons ascended, crashing into the locust-like swarm of vicious demons.