Everyone had half-expected Alice to say something profound and noble.
Instead, she went straight for the humblebrag.
Collectively, hearts grew sour. No one bothered poking at it.
After all, this was the first time any of them had seen a Third-Turn Rebirth Pill used on a person.
First, no one here had ever been injured that badly. Even when Tartaglia got himself hacked up in a spar, he bounced back after a short rest.
Second…
That pill was insanely expensive.
If you could recover on your own, you absolutely would. If you couldn't, you'd start with cheaper pills first.
Three thousand contribution points for a single dose—what, did everyone here have a divine-physique daughter at home?
A lower-grade magical artifact cost just over two thousand contribution points.
One pill was one weapon gone.
Far too extravagant.
Ningguang couldn't help sighing. Even she didn't dare spend like that.
Then, inevitably, she started worrying about how long it would take before she could achieve "cultivator financial freedom."
Every time she walked into the Hall of Merits lately, she felt like she'd gone back to the days when she was dirt poor.
Back then, she'd sworn she would live rich.
Now, oaths might not be enough.
Strength meant more than anything to a cultivator.
As for contribution points…
Ningguang knew she wouldn't be getting too many anytime soon.
As the Third-Turn Rebirth Pill fully dissolved into the red-haired woman's body, surging life-force burst outward without restraint.
Her eroded organs regenerated in an instant. The withered embers of life rekindled, then burned even brighter than before.
The external wounds vanished as if they'd never existed.
Even the consciousness that had begun to scatter slowly gathered again.
Watching this miracle—like watching someone be reborn—Ningguang opened her mouth in a daze.
"No wonder they call the Third-Turn Rebirth Pill the 'Elixir of Rebirth'… Three thousand contribution points is a bargain. I'd bet the Sect Master priced it low on purpose."
This time, she'd guessed right.
With the Nine Nether expedition coming up, no one cared about pills that slightly boosted cultivation.
Healing was all that mattered.
The Third-Turn Rebirth Pill was technically only meant for Refining Essence into Qi cultivators—but if you priced it in spirit stones, it would cost over a thousand mid-grade stones.
Converted to contribution points, that was easily ten thousand.
But Jiang Yan wanted every inner disciple to have one life-saving pill.
So he'd set the price at three thousand.
Right now, the pill was at work in an ordinary woman with slightly above-average physique.
Forget "a single breath left"—even if that last breath had stopped a while ago, she could still be pulled back.
"It looks like she'll wake before long."
Baizhu nodded lightly—
then a strange wave of power stirred in the gem at the woman's chest.
It felt like it wanted to start devouring her life-force again.
Alice's expression darkened immediately.
"Who gave you the guts, huh? Daring to kill someone I've decided to protect? Right under my nose?!"
"Not just that."
Neuvillette frowned, closing his eyes to sense more clearly. When he opened them, his expression was odd.
"The source of this power doesn't seem to be in Teyvat. It's very far away."
"Its quality is quite high, but… from the feel of it, it's trying to…"
"…descend into the Mount Shu world for some kind of… test?"
Everyone looked at the gleaming gem in the woman's chest, stunned.
A strange light flickered in their eyes—as if they were watching a brave soul walk to the execution ground.
"If I remember correctly…"
Alice's anger vanished. Her tone turned faint and chilly.
"The Mount Shu world was created by the Sect Master. He left behind a sliver of his will at peak Return-to-Void, didn't he?"
"He did say that…" Keqing replied softly.
No one else spoke. They simply watched that reckless power continue to reach toward the very origin of the Mount Shu world.
The next instant, heaven and earth seemed to dim. A colossal will swept through everything.
Rage poured from it.
In Jiang Yan's cave, Ganyu's brows creased. She opened her eyes and glanced at the sky.
"Mount Shu's Heavenly Dao is angry? That…"
She pinched a quick divination, consulting the Dao itself for a moment. Then she gave a helpless shake of her head and closed her eyes again, stabilizing her realm.
"Heavenly Dao has taken action. Eh-heh—this should be interesting."
Venti grinned at the gem on the woman's chest.
For a brief moment, a chaotic intent had tried to emerge within it—
and had been brutally ground to dust almost instantly.
That bizarre power was shredded as well beneath Heavenly Dao's fury.
"Of all things to provoke, you chose Mount Shu's Heavenly Dao… What a poor fool."
Tartaglia shook his head and, with everyone else, quietly waited for Heavenly Dao's response.
At that moment, Heavenly Dao had already wrapped itself in the sliver of Jiang Yan's will reserved for its protection, tearing through space and arriving at the roots of the Imaginary Tree.
There it found… something like a cocoon, yet not—an odd entity connected to the Imaginary Tree itself.
A constant pulse of testing intent radiated from it.
Mount Shu's Heavenly Dao condensed into a blurry, human-shaped figure.
"Vile thing. I am the world created by the honored Sect Master. You are a wretched, postnatal scrap—yet you dare lay hands on me?"
"Today, you will be erased."
It thrust out a hand, Jiang Yan's Return-to-Void will surging through its palm, sweeping across the entire Tree-and-Sea cosmos.
In that moment, countless distant observers—previously content to watch the show—scrambled to flee from the Imaginary Tree.
This strike was meant to annihilate everything in its path.
The Cocoon of Finality finally seemed to realize it had provoked something it should not.
That "plain" blow allowed every watching will to glimpse a vision of their own end.
Suddenly, the Imaginary Tree erupted with unimaginable quantities of Imaginary power, resisting Heavenly Dao.
Many high-dimensional beings joined in, trying to block the blow.
Mount Shu's Heavenly Dao was strong, and the sliver of Jiang Yan's will granted it terrifying weight—
but it was still not Jiang Yan himself.
And the Tree-and-Sea cosmos was a Middle Thousand World.
When all was said and done, the Imaginary Tree managed to stop the attack.
At a price.
Nearly a tenth of its laws were severed. Nearly ten thousand newborn worlds were crushed and erased.
"Insects beyond my domain—how dare you obstruct the will of Heavenly Dao?"
The Heavenly Dao's gaze was icy.
As the world Jiang Yan created, Mount Shu naturally existed anchored to him.
Jiang Yan's will for this world was clear: detached yet independent, strong yet unprovoking, never stirring trouble first—
but if trouble came, strike preemptively, and eradicate it at the root.
Now the Cocoon of Finality had, without warning, attempted to drop Honkai onto the Mount Shu world.
If Heavenly Dao didn't flatten its ancestral grave, Heavenly Dao wasn't worthy of the role.
As for the Imaginary Tree's resistance…
Mount Shu was bearing far too many treasures now. Its Heavenly Dao had long since surpassed an ordinary Middle Thousand World's.
Heavenly Dao reached out and tore open space. A glazed pagoda appeared in its hand.
This wasn't the Demon-Sealing Tower. That immortal weapon, forged by a Golden Immortal, was still beyond its authority.
This was the Three-Colored Exquisite Pagoda—
or more precisely, its imprint.
When the pagoda ascended within the Mount Shu world and became a lower-grade treasure, its power and memory had remained within Heavenly Dao.
Whenever it descended punishment, it could invoke that memory.
And now was the perfect time.
A mere Middle Thousand World couldn't possibly block the Three-Colored Exquisite Pagoda.
Once the pagoda opened, it could flatten this cosmos in short order.
Heavenly Dao was, very simply, unreasonable.
On the other side, the Imaginary Tree—originally ready to resist—froze at the sight.
Then, immediately, it stopped fighting back, frantically transmitting information in hopes that Heavenly Dao would stand down.
Heavenly Dao had no intention of stopping.
Forced to act, the Imaginary Tree analyzed and cut away a portion of its own origin, offering it up.
Heavenly Dao hadn't planned to respond—
until it sensed that this piece of origin involved some extremely high-tier beings.
After a moment's judgment, it turned back to the Cocoon of Finality.
The Imaginary Tree clearly wanted to protect it. The Cocoon hadn't been born from the Tree itself, but it had long since attached to it, helping filter and "test" civilizations.
Now that Heavenly Dao had accepted the Tree's offering, it would not continue to directly attack the Cocoon.
However—
It still flung the Three-Colored Pagoda outward.
No one knew how much distance it crossed, only that it fell over a dazzling, kaleidoscopic high-dimensional civilization—one of the highest strata in the Tree-and-Sea cosmos.
A moment later, the pagoda descended.
That civilization, among the highest of their kind, was erased utterly.
Existence, meaning, concept—
all of it was severed and stripped away.
The countless powerhouses of the Tree-and-Sea system watched, speechless.
In the end, all they could do was watch the pagoda's light tear open the space beside the Tree itself and drag Heavenly Dao back.
The ultimate secret of the cosmos, the Imaginary Tree—
Had just been humiliated in its own home.
That alone would be enough to shock every civilization that understood the Tree for many years to come.
…
Within the Mount Shu world, Heavenly Dao's little trip had stirred no small amount of commotion.
The entire world trembled faintly.
Still, no one was worried.
With everything the Mount Shu world carried now, even if the Tree-and-Sea cosmos exploded, this place wouldn't.
The Demon-Sealing Tower alone could anchor the world.
Before long, everything settled. The panic and confusion among the world's beings faded away.
Everyone exchanged glances, knowing Heavenly Dao had returned.
What exactly had happened, they couldn't say.
But from the Mount Shu world's continued tranquility, they were certain of one thing:
Heavenly Dao hadn't been on the losing end.
With that in mind, there was nothing to worry about.
"Hopefully it didn't cause too much trouble outside," Neuvillette sighed, turning back to the red-haired woman.
Without that strange power interfering, her recovery had accelerated.
In the blink of an eye, both external and internal injuries—including organs rotted by depletion of life-force—had been restored completely.
The pill's power still hadn't run dry. It continued to delve into her mind.
With the body fixed, what remained was her mental strength—
in simple terms, her soul.
The Third-Turn Rebirth Pill technically had no soul-restoring effect.
After all, soul-healing pills started at sixth grade and above. There wasn't a single one in all of Mount Shu.
But this woman was ultimately just an ordinary human. Her soul wasn't truly damaged—only her mental strength was badly drained.
The pill's overwhelming vitality could patch her consciousness as though it were patching flesh.
Before long, the last of its power completely merged into her.
The hazy glow around her faded.
Long lashes fluttered.
Her eyes snapped open.
"She woke up!"
Alice leaned in with a cheerful grin, giving her a quick once-over.
The woman still wasn't fully lucid. Even with Alice right in her face, she didn't react.
"Where… is this?"
She pressed a hand to her forehead and slowly stood, looking around in confusion.
"This is Mount Shu. After you drifted into our world, Elder Alice brought you here."
"Do you remember who you are? Do you remember what happened?"
Jean softened her voice as much as she could. The woman seemed to gradually register the situation.
Even though her mind was still a fog, she straightened slightly and said, with as much composure as she could muster:
"Hello. My name is Murata Himeko."
"Thank you for saving me."
To read 220+ future chapters, head over to Patreon:
patreon.com/WhiteDevil7554