Chapter 489: Primordial Ark
An ancient ship, its age unknown, lay dim and lusterless, covered in rust and mottled patches, stretched out ahead as it drifted toward them, on a collision course to meet.
Yet, it emitted a faint fluctuation, strikingly similar to the breath of life. This shocked Ye Fan immensely—at least hundreds of thousands of years had passed, how could there still be living things within?
Mother Qi of All Things cascaded down as he summoned his cauldron, suspending it above his head, uncertain.
"Did Emperor Wu Shi really die within the Ancient Emperor Mountain?"
Every time he thought of Wu Shi, he recalled the bell tolls from Purple Mountain, which had repelled four or five Extreme Imperial weapons—an utterly inconceivable feat.
"This boundless universe—how many life-bearing lands exist?" Ye Fan examined carefully, then trembled again. In the final passage of text, the female sage mentioned the Stellar Ancient Path, but unfortunately, when she discovered the ancient path, her life was nearly spent, and she could not pursue it.
The female sage only saw the ancient ship before her passing, but she had no chance to explore it before dissolving into the Dao. She was merely a latecomer.
This skull was a priceless divine object, yet Ye Fan did not wish to defile it. If one day he could truly return to the Big Dipper Star Domain, he might consider bringing it before Purple Mountain.
Suddenly, as his hand approached the crystalline skull, he felt an extreme cold, bone-piercing and icy, so intense that even his formidable physique could barely withstand it.
"Ding"
As he lifted the skull, a jade pendant fell out, no more than an inch long, shaped like a crescent moon, translucent and lustrous—clearly a cherished item of the female sage.
The bone-chilling cold emanated from it, capable of freezing a person's very soul. If not for Ye Fan, any other cultivator would likely have turned into an ice statue.
"Yin Saint Force!"
Ye Fan's eyes shot out two divine beams. Enduring the agonizing cold, he held the jade pendant in his palm and examined it closely. Only by cultivating the True Yin Scripture could one refine such saintly force.
"A mere jade pendant—how can it emit Yin Saint Force?"
He extended his divine sense, attempting to enter the jade pendant, but immediately felt as if pricked by needles, his head splitting with pain. The Yin Saint Force within the ancient jade was even more terrifying!
"Could the Dao Jue that Emperor Wu Shi gave her back then be contained within this jade pendant?" He conceived such a bold thought.
Finally, Ye Fan put away both the skull and the jade pendant, continuing forward. The ancient cabin was vast and boundless, with many places awaiting exploration.
Along the way, he saw pieces of scrap copper and iron—undoubtedly, countless years ago, they must have been divine weapons and ancient treasures.
The battle back then had been fierce. The ancient cabin was covered in traces of destruction, with no white bones, only some bone dust, the damage spreading far and wide.
"Not human..."
Among the bone dust, Ye Fan also found some broken scales and a few divine feathers buried within the bones—remnants of very powerful foreign races.
Before long, he arrived at a magnificent divine hall. His eyes trembled as he finally saw a human-shaped pile of bone dust, with a single finger bone preserved, not yet dissolved.
"Hundreds of thousands of years, or even longer, and a single finger bone remains—this person must have been incredibly powerful in life."
Suddenly, Ye Fan was startled. Beneath the bone dust, there were traces of writing, still in divine script. He crouched down to examine it closely and once again saw the words "Stellar Ancient Path."
"I have discovered the Stellar Ancient Path, leading toward..." The writing stopped abruptly here, unfinished, as if the person had died from exhaustion.
"What a pity!" Ye Fan sighed softly.
Soon after, he finally approached the central area of the ancient ship. When he pushed open a purple bronze door, he suddenly entered a sealed, mysterious, and weighty region.
Before his eyes lay a crystalline sight—rows and rows, like coffins, of dozens of large blocks of Divine Source!
"Heavens, so many!"
Even with all Ye Fan had seen and experienced, he couldn't help but exclaim. Over forty large blocks of Divine Source, each two or three cubic meters in size, all sealed with ancient living beings within.
He was truly stunned. Even the Ten Thousand Dragon Nest had far fewer than this. What kind of force was this? If all were Primordial Kings, they could shake the ages and send chills down one's spine!
"No!"
Ye Fan quickly noticed something unusual. So many Divine Source blocks gathered in one cabin, yet there was no fluctuation of divine power at all, nor any dazzling light emitted. Instead, they were all somewhat dim.
"This is... the essence of the Divine Source has been completely drained, leaving only empty shells!"
This sight was even more terrifying. Having drained the Divine Source, what kind of great calamity had the ancient creatures within experienced? How many years had they drifted through the cosmos?
"Are they all Primordial Kings? Are they all dead? Their flesh, bones, and personal weapons are all priceless divine objects!"