517: Chapter 517 Empty, the Palace of the Great Dao

Beyond the gates of the Immortal Abode, it was not the expected scene of misty Immortal Qi and magnificent jade palaces.

What met Shen Yuanmo's eyes was a gray stone hall so vast it felt nearly deathly silent.

It was massive, ancient, and could even be described as crude.

The structure of the entire hall was visible at a glance; aside from several hundred sky-propping stone pillars supporting the dome, there was nothing else.

The walls, beams, and floor tiles were all constructed from the same unknown gray rock.

The surfaces were smooth, yet they exuded a sense of weight that had endured through eternal ages.

However, Shen Yuanmo's chaos dao embryo trembled slightly at this moment.

He keenly sensed that this hall was not as simple as it appeared on the surface.

His gaze narrowed as his vision pierced through the exterior of the stone, falling upon the interior of every brick and stone that composed the palace.

There, billions of profound dao runes, countless times thinner than a strand of hair, were inscribed.

These dao runes were interconnected, forming an invisible grand array that covered the entire palace.

They were constantly emitting an extremely subtle fluctuation of will.

It was a will of assimilation, distortion, and conversion.

It carried no killing intent, yet it was more insidious than any lethal move.

Like a spring breeze turning into rain, it nourished things silently, attempting to twist and assimilate the Great Dao cognition of any living being that stepped into this place, bit by bit.

Eventually, they would become no different from the master of this place—the Heavenly Venerable of Nine Mysteries.

They would become an extension of his Dao, a servant of his will.

“An interesting appetizer,”

Shen Yuanmo whispered, his calm voice echoing in the vast, empty hall.

“Trying to plant the seed of a Dao Slave within me without me noticing?”

If an ordinary Cultivator, even a Saint Lord at Mahayana Perfection Stage, were to step into this place,

They would likely only feel that the dao rhyme here was profound, making it an excellent place to contemplate the Great Dao.

Little would they know that while they were immersed in their comprehension,

Their own will and dao foundation would have already been shackled through subtle influence, becoming a stepping stone for someone else.

Unfortunately for the Heavenly Venerable of Nine Mysteries, he had encountered Shen Yuanmo.

Buzz—

Instead of circulating his magical power to resist, Shen Yuanmo took a step forward.

As his foot landed, the chaos dao embryo within his Dantian Sea of Qi suddenly opened its eyes.

An invisible and domineering aura centered on him erupted outward.

Chaos Domain!

Within the Domain, all Laws wailed and retreated.

Inside Shen Yuanmo's body, the Chaos Myriad Dao Returning Origin Scripture circulated frantically at an unprecedented speed.

At this moment, his entire being transformed into a chaotic black hole that devoured all things.

The dao rune wills surging from all directions, attempting to taint his Dao Heart, encountered the Chaos Domain.

Like snow meeting a scorching sun, they were forcibly decomposed and assimilated without causing even a single ripple.

“Not enough.”

Shen Yuanmo was not satisfied with passive defense.

He spread his fingers and made a sudden grasping motion toward the empty space ahead.

“Since this nourishment has been delivered to my door, I won't be polite.”

Rumble!

The entire gray stone hall shook violently.

With Shen Yuanmo as the center, a visible Chaos Vortex appeared out of thin air and expanded outward at an alarming rate.

On the walls, the beams, and beneath the floor tiles, those dao runes that had been hidden for endless years—

As if drawn by some fatal attraction, they actually surfaced from the stone of their own accord.

Streams of brilliantly colored runes transformed into dazzling rivers of stars, uncontrollably surging toward the Chaos Vortex in Shen Yuanmo's palm.

These dao runes, which contained the Heavenly Venerable of Nine Mysteries's Great Dao insights, were originally a malicious trap.

Now, they had become pure supplements for Shen Yuanmo's chaos dao embryo!

The chaos dao embryo refused nothing, devouring all of these miscellaneous dao rhymes.

Then, using the Chaos Myriad Dao Returning Origin Scripture as a furnace and the Chaos Fire as fuel,

It forcibly erased and incinerated every trace of the Heavenly Venerable of Nine Mysteries's personal imprint and will.

Only the purest immortal dao principles remained, merging into his own Chaos Great Dao.

As Shen Yuanmo devoured frantically, this grand hall, which had originally exuded an ancient dao rhyme, was dying at a visible rate.

The luster on the walls quickly dimmed, the stone pillars began to weather, and fine cracks appeared on the floor tiles.

That miraculous aura that transcended this world was being extracted bit by bit.

After a mere dozen breaths,

When the final dao rune was swallowed by Shen Yuanmo, the light of the entire hall completely extinguished.

The hall lost all its miraculous qualities, becoming a massive empty shell piled together from mundane stones.

It was as if its Soul had been extracted, leaving only a decaying husk that could collapse at any moment under the erosion of time.

Just then.

“Eh?”

An extremely faint sound of surprise came from the deepest part of the palace.

The voice was ethereal and uncertain, as if it did not exist in this time and space, yet it clearly reached Shen Yuanmo's ears.

Shen Yuanmo paid it no heed and slowly withdrew his palm.

Feeling that his Chaos Great Dao had advanced a few steps further, his expression remained entirely placid.

He walked through the now-ruined, empty hall and reached the end.

There, a portal composed of pure light floated.

Upon the light gate, shadows shifted, evolving into scenes that could cause one's mind to collapse.

There were peerless geniuses whose Divine Souls were torn apart by Extraterritorial Heavenly Demons as they charged toward the Immortal Path, turning into flying ash.

There were ancient Saint Lords with Dao Hearts as firm as rock who, when questioning the Immortal Gate, lost their Dao Hearts, causing their Dao Fruits to disintegrate and their entire cultivation to return to heaven and earth.

There was a brilliant Empress in the Mortal World who was trapped by love, her Heart Demons flourishing, finally passing away in endless regret and despair.

Failure, despair, and death.

The tragic scenes of countless Cultivators failing to reach higher Realms played out continuously on the light gate like a revolving lantern.

Waves of negative emotions, so thick they could not be dispersed, pierced through the light gate and stabbed into the depths of one's Divine Soul, attempting to trigger the deepest fears and Heart Demons.

Shen Yuanmo watched all of this quietly, his eyes as calm as still water.

“My Dao is for me to walk; why do I need others to judge it?”

His voice was soft, yet it contained an unquestionable absolute confidence.

These illusions might shake those Cultivators who felt lost regarding the path ahead.

But to Shen Yuanmo, they were nothing more than passing clouds.

His Great Dao was the supreme Dao that devoured all Daos and returned them to Chaos, a path with no predecessors and destined to have no successors.

On this path, Shen Yuanmo was the only truth.

As his voice fell, he did not pause for a second, stepping into the light gate that displayed infinite tragedies.

The scene before him changed once more.

This time, it was no longer an empty stone hall.

Instead, it was a boundless void.

No sky above, no ground below, infinite in all directions—only eternal darkness and loneliness.

In the center of this void, there was a path.

A staircase paved with pure white jade wound upward.

It seemed to have no end, leading all the way to the deepest, highest point of that darkness.

Shen Yuanmo could clearly perceive that what composed this white jade staircase was not any physical substance.

Rather, it was condensed from strands of immortal dao rules that were pure to the extreme.

And at the end of the staircase, at the highest point of that void,

A solitary throne floated quietly.

The throne was ancient and majestic, made of an unknown material, inscribed with scenes of the sun, moon, stars, and the myriad Daos rising and falling.

It just sat there quietly, yet it seemed to be the sole center of this void Universe.

It exuded a supreme majesty that dominated the eternal ages and looked down upon all living beings.

Just as Shen Yuanmo's gaze fell upon the throne,

A blurry silhouette of light slowly condensed into form atop the throne.

The face of the silhouette could not be seen, yet it emitted a terrifying aura that stood above the Heavenly Dao.

A grand, majestic, and emotionless voice came from the throne, echoing through the entire void space.

“Ascend the Heavenly Ladder, mount the throne.”

“Inherit my Dao Fruit, and you shall be a True Immortal.”