Paragon of Sin

Easy Spring, Outside the Galactic Layer of the Sky Heart Galaxy. Magistrate Bai Pan held her book open as wisps of enlightened mist swirled about her body. These wisps acted like tendrils that stabbed into the void, initiating a profound connection with the world. She was exhibiting a different form of information collection by connecting with 'The World', notably different than the techniques of Heavenly Seers.

She was an Oracle!

Unlike Heavenly Seers who attune to the Heavenly Daos, grasping their intentions, and gathering information loosely allowed from the heavens, Oracles divine using the World's Trends and the Void, literally reading information of the world itself. Wei Wuyin had once entered the Void without sufficient preparation during his initial attempts at establishing Void Portals and had been overwhelmed by a single air particle's information that had existed!

Magistrate Bai Pan was also known by the Utmost Purity Galaxy as World Prophetess Bai! Similar to cultivation, the terms Earthly Oracle, Worldly Oracle, and Heavenly Oracle existed and were referred to as respective achievements in Cultivation Methods and depths of comprehension of the world, including reading the past, and present, and deducing the future by relying on the World's Trend!

"There was a brief disturbance in the seal, which was likely an attempt to investigate, but no signs of breaching or imminent intrusion. This didn't happen just once, however. The first disturbance occurred a few years ago, and the other happened within the last hour." World Prophetess Bai, the scholarly middle-aged woman, informed Sage Springfield with diligent and succinct verbiage.

The perpetually smiling Sage Springfield's handsome face remained unchanged upon hearing these details as if expecting it. It didn't make sense if someone of the Worldly Saint Alchemist level hadn't figured out his plans and investigated. This all but confirmed that this Neo-Dawn Alchemic Saint had the strength of a Sage. This, however, didn't cause him to feel any pressure.

Since the seal enveloping his Soul-Bound Edict Seed hybrid, a mutation he had spent thousands upon thousands of years cultivating by relying on the unique aspects of the Sky Heart Galaxy, allowing it to remain hidden from the eyes of most Sages and almost all cultivators at and beneath the Mystic Overlord level, was only disturbed and not breached, this suggested that his means was beneath that of a Resonant Soul Realm.

Additionally, the Prohibition of Heaven engulfing the Sky Heart Galaxy served as a detriment to those of considerable power, especially since Resonant Soul Realm experts would be disinclined to even step foot into such restrictive environments. As for his protective formations causing this Worldly Saint Alchemist's demise, considering that Teng Jiangwen, a Sage, was supposedly killed by him, that was entirely unlikely.

"Function?" Sage Springfield sat in a comfortable chair, sipping piping hot tea, enjoying the wondrous flavors of this incredible brew. It was a rare type of tea leaf that World Emperors would fight for fiercely and consider a precious resource, but to him, it was merely an enjoyable tea.

World Prophetess Bai pressed her hand lightly against the pages of her book, slowly moving her entire palm on the pages as if reading some information through touch.

"The Soul Wheel and Heart Siphon functions are at full power," she relayed with a faint smile on her face. Her forehead generated a bead of sweat as her cultivation at the Heavenly Saint Phase, the Sixth Stage of Mystic Ascendant Realm, was exhausted by a significant degree from her techniques. It wasn't easy for Heavenly Seers, Oracles, or Fortune Tellers to easily divine information of a greater and more complex nature without expending a cost.

Ming Shufeng and Wen Mingna, both Heavenly Seers of the Golden Gate Pavilion, relied on supplementing their divinations with temporal energies to ease the strain and exhausted lifeforce if it proved too difficult.

"That's good," at the side, the alabaster-skinned young girl crunched on a hardy fruit that resembled a pear, her scarlet eyes glistening with relief. She had put significant work into establishing the basis of the Heart Siphon Formation. As for the dreadful Soul Wheel, she didn't dare to touch it for fear of evoking heaven's wrath.

The Soul Wheel was a formation that could be described as an Evil Formation by the old standards of the Ancient Sealed Regions, but could now be described as a Dark Formation. That said, it was genuinely evil and heaven-defying. Sage Springfield had established this formation to cultivate a Soul-Bound Treasure and nurture it to an extreme.

The Soul Wheel was placed at the Heart of the Galaxy, faintly affecting all living things that were non-beast within the Sky Heart Galaxy. Subtly, it absorbs the souls of the deceased in a way similar to the natural foundation of samsara, and then processes and refines those souls into pure soul essence, feeding them into the Soul-Bound Edict Seed hybrid, the Soul of the Meadows.

This act itself wasn't inherently wrong given the nature of the cultivation world, but the souls would inevitably disperse, losing their chance at reincarnation. This was confirmed by Resonant Soul Realm experts many times and heavily advised against doing so due to its cruel nature. That said, not everyone followed such softly-given rules.

Some cultivators even outright destroyed souls or tortured them for thousands and thousands of years due to grudges and rage. Moreover, with experts at the Resonant Soul Realm, this was the only way to ensure that your enemies wouldn't be revived due to the random whim of these experts.

There was a well-circulated tale of an exceptional female beauty at the Original Magistrate level who died as an unmarried virgin. She had incurred the wrath of a great force with an Enlightened Sage expert at the helm, but her killer was only a cultivator with an equal cultivation realm. She was destroyed in body and spirit but not soul.

A Resonant Soul Realm expert had seen her portrait in passing and instantly fell for her looks and valiant charm. Without considering the situation, he used his great powers to revive her and they swiftly became Dao Companions. Ten thousand years later, the woman brought her spear along with her and single-handedly eliminated the entire force as an Enlightened Sage, destroying her enemies' souls and torturing her killer for ten thousand years.

It served as a great lesson that the world was incomparably fickle, an unforgettable tale.

Still, the action of doing this on a massive scale, including the souls of mortals in it as well, was something Alchemic Saint White Sky refused to actively assist with. She only helped in the Heart Siphon Formation that used the heart of the galaxy to gather and refine copious amounts of essential energies across the Sky Heart Galaxy, all fed to the Soul of the Meadows.

"..." Martial Overlord Tigerheart kept silent as he stood behind Alchemic Saint White Sky. Inwardly, he remained awed by Sage Springfield's act of using the heart of a galaxy as a nurturing ground for his treasure. It was ambitious and extraordinary!

"Indeed. It is quite good," Sage Springfield took a sip of his tea, that shadow of a smile remained on his lips as if it would never go away.

"It seems we came unnecessarily, Sage Springfield. This Neo-Dawn Alchemic Saint doesn't seem capable enough to disturb your plans," Alchemic Saint White Sky remarked with pouty lips tinged with dissatisfaction. She had to stop all her concoction efforts due to this. It was clear that Sage Springfield was genuinely concerned that Wei Wuyin had a Resonant Soul Realm expert at his back and could harm his efforts.

She also knew that her identity as an assistant in the establishment of the Soul Cycle Array, the array that contained the numerous formations such as the Heart Siphon Formation and Soul Wheel Formation, was secondary to her identity here, and this Enlightened Sage was planning to rely on her status and prestige to deal with any interference with bribery. She could even offer certain Alchemic Methods and share her Alchemic Dao's accumulations if desperate enough.

If all else failed, perhaps relying on her backing as a member of the Utmost Purity Galaxy's top force was enough to instill caution within the other party and weigh the worth. After all, alchemists were renowned for being protective and vindictive against non-alchemists.

Not even a Resonant Soul Realm expert would want an Exalted Worldly Saint Alchemist to place a bounty on their heads without care for a cost, even worse if it was an entire alchemist organization. The gathering strength of an entire alchemist organization with multiple Worldly Saint Alchemists could even get those from the Treasured Vale Galaxy or Prosperous Ruin Galaxy to take action!

Moreover, they might form a hunting roster of only Resonant Soul Realm experts!

Any cultivator had to genuinely weigh the worth of offending a Worldly Saint Alchemist with an organization behind them!

"Are we going to wait until this Neo-Dawn Alchemic Saint comes out to meet us? Or will we go into the Sky Heart Galaxy and find him ourselves? I can't believe he hid himself after we arrived!" Alchemic Saint Sky Heart asked with impatience within her expression. She was displeased with how dubious and disrespectful this Neo-Dawn Alchemic Saint was acting. After all, he was the one who sought to meet Sage Springfield first!

Since he had boldly claimed to have killed Teng Jiangwen, a legitimate Sage, there was no way he was being a coward.

"Where is this guy?" Alchemic Saint White Sky asked World Prophetess Bai.

World Prophetess Bai glanced at Sage Springfield who thought for a minute before giving her a casual nod. Since he wanted to be mysterious and stay within the Sky Heart Galaxy, he shouldn't blame them for divining his location and seeking him out themselves.

Seeing Sage Springfield agree to it, World Prophetess Bai began to exude Enlightened Scholarly Mist in large quantities as she executed a Mental Incantation, closing her eyes to focus entirely on the act, sending wispy tendrils into the void, and slowly extrapolating relevant information from The World regarding Wei Wuyin's location and his entire itinerary since arriving in the Sky Heart Galaxy.

"...Ah!" She moaned out in slight pain, beads of sweat forming on her palms and forehead immediately, threatening to drench her book and clothes. Her breathing grew heavier, but the three experts and silent-since-the-beginning interim captain expected this reaction given the degree of difficulty or preventive measures in place.

"I...I found him!" Her eyes shot open wide and there was mist within her irises and bloody, bulging veins in her sclera-bloodshot to an extreme!

"Oh?" Interest piqued, Alchemic Saint White Sky couldn't help but perk up and open her little ears. To be honest, she was interested in meeting this Neo-Dawn Alchemic Saint and exchanging matters of the Alchemic Dao since he had created his own lineage products at the Mystic-World grade. Despite her talent, she hadn't devised any Mystic-Earth or Mystic-World lineage products for her White Sky Lineage, only first-grade to ninth-grade.

It was considerably difficult, abnormally so, to concoct a successful lineage that was more effective than existing products and receive the Alchemic Dao's recognition. For example, many products had similar effects as others, but there were countless more with the exact effects but of lesser quality, greater concoction difficulties, and higher material requirements, creating significantly inferior products that, even if named, wouldn't receive the recognition of the Alchemic Dao.

Only by devising a better product or one of similar yet a great difference at later levels of quality such as high and peak creating enough difference was a product accepted. That was not an easy feat given the repetitive nature of practicing established products for thousands upon thousands of years.

Fortunately, the current alchemical societal standards of the Utmost Purity Galaxy didn't require unique lineages to rise in the ranks, and just concocting established products effectively was enough to become a Junior, Senior, or Exalted Alchemic Saint!

World Prophetess Bai's breathing grew heavier as her head suddenly turned to Sage Springfield. She said a single word that caused everyone's expressions to change!

"HERE!!!"

Just as that word left her lips, the Easy Spring's core began to release rapidly oscillating sounds! The expressions of everyone present once again shifted dramatically as they all turned to the source of the sound. The interim captain paled as a ghost.

They each moved just a little!

And then-

BOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!