Lan Xiaobu didn’t even extend his divine sense before landing on the ground. He had assumed he would arrive at a plaza, likely a teleportation plaza.
To his surprise, he found himself in a desolate wilderness. Clearly, this was a random teleportation—once your primordial Dao scroll was deemed qualified, you were sent to a random location in the Great Cosmos.
But Lan Xiaobu had no time to dwell on this; he was already stunned.
It wasn’t the dense, almost tangible cosmic vitality, the near-perfect cosmic rules, or the breathtakingly beautiful scenery filled with blooming flowers that shocked him. It was the countless planets, vast rivers, lakes, seas, deserts, swamps, and mountains in his divine sense.
In his experience, every realm was flat. Whether mountains, rivers, deserts, or swamps, they were all grounded on a plane.
True, he had seen rivers and seas suspended in the void, but those were rare and often relied on arrays.
This place, however, felt like a three-dimensional world, not a flat one.
Lan Xiaobu had watched sci-fi films depicting stunning landscapes—immortal mountains floating in the void, forests nestled in clouds. But nothing compared to the vivid, beautiful, and awe-inspiring reality here.
His divine sense revealed numerous planets suspended in the air—not the void, as that term applied to the cosmos beyond planets, but simply the sky. Beyond that, countless mountains and rivers floated as well.
His divine sense, however, was heavily suppressed, reaching only a few tens of thousands of miles.
Scanning the surroundings, Lan Xiaobu could imagine that cultivating in any spot here would give him a chance to reach the fourth stage.
So this was the Great Cosmos—truly worthy of its name.
As he traveled, even temporary markets were structured like proper Dao cities. Many planets floating above the star continent were either major forces’ Dao fields or city-like planets.
Along the way, Lan Xiaobu saw almost no signs of fighting. Either the rules here were strict, or someone was deliberately erasing traces of conflict. Logically, no one would bother erasing such traces, suggesting that fighting was rare, and the rules here were far stricter than those on the star continent plaza outside.
Lan Xiaobu couldn’t tell how many suns were in the Great Cosmos’s sky, but he saw four. After a day, he was surprised to find that, despite longer daylight hours, there was still night. The suns seemed to operate independently, perfectly dividing day and night.
Over several days of wandering, he encountered many cultivators, none weak, including a fourth-stage powerhouse. All shared a common trait: they appeared kind, lacking the intense wariness he was used to. When he asked the fourth-stage powerhouse for directions, the cultivator stopped and patiently answered.
This impressed Lan Xiaobu. His Great Desolation Universe was harmonious, but that harmony stemmed from powerful laws backed by his own strength and that of his allies, who were top-tier in that universe.
He quickly deduced the reasons. First, the cultivation resources here were astonishingly abundant. With such wealth, who would waste time stirring trouble? For cultivators, time was the most valuable asset. When idle, they’d seek a stable cave to cultivate.
Second, there must be extremely strict laws. Otherwise, even with abundant resources, cultivators would follow the law of the jungle.
Three days later, after roughly observing the terrain within a million miles, Lan Xiaobu entered a market called Chenji.
Typically, markets were open-air or enclosed by simple protective arrays for trading. But Chenji Market overturned Lan Xiaobu’s expectations. Compared to the largest Dao city in the Land of Eternal Life, this market was superior. It was essentially a Dao city, with the floating words “Chenji Market” outside far surpassing typical Dao cities.
At the entrance, no one collected Dao crystals. Lan Xiaobu entered, finding it not overly crowded but lively, with several fourth-stage powerhouses visible.
He intended to visit a shop to buy records about the Great Cosmos, but upon entering, he was stunned by the dense cosmic vitality and powerful cosmic principles, far surpassing those outside. He realised his earlier thought—that any spot in the Great Cosmos could lead to the fourth stage—was naive.
The vitality and principles here were so superior that he’d choose to cultivate in this market over the wilderness. He then wondered how much richer the resources must be in true Dao cities or the floating planets and continents above.
In a trading hall, he bought over a dozen records about the Great Cosmos. The clerk casually gave him a jade slip detailing the rules of the Moru World, essentially its laws.
Fortunately, Dao crystals were universal here, and even low-grade ones could be used, including for renting caves. Lan Xiaobu spent ten thousand low-grade Dao crystals to rent a mid-tier cave for a year.
He had expected a mid-tier cave in such a resource-rich, rule-clear place to cost tens or hundreds of thousands of low-grade Dao crystals, so ten thousand was a pleasant surprise.
In the cave, he set up a simple defensive restriction and took out the jade slips. He first examined the rules slip. It detailed various legal restrictions for the Moru World, the realm he was in.
After a quick scan, he understood why this place was so peaceful. The laws were strict, prohibiting private fights. No matter how skilled you were, killing someone wouldn’t let you escape easily, as great divine ability users could use time-space retracing to find you.
Setting aside the rules slip, Lan Xiaobu picked up a jade slip introducing the Great Cosmos.
Reading it, he realised he had underestimated the Great Cosmos. It comprised ten worlds, with the Moru World being just one. Yet, all ten worlds combined were less than a ten-thousandth of the Great Cosmos’s size.
This showed how vast the Great Cosmos was.
Each of the ten worlds was initially established by a Cosmic Dao Ancestor. Additionally, each had a Heavenly Emperor. The Dao Ancestor was the true creator of the world’s rules, whether cosmic or orderly, though the simple jade slip didn’t clarify. The Heavenly Emperor, while not explicitly stated, seemed a symbolic figure or law-signing authority, with influence and strength constrained by many factors.
What thrilled Lan Xiaobu most was seeing the Great Desolation World. Its Dao Master was none other than Ancestor Hongjun, and its Heavenly Emperor was the Jade Emperor. Though details were sparse, Lan Xiaobu knew the Great Desolation World was founded by the many powerhouses who left his Great Desolation Universe. He had always wondered where Ancestor Hongjun and the others went, and now he had caught up to their footsteps.
This filled him with admiration. The collapse of the Great Desolation Universe wasn’t long ago, yet Ancestor Hongjun had led its powerhouses to the Great Cosmos, claimed a world, and made it one of the ten worlds. How impressive was that?
For perspective, consider the Great Blue Starship, carrying an entire universe’s cultivators, still guarding the Great Cosmos’s periphery, waiting to meet entry conditions. Even if they entered, they’d only establish a Dao field in one of the worlds.
