The Longevity Family: Starting from the Foundation Establishment Ancestor

Click.

The sound was very soft, yet it was exceptionally clear and jarring in the silent, folded space.

The cracks on the surface of the greyish-white ancient coffin widened, and more greyish-white aura seeped out from the gaps, carrying with it an ancient, weathered, and indescribable sorrow. The bronze beacon fragment in Han Mu's hand trembled even more violently, emitting a buzzing mournful sound, as if it were weeping, or perhaps calling out.

"Senior..." Yun Li followed three zhang behind Han Mu, warily watching the ancient coffin. Her broken flute was already held horizontally in front of her, a faint light flowing from its surface. "This coffin... has a very strange aura. It doesn't seem like an inanimate object, but I can't sense any living presence either."

Han Mu remained silent, his entire attention focused on the ancient coffin. The resonance deep within his bloodline was so intense it made his heart pound; it was a sense of intimacy originating from his very soul, as if the object within the coffin was connected to him by blood. But at the same time, an indescribable, immense sorrow and desolation spread with the grayish-white aura, permeating his mind and causing him to feel a sudden tightness in his chest for no apparent reason.

What exactly is this coffin? And what is its connection to the "immortal coffin" inside his body? Why can it activate the beacon fragments and summon his bloodline?

He tried to take a step forward.

hum-

The bronze beacon fragment suddenly broke free from his hand, transformed into a streak of light, and flew straight toward the gray-white ancient coffin. Then... it merged into the cracks on the surface of the coffin without any hindrance and disappeared!

Immediately afterwards, the entire ancient coffin trembled slightly, and the cracks on its surface began to spread and increase at a visible speed, quickly covering the entire coffin like a spider web. More grayish-white aura burst forth, slowly condensing above the ancient coffin, gradually outlining a blurry, extremely dim phantom.

The phantom resembled a human, but its face was indistinct, and its gender was unclear. Only two faint, grayish-white flames seemed to be burning quietly in the empty eye sockets. As soon as the phantom appeared, its gaze (or rather, the direction of the flames) accurately "looked" at Han Mu.

"..." The phantom seemed to want to say something, but no sound came out. Only a faint spiritual fluctuation, carrying endless fatigue and vicissitudes, intermittently entered Han Mu's consciousness.

"...Bloodline...finally...has arrived..."

Han Mu's pupils contracted slightly. He subconsciously connected with the "Immortal Coffin" within his body, a faint wisp of temporal power flowing through his meridians, ready to respond to any unforeseen circumstances. "Who are you? And what is this coffin?"

"...I...am...the guardian of the coffin...and...the lingering remnant within the coffin..." The mental fluctuations were intermittent, as if they might be extinguished at any moment. "This is...a fragment of the 'Coffin of Origin'...within your body...there is a shared...aura..."

The Coffin of Origin? A fragment? Han Mu's mind trembled violently. The immortal coffin within his body was actually a fragment of this so-called "Coffin of Origin"? Then was this enormous gray-white ancient coffin another fragment, or... the main body?

"What is the Coffin of Origin?" Han Mu asked in a deep voice, while signaling Yun Li not to act rashly. Although this lingering thought was weak, it gave him an unfathomable feeling. Even if it was just a wisp of lingering thought, it was by no means ordinary.

"...The thing that bears...the imprint...of...the beginning...of...time and space..." The fluctuations of the lingering will grew even weaker, as if each thought required immense power to transmit. "The great calamity...shattered...I guarded this fragment...drifting...in chaos...for endless years...finally...the awakener has arrived..."

"The Awakener? Because of the same source energy within me?" Han Mu pressed.

"...Yes...and no..." The lingering "gaze" seemed to fall on Han Mu, and the gray-white flame flickered slightly. "Your bloodline...contains...the primordial seed...weak...but pure...the beacon...guiding...you to come..."

The First Seed? Han Mu frowned. What was this? Was it related to his mysterious, ever-advancing "Eternal Life Family" system? Or was it related to his seemingly ordinary background?

"What do you need me to do?" Han Mu asked directly, getting to the heart of the matter. This lingering remnant had awakened him and guided him here; it was definitely not just for casual conversation.

"...Take...it...away..." The lingering spiritual energy pointed towards the grayish-white ancient coffin below, carrying a hint of pleading, but more so, urgency. "The seal here...is about to break...'They'...will soon...sense...it..."

"Who are they?" Han Mu pressed.

The lingering regret offered no answer, or rather, it lacked the power to explain further. Its phantom began to tremble violently, growing even more blurred and dim. "Take...the...coffin...to...the...Eye of 'Return to the Void'...there...are...the answers...and...danger...beware...of the 'Time Reverser'..."

As soon as the words were spoken, the illusory figure completely disintegrated, turning into specks of grayish-white light that merged back into the ancient coffin below. The cracks on the surface of the coffin stopped spreading at that moment, but the grayish-white light emanating from those cracks became slightly brighter than before, and the sense of shared origin emanating from the coffin became clearer and more urgent.

At the same time, Han Mu felt the communication jade slip in his arms vibrate slightly. It was from Liu Ruyan.

He spared a sliver of his attention to probe, and Liu Ruyan's voice, tinged with solemnity and a hint of confusion, came through: "My lord, regarding the spatial disorder you mentioned earlier in 'Shattered Star Gorge,' Zhou Meng and Lin Xue went to investigate the outer perimeter. Although they didn't go deep, that fool Zhou Meng somehow triggered something, causing a brief spatial fluctuation that revealed a trace of extremely ancient Daoist energy related to time and space. The fluctuation was very weak, but Lin Xue said that the feeling... seemed to be one ten-thousandth similar to the aura you occasionally exuded when you cultivated? Zhou Meng even exclaimed that it felt as familiar as returning to his hometown, though only for a moment. This matter is quite strange. We have ordered them to withdraw and strengthened the concealment of Green Bamboo Peak. My lord, are you alright on your end? Do you need any support?"

Shattered Star Valley? Ancient Daoist aura? A faint resemblance to his own? Zhou Meng felt a sense of familiarity?

Han Mu's heart skipped a beat. The discovery at Green Bamboo Peak seemed to be vaguely related to the fragments of the "Coffin of Origin" before him, as well as the "First Seed" and "Bloodline" mentioned by the lingering spirit. Could there be something similar, or some clue, at Shattered Star Gorge?

He temporarily suppressed his doubts and replied to Liu Ruyan: "Everything is fine, we are at a critical juncture. The matter of Shattered Star Gorge is temporarily sealed off, and no one is allowed to approach it. I will handle it when I return. Strengthen security, and send a message immediately if anything unusual occurs."

After ending the message, Han Mu looked at the cracked, grayish-white ancient coffin. The "them" and "time reversers" mentioned by the remnant spirit made him wary. A being that could make even such an ancient being like the remnant spirit fear and warn was no ordinary being. And "Eye of the Ruins" sounded like an extremely dangerous place.

But right now, there don't seem to be many options. The fragment of the beacon merged into the ancient coffin, which was connected to him by blood, and its lingering plea was sincere. More importantly, Han Mu could sense that the ancient coffin didn't seem to have any ill intentions towards him; on the contrary, it seemed to have an instinctive closeness and dependence on him.

"Senior, should we take it with us? This coffin..." Yun Li stepped forward, looking at the enormous ancient coffin, somewhat hesitant. This coffin looked extraordinary, but it must also be incredibly heavy, and its aura was ancient. Who knew what kind of changes taking it away would cause?

"This place is not safe to stay any longer," Han Mu decided. The remnant spirit said the seal was about to break, and "they" would sense it. Whoever "they" were, those who could be called "they," and whom even this ancient remnant spirit feared so much, were definitely not something he could handle in his current state. He had to leave first.

He attempted to envelop the ancient coffin with his divine sense, hoping to store it in his storage artifact. However, the moment his divine sense touched the coffin, an immense suction force surged forth, rendering his divine sense utterly ineffective, like a mud ox sinking into the sea. The ancient coffin, though seemingly small, felt as heavy as a star, and was subtly integrated with this folded space.

"Can't take it away?" Han Mu frowned. He tried to communicate with the "Immortal Coffin" within his body, a faint trace of time power mixed with his own aura slowly reaching towards the gray-white ancient coffin.

This time, the ancient coffin reacted. The coffin trembled slightly, and the gray-white light on its surface flowed, its size actually began to slowly shrink! In a few breaths, the huge ancient coffin, which was several meters long, shrank to the size of a palm, and quietly floated in front of Han Mu. The cracks were still there, but its aura was much more restrained.

At the same time, Han Mu felt the "Immortal Coffin" inside his body tremble slightly, conveying a trace of pleasure and longing, as if it was very close to this shrunken fragment of the "Coffin of Origin".

Han Mu reached out, and the shrunken, grayish-white ancient coffin automatically fell into his palm. It felt cool to the touch and had no special weight. He carefully put it away, placing it in a different location from the "Immortal Coffin" inside his body, but he could clearly feel a subtle connection between the two.

The moment he put away the ancient coffin, the gray-white mist around him began to surge violently. The huge chain phantoms that pierced through the void creaked under the strain. Then, cracks spread across the chains and the mist barrier!

This folded space, having lost the ancient coffin's support, began to collapse!

"Go!" Han Mu shouted, grabbing Yun Li's arm. He enveloped his entire body in the power of time and sped towards the entrance of the rift they had come from! Behind them, the sound of space collapsing was like thunder, and violent spatial turbulence began to rage.

The two narrowly escaped before the entrance to the crack was completely torn apart, returning to the stone platform atop the land fragment. Looking back, they saw the crack collapse and heal at a visible speed, disappearing in a few breaths as if it had never existed, leaving only the stone platform and the still-floating ruins of the land fragment in the distance.

Before they could even catch their breath, Han Mu's expression suddenly changed, and he abruptly looked up into the depths of the void.

Almost simultaneously, Yun Li also sensed a powerful, cold divine thought, filled with undisguised malice, sweeping in from a great distance like a cold tide, instantly covering the area!

This divine sense was completely different from the auras of Hei Tian and Bai Yuan before; it was more obscure, more sinister, and carried a chill that seemed capable of freezing time and space. When the divine sense swept over the location of Han Mu and Yun Li, it clearly paused for a moment, then, like a shark smelling blood, it locked onto them firmly!

Especially the fragments of the "Coffin of Origin" on Han Mu's body, which had just been put away and whose aura had not yet fully subsided, as well as the "Immortal Coffin" and bloodline aura resonating with it within his body, were like bright lights in the dark night, instantly becoming the focus of this cold divine thought!

"Found...you..." A cold, stiff, and emotionless voice resounded directly deep within Han Mu and Yun Li's souls, carrying a chilling aura. "The...insect...that stole...the essence of time..."

Before he could finish speaking, a hazy, icy finger beam, seemingly capable of swallowing all light, appeared instantly three feet in front of Han Mu's brow, ignoring spatial distance! Wherever the finger beam passed, the void was frozen into a fine trail of ice crystals, and the flow of time seemed to slow down and become viscous!

Too fast! Too powerful! And it contains an extremely profound power of time, far beyond Han Mu's current understanding!

This finger strike is definitely not at the Golden Immortal level! It might even surpass an ordinary Great Luo Immortal!

Han Mu's hair stood on end, and the shadow of death instantly loomed over him! The laws of time within his body spontaneously activated to their limit. At the critical moment, he used all his strength to distort the flow of time in front of him, while simultaneously shoving Yun Li aside and barely managing to turn himself to the side!

laugh!

A cold, sharp finger grazed Han Mu's forehead, drawing a trail of blood that instantly froze into ice crystals in mid-air. A chilling, malevolent power, seemingly capable of corroding the very essence of time, surged into the wound, instantly numbing half of Han Mu's body, his thoughts seemingly frozen in place!

It was just a slight graze, yet it was so terrifying!

"Huh? The power of time?" The cold voice carried a hint of surprise, followed by a deeper greed and killing intent. "As expected... the thief... deserves to die even more..."

Ripples spread through the void, and a blurry figure, seemingly formed from countless fragments of gray time, slowly emerged a hundred feet in front of Han Mu. The figure was indistinct, its face obscured, only a pair of emotionless gray eyes, like millennia-old ice, coldly staring at Han Mu as if he were an ant that could be crushed at will.

Han Mu clutched his forehead, blood seeping from between his fingers and freezing rapidly. He frantically circulated his immortal power, attempting to dispel the chilling, corrosive force of time, but with little effect. His opponent's realm, their understanding and application of the laws of time, far surpassed his own!

The "they" that Can Nian mentioned, have arrived so quickly? Or are they the so-called "time reversers"?

Yun Li was pushed aside by Han Mu and fell onto a stone platform some distance away. Her face was deathly pale, and her eyes were filled with horror. Just the afterglow of that figure's gaze had frozen her soul! This enemy was far more terrifying than Hei Tian and Bai Yuan before! He was a truly invincible foe!

Han Mu forced himself to calm down, his mind racing. Escape? Given the opponent's displayed methods and control over time and space, the hope of escape was slim. Fight? There was no chance of victory either. The difference in their cultivation levels was too great, and their understanding of the laws of time was worlds apart.

Are we going to have to use our last resort? Like... that coffin?

Just as Han Mu was racking his brains, thinking of countermeasures, and even preparing to fight to the death, the blurry gray figure seemed to sense something. Its gray eyes turned slightly and looked at the location in Han Mu's arms—there was the miniature fragment of the "Coffin of Origin" that he had just put away.

"...The Origin Coffin...aura..." The gray figure's voice wavered slightly, no longer displaying pure, icy killing intent, but instead carrying a hint of...unbelievable ecstasy? "You...possess fragments of the Origin Coffin?! Hand them over! I'll spare your life!"

He really did come for the fragment of the "Coffin of Origin"! Han Mu's heart sank to the bottom. This fragment was both an opportunity and a death sentence!

The gray figure stopped wasting words and directly extended a giant hand formed from fragments of gray time, grabbing towards Han Mu. Under the giant hand's influence, Han Mu felt the flow of time around him become extremely strange, sometimes accelerating, sometimes reversing, and sometimes stopping, causing his mind and body to become confused and uncomfortable, making even mobilizing his immortal power extremely difficult! This was an absolute crushing defeat in terms of time control!

Just as the large gray hand was about to fall and grab Han Mu along with the fragments of the ancient coffin in his arms, it was about to strike.

Sudden--

The shrunken, grayish-white ancient coffin in Han Mu's arms flew out automatically without warning and hovered in front of him. From the dense cracks on the coffin's surface, an unprecedented grayish-white light suddenly erupted!

The light wasn't dazzling, but it carried an indescribable ancient, vast, and weighty aura, seemingly capable of smoothing out all the wrinkles of time. Wherever the light touched, the eerie flow of time caused by the gray hand was instantly smoothed out and neutralized!

Immediately afterwards, to Han Mu's astonishment, the lid of the gray-white ancient coffin slowly moved backward a fraction of an inch.

It really was just a tiny crack.

But from that tiny gap, a wisp of gray-white energy, condensed to its extreme and seemingly containing the secrets of the origin and end of time, drifted out silently. Seemingly slow, it actually touched the gray hand of time that had reached out to grab it in an instant.

There was no earth-shattering explosion, nor any dazzling collision of lights.

The enormous hand, formed from countless fragments of gray time and radiating terrifying power, vanished silently, starting from its fingertips, like pencil marks erased by an eraser, the moment it was touched by the gray-white airflow. It dissipated into the most primordial particles of time and returned to the void.

For the first time, a violent emotional fluctuation appeared in the gray figure's eternally cold eyes. It was shock, horror, disbelief, and even... a trace of deeply hidden fear!

"The Source Coffin...awakened on its own?! No! Impossible! It had already..."

He didn't finish his sentence.

Because after the grayish-white airflow "wiped away" the gray hand, it did not stop, but as if it had a life of its own, it locked onto the gray figure itself and gently "blew" towards him.

The gray figure let out a sharp, inhuman shriek and retreated rapidly. At the same time, it frantically waved its hands, creating gray barriers of time in front of it. Each barrier was enough to easily trap and kill a peak Golden Immortal!

However, in the face of that seemingly faint grayish-white current, these barriers of time melted away as quickly as ice and snow under the sun, failing to provide any resistance whatsoever.

A gray-white stream of air "blew" past the gray figure.

The gray figure's retreating motion abruptly froze, its blurred form beginning to twist and tremble violently, emitting painful screams. The gray fragments of time that constituted its body were collapsing and dissipating at a visible speed.

"No!! I am an inspector of the 'Anti-Time Alliance'! How dare you cripples..." The roar, filled with resentment and fear, came to an abrupt halt.

The gray figure completely disintegrated, turning into specks of gray light, which were then swept away by the remaining gray-white air currents in the void, disappearing without a trace, leaving not even a trace of its aura.

A terrifying being, who was suspected of surpassing the Golden Immortal level and controlling profound time laws, was easily annihilated by a wisp of air emitted autonomously from an ancient coffin, his body and soul destroyed.

There was a deathly silence all around.

Only the greyish-white ancient coffin floating in front of Han Mu still emitted a faint greyish-white light, and the slight gap in the coffin lid slowly closed. The light gradually subsided, returning to its ancient and unadorned state, as if the astonishing scene from just moments ago had never happened.

Han Mu and Yun Li stood there dumbfounded, unable to recover for a long time.

It all happened too fast, too suddenly, too unbelievably. One moment they were in dire straits, the next, that terrifying enemy had vanished into thin air.

After a long while, Han Mu slowly exhaled a breath of stale air mixed with icy shards. The wound on his forehead still stung and chilled him, reminding him that what he had just experienced was not an illusion. He looked at the gray-white ancient coffin floating in front of him, his eyes filled with complex emotions. What secrets and powers did this coffin conceal? And what was the background of that "Reverse Time Alliance" inspector? It seemed to be a terrifying organization specifically targeting time and space, and specifically the "Coffin of Origin"?

The ancient coffin trembled slightly and slowly flew back into Han Mu's hand. It still felt cool to the touch, as if everything that had just happened had nothing to do with it.

Han Mu gripped it tightly, feeling a faint, almost slumbering call from within the coffin. Can Nian said, "Take it to the 'Eye of the Ruins.' There, you'll find answers, but also danger."

"Senior..." Yun Li walked over, still shaken, looking at the small coffin in Han Mu's hand, then at the spot where the gray figure had disappeared, her voice hoarse. "What was that just now..."

"A member of a very troublesome organization, it seems, called the 'Reverse Time Alliance'." Han Mu carefully put away the ancient coffin, his expression grave. "He's dead, but he's likely already relayed our location, or the aura of this ancient coffin, back to us. We absolutely cannot stay here any longer!"

He endured the discomfort caused by his injuries and the corrosive power of time, and pulled Yun Li up. "Let's go! Let's get out of the depths of the Chaos Sea first! Let's find a safe place to heal, and then we can discuss this further!"

The two dared not delay for a moment, and without even bothering to carefully examine whether the gray figure had left anything behind, they immediately increased their escape speed to the maximum, randomly chose a direction different from the way they came and from the direction of the "Eye of Return to the Void", and fled frantically.

About the time it takes to drink a cup of tea after they left, the void rippled slightly, and two gray phantoms, more solid and with a more obscure and terrifying aura than the previous gray figure, quietly appeared above the stone platform.

Two illusory figures silently surveyed the area. One of them stretched out its hand, with gray sands of time flowing from its fingertips, as if it were trying to trace back and capture the remaining traces of time in this place.

A moment later, he withdrew his hand, and a cold, stiff voice rang out: "The aura of 'Darkness'... has completely dissipated. There are remnants of the aura of the 'Source Coffin' fragment... and two unfamiliar traces of time disturbance, one strong and one weak. The stronger one... seems to also possess a rudimentary grasp of time power and has a deep connection with the 'Source Coffin' fragment. The weaker one can be ignored."

Another illusory figure spoke, its voice equally cold: "The key is the target who can trigger the 'Source Coffin' fragments to awaken and counterattack, obliterating 'Darkness'... The one who controls the power of time. We must find him, retrieve the fragments, and investigate his relationship with the 'Source Coffin'."

"The traces point in that direction, but they're blurry, interfered with by some force." The first phantom pointed in the direction Han Mu and his group left, but then immediately pointed in several other completely different directions. "There are multiple misleading traces at the same time. Very cautious."

"It's alright. Before 'Hui' died, he should have already transmitted the most crucial aura imprint back to 'Shiyuan'. The alliance will soon issue a full-scale manhunt order. He can't escape. This Chaos Sea will soon be anything but peaceful." The second illusory figure spoke calmly. "First, go and meet up with the two stewards, 'Xuan' and 'Huang'. The spacetime node within the Blackwater Serpent seems to have changed, and the alliance is taking it very seriously. Just report what's happening here."

The two illusory figures nodded slightly, their forms flickered, and they vanished as if they had never existed, disappearing into time itself.

Only the faint traces remaining on the stone platform, gradually smoothed out by the chaotic energy, testify to what had just happened.

In another distant region of the Chaos Sea, Han Mu, who was carefully avoiding spatial turbulence and flying towards the outer edge of the Chaos Sea, suddenly felt a pang of fear, as if he were being watched by something extremely terrifying.

He subconsciously touched the gray-white ancient coffin in his arms, his eyes filled with extreme solemnity.

The trouble seems to have only just begun.