From the 82nd generation mountain master James Sutton, William Sutton, to the seventh senior brother before Lucas Warren, John Blake, every single name was dazzlingly golden.

So much so that the last, obscure white-named Lucas Warren, the dignified mountain master, now seemed completely out of place.

“So…”

Looking at the brilliant golden light on the Ascension Register, Lucas Warren finally understood what had happened on Ling Mountain.

From Master James Sutton to Senior Sister Olivia Warren, for reasons unknown, these people had actually ascended together!

And the only one left behind had become the sole master of Ling Mountain!

Chapter 2: Please Witness, A Spectacular Sight Ahead

Standing in front of the Qi Ling Hall, Lucas Warren felt an unprecedented sense of absurdity.

Because only I didn’t ascend, I have to take over as the master of Ling Mountain and enjoy a leisurely life?

The problem is, this world where only I didn’t ascend, from another perspective, is actually a world where Ling Mountain has been wiped out!

To be exterminated because of collective ascension—how could such a thing exist in this world?

Yet, amidst the absurdity, Lucas Warren realized there was indeed some logic to it.

With Ling Mountain’s strength, no external enemy could shake it in the slightest… but if the anomaly came from the heavens, that would be another matter.

And is it possible for a heavenly anomaly to occur? Of course it is. For example, there’s the age-old legend: the gates of immortality open, and one ascends in broad daylight.

This legend refers to times when immortal fate suddenly and inexplicably favors someone, causing their cultivation to skyrocket, even allowing them to ascend on the spot. It’s as if the gates of the Immortal Realm open above their head, drawing the cultivator in.

The legend seems ethereal, but throughout long history, it has truly happened. Even immortals in the Immortal Realm can’t explain the exact reason; all they know is that some people just get incredibly lucky and can ascend without effort.

In fact, as the cultivation world of the Nine Provinces developed, the frequency of this seemingly illusory legend increased. In the past, it might have happened only once in a thousand years, but in the last fifty years, it has already occurred three times, to the point where some cultivators simply lie flat and wait for immortal fate to descend.

But the people of Ling Mountain have never cared much for this legend. On one hand, ascension is already easy, so many people have become picky and don’t ascend even if they can; on the other hand, the opening of the immortal gates is a purely random event, not favoring any particular blessed land. Even though Ling Mountain is the leader of the cultivation world, in over ten thousand years, it has never once encountered the opening of the immortal gates.

So, no one knows, if the immortal gates really do open and force ascension, whether cultivators have any choice at all…

But at least Lucas Warren knows that once you go up, you can’t come back down.

Since the Immortal Ancestor Chicheng opened up the Immortal Realm, the Immortal Realm has had a huge influence on the mortal world, but there has never been a case of an immortal descending to the mortal world—not even Immortal Ancestor Chicheng could do it. So if James Sutton, Olivia Warren, and the others really encountered some sudden event and ascended together, then…

That would truly mean Ling Mountain has been wiped out, and the sole survivor has no choice but to take up the position of mountain master with tears in his eyes.

For a moment, Lucas Warren didn’t know whether to congratulate his master and senior sister for successfully reaching the end of their mortal cultivation, or to lament that his closest loved ones had become forever separated overnight… Well, lamenting isn’t really necessary. With Lucas Warren’s talent, he’ll ascend in at most a hundred years, and he doesn’t have the mortal attachments of Fourth Senior Sister Stephen White or Fifth Senior Brother Matthew Reed; he still wants to ascend if he can. So, they’ll just reunite in the Immortal Realm then—no need to dwell on it.

The real issue now is that this position as the 84th generation mountain master is truly not easy to take on.

In Ling Mountain’s ten-thousand-year history, there has never been a mountain master at the Foundation Establishment stage, and a cultivator at the Foundation Establishment stage simply cannot handle the responsibilities of a mountain master.

Looking at the empty Qi Ling Hall, Lucas Warren already realized that it wasn’t that Olivia Warren had cleaned out the hall, but that as a Foundation Establishment mountain master, he wasn’t qualified to “see” the dazzling immortal treasures inside.

Besides that, he hadn’t unlocked many of the privileges a mountain master should have: after taking over, the Ascension Register should have gained several new functions. For example, he had personally seen James Sutton use the mountain master’s version of the Ascension Register to remotely control the Qi Ling Hall, shifting the entire Ling Mountain, changing the course of mountains and rivers, and restructuring the earth veins in just a few breaths. He had also seen James Sutton directly retrieve the most precious elixirs from the Jinxiu Pavilion through the Ascension Register.

But now, as the 84th generation mountain master, he couldn’t even disperse the sea of clouds in the mountain.

This is the very definition of virtue not matching the position… and there are risks to that.

Ling Mountain, as the leader of the Nine Provinces’ cultivation world, attracts a lot of attention and has no shortage of enemies, with even more competitors. It’s just that for over ten thousand years, no one has been able to shake Ling Mountain’s status.

But now that the entire sect has ascended, who could resist making a move?

And once they do, can a mere Foundation Establishment mountain master withstand it? Moreover, even without external threats, as the leader of the cultivation world, Ling Mountain’s influence is vast, and its very existence requires management and maintenance, which Lucas Warren clearly isn’t capable of right now. What’s more, although Ling Mountain’s official staff isn’t large, the outer sects handling miscellaneous affairs are huge in scale, and Lucas Warren hasn’t had much contact with them before.

Lucas Warren pondered in the Qi Ling Hall for a long time, feeling as if countless tangled threads were crashing over him like a tide, all of them discouraging. Fortunately, of the two people on Ling Mountain who are least likely to know the meaning of discouragement or defeat, he is one of them.