"How much preserved food and water does everyone have left?" asked Scholar Jia. Everyone who still had rations and water brought them out. Looking at the meager portions each person held, every head bowed in silent contemplation.

Suddenly, Young Master Liu’s eyes snapped open, and he shouted, "I have a feeling we will leave this place alive, and more than that, we will unravel all these mysteries." In an instant, everyone’s eyes fixed on Young Master Liu; the expression on every face became animated, some even struggling to contain their excitement.

Scholar Jia urgently pressed, "Hurry and tell us, what are you sensing?"

Young Master Liu smiled and quickly stated, "Think about it, everyone. First, why did this palace shake violently after the Phoenix’s Gall, that golden sphere, was taken by the Phoenix? It must be because the Phoenix’s Gall left this white casket."

Scholar Jia blinked his small eyes. "And what of it?"

Young Master Liu continued, "Second, why did the palace suddenly close? I believe this was intentional on the part of the palace's designer. Time, events, perhaps even our very presence, the appearance of the Phoenix, the removal of the Phoenix’s Gall—these could all be reasons for the palace gates to shut."

Everyone nodded, watching Young Master Liu intently. He went on, "Third, the moment the doors closed, the shaking instantly ceased. Shortly after, I felt as if some force was pulling my entire body backward, causing me to lean back and drop. I think this great hall we are currently in must be... how should I put it... it has moved, or rather, some force is manipulating this entire hall."

The others stared at Young Master Liu in disbelief, finding it utterly incredible.

Young Master Liu ignored their skeptical gazes and continued to elaborate on the revelations gleaned from his sensations: "Fourth, the doors are sealed. If the designer intended to trap us intruders inside with no way out, why would they design that white casket to show us the images we just saw? This indicates the designer wanted us to learn certain information." As he said this, seeing that everyone seemed to be deep in thought, Young Master Liu smiled again and added, "From everything I’ve said, I have a strong feeling that this palace is silently moving. It will reopen at a specific time and in a specific place. Perhaps then and there, when we step out, all the secrets will be revealed."

The very instant Young Master Liu finished speaking, he once again felt his body being dominated by some potent force, involuntarily lurching backward, accompanied by a massive sensation of falling rising from beneath him.

"Heavens! I feel it too, the falling sensation!" shouted Scholar Jia.

At this moment, Young Master Liu saw the same expression on everyone’s face: shock. He knew that this time, everyone had felt it. Only about ten seconds after everyone felt the descent, a faint tremor traveled up through the hall floor, and Young Master Liu’s sensation of falling abruptly vanished. A surge of tension, unbidden, filled him; he surmised they must have arrived at their intended destination.

As expected, Fan DeBiao pointed toward the hall entrance, his expression a mixture of wild ecstasy and disbelief, stammering, "The... the door's open... it really opened!" Everyone instantly jumped up, looking at the exit revealed by the open door, their faces beaming with extreme joy. Of course, everyone carried countless unspoken emotions in their hearts.

The door had finally opened. From where they stood, a gentle beam of soft white light streamed in from outside, though no scenery was visible. Young Master Liu gazed quietly at the white light, suddenly feeling an extraordinary sense of peace, even sensing a familiar and benevolent voice calling to him from the space beyond the door, causing him to step forward involuntarily toward the entrance.

Seeing Young Master Liu advance toward the door without hesitation, the others followed him in a line, stepping out into the unknown space beyond.

They filed out of the Wuji Dao Zang (Boundless Dao Repository) and immediately found themselves inside a rather small space station. Although it was large enough to contain a structure the size of the Wuji Dao Zang, Young Master Liu took in the station’s layout quickly enough to grasp its entire scope at a glance.

He observed that the surroundings consisted of the smooth, jointed steel plate construction often seen in science fiction films. Along the station's ceiling were conduits and lines of varying lengths and shapes, some intermittently flashing with indescribable specks of light.

From his observation, Young Master Liu felt certain this place did not belong to Earth. Yet, within the space station, there was something even more astonishing: resting on a control console was a square object resembling some sort of instrument. This object had a black casing all around, with a brightly glowing white screen on the front—the soft white light illuminating the entire chamber originated from its screen. Beneath the screen, there seemed to be several protruding buttons. The entire apparatus looked remarkably like a very large television set.

Seeing this object, everyone was astonished. Fan DeBiao even gaped and exclaimed in surprise, "My dear Lord, who put a television set here?"

The others ignored Fan DeBiao’s remark and slowly approached the stone platform where the TV-like object rested. Young Master Liu spoke first, "What do you all think this thing is?"

Scholar Jia replied, "Could it be an instrument used by an alien? Perhaps the one used by that person wearing the shimmering silver clothes in the first image inside the Wuji Dao Zang?"

Young Master Liu said, "I think what the senior said is correct. It’s some kind of instrument, perhaps one that person once used. However, it must be left for us now, or perhaps for those who arrive here aboard a spacecraft."

"Spacecraft?" Scholar Jia looked at Young Master Liu in astonishment.

Young Master Liu smiled and then stated, "Yes, a spacecraft."

Turning around, Young Master Liu pointed to the Wuji Dao Zang from which they had just emerged and continued, "This Wuji Dao Zang is the spacecraft that carried us to this space."

Everyone instantly understood. Scholar Jia shook his head with a bitter smile. "It’s simply unbelievable."

Young Master Liu nodded. "Indeed. Humanity has always explored the unknown space and life forms beyond Earth. It is true; we should believe that beyond Earth, there are outer worlds and outer life forms more wondrous, more civilized, and more unbelievable than our Earth."

After a period of hushed awe, they turned back to look at the strange, television-like instrument resting on the circular stone platform. Fan DeBiao looked at Young Master Liu and asked, "Young Master, you always seem to have more accurate thoughts and insights than the rest of us. What do you think this thing is? And what might it bring us?"

Young Master Liu pointed to the buttons below the white screen. "I think the key to this instrument lies in these buttons. My greatest guess is that this instrument, much like the white casket in the Wuji Dao Zang, will project images to tell us things."

Fan DeBiao interjected then, "That's right. This thing looks like a TV to me; it must be displaying images to tell us some secrets."

Everyone nodded, agreeing that this was the most logical speculation.

Cai Qingchong then raised another question, "But there are four buttons: one white, one green, one silver-gray, and one red. What about those? Which one plays the image? And what are the other three for? What would happen if we press the wrong one?"

The group froze again. Yes, there were four buttons—what did that mean? No one dared to contemplate the potentially extreme danger should the wrong button be pressed.

Young Master Liu’s mind began to whirl for a moment. Four buttons? What could they signify? Was his guess wrong? Was this instrument not a projector but for some other purpose?

Suddenly, he seemed to hear a faint, familiar voice near his ear, as if someone were speaking to him, but the sound was so faint that Young Master Liu could barely make out the words. He closed his eyes, forcing himself to dismiss all extraneous thoughts and concentrate on listening to the subtle sound. This time, Young Master Liu vaguely heard the voice repeatedly murmuring: "Left one, right one, left two, right two, the answer, rebirth…" Young Master Liu snapped his eyes open; he suddenly remembered—this voice sounded exactly like Zhang Enpu.

Young Master Liu repeated the twelve characters silently in his mind, then added a private thought: "Master, thank you!"

He took a deep breath, then looked at the worried faces of the others, slowly extending his left hand and pressing the first button on the left—the white one.

Watching Young Master Liu press the white button without a word, everyone stared at him in astonishment, wondering why he had acted so abruptly.

Young Master Liu offered a slight smile, then pointed to the strange instrument and said, "Trust me! Look at this machine, everyone. We are about to uncover all the secrets."

Hearing Young Master Liu’s words, everyone quickly turned their eyes back to the instrument before them. Indeed, after flickering a few times, the instrument’s white screen displayed a clear image. Strangely, the very first scene that appeared was identical to the first image shown in the white casket back in the Three Purity Dao Preaching Platform. Everyone exchanged bewildered glances—how could this be?

Just then, a voice echoed from the screen: "I... I do not know who you are, but I know that the secret of the Wuji Dao Zang will one day be discovered by the humans of Earth. Having arrived here, you will learn all the answers you seek through this message-leaving instrument. You must have seen those images in the spacecraft. I am the person in the first picture, known in China as Zhang Daoling, the founder of Daoism in your terminology. I come from a distant world and passed by your Earth by chance, discovering that this world suffered too many disasters and deaths, and that this world lacked the civilization... and the faith required to cope with these catastrophes. Thus, I stayed on this beautiful planet temporarily with one of my servants. Across the seven continents and eight oceans, in every region of the world, I sowed the seeds of faith into the minds of humanity, granting them self-respect, self-love, self-reliance, and the courage to survive. Over the course of time, what you know as Daoism, Buddhism, Catholicism, Islam, and others came into being."

"On this planet, I also encountered people from many other worlds, some benevolent and some malevolent. The benevolent ones, like me, held the goal of helping this backward planet advance its civilization; the malevolent ones opposed us. They infiltrated the humans of this planet, instigating conflict with malicious intent, attempting to seize this beautiful world for themselves. Eventually, their conspiracy caused immense disaster for this beautiful planet: heavenly fire and great floods. Therefore, I and many benevolent friends from other worlds helped certain human tribes enter the temporal stations we built on Earth, preserving the last forms of life on the planet."

"I do not know how the other tribes survived, left the temporal stations, and returned to Earth to multiply. I only know that the lineage of the tribe I preserved was ultimately wiped out due to my oversight."

"After I brought this Earth tribe to the temporal station, a sudden upheaval occurred in our own world, forcing me to leave my servant to look after them while I returned to deal with matters there. Unexpectedly, my servant developed ambition during that time, inciting this tribe to return to the surface and establish the Yellow Turban Rebellion. During this period, my servant utilized the Phoenix’s Gall I left behind countless times to resurrect the Yellow Turbans, eventually turning a small tribe with few people into a powerful legion capable of threatening the entire nation, capable of rivaling the mighty Han Dynasty of that era."

"My servant was originally a penitent cultivator from our world, just like me, but for the selfish desire involving a human woman, he also traveled to Earth and helped her become the so-called Great Teacher of Celestial Matters, Zhang Jiao. However, he did not know that the Phoenix’s Gall was not capable of granting endless resurrection and immortality as he imagined. The Phoenix’s Gall brings only endless calamity to humanity. Once a person is revived through the Phoenix’s Gall after death, they are no longer truly human. Although possessing human instinct and intelligence, their nature has completely transformed into a composite being of brutality, greed, selfishness, lust, and other base qualities. If these beings remain on Earth, they will only bring endless war, slaughter, and disaster to the people of this beautiful planet; their proliferation will eventually destroy the planet."

"When I finished dealing with matters in our world and returned to the Earth temporal station, I learned that all this was caused by my servant. Thus, I resolved to rectify everything. Zhang Lu, who suppressed the Yellow Turban Uprising, was another servant of mine in disguise. I used him to defeat those undead soldiers who had been radiated by the Phoenix’s Gall and dealt with them properly. However, my treacherous servant had already taken Zhang Jiao's body to the Golden Ancient City, intending to use the Phoenix’s Gall to revive her again. As it turned out, the Phoenix’s Gall’s effect failed, turning Zhang Jiao into a living corpse with life but no consciousness. When I reached the Golden Ancient City, my treacherous servant ambushed me, and in the end, I used the last of my cultivation to perish alongside him. My only regret is that I failed to restore the 'Ninety-Nine Heavens'—which my evil servant had corrupted—to its original purity, leading to the countless evil occurrences you encountered."

"After my evil servant and I perished together, our physical bodies were destroyed, but our Primordial Yang remained immortal. I commanded my other servant, Zhang Lu, to take the Phoenix’s Gall and seal it within the Wuji Dao Zang, where I cultivated in the temporal station. That was the only place my evil servant dared not tamper with. However, I did not expect that my evil servant's Primordial Yang also survived; though he was powerless to assume human form and harm the world again, he transformed into an evil dragon under the hand of a villain from another world, intent on reclaiming the Phoenix’s Gall. Fortunately, my benevolent servant Zhang Lu, aided by the Phoenix I left behind, sealed him in the Azure Lake."

"What happened afterward is what you experienced. The Phoenix I left behind must have defeated the evil dragon, which had been sealed for a thousand years and lost its cultivation, thus guarding the Phoenix’s Gall. Only then could you come here and hear the message I left imprinted with my Primordial Yang."

"Among the three buttons on this message-leaving machine, one allows you to enter the Outer Immortal Realm. Upon entering, you will face trials of life and death, and perhaps enter our world to become cultivators. Another button allows you to return to your world. The remaining button will destroy the entire Ninety-Nine Heavens temporal station. Whether you choose to enter the City of Life and Death or return to your world, you must first find the button to destroy the Ninety-Nine Heavens. Destroy this temporal station first, which has been corrupted by my evil servant into a place of wickedness."

"Finally, I must make one point clear: whether you choose to enter the Ninety-Nine Heavens, attain eternal life, and become an otherworldly being—the ascension your Daoist predecessors dreamed of—or choose to return to your world and remain inhabitants of Earth, you must decide for yourselves. There are three buttons left; choose as you will!"

The instrument, which the voice's owner had called the message-leaving machine, suddenly flickered at this point. The image on the screen vanished, returning to its initial blank state.

It took a long time for the group to recover, staring blankly at the messaging device, now devoid of sound or image, unsure what to say.

The answer had indeed finally been revealed. Although Zhang Daoling had not recounted the entire sequence of events, Young Master Liu felt that perhaps not everything needed to be perfectly clear and understood. It might be better to leave the rest to be discovered and excavated in the stories yet to come.

Now, having recovered, they stared at the three remaining buttons, uncertain where to begin. Slowly, their eyes once again focused on Young Master Liu.