The comet remained silent, only relentlessly unleashing heavenly tribulations.

"Wu Gang... or perhaps, the great sorcerer Hou Yi?"

Song Yi looked at the legendary giant, and a thought struck him.

In ancient times, the witches and demons were at odds. Hou Yi was a great witch of the witch tribe. When he saw the ten golden crow princes of the demon emperor Di Jun wreaking havoc on the earth and causing great suffering to the people of the witch tribe, he took up the Sun-Shooting Bow and killed nine suns in succession to protect his people.

This action completely escalated the conflict between the witches and demons. Di Jun, grieving the loss of his nine sons, angrily captured Chang'e, Hou Yi's wife, imprisoned her in the Guanghan Palace, and forced Hou Yi, who had followed him, to swear a solemn oath to Heaven:

"As long as the osmanthus tree stands, and the seal on the Taiyin Palace remains intact, I will never see Chang'e again! From now on, there will be no more great wizard Hou Yi, only the woodcutter Wu Gang!"

The Heavenly Dao responded, unleashing its power of rules to erase his soul and spirit, leaving only a shell with empty strength.

The innate laurel root is a top-grade spiritual root, nourished by the boundless power of the yin. If a branch is cut off, a new branch will immediately grow back.

Chang'e is imprisoned just a stone's throw away, while Wu Gang is forever chopping wood, never to see her again.

This is an extremely cruel curse, one that will never end.

Those few axe blows may have seemed like a lot of noise but little action, but in reality, they contained terrifying power.

Song Yi secretly estimated that even the Blood Corpse Demon at his peak, or that Kumosh, probably couldn't withstand a single blow from his axe.

A thought struck him, and he quietly took out a leaf from the Innate Enlightenment Tree. The leaf was engraved with an axe-shaped Dao pattern.

The innate Dao patterns on the tea leaves of the Enlightenment Tree encompass everything, including auspicious beasts such as dragons, phoenixes, and unicorns, divine weapons such as swords, spears, axes, and halberds, and various magical treasures such as pagodas, beads, flags, and furnaces—nothing is left untouched and nothing is left unrevealed.

Song Yi put the tea leaves in his mouth and pressed them under his tongue.

Before long, he once again entered a state of enlightenment where he was one with the universe.

What was originally a simple and unadorned chopping motion gradually evolved into many mysterious and inexplicable trajectories in his eyes. Every axe stroke was in accordance with the ultimate principles of heaven and earth, and every strike contained the profound mysteries of the Great Dao.

That is the ultimate exertion of strength, a return to simplicity.

After the effects of the tea dissipated, he did not hesitate to take out another leaf and put it in his mouth, continuing to ponder it carefully.

After an unknown amount of time, and after consuming an unknown amount of precious Enlightenment Tea leaves, Song Yi finally opened his eyes.

In his eyes, a fleeting, indistinct image of a giant axe flashed by.

"The supernatural powers of the Witch Clan truly do not cultivate the primordial spirit, but only seek the ultimate in power."

Song Yi sighed deeply, his eyes gradually clearing.

He raised his right hand, pointed his fingers as if making a sword, and lightly drew a line across the ground.

laugh!

A sharp and incomparable burst of energy shot out, and the Taiyin Earth surface, which was hard enough to withstand the battle of immortals and was hundreds of times harder than refined iron, was cleaved open like tofu, leaving a huge, straight crack.

Song Yi looked around and saw a mess everywhere, with laurel branches of varying thickness and length lying across the cold, moonlit ground.

He bent down and picked up a broken branch that was hundreds of feet long. He immediately felt that it was as heavy as a thousand pounds and its touch was icy cold.

This branch is entirely dark silver, with patterns resembling blooming frost flowers. It is indestructible and contains extremely rich Yin energy.

If an ordinary cultivator who has not yet attained immortality dares to touch it, their primordial spirit will likely be frozen and shattered instantly.

There are also long branches, dozens of miles long and as thick as dragons, stretching across the wasteland like mountain ridges.

These extremely yin and cold divine objects are so cold that ordinary spatial magic treasures simply cannot withstand their corrosive power. Cleaning and moving them would be extremely difficult.

No wonder the Jade Rabbit was unwilling to do it itself and insisted on asking the Qingtianjian to intervene.

Song Yi did not delay and immediately offered up the Seven Treasures Xuanhuang Pagoda.

The pagoda spun in mid-air, casting down streams of mysterious yellow energy that collected the scattered laurel branches one by one.

While cleaning, Song Yi keenly noticed that some fist-sized laurel flowers were hidden among the gaps in the broken branches.

These flowers are about the size of a fist, appearing exceptionally small and delicate compared to the giant branches that stretch for tens of miles nearby.

The petals are a pale gold color, and feel as smooth as silk to the touch, yet they are incredibly tough, impossible to tear with ordinary force.

A unique fragrance emanates from between the petals, which is refreshing and soothing, washing away all distracting thoughts like a receding tide.

"This osmanthus flower has the wonderful effect of calming the mind and suppressing inner demons," Song Yi thought with delight.

In this way, it took about three days to finally clear away all the debris that had accumulated over the past tens of thousands of years.

Song Yi exhaled a breath of stale air, and was about to head to the Moon Palace to pay a visit to the Moon Goddess.

Suddenly, on the towering laurel tree that stretched straight into the starry sky and whose height was unknown, there were specks of golden light that shimmered, standing out brightly in the cool moonlight.

On a sudden impulse, he immediately leaped upwards.

"This primordial laurel tree is already so enormous; what must the legendary towering Jianmu tree be like?"

As Song Yi flew upwards, he sighed inwardly.

The branches of the laurel tree flew past him rapidly, and it took a full cup of tea's time for the golden light to gradually become clear.

Upon seeing the source of the light, Song Yi was taken aback; it was also a laurel flower.

This flower was completely different from the ones seen before. It was the size of a lotus platform, with layers upon layers of petals, shining with golden light, and emitting countless fine rays of light, which diluted the surrounding coldness and gave way to a faint warmth.

"I always thought that while the flowers of this innate laurel tree could eliminate inner demons and distracting thoughts, they didn't quite live up to the reputation of a top-grade innate spiritual root. It turns out that even flowers have different levels of quality!"

Song Yi suddenly realized that only laurel and lotus flowers of this quality could truly be called innate spiritual objects.

He reached out to pluck it, but found that the flower stem was exceptionally tough, and even with his current cultivation level, he couldn't lift it.

He immediately took out a celestial sword and used all his magic power to slash at it.

With a clang, sparks flew, leaving only a faint white mark on the flower stem.

Song Yi was greatly surprised, thinking to himself that it was indeed a rare and extraordinary innate treasure.

As he was pondering, he glanced down and saw Wu Gang tirelessly chopping down the laurel tree below.

With a thought, he raised the immortal sword again, and an extremely sharp light burst forth from the sword, faintly echoing the intent of Wu Gang's axe.

"laugh!"

The flower stem snapped off instantly, leaving a smooth, mirror-like cut.

"My darling!"

Song Yi was overjoyed and carefully placed the laurel lotus flower into the tower.

Looking up again, the laurel tree's canopy stretches into the depths of the starry sky, with scattered golden lights among its branches and leaves, like stars scattered across the night sky.

However, he knew the principle that too much of a good thing is bad, and that being greedy was not good, so he suppressed his thoughts, turned around, climbed down from the laurel tree, and flew towards the Moon Palace.

Before long, an ancient palace appeared ahead, its style simple and ancient, as if it were carved from a single, enormous piece of cold jade, perfectly integrated without any trace of splicing.

Song Yi stepped forward and knocked on the door three times.

A moment later, the palace gate creaked open, revealing a beautiful face with a touch of playfulness—it was the Jade Rabbit Fairy.

Upon seeing that it was Song Yi, a hint of surprise flashed in her eyes: "Star Lord, have you... finished cleaning everything?"

Song Yi smiled and nodded.

The Jade Rabbit Fairy quickly stepped aside to let him in.

Stepping into the Moon Palace, one sees a winding corridor with ancient and mysterious patterns on the pillars, quite different from the style of the celestial world today, revealing a sense of ancient times and primordial chaos.

The entire palace was extremely empty and desolate; apart from the Jade Rabbit, there was not a single maid or fairy in sight.