Holding onto this hope, Qiu Ling traveled in the same direction. He still looked around along the way, not wanting to miss if there were any traces of somebody living here to the side. For a long time, he didn’t see anything though. Then what appeared in front of him were a very familiar wall and gate.

Qiu Ling stopped in his tracks, looking at the place up ahead in a daze. This … looked exactly like the wall and gate of the Nine Heaven’s capital city. Well, no, not exactly alike. There were a few details that differed but they were few and far in between and without looking closely, he wouldn’t have realized at all.

Qiu Ling furrowed his brows and slowly inched closer. He knew he couldn’t hesitate but this was too surprising. This was the only city he had ever seen since entering the High Heavens which had to mean that its status was special. Why did it look like this?

He stopped directly in front of the gate, the feeling of astonishment deepening further. Save for some of the engravings, this really looked exactly like the gate of the capital city down in the Nine Heavens. He definitely wouldn’t mistake it.

For a moment, Qiu Ling felt that he had to be especially careful. This just … didn’t seem normal. Why would this place appear here? Could it be that somebody was messing with his mind? Or had the damage to Jing He’s soul and the backlash he received through their bond caused him to hallucinate now? It seemed like it was possible.

He hesitated for a moment but then pushed the gate. The street that appeared behind it … well, it sure had a lot of resemblance to the one he was familiar with. This time, the differences were more pronounced though.

Qiu Ling raised a brow and pondered. The High Heavens weren’t more related to the Nine Heavens than the other immortal realms so it seemed odd for this city to appear here like this. In fact, the Tian Shan sat smackdab in the middle between the three realms so if anything, the High Heavens should have been a mixture of everything. But then, the borders of those realms hadn’t always been the same so this didn’t say anything.

Still, it seemed odd for a city this similar to be here without reason. So why … He tilted his head and then thought of just who lived here. In fact, there only seemed to be a very select number of people: Tian and maybe some fallen gods.

As for who would erect a city in an otherwise empty realm like this, there was only one person he could imagine. After all, this realm was Tian’s domain. Why he would create this city … If looking at it from this point of view, it suddenly made sense. Not just the city itself but also why there were some differences to the one in the Nine Heavens.

Yes, most likely, this place was created according to the capital city of the Nine Heavens but not the one he was familiar with. No, this should be a mirror image of the capital from the time when Tian’s lover had lived there. And he had probably created this place for his lover as well because he wanted him to have a home he could return to even after he fell.

In this regard, he really had to applaud the supreme sovereign. There was clearly nothing he couldn’t do for his beloved. No step was too far, no task too difficult. Sure, the guy was probably omnipotent so this shouldn’t be hard for him but doing it still showed that he cared. As somebody equally willing to put the one he loved ahead of everything else, how could he not admire this?

Qiu Ling let go of his previous doubts about this city and simply moved forward. He couldn’t say for sure if his idea that Jing He might be at the very same place that he had vanished from was true. But if it was, he knew exactly where to go.

He hurriedly moved through the streets of the capital city that looked both familiar but also foreign to him. It was obviously the same place but being inside, he saw more differences now. It truly felt as if he had stumbled into the past. Thinking this, he couldn’t help but also think of Jing He. His beloved certainly would have loved to take a look around. To see the place where Xing had lived, the true remnants of the time when Tian had walked among the trueborn gods … it should be an emotional moment for him.

If he really was here, waiting for him to find him, then after he woke up, they should probably have a look around. After all, they certainly wouldn’t get another chance. Ah, of course, this matter would still need to be weighed for a while. They couldn’t do something to anger Tian, after all. Even though the supreme sovereign had seemed nice enough so far, he still remembered Xin Lan’s warning from earlier and … well, to be honest, he also didn’t have any illusions that the person who rather casually cursed three races was somebody who would usually give others a good face.

Qiu Ling coughed and pushed the thought away. He knew he was only trying to distract himself because the closer he got to the place where Jing He’s palace stood in the Nine Heavens, the more worried he was. Would the palace even be there considering that this city was built according to its state thousands of years ago? And even if it did … would he find him there?

His heart raced and his hands couldn’t help but clench as the thought he had tried to push off finally managed to squeeze into the forefront of his mind. Gritting his teeth, Qiu Ling simply sped up. No matter what, he had to try.

In this way, he finally passed the palaces of the titled gods and then came to that place a little further away from where you could usually witness the bustle of the capital city. The path actually ended much earlier than he was familiar with and his heart seemed to drop. Looking up though, there was indeed a palace in the distance and he could even see the edge of a beautiful garden as if this was actually the place in the Nine Heavens where Jing He lived.

Seeing it, Qiu Ling didn’t hesitate at all. He rushed ahead, barging into the palace without further thought. But before he could pass the screen right behind the door, he came face to face with the only person he knew to live in the High Heavens for sure.