Daoist Heavenspan

Daoist Heavenspan, better known in the Heavenspan Realm as the Celestial, is the ruler of the lands surrounding the Heavenspan River and the father of Du Lingfei. His fear of death drives him to challenge the Gravekeeper, sacrifice his own realm in an attempt to refine an Undying Live Forever Pill, and later submit to the Mortal Renegade for greater power. He becomes one of Bai Xiaochun's most persistent enemies before perishing in the final preparations for the Mortal Renegade's awakening. (Chapters 461, 837–840, 1004–1028, 1149–1150, 1278–1291)

Biography

The Ruler Who Could Not Open the Worldgate

Long before he appears in person, Daoist Heavenspan is established as the exceptional cultivator who used five deva beast souls to form a Heaven-Dao Nascent Soul. He rules the entire Heavenspan region from Heavenspan Island and has become so closely joined to the realm that he can borrow the power of its lands and sea. His authority, however, does not give him the Arch-Emperor legacy required to pass through the Worldgate. That refusal becomes the central grievance behind his conflict with the Gravekeeper. (Chapters 461 and 837–838)

When he finally enters the open, he rescues the soulclone allied with him from the Gravekeeper and reveals the name Daoist Heavenspan. The ally is a soulclone associated with Ghostmother, not the original Gongsun Wan'er. Bound to help her and needing her strength, Daoist Heavenspan joins her attack on the Gravekeeper and demands that the Worldgate be opened. He argues that the world's approval makes him legitimate; the Gravekeeper answers that he lacks the required legacy, then defeats both attackers. (Chapters 837–840)

Daoist Heavenspan survives only because a cultivated lock of blood-red hair substitutes for his life when a world-damaging attack should kill him. Although he loses that protection, he still uses Heavenspan Sea water to replace the fallen Great Wall with a restrictive barrier before retreating. The encounter establishes both the breadth and the limit of his rule: he can weaponize the realm on a continental scale, but he cannot compel the Gravekeeper to grant him the path beyond it. (Chapters 838–840)

Refining the Undying Live Forever Pill

As his longevity dwindles, Daoist Heavenspan turns the Heavenspan war into part of a plan to escape death. He had obtained the Live Forever Codex from the Arch-Emperor Dynasty and permitted the Undying Codex to circulate in the Heavenspan lands. His earlier attempt to bring the two legacies together had been obstructed by the Frigid Matriarch and the Blood Ancestor, but Bai Xiaochun's mastery of the Undying Codex and Du Lingfei's cultivation of the Live Forever Codex give him another pair of candidates. (Chapters 1004–1008)

He places slave seals on Du Lingfei and tries to refine her together with Bai Xiaochun into an Undying Live Forever Pill. The pill is intended to grant the longevity and power he believes he needs to become a true celestial and leave the realm. He briefly wavers when Du Lingfei pleads with him as her father, yet ultimately treats even his daughter as an acceptable price for survival. Bai Hao's twenty-two-colored flame and the awakening Blood Ancestor interrupt the refinement, turning Daoist Heavenspan's carefully prepared ceremony into a direct battle. (Chapters 1005–1013)

The Tenth Daogate and a Shattered Realm

Daoist Heavenspan answers resistance with his sequence of Daogates, culminating in a tenth gate whose vortex drains life throughout the world. By this point he openly reasons that, if he cannot escape, the realm is doomed anyway and its remaining life should strengthen him. Bai Xiaochun counters with the Live Forever Lamp and the Greatsword of the North, severing limbs and forcing him to detonate his fleshly body. Seed-like symbols escape the destruction, while the Heavenspan Realm itself shatters and its surviving people are scattered into the Eternal Immortal Domains. (Chapters 1024–1028)

He later reappears in the Vile-Emperor Dynasty as a black-robed celestial known there as Celestial Du. His cultivation is in the early Celestial Realm, but his combat ability approaches the middle stage. The reigning Vile-Emperor protects him when Bai Xiaochun attacks, and subsequent confrontations show that Daoist Heavenspan has acquired unfamiliar black stones and defensive power. Those gifts are eventually revealed to have come, through the imposter Vile-Emperor, from the Mortal Renegade. (Chapters 1149–1150, 1189–1190, and 1279)

Apprentice of the Mortal Renegade

The black stones let Daoist Heavenspan evade the Eternal Mother's approval, become a celestial, and advance rapidly. Once he recognizes the will inside them, he knowingly betrays the Eternal Immortal Domains and becomes the Mortal Renegade's apprentice. Unlike the imposter Vile-Emperor, who is merely a clone, Daoist Heavenspan submits by choice. He enters the Mortal Renegade's body, emulates the Dao of nirvanic extermination, and rises to an Archaean level stronger than the former Vile-Emperor. (Chapter 1279)

When Bai Xiaochun's Gravitational Extermination Formation threatens to delay the Mortal Renegade's awakening, Daoist Heavenspan emerges from his master's forehead as its Dao protector. Bai defeats him, but the Mortal Renegade draws him back before the final blow. Daoist Heavenspan then uses the opportunity to steal energy and secretly raises himself close to the peak of the Archaean Realm, hoping to take enough power to become a true sovereign rather than remain dependent on his master. (Chapters 1278–1284)

Daoist Heavenspan returns while Bai attempts his own breakthrough. Externally empowered to the level of a half-sovereign, he wields the Devil-Sun and Demon-Moon and nearly overturns the defense of the Eternal Immortal Domains. The Eternal Mother weakens him, while Song Que and the Saint-Emperor prevent him from reaching the Mortal Renegade. He burns his flesh, soul, and borrowed Dao into a final projection of his master, but Song Que's Worldly Daoist incarnation leaves him fatally depleted. Remembering Du Lingfei's plea, he questions whether his choices were worthwhile before turning completely to ash. (Chapters 1285–1291)

Appearance and personality

In his first direct appearance, Daoist Heavenspan is a spectacularly handsome middle-aged man with sword-like eyebrows, black hair, and eyes compared to the sun and moon. He wears golden armor and an imperial crown, while a single red lock hangs across his forehead. That lock is a cultivated life-saving blood-hair rather than an ordinary feature. In the Eternal Immortal Domains he instead appears in a black Daoist robe, and his final form increasingly resembles the Mortal Renegade whose Dao and power he has accepted. (Chapters 837, 840, 1149, and 1279–1289)

He is proud, calculating, and consumed by the need to outlive his limits. He can build plans that extend across generations and an entire world, yet repeatedly interprets other lives as resources for his survival. His ambition does not erase all attachment: he remembers his daughter even after losing much of himself to the Mortal Renegade, and his last moments show grief and uncertainty. Those feelings never make him reverse course, however, and his choices remain defined by self-preservation at any cost. (Chapters 838–840, 1004–1009, 1026–1028, 1279, and 1290–1291)

Abilities and cultivation

Heaven-Dao cultivation and world authority

Daoist Heavenspan is the only known cultivator in his realm before Bai Xiaochun to form a Heaven-Dao Nascent Soul from five deva beast souls. As the Celestial, he stands above its demigods and can draw on the world power of the Heavenspan Realm. He projects the Heavenspan Sea and the entire Heavenspan continent, turns the sea into hands and spears, opens eye-like rifts that emit sword light, and uses the world's approval to amplify his attacks. This authority depends on the realm and does not make him equal to the Gravekeeper, who defeats him despite it. (Chapters 461 and 837–840)

Daogates and life substitution

His signature cultivation attacks manifest as nine Daogates and a far more dangerous tenth gate. The first nine can become sealing marks, lamps, and hands of black smoke; the tenth produces a destructive vortex capable of draining life from the surrounding world. He also possesses substitute-death methods. The blood-hair absorbs a fatal attack from the Gravekeeper, while a discarnate laughing-and-crying ghost takes the effect of Bai Xiaochun's Live Forever Lamp in his place. The source demonstrates that these methods are expended or lost when used and does not present them as unlimited resurrection. (Chapters 840, 1025–1028, 1149–1150, and 1279)

Power granted by the Mortal Renegade

After entering the Eternal Immortal Domains, Daoist Heavenspan reaches the Celestial and then Archaean realms through black stones and approval originating with the Mortal Renegade. His new Dao includes Starry Sky: Nirvanic Extermination, which projects dying worlds and a face resembling his master. He can burn his own life, soul, and Dao to turn that face into a full projected body, gaining enormous short-lived power at the cost of consuming himself. (Chapters 1279–1290)

At the height of that external empowerment he is described as a half-sovereign, although his underlying cultivation is near the peak of the Archaean Realm and his power comes from the Mortal Renegade. A sovereign sigil appears on his forehead, and he can command the Devil-Sun and Demon-Moon. These forces let him threaten Bai Xiaochun's breakthrough and overpower ordinary archaeans, but the Eternal Mother's intervention severs much of the support behind them. He never completes his private plan to become an independent sovereign. (Chapters 1284–1290)

Power progression

Relationships

Du Lingfei

Du Lingfei is Daoist Heavenspan's daughter and cultivates the Live Forever Codex as part of his design. He tries to sacrifice her in the Undying Live Forever Pill despite her pleas, choosing longevity over their relationship. Even after becoming the Mortal Renegade's apprentice, he retains memories of having a daughter. Her earlier question about whether the sacrifice was worth it returns in his final moments and prompts his last expression of doubt. (Chapters 1005–1009, 1279, and 1290)

Bai Xiaochun

Bai Xiaochun is first a cultivation resource in Daoist Heavenspan's plan, then the opponent who survives that plan and repeatedly surpasses him. Their conflict destroys the Heavenspan Realm, resumes under the rival Eternal Immortal Domains dynasties, and ends with Bai preventing Daoist Heavenspan from sabotaging the world's defenses. Daoist Heavenspan remains fixated on him even when other opponents deliver the wounds that finally kill him. (Chapters 1004–1028, 1149–1150, 1278–1290)

The Gravekeeper and the Mortal Renegade

The Gravekeeper denies Daoist Heavenspan access to the Worldgate because he lacks the Arch-Emperor legacy, making him the obstacle Daoist Heavenspan tries and fails to overcome. The Mortal Renegade offers the opposite bargain: rapid advancement and extraordinary power in exchange for submission. Daoist Heavenspan accepts, yet later steals energy during Bai's attack in an attempt to become a sovereign on his own terms. His relationship with each greater power therefore grows from the same refusal to accept mortality or dependence. (Chapters 837–840 and 1279–1289)