The Tiantai Mountain Cave is 32 kilometres from Zhaxi, the county seat, and sits on Laoyingyan in Linfeng Township. It took shape 230 million to 280 million years ago and is celebrated for its grandeur, beauty, spacious layout and numerous branches.

The cave system has four tiers, each ranging from 20 to 50 metres in height. All caverns are interconnected with separate halls and chambers, among which three tiers are suitable for development. The surveyed second tier covers an area of 61,095.5 square metres with a total length of 2,138.2 metres. The cave entrance is halfway up the mountain at an elevation of 1,100 metres, while the interior reaches 1,188.94 metres, creating a relative height difference of roughly 89 metres. The main cavern stretches 1,264.1 metres long, 35 metres wide and about 25 metres high. The branch cave extends 874.1 metres, 25 metres wide, with heights between 18 and 25 metres. There are more than ten great halls; the largest is around 100 metres wide, and smaller ones measure 20 to 30 metres across.

The cave boasts a rich variety of secondary calcium carbonate deposits in gorgeous colours and fantastic shapes. Single and composite formations coexist everywhere. Yellow, pale red, white and colourless transparent stalactites, stone pillars and stalagmites spread across the cave, standing upright, clinging sideways or hanging overhead. This cave features smaller caves within the main cavern, underground streams, stone "forests" and rock mountains. The mountains contain narrow gorges filled with running water. The passage rises and falls abruptly, widening and narrowing unexpectedly. Visitors wander along stone paths, corridors, staircases, stone bridges and grottos, confronted with an endless succession of magical scenes.

When you duck into the cavern, it suddenly opens up into a vast hall ringed with stalactites, stone branches and massive pillars. Climbing onward, the path winds continuously past breathtaking rock formations: stone figures, stone monkeys, stone dragons, stone lions and blooming stone flowers. Stone waterfalls surge down with overwhelming momentum. One huge stone pillar reaches from floor to ceiling with a girth of 13.5 metres. Inverted cone-shaped stalactites hang from above, while elaborately carved stalagmites and pillars rise from the ground. Curved tubular stalactite branches cluster on the rock face, and fresh spring water drips down with a refreshing coolness. Pale red clustered and feather-shaped stone pillars cover the ceiling, just like bunches of ripe millet grains. Yellowish travertine accumulations on the cave floor take the form of upturned bronze bells, hanging lotus blossoms and imperial canopies. In the Pillar Hall, two gigantic connected pillars stand 25 metres tall with a diameter of 1.5 metres, resembling lovers pledging eternal devotion. Feather-like, branch-shaped and columnar stalactites twist across the ceiling, walls and floor, resembling the tangled roots of a tropical rainforest. Some tapered pillars look like missiles ready to blast off into the vast universe. In one great hall, several thick stone pillars appear misaligned and precarious, yet they stand as firm as Mount Tai.

Stone grapes, crystal blossoms, stone nodules, stone corals, ganoderma-shaped stones, hydrangea-like formations and stone lotus flowers greet the eye endlessly, making visitors feel as if they have stepped into an underwater dragon palace. Further along the second tier lies the Southern Heavenly Gate. The sunken hall is packed with jagged ice-like rock peaks, blooming stone flowers and cascading jade waterfalls, presenting a celestial fairyland that makes people reluctant to leave.

Above the second tier stands the Baoling Temple, wreathed in curling incense smoke. The caves stretching from the temple remain broad and magnificent with twisting passages. The lower section of the second tier features narrow, winding tunnels full of perils and is rarely visited today. Pine forests rustle atop the mountain above the cave. Another secluded grotto with a dragon spring can be found at Muyubao, where ancient towering trees grow inside a circular hollow. A poet once left this couplet:

From the hundred-zhang cliff, I grasp the rustle of pines and bamboo; On the nine-layered mountain, I breathe out auspicious vapour and radiant light.