"An opportunity to advance further?"
Life Master's emerald-green eyes flickered with thought. At her current stage, the thing she desired most was nothing more than to advance a step further in this realm. Other than that, everything in the myriad worlds held no meaning for her.
But taking that further step was incredibly difficult—there was hardly any hope in sight. They didn't even know how to proceed, nor could they fathom what realm lay above them.
Perhaps it was as Emptiness Master had said: only by controlling more Authority of the Heavenly Dao could one possess power comparable to that of the Heavenly Dao.
Since ancient times, all Authorities of the Heavenly Dao that had appeared were powers belonging to the Heavenly Dao.
The True Path Realm, in truth, was merely one path chosen in the exploration of the Heavenly Dao—completely opposite to the path of Supreme Shattering, which relied solely on oneself.
Life Master had also considered scheming against other True Path–level existences, seizing the Authority of the Heavenly Dao they controlled. The Emptiness Master right before her had even fought a long epoch-spanning battle with her over this very matter. In the end, neither could gain the upper hand over the other, so they gave up.
As it turned out, beings in the True Path Realm could all sense one another. Although the Authorities they wielded were different, the power and methods they exercised were roughly the same—unless several allied against a single individual.
But such a situation… was nearly impossible. Once a being in the True Path Realm sensed danger, they would hide within the deepest layers of spacetime in the primordial chaos, where no one could ever find them—unless someone turned the entire Vast Expanse upside down.
And as for how vast the Vast Expanse truly was… even beings in the True Path Realm found it hard to fully fathom. Especially through their long-term observations, the Vast Expanse appeared like a mass of mist—disordered, chaotic, dark, immense, and unknowable, ceaselessly expanding and transforming. The Vast Expanse had been expanding all along, never once pausing; no one knew where its edges lay.
Within it, time, space, matter, life, and all things… every conceivable, tangible or intangible existence was generated.
As long as they remained within the Vast Expanse, they would be bound by its shackles and could never transcend and leave.
The true Other Shore and true Transcendence had always been delusions and lies.
Yet within this boundless delusion, existences as inconceivable as the Three True Ancestors were born—beings that had already surpassed their cognition, imagination, and observation.
They had transcended the very concept of life. They themselves were, in fact, a kind of established convention, engraved into the deepest bloodlines of all beings in the Vast Expanse—thoughts and appearances that inspired awe and trembling, along with the utterly unknown.
Once one reached this realm, they would understand that Heaven stood above all living beings, while the Three True Ancestors stood above Heaven itself. They had established everything. They had neither right nor wrong, neither good nor evil, for they were the rules. Even Heaven had to operate according to their will. What they acknowledged became eternal, immutable truth; what they denied was nothing but endless illusory dream ashes.
As an ancient being born from the primordial chaos, Life Master had been fortunate enough to behold the Three True Ancestors once, yet even now, she could not describe what kind of existences they truly were.
They transcended all tangible and all intangible, all causality, all power. Any living being before them was no more than a single grain of sand beside the sea. A single thought from them could bring the tide in and out, and any living beings or worlds swept into it would dissolve and be destroyed.
The Grand Priest of the Ancient Treasure Civilization had once chosen to offer sacrifices in order to appease Heaven's wrath.
But to them, such an approach was like ignorant villagers trying to calm the rivers and seas by sacrificing boys and girls, praying for peace and quiet. Yet how could the forces of nature be influenced by living beings? Would the tides care about a grain of sand on the shore as they ebbed and flowed?
Trying to understand their existence was like trying to make an ordinary person comprehend that the sea was also a living entity, or that nature itself was a living being… at least for now, it lay far beyond their cognition and imagination.
Incomprehensible, unimaginable, and even more impossible to observe or cognize…
But incomprehensibility did not mean nonexistence. Those who held the Authority of the Heavenly Dao had always known that such Three True Ancestors eternally existed in the world, creating the wellspring of everything, creating all life and all worlds. They were the starting point and origin of everything, and also the final destination of all.
On the day the Epoch Mother Tree broke, the beings of the Ancient Treasure Civilization all said they saw a sky-supporting giant hand strike down and snap it across the heavens. In truth, this was merely the phenomenon they were capable of seeing and interpreting. In the eyes of True Path Realm existences, the scene was entirely different, nothing like that.
"Heaven-Slaying can never succeed. Even the Heavenly Dao fears the Three True Ancestors. The true power of the Heavenly Dao is used entirely to maintain the operation of the Vast Expanse. The Authorities we possess can exert only less than one ten-thousandth of that might. Even if the Alliance Leader of the Heaven-Slaying Alliance could successfully slay Heaven, what would he then encounter?"
Life Master sighed softly, her thoughts recovering from endless melancholy and helplessness. In her view, slaying Heaven could never succeed, and the True Ancestors could never be overcome. The current Vast Expanse was still far from capable of producing power comparable to the Heavenly Dao, let alone posing any threat to the Three True Ancestors.
The Three True Ancestors did not care what happened to the Vast Expanse, which was precisely why parasites like them, who attached themselves to and drew upon the power of the Heavenly Dao, had emerged.
If one day the Three True Ancestors were to awaken, would this world shatter like waking from a dream? They could not fathom or know, but they all understood that if such a day truly came, everything would be like falling into an endless nightmare; all realms would be swallowed by fear, darkness, and chaos.
And on that day, would the very concept of a "world" even still exist?
"Yes, the matters of the future are not for us to consider. The future within the Vast Expanse is something no one can control. We only need to follow the Heavenly Will; that way, there will be no mistake. As for the current Heavenly Dao, though it is a Pseudo-Heaven, it is supported by the Three True Ancestors. Acknowledge that they are never wrong; to defy them is to court only death and the dissolution of your Dao."
"Although we do not know how the Alliance Leader of the Heaven-Slaying Alliance reached this point, nor how he exists, he is currently far from reaching the level of the Three True Ancestors."
"So this is simply a matter of choosing sides." Emptiness Master seemed to know what Life Master was pondering.
"Heh, even so, the Alliance Leader of the Heaven-Slaying Alliance is not someone we can deal with now. The fact that he could easily intimidate the Imperial Ruler of the Ancient Treasure Civilization and subject him to such humiliation is proof enough of his might and strength." Life Master sneered.
But how could choosing sides be so easy? A single misstep would lead to utter ruin beyond redemption.
"That is precisely why I came to discuss this with you. The Alliance Leader of the Heaven-Slaying Alliance needs the power within the Vast Expanse to slay Heaven alongside him. So we shall simply comply. So long as our true hearts remain unchanged, the Heavenly Dao can perceive it. Pseudo-Heaven may be a pseudo-heaven, but it still ultimately operates according to its established trajectory and rules, rewarding and punishing with clarity," Emptiness Master said.
Life Master laughed. "True hearts unchanged? If the Heavenly Dao could perceive our true hearts, how could so many Heaven-Slayers have been born? In the end, the human heart is eternally greedy and never satisfied. When plagued by illness, one craves a healthy body; with a healthy body, one craves warmth and plenty; with warmth and plenty, one craves great power in hand…
"Mortal emperors crave eternal life. Cultivators who achieve the Immortal Realm crave the Dao Realms. Those who walk to the End of the Path deludedly seek to control the Heavenly Dao…"
Emptiness Master also fell silent for a moment, then after a long while agreed, "Speaking of which, the Alliance Leader of the Heaven-Slaying Alliance is right: the power of the heart is limitless. Even if the Heavenly Dao governs everything, it cannot control the human heart."
"Perhaps the Heaven-Slaying Alliance has grown so powerful now precisely because of that source power drawn from the deepest depths of the human heart…"
Life Master did not continue that line of discussion. She mused, "I will contact Power Master. He controls the Authority of Strength. Although he once betrayed the Palace of Fate Defiance and stabbed its leader at a critical moment—the wound was not fatal—he has been resented by the Palace of Fate Defiance ever since, drifting in the depths of the chaotic edge throughout these epochs.
"This time, with the Heaven-Slaying Alliance intending to slay Heaven, he should be very interested. In the last Heaven-Slaying battle of the Palace of Fate Defiance, he ultimately gained quite a few benefits. That leader of the Palace of Fate Defiance sacrificed his own body to shelter the world, and his legacy scattered across the myriad worlds. A very large portion of it seemed to end up in the hands of Power Master."
Hearing this, Emptiness Master's eyes also held a trace of wariness.
Every great Heaven-Slaying war heralded a time of great change in heaven and earth. Just as the clash between righteous and demonic, pure and turbid, often gave rise to many inconceivable opportunities and benefits.
Even they had things they wished to understand and obtain. The former leader of the Palace of Fate Defiance was, aside from the Alliance Leader of the Heaven-Slaying Alliance and the Lord of Heaven's Proxy, the most powerful person since the birth of the Vast Expanse. In the cognition of many beings, he had even approached Transcendence, an existence capable of touching the Land of Truth.
Yet even such an existence still could not change heaven or alter fate.
Power Master, this person, held the Authority of Strength, an Authority that had appeared during the Primordial Tribulation. In terms of offensive power, it could be called the first.
...
While the entire Vast Expanse was in an uproar over what had happened to the Ancient Treasure Civilization, in the Land of the Nine Heavens.
In the depths of the Gu Clan, within the mountain ridges shrouded by endless mist, a mighty force seemed to be surging. The terrain there was loftier than any mountain range.
Faintly, an ancient ancestral shrine could be seen sitting there, as if overlooking the myriad heavens and the universe. An extremely powerful aura pervaded the area, and chaotic waterfalls cascaded like seas, pressing down until the surrounding spacetime and Dao laws warped.
At this moment, within this ancestral shrine, one blurry ancient figure after another stood in place. If members of the Gu Family from the Dao Chang True World were here, they would clearly recognize a black-robed old man among them—it was none other than Gu Wuwang, the Ancestor of that Gu Family branch.
He had left the Dao Chang True World at some unknown time and returned to the depths of the Gu Clan in the Land of the Nine Heavens.
Yet even with Gu Wuwang's status, he could not stand at the very front. Before him were several figures with powerful auras, and the First Ancestor of the Gu Family was among them as well.
His expression was solemn, staring fixedly ahead.
At this moment, everyone was staring at the depths of the ancestral shrine, where a gateway seemed to be situated.
Vast and boundless, like an infinite cosmos, an ancient, timeworn, and spatiotemporal aura flowed out from within. A single trace of power leaking from it could influence reality. The surrounding spacetime distorted in response, and that aura of ages could affect even existences at the Ancestral Dao Realm.
One could imagine how mighty that temporal aura was.
This place was a spacetime turbulence created by the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Clan, independent of past, future, and present, unaffected by the present world, where one could meditate and cultivate.
It could maximally retrieve the true self and power from all timelines, and converge all causal lines and time lines from all dimensions and spacetimes into one.
"Is the Ancient Ancestor about to reappear in the world…"
"This aura fluctuation—there's no mistake, it's absolutely the Ancient Ancestor."
"Even though only a wisp was emitted just now, it stirred changes throughout the entire ancestral shrine."
The numerous ancient existences of the Gu Clan stared intently, filled with extreme tension and anticipation.
Even the First Ancestor, who never showed joy or anger and whose expression would not change even if Mount Tai collapsed before her, looked inside, her jade hands clenching her sleeves.
Gu Wuwang's gaze was even more complicated. He had stayed in the Dao Chang True World for so long precisely to await the return of the Ancient Ancestor's true spirit, yet who would have thought he would miss it.
Gu Xian'er… could she really be the true spirit of the Ancient Ancestor?
In the deepest part of this spacetime turbulence, a woman with skin like ice and bones of jade, transcendent as an immortal, sat quietly cross-legged. She wore a flowing immortal robe with wide sleeves, her features delicate as a painting, her black hair cascading like a waterfall over her chest. She had no extra ornaments, looking very simple, yet unable to conceal her innate air of cold detachment.
Above her head, a hazy mass of Primordial Chaos Purple Qi floated and hovered, transforming into a small tree of Primordial Chaos. Each leaf was so complex it seemed to contain all profound truths, inhaling and exhaling strands of Primordial Chaos Qi.
And opposite her, another figure seemed to be sitting cross-legged—except it was very blurry, enveloped by an indescribable mist. Around her, fragments of causality filled the air, appearing even more boundless and vast as they rose and fell.
What was different was that above this blurry figure's head, a hazy, crystalline mirror had manifested, seemingly capable of reflecting the fates of all living beings, all past and future.
As the small Primordial Chaos tree inhaled and exhaled, this blurry figure gradually dissipated, turning into stream after stream of chaos-colored mist that entwined around the small tree, condensing into the embryonic form of a Dao Fruit there.
"I am me…"
"You are you, I am not the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family."
The woman who had been sitting quietly opened her eyes. The aura around her fluctuated, sometimes resembling the Dao Realms, sometimes transcending them, deep and vast like rivers and seas.
The blurry figure opposite her showed no movement, simply meeting her gaze calmly. Both bore auras of the same origin.
"I am you, you are me; we were originally one person. This has never changed, nor will it. It's just that you still don't understand…"
The blurry figure spoke calmly, strands of mist surging like air currents, entwining toward the small Primordial Chaos tree.
The moment those words were finished, the figure gradually faded away, as if it had never appeared.
Gu Xian'er watched this scene and fell into contemplation.
In fact, after returning to the Gu Clan in the Land of the Nine Heavens, she had faint suspicions. Everyone treated her with the utmost respect—an attitude completely unlike that shown to ordinary clan members.
But no one had told her any of this.
She had never imagined that she would be the true spirit of the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family.
Who once saved all living beings with her own strength?
"I am me, I am not the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family…"
Gu Xian'er clenched her fists, inwardly resolute. She did not want to become anyone else; she was herself.
So what if she was the true spirit of the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family? Could that ever sway her will?
"No matter who it is, they cannot shake me. Cultivating in this spacetime turbulence not only allowed me to successfully condense a Dao Realm Seed and break through to the Dao Realms, but also to obtain the causal origin once scattered across heaven and earth by the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family, causing the Heavenly Decline Tribulation to descend ahead of time…"
She did not let this matter shake her conviction, quickly stabilizing her thoughts and sorting out the changes in herself over this period.
The biggest change was undoubtedly her cultivation. The nine tribulations of the Dao Realms were divided into Void Dao, True Dao, and Ancestral Dao. She now had the strength of the pinnacle Void Dao Realm, meaning she had already crossed three Heavenly Decline Tribulations.
This spacetime turbulence was indeed miraculous. Originally, it would take many long epochs in the outside world to reach this stage. But even here, she had indeed spent a very long time stabilizing her cultivation realm.
Furthermore, the identity of the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family also left her somewhat at a loss and hard to accept.
In the Ancestral Shrine of the Gu Clan, Gu Xian'er's figure slowly walked out from the gateway. Whether it was the First Ancestor, or Gu Wuwang, the former Ancestor of the Gu Clan from the Dao Chang True World, their gazes fell upon her.
"Ancient Ancestor?"
The First Ancestor, sensing the change in her aura, asked tentatively.
Gu Xian'er frowned and said, "I am not the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family."
But upon hearing this, the First Ancestor's gaze was persistent and reverent as she said, "The aura does not change; you are the First Ancestor."
The other Gu Family old ancestors, upon hearing this, all bowed together and said, "Greetings, Ancient Ancestor."
Even Gu Wuwang did the same. When in the Dao Chang True World, Gu Xian'er was merely a junior; but now it was completely different. Having created the Gu Family's ancestors, one could say the entire Gu Clan had been created by her.
Gu Xian'er did not know how to explain. Although she had learned some memories of the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family, those memories could not affect her true heart. At most, she could only be considered her successor.
To treat her as the reincarnation of the Ancient Ancestor of the Gu Family would be far too forced.
"We have always firmly believed that one day the Ancient Ancestor would return. With heaven and earth undergoing great changes again, this is the opportunity…" the First Ancestor of the Gu Family said reverently.