Chapter 61
"What do you mean, Huan Zheng? If it is not destroyed, then what happens to everything we have built?"
Huan Zheng smiled—not the bitter smile from before, but a strangely patient one, like a teacher who has explained the same formula countless times yet never grows tired because his student is gifted, even if sometimes slow to grasp.
"Not destroyed, Ling Xu. Absorbed. More precisely, your talent will be 'further' absorbed into the sea of consciousness. Not gone, not vanished, not turned into dust scattered by the wind—but becoming a deeper, older, more absolute part of yourself. Like river water flowing into the sea, Ling Xu. The river does not disappear when it meets the sea—it becomes the sea, it becomes part of something greater than itself, inseparable from where it came from and where it will go."
He raised his hand, and in his palm, he began to form a pattern.
Not a pattern of darkness like before, but one of light—yet a strange light, a light that did not illuminate but instead created shadows where brightness should exist, a pattern depicting a cultivator standing in the middle of the sea of consciousness, surrounded by raging currents carrying all of his achievements, yet he did not drown, he was not swept away, he simply stood there, and those currents flowed past him like time flowing past a rock that is never eroded.
"And after that, Ling Xu," Huan Zheng continued, his telepathic vibration now deeper, heavier, like a bell struck in a dark underground chamber, yet strangely also like a whisper full of hope, like a prayer spoken by a child who still believes the universe is not entirely cruel, "those who are truly worthy to transform—those who are not only strong but also ready, those who are not only hungry but know when to stop devouring—will fully break through into Realm of Humanity. Not halfway, not with remnants of doubt hidden in the dark corners of their hearts, not with one foot still held back in the Dew out of fear of letting go of what they have painstakingly built. Completely, Ling Xu. Whole. Without return."
He paused for a moment, looking at Ling Xu with eyes no longer lazy, no longer half-closed, but fully open, clear like the surface of a lake in the morning, untouched by wind, humans, or beasts—and in those eyes, Ling Xu saw her own reflection.
Not a reflection like in a mirror, but one born from Huan Zheng's memory of his past, of when he himself stood at the same threshold, of when he decided to ascend and become one of those who stepped into the Realm of Humanity, of when he never imagined that thousands of years later, he would stand here, in the void that was once called the universe, explaining the same thing to a Goddess girl who had lost both her eyes yet possessed three new ones, each seeing from a different dimension.
Ling Xu, hearing all of that, could not speak.
She simply stood still, letting Huan Zheng's words flow through her mind like an underground river that had never seen sunlight, and within her heart, between the pulses of the Dew Dao that now throbbed with a different rhythm—a rhythm no longer bound by space, time, or causality, a rhythm that told her she must choose, that she must decide, that she could no longer run or hide or hope that someone would come to save her—she murmured.
"And when that happens, Huan Zheng? When I succeed in breaking through? When I am worthy to transform into a Humanity cultivator? What will happen to us?"
Huan Zheng, hearing that, smiled—a smile neither warm nor cold, but mysterious, like the moon hidden behind clouds on a dark night, like an answer you can never predict no matter how many times you ask the same question—then replied through telepathy with a vibration that suddenly became very soft, very gentle, very careful, like someone opening a door to a room they had not touched for years because they feared what might be inside.
"We will be teleported, Ling Xu. Not by your own feet, not by your own wings, not by your own power—but by the universe itself, by the Dao that you have shattered, absorbed, and made part of your sea of consciousness. We will be teleported directly to where humanity—who have now become the Second Divine, who once beheaded the gods that had already surrendered, who once violated and took turns with the goddesses before being beheaded themselves—reside."
In the void that was once called the universe—where the stars had become flesh, and that flesh had been pulled back into the womb of the Cancer plague, leaving behind only a darkness older than darkness itself—Ling Xu stood with her head lowered, both hands gripping the edge of her robe, soaked with something she could no longer call tears or sweat or blood, because the three had long merged into one since she lost her original eyes and gained three new ones, each seeing from a different dimension.
Within her heart, between the pulses of the Dew Dao that strangely resembled her mother's heartbeat—a heartbeat she once heard as a child, when she could rest her ear against that woman's chest and feel something warm and comforting before everything turned into a silence more terrifying than screams—she murmured in a voice no one could hear, not even Huan Zheng who stood only three steps before her.
"I have no choice, do I? I have devoured the civilization of the gods whole. There is nothing left to protect, nothing left to defend, nothing left to use as a reason for me to remain in these ruins. There is only the cold void, and beyond that void, in a place I have never touched before, there are them—humans who call themselves the Second Divine, who beheaded my mother after taking turns with her on the cold stone floor, whose laughter still echoes in my ears every time I am about to fall asleep, whose faces I still see in every scratch of stone in every city I have ever visited."
She drew a breath—a breath that felt like swallowing the ashes of a fire that had burned an entire divine civilization, a breath that felt like preparing to dive into depths she had never imagined before—then exhaled slowly, letting the air leave her lungs like a river releasing its water into the sea, without protest, without regret, without a single word asking the universe to understand what she was about to do next.
"I will ascend, Huan Zheng," she finally said, her voice no longer trembling like when she first heard of the Realm of Humanity, no longer hesitant like when she imagined having to tear down everything she had built with such effort, but flat, empty, like the surface of a lake undisturbed for too long by wind, humans, or beasts.
To be continued…