However, Lan Xiaobu soon realized that the Great Universe was boundless, with chaotic zones everywhere. If he could find a top-grade Dao vein in the Jiuyuan Chaos Zone, couldn’t he do the same in other chaotic zones?
Lan Xiaobu also understood that the chaotic zones in the Great Universe were far from the purest chaos. Just like the chaotic zone he encountered in the Taixu Tomb, it wasn’t the purest chaos either.
What is chaos? Chaos is a place without space, time, or any rules. Yet the Jiuyuan Chaos Zone had a name and spatial structure, which made it odd to call it true chaos. After stepping into the Fourth Step of the Great Dao, he had come to understand what true chaos was.
When he achieved the Fourth Step, if he had been in true chaos and comprehended the Chaos Dao, he might have had a real chance to construct a universe world different from the Longevity Realm.
Lan Xiaobu’s divine sense fell upon his own world. In chaos, where there’s no concept of time or space, he immediately knew he had been in seclusion in the chaotic zone for over three hundred years.
Three hundred years was enough for the Tingdao Ship to make several trips to and from Jiubian Sea City. Whether the Tingdao Ship was still on that route didn’t matter; as long as his Dao imprint on it remained intact, he could find it.
Finding a top-grade Dao vein was one of Lan Xiaobu’s priorities, but even more important was locating the Tingdao Ship to retrieve his Dao crystals. His Dao crystals weren’t something anyone could just take; whoever took them would have to pay back double.
After achieving the Fourth Step, Lan Xiaobu’s Dao underwent a qualitative transformation. Before, surviving in a chaotic zone was a struggle, but now he could break out of his constructed Longevity Space and step into the chaotic zone.
The Longevity Space, formed by his Longevity Dao, enveloped Lan Xiaobu. In the chaotic zone, this space was constantly suppressed by chaos, but as his Dao circulated, the Longevity Space held firm, preventing him from being crushed into nothingness.
However, in the chaotic zone, there was no sense of direction, and he couldn’t use teleportation. Lan Xiaobu could only move based on instinct.
Initially, he thought he hadn’t been in the chaotic zone long and that leaving wouldn’t take much time. But after moving for a year without finding an exit, he calmed down.
Leaving the chaotic zone relied on luck.
Fortunately, this wasn’t true chaos but a chaotic zone within a ruled world. As long as he moved in one direction, he would eventually find a way out.
No longer desperate to leave, Lan Xiaobu began to appreciate the benefits of traversing chaos. Chaos was the origin of all—universes, life, worlds, everything stemmed from it. Why was chaotic energy so precious to cultivators? It was invaluable not just to those below the Saint level but even to true Saints, primarily because it was the origin of the Dao.
Though Lan Xiaobu could move through chaos and access chaotic energy at will, others couldn’t even approach it. How could they obtain chaotic energy? It wasn’t something you could acquire with arrays or treasures; anything near chaos would be annihilated into nothingness.
Moreover, Lan Xiaobu was clear that the Jiuyuan Chaos Zone wasn’t true chaos. The chaotic energy here, though precious, wasn’t something Great Universe cultivators would risk their lives for. But by constantly moving through chaos, he could sense the origin breath of the Dao nurtured in chaos, continuously refining his Longevity Dao.
Initially, Lan Xiaobu wondered when he could leave, but as his understanding of the origin Dao in chaos deepened, he forgot about whether or when he could exit.
It wasn’t until the oppressive spatial pressure around him suddenly vanished, and his divine sense could sweep outward, that Lan Xiaobu snapped awake. Unknowingly, he had walked out of the chaotic zone. Checking his Longevity Realm, he realized he had been traversing the chaotic zone for nearly thirty years.
Though still on the edge of the chaotic zone, Lan Xiaobu no longer felt like searching for a top-grade Dao vein. He considered using the Seven Realms Stone but then thought of spatial rifts. What if the Seven Realms Stone collided with a spatial rift and got damaged?
If his top-grade divine artifact spaceship crashed into something solid, it might break apart but wouldn’t turn into a pile of debris. This showed how unusual spatial rifts were.
Sacrificing another spaceship, Lan Xiaobu extended his divine sense and easily avoided the spatial rift.
The spatial rifts here appeared in clusters, one after another. Without a rift-breaking ship, one could be shattered by them at any moment. The materials and arrays embedded in rift-breaking ships were clearly special.
Lan Xiaobu marveled inwardly. If he hadn’t achieved the Fourth Step in chaos, if he hadn’t walked through it for decades, gaining insight into its many origin Dao principles, his divine sense wouldn’t have been able to detect spatial rifts, just like before.
Being able to see spatial rifts was his greatest progress.
With his divine sense’s help, Lan Xiaobu switched to an innate flying treasure, the Heaven and Earth Buckle.
He couldn’t recall from whom he obtained the Heaven and Earth Buckle. Though he had many innate treasures in his world, flying treasures were scarce. The Heaven and Earth Buckle was likely his best flying treasure besides the Seven Realms Stone. After hesitating, he sacrificed a top-grade divine flying artifact and moved away from the chaotic zone at a moderate speed, keeping his divine sense extended.
A few days later, his divine sense detected patches of vague spatial rule energy. Spatial rules varied everywhere; even if two cultivators both achieved a Spatial Dao, their rules would differ.
But no matter the spatial rule, Lan Xiaobu had never felt anything as strange as this space…
No, he suddenly realized. The next moment, he rushed out of his spaceship without hesitation. This wasn’t a special spatial zone—it was a spatial rift, an imperfect byproduct of chaos evolving into a ruled world. Colliding with it could shatter a body or cause serious injury.
Boom! Just as Lan Xiaobu escaped, his top-grade divine artifact spaceship crashed into the spatial rift, turning into a pile of debris.
Lan Xiaobu thought to himself how close that was. Even if the spaceship had crashed into something solid at a faster speed, it wouldn’t have been reduced to such fragments. This confirmed the spatial rift’s extraordinary nature.
Seeing spatial rifts wasn’t something array flags could achieve…
But Dao principles could. His divine sense could detect spatial rifts because his Longevity Dao had integrated the spatial rules of the rift’s domain. If he could incorporate these rules into an array, couldn’t he detect upcoming spatial rifts?
More precisely, this wouldn’t be an array but a barrier. Barriers were constructed with Dao principles and didn’t necessarily protect or defend a realm. If he could create a barrier to assist a flying treasure in navigation, it should be feasible.
The more Lan Xiaobu thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. If he could one day create such a barrier and embed it in a flying treasure, many would likely seek to buy it.
Why were rift-breaking ships so popular? Because they could break through spatial rifts. If he created something that didn’t break but avoided spatial rifts, it would be a hit. Considering the cost of a trip on the Tingdao Ship—either losing your life or emptying your wallet—having a treasure that didn’t require such risks would be ideal.
The Heaven and Earth Buckle resembled a shuttle. After refining it, Lan Xiaobu activated it, and its speed was nearly ten times faster than the top-grade divine artifact.
Like a petrel skimming the sea, the Heaven and Earth Buckle twisted through domains filled with spatial rifts. As time passed, it encountered fewer rifts, indicating it was moving further from the chaotic zone. The buckle’s speed gradually increased.
Lan Xiaobu suddenly wondered if he could place a monitoring array on the Heaven and Earth Buckle to avoid spatial rifts, sparing him the need to constantly use his divine sense.
But he soon realized this wasn’t realistic. Arrays couldn’t detect spatial rifts, nor could ordinary cultivators’ divine sense. Only because he achieved the Fourth Step in chaos, walked through it for decades, and transformed his Dao and divine sense could he perceive them.
Seeing spatial rifts wasn’t something array flags could achieve…
But incorporating these rules into an array could allow detection of upcoming spatial rifts.
