It is the body of consciousness, like a soul.
Zhang Ruochen’s consciousness had only just fluctuated when the circle so close at hand suddenly receded far away.
The originally condensed body of consciousness scattered as the circle expanded, turning once more into billions of points of light.
“What is going on?”
In the time that followed, Zhang Ruochen tried again and again, attempting to pull the circle back and recondense the body of consciousness. Yet the more he tried, the further the circle retreated.
Just then, a sudden change occurred.
Boom!
The reddish-yellow earth split open and space violently shuddered.
From the fissures in the ground surged grey-brown death qi that shot straight into the sky, emitting an eerie wailing sound.
Amid the raging death qi appeared numerous spatial cracks and dark misty light.
Bai Qing’er sensed mortal danger and immediately released her divine realm world. Using origin power, she constructed a white sea of light and rapidly retreated backwards.
Even Zhang Ruochen, who now existed only as consciousness, could feel an utterly terrifying aura of death rising from beneath the earth, as though some ancient ferocious beast were about to emerge.
Clank! Clank! Clank…
The sound of iron chains dragging echoed from below the ground fissure, accompanied by the furious roars of evil beasts.
A humanoid divine hand, its rotting flesh covered in green moss, reached out from the depths.
The palm alone was more than a thousand metres long and gave off a nauseating stench. In an instant, the corrosive aura turned a thousand li of red earth into black soil.
The pursuing divine corpses seemed utterly terrified. They halted one after another and retreated towards the divine temple.
Boom!
The thousand-metre-long rotting divine hand shattered the ground beneath Bai Qing’er’s feet and dragged both her and her origin divine sea down into the earth.
All that remained on the surface was a cavern several thousand metres across and a ground fissure stretching a thousand li.
The earth trembled and the sky turned pitch black.
Lord Turtle King, Yan God, Jia Lin Nan, and Kailan Feili, who had fled into the oasis, stared at the rolling death qi rising in the distance.
“What a terrifying aura. What kind of monster lies beneath the ground?” Jia Lin Nan concealed his own aura completely, not daring to breathe loudly.
Kailan Feili said, “It seems to have calmed down. Shall we go and investigate?”
Yan God and Jia Lin Nan immediately shook their heads. The aura just now had been far too powerful. Ordinary great gods did not possess such terrifying divine might. Moreover, the corrosive force had already spread to the edge of the oasis.
…
Bai Qing’er’s divine realm world was crushed by the five rotting fingers, utterly unable to resist.
“Earth Demon Sparrow!”
A clear, resounding cry of a sparrow rang out.
From Bai Qing’er’s sleeve surged a stream of demonic qi. Within the demonic qi, a stone bird in the form of a vermilion sparrow unfurled a pair of enormous stone wings and collided with the contracting five fingers.
Countless ancient divine patterns appeared densely across the Earth Demon Sparrow’s body, blocking the pillar-like rotting fingers.
The Earth Demon Sparrow was one of the three great temple-suppressing divine artefacts of the Origin Temple that Bai Qing’er had obtained there, alongside the Heavenly Dao Flute and the Seven Star Sword.
Bai Qing’er breathed a slight sigh of relief and raised her head to look.
She saw black blood seeping from the five pillar-like divine fingers. The corrosive power it emitted could not even be blocked by an origin divine sea.
“How formidable. Is this the decayed hand of a divine venerable corpse?”
Bai Qing’er was deeply worried that a Divine Venerable of the Corpse Clan lay buried beneath the earth.
Yet after a moment’s thought, she felt it was impossible.
If a true Divine Venerable were really sealed underground, how could she possibly contend with it? Even wielding the Earth Demon Sparrow, she would be utterly unable to resist.
The rotting divine hand continued dragging her downwards into the earth.
There was no more time to delay.
Bai Qing’er held Zhang Ruochen and flew into the mouth of the Earth Demon Sparrow, entering its belly. She placed Zhang Ruochen to one side and then stepped into the Pivot Pool that controlled the Earth Demon Sparrow.
Bai Qing’er walked across the water’s surface to the centre of the rippling pool, her graceful figure resembling a fairy treading on waves.
Splash!
Countless array patterns emerged on the water’s surface.
Above the pool appeared a white origin divine sea.
The artefact spirit of the Earth Demon Sparrow, a vermilion sparrow wreathed in flames, flew within the origin divine sea, its wings radiant and scattering brilliant light.
Zhang Ruochen stood at the edge of the Pivot Pool, silently watching Bai Qing’er.
Under the urging of Bai Qing’er’s spiritual power, more and more inscriptions and divine patterns appeared on the Earth Demon Sparrow, and the divine artefact’s might climbed steadily higher.
Its stone wings beat continuously, striving upwards against the rotting divine hand.
After an unknown length of time, Zhang Ruochen discovered to his surprise that the circle had reappeared close before him, and his body of consciousness had reformed.
His consciousness stirred slightly in shock, and the circle immediately scattered outwards.
Zhang Ruochen hurriedly calmed the fluctuations of his consciousness.
Sure enough, the circle slowly contracted once more.
“So that is how it is. When the heart is still, it draws near. When the heart is disturbed, it retreats far away,” Zhang Ruochen thought to himself.
The heart, in this case, was his current consciousness.
Zhang Ruochen clearly understood that his consciousness had not dispersed because of these circles. To return to life, the key perhaps lay with them.
He reached out a hand towards the edge of the circle.
Yet before he even drew near, the circle retreated into the distance.
It could not be touched.
Zhang Ruochen was in no hurry. Remaining calm and composed, his body of consciousness sat cross-legged and began to study and observe carefully.
Gradually, he noticed things he had completely overlooked before. For example, the circles surrounding him were not all parallel to the ground.
Depending on the angle of observation, the orientation of the circles changed.
When he looked upwards, the circles stood perpendicular to the ground.
Without doubt, these circles centred on him were infinite not only in number from inside to outside. From different angles, the number of the same circle was also infinite.
“Could this be… Taiji…”
Zhang Ruochen was stunned, such a conjecture rising in his heart.
In the eyes of the ancient Daoist sages, Taiji was born from Wuji, emerging before the chaos, before the opening of heaven and earth. Taiji is a circle, boundless and containing nothing.
Only when heaven and earth first opened and chaos divided did yin and yang qi appear within the circle, known as the Two Modes.
The process from Wuji to Taiji is the process from nothing to something, the most difficult and lengthy stage in the evolution of heaven and earth.
From Taiji to the Two Modes is the process from one to two.
Zhang Ruochen guessed this might be Taiji because he had once cultivated the Wuji Sacred Will. That sacred will pervaded the universe, standing equal with the Heavenly Dao, eternal and undying.
It was entirely possible for Taiji to evolve from Wuji.
“This is impossible!” Zhang Ruochen’s consciousness reeled in shock.
It could not be that he was capable of evolving another universe within this one, a universe belonging solely to himself.
Splash!
The circle retreated far away.
By the time his body of consciousness reformed, Zhang Ruochen had completely calmed himself. Careful observation revealed that indeed, within the first circle, there was nothing at all.
No qi, no heavenly rules, no matter.
Only his consciousness.
Between the first circle and the second appeared heavenly rules.
The further out, the more heavenly rules filled each circle.
“The first circle should be my own Taiji, completely separated from the outer world.”
“But what of it? I am now only a body of consciousness. Within Taiji, there is no matter at all. No… does that not mean that within one circle, I am heaven itself, and my consciousness is heavenly will?”
“All matter in the world is created by rules. Origin! The nine eternal ancient ways, the origin rules that gave birth to all things.”
Zhang Ruochen’s consciousness entered the origin divine sea around Bai Qing’er, observing the active origin rules within it. He then began to inscribe his own origin rules within the first circle.
Yet the moment they were drawn, the origin rules dispersed, unable to persist.
“I refuse to believe this!”
Zhang Ruochen continued to inscribe.
Once.
Twice.
…
After more than a thousand attempts and a thousand failures, Zhang Ruochen finally stopped. Calming himself, he thought, “I cannot blindly inscribe like this. Right now, Taiji is utterly empty. Origin cannot exist alone.”
“Origin requires space to contain it, space must combine with time, time must coexist with truth… To construct my own world of rules cannot be achieved overnight.”
Just as Zhang Ruochen was at a loss, the Earth Demon Sparrow, locked in combat with the rotting divine hand, sank another great distance towards the depths.
The space inside the Earth Demon Sparrow shook violently.
Zhang Ruochen’s body of consciousness looked downwards. His consciousness passed through the Earth Demon Sparrow’s body and saw that deep underground, death rules abounded, manifesting as grey death qi mist.
Then Zhang Ruochen suddenly raised his head and looked upwards.
Although death rules were still dense above, strands of life rules twisted and entwined among them.
“I have it! Since the ancient Daoist sages deduced that the evolution of heaven and earth is Wuji giving birth to Taiji, and Taiji giving birth to the Two Modes, then I shall first construct yin and yang, the Two Modes!”
“Nothing represents yin and yang better than life and death.”
Zhang Ruochen gazed at the sky, observing the life rules. He slowly raised his right arm and inscribed a single strand.
Splash!
For some unknown reason, though he inscribed only a strand of life rule, a vast expanse of tiny death rules automatically manifested beside it.
Life and death coexisted.
One strand of life rule and a great expanse of death rules formed a delicate balance, flowing towards the first circle and beginning to revolve upon it.
Then Zhang Ruochen inscribed a second strand of life rule.
…
Inside the Pivot Pool.
The voice of the Earth Demon Sparrow’s artefact spirit rang out urgently. “The opponent’s power is too great. We cannot contend with it. Once dragged into the depths, the owner of this rotting hand could kill us as easily as turning over a palm.”
“In that case, we fight to the death.”
Bai Qing’er’s beautiful eyes were resolute beyond compare. With a gentle wave of her slender jade hand, she summoned sixty-five bronze bells. At the same time, the origin profound meaning that occupied one-tenth of the entire universe radiated from her body, mobilising the origin rules of heaven and earth.
Splash!
A pillar of origin light shot from the ground into the sky.
All the origin rules of Xinghuan Heaven and the surrounding star domains continuously converged into the light pillar, flying towards Bai Qing’er inside the Earth Demon Sparrow.
Although mastering one-tenth of the profound meaning made one a primary god of a path, Bai Qing’er had become a god only recently. The strength of her divine soul and her comprehension of the origin path were far from the level of a primary god. She could not even fully exert the power of an emissary.
Yet just as Bai Qing’er mobilised the origin rules of heaven and earth, the aged corpse that had been lying to one side saw its white hair turn black. The wrinkles on its face slowly vanished, and its withered yellow skin gradually became smooth and tender. Life rules flowed within the dead flesh, giving birth to the qi of life.
