Chapter 1795: Selfish
One hundred years were neither a long nor a short period of time.
The fourth realm remained at peace. When the land of darkness disappeared, it took all of the secondary worlds with it. Of their former inhabitants, Meng w.a.n.g relocated some to the primary worlds, while others were sheltered by those from the chief worlds as new recruits under their banner.
The Land of Reincarnation was a very simplistic place these days. Qing Buyi threw out even the outsiders who were legitimately present in the fourth realm, stripping them of their borrowed ident.i.ties.
Apart from the land’s native inhabitants, only a select few outsiders remained. They were Lu Yun’s allies—Chu Xingran, Moran Dongning, Xie Tianxun, and some others. Moran Dongning’s brother, the s.p.a.cetime King, left.
Although the corpse G.o.d and G.o.d of Mount Tai remained in the fourth realm, Qing Buyi couldn’t find them no matter how he tried. The fourth realm was too big! It was truly a boundless plane of existence. Though it possessed borders, Lu Yun had only ever visited the Mount Astronomia locale. He had no idea where the others were.
While Qing Buyi could easily identify where the outsiders were, he couldn’t find the mountain G.o.d or corpse G.o.d. But in his words, “What’s the point of finding them? I can’t beat them, and it’s more likely that they’ll kill me instead.”
In the last one hundred years allotted to the Land of Reincarnation, however, the fourth realm was far from peace. Fires of war spontaneously raged through the land as immortal dao erupted from the Central Hongmeng and traversed the fourth realm. Formula dao burst forth as well, flaring with the light of immortal dao and becoming one with the great dao from the Central Hongmeng.
The fourth realm was a place in which thousands of daos blossomed in unison. There’d never been one single great dao to dominate it, not even in the era of the original Hongmeng. A new dao from the other realms sought to be their one true path? Naturally, there were many pockets of resistance to the new world order.
Old monsters that’d survived for endless eons awoke in the fourth realm. These were ones that not even the original emperor had managed to subdue back in the day. And so, the curtains drew back on a colossal war against immortal dao.
The war commenced with surprising abruptness—beginning the precise moment that Lu Yun took the cavern. While immortal dao had seeped into the fourth realm over the past twenty-seven hundred years, it’d met with no pushback during that period. The cultivators of the realm seemed to accept their fate. This was further reinforced when they discovered that their own daos could a.s.similate into immortal dao without any resistance or expulsion.
But somehow, a tremendous campaign against immortal dao raged in those hundred years, embroiling countless factions into its battles. What would happen a hundred years from now was no secret; it was common knowledge that there was an even greater collection of worlds constantly staring covetously at them. Many people were making preparations to either resist or surrender to the outsiders.
No one understood why civil war would take place now.
……
“So we thrive in calamity and perish in soft living?” The little fox leaned her head on Lu Yun’s shoulder and gazed up at his cheek, repeating a famous saying from Earth.
“No,” Lu Yun shook his head. “There’s not enough time to thrive in calamity even if we wanted to. We’re in a time of internal revolt and external aggression.”
“We need to calm the internal unrest first!” Qing Yu said softly, leaning on Lu Yun’s other shoulder.
He nodded gently. “That’s right, resolving our own issues is a top priority. Otherwise, once cultivators with their own motives or ones compromised by outsiders rise up too, the fourth realm will fall to the enemy. The outsiders will easily claim our home and build their foundation on top of it.”
The little fox abruptly realized what was at stake.
While the war seemed to be a struggle between the old guard and the world of immortals, it was also a perfect opportunity to root out traitors and dissidents. With the Karmic Tree, Lu Yun could read other people’s emotions and easily determine who had divided or switched loyalties.
The current world of immortals absolutely possessed the capability to strike back.
With Mo Yi’s help, the heavenly palace combined with Fairylands and formed a vast world of immortal dao sequence. Immortal dao sequence radiated from the palace and reorganized the Hongmeng, chaos, worlds, world of immortals, and Earth into orderly layers of a world of immortal dao.
The Central Hongmeng had once been forged into a tomb—the Hongmeng, chaos, and worlds were three sides of the same issue and delineated by the yin yang tomb layout. The Dao King had destroyed it so that the Central Hongmeng could return to its origins as a true world.
Afterward, the law of time crossed the chaos and Hongmeng. Since both of them weren’t true worlds, there was no pa.s.sage of time in either of them. Now with the Central Hongmeng reverting back to a normal state, it began to evolve, just as the original Hongmeng had. Heaven and earth were the ultimate products of order—tthe most sophisticated level of a world in existence.
Whether it was the second or third realm, both were part of the process of order evolving into a world. But since the worlds of the fourth realm were flawed, Lu Yun was unable to make them whole again even with the enigma stone vein planted into the world of immortal dao sequence and the The Kins.h.i.+p of Heaven and Earth melded into immortal dao.
They lacked one final detail. After repeated calculations, Lu Yun finally understood that it was the seed of nothing. Once it fully developed and melded into the world of immortals, that would finally complete the worlds.
Everything proceeded according to Lu Yun’s plans and under his full control.
……
There was no longer a boundless land of darkness outside Mount Astronomia; it had been replaced by the chief worlds of the outside realm. There was a spatial node there that provided pa.s.sage to both the darkness and chief worlds. It was a doorway that the G.o.d of Mount Tai left for himself.
Hundreds of powerful figures crowded the perimeter of the mountain. They were the supremes of the chief worlds, beings who’d exceeded sequence.
They couldn’t enter the Land of Reincarnation yet, lest they be killed by the orders of the land. The same limitation didn’t apply to the projections of their will, however. Thus, they sent in their disciples and a.s.sorted subordinates.
There’d once been a restriction in the primary worlds that limited everyone to nine levels of sequence. With the restoration of the Major Cycle Worlds in the cosmos of the ancestral planet, the orders of the fourth realm were repaired. Apart from t.i.tans that exceeded sequence, any level of sequence expert could freely enter!
One hundred years pa.s.sed swiftly and the fires of war finally died down. Factions and cultivators bearing ulterior motives had all been eliminated. Everyone had their own thoughts and concerns—they’d made decisions that benefited them the most. There was no right or wrong in it, just a matter of perspective.
Their only fault was that they weren’t strong enough to protect their choice, and so Lu Yun uprooted them. He’d also made his own choice. Not only was he strong enough to reinforce his decision, but he could also remove those who opposed him.
True, he was being selfish, but if he was selfless, then the ones to die would be him and his loved ones. Those who made different decisions from him would have to kill him and his people for their own sakes.
On this particular day, Qing Buyi stood up and stretched mightily. He patted Lu Qing’s shoulder with a smile. “You’ve learned most of what I know. I don’t expect you to become the fifth s.p.a.cetime traveler, but I’ll be satisfied if you beat the s.h.i.+t out of the geniuses those old fellows have sent in. Smash their faces in until their own mothers don’t recognize them!”