Aspiring to the Immortal Path

Fate played me!

Yu Cheng’s furious cry swept through the hall like a storm, bouncing off the walls over and over.

“You deserved it!” Immortal Ji Yao viciously glared at Yu Cheng.

She had once believed that it had all been the Azure Dragon’s scheme and that Yu Cheng had merely been fooled. Later on, she learned that Yu Cheng had also deceived the Azure Dragon, so she thought that Yu Cheng had sensed that something was going on and simply ignored it. But she had never imagined that the mastermind behind her fall was really Yu Cheng.

Indeed, the Azure Dragon was an expert in the Dao of Fate, but wasn’t Yu Cheng as well?

Just how could the Azure Dragon fool Yu Cheng?

All of it was because of that accursed bastard, all for his plan to transcend the Heavenly Dao!

“How did you find out?” Tang Jie asked.

“Because I met him!” Yu Cheng replied.

Unbeknownst to all, after Martial Lord Li Jiuyang had escaped from the world of demons, the first person he went to find wasn’t the Pearl Lady, but Yu Cheng—he knew that all of this had been Yu Cheng’s doing.

It had been an extremely secretive meeting, held in the depths of the Stellar Chaos Ocean.

And what followed was an explosive battle.

This battle produced massive shockwaves, but nobody knew that it had happened, as it had taken place in the dangerous and uninhabited Stellar Chaos Ocean.

They only knew that the stars were particularly bright that night.

Nor did anyone know that the supreme Immortal Emperor of the court had been defeated, and in a most one-sided manner.

The Martial Lord had beaten down Yu Cheng with almost no resistance, casting his pride and majesty into the mud and stomping and stomping until it was ground to bits.

He stepped on Yu Cheng’s face and told him, “This is payback for your past actions,” and then he left to find his love.

Yu Cheng went crazy.

It was that battle that finally confirmed for him what was in that dimension.

It was that battle that resolved him to develop the Fake Sky, False Sun Immortal Art.

It was that battle that planted the seeds of so many of the events of the present.

He looked at Tang Jie and said, “That battle was the greatest humiliation in my life. I can never forget it, but it also hardened my Dao Heart. My life became devoted to entering this place.”

Everyone sighed at the tragic past Yu Cheng had been hiding.

At that moment, Nine Disaster suddenly said, “Did that battle take place on the Day of Celestial Radiance?”

The Day of Celestial Radiance was a very special day in the history of the Great Stellar Chiliocosm. On that day, the stars were so bright that there became no distinction between day and night, and the tides of energy were so vast and powerful that almost half of the Great Stellar Chiliocosm could sense that some momentous change was occurring in the world. Thus, it was called the Day of Celestial Radiance.

Yu Cheng nodded. “To be more precise, the Day of Celestial Radiance was caused by that battle. What about it?”

For a battle to cause celestial phenomena on such a vast scale, the powers involved were terrifying indeed.

Nine Disaster muttered a mantra and then said, “It was on that day that this old monk received the guidance of the heavens and became a demon to protect the heavens.”

The Heavenly Dao was demonic!

Everyone gasped.

Even Yu Cheng was taken aback. After a while, he said, “Could it be that everything was truly predetermined? But if that was the case, why did Fate guide me to cast those people down and lead Li Jiuyang to that place? Why are the guidances of Fate at complete odds with each other?”

“Perhaps because they were not the guidance of the same will.”

A voice suddenly spoke.

Everyone turned to see that it was the purple-robed man who had spoken, his expression relaxed as he nursed his drink.

“What did you say?”

Yu Cheng and Nine Disaster cried out in shock, and then they exchanged a glance.

A moment later, Nine Disaster shouted, “This old monk definitely received the guidance of the Heavenly Dao. All that I do is on the behalf of the heavens!”

“You must have received the guidance of the Demon Dao, no? How could the Heavenly Dao make you become a demon?” the Sage Mother of the West sneered.

“What do you understand!?” Nine Disaster roared. “Buddhism has its thunderous wrath, and the Heavenly Dao has its blade to kill its enemies! The Demon Dao is the Heavenly Dao’s blade. The Heavenly Dao is not just demonic, but everything in this universe! Thus, the positive plane is the Heavenly Dao, and the demonic plane is the Heavenly Dao!”

Nine Disaster had previously been an esteemed monk, and though he was now a Demon Sovereign, he still possessed all of his erudition from his Buddhist days, so he already had an argument regarding whether the Heavenly Dao was demonic or not. It was just that he couldn’t be bothered to debate with anyone before, but now that he did, his arguments made complete sense.

In his view, the Heavenly Dao was the manifestation of the Great Stellar Chiliocosm’s will, so whether it was the positive plane or negative, Life or Death, it was all a part of the Heavenly Dao. Whether one was a demon, an Immortal, or a Buddhist, all had to heed and serve the heavens.

Thus, wherever the Heavenly Dao pointed was just, and in the pursuit of justice, one could even become a demon!

This was the theory behind Nine Disaster’s actions.

And it was also his Dao!

Immortal Ji Yao replied, “The chiliocosm can be considered the Heavenly Dao, but the world is without a will. The Heavenly Dao is not the will of the heavens because the will of the heavens does not exist.”

As usual, she argued that the Heavenly Dao did not exist.

Of course, her experiences had filled out her theory. She no longer denied the Heavenly Dao, but the will of the heavens, believing that the two could exist or not exist separately.

The Buddha Ancestor intoned, “The world has the Heavenly Dao, and the heavens have the will of the heavens. If there is no will of the heavens, then what is Fate?”

Immortal Ji Yao asked, “Where does the will of the heavens come from?”

“From the grass, the trees, the fish, the insects, the mountains and rivers, the flowers and birds. It is a congregation of all things in the world,” the Buddha Ancestor replied.

The Three Sages Ancestor replied, “Not at all, not at all. Plants have no will, so how can bringing them together create a will? The source of the Heavenly Dao is the source of its will.”

Like the Western Heaven Buddha Ancestor, the Three Sages Ancestor also believed that the will of the heavens existed. But while the Buddha Ancestor believed that the will of the heavens was the aggregation of countless scattered Fates, the Three Sages Ancestor believed that the will of the heavens had always had a true origin, which he called the Heavenly Dao Source.

The source was the Heavenly Dao’s core, and its will was born from it.

This was the Three Sages Ancestor’s view.

Just like that, they began to argue about the Heavenly Dao and the will of the heavens, each side having their opinion and refusing to yield.

There were also those who revered the Heavenly Dao, considering the Heavenly Dao unfathomable and that discussing it would draw its wrath. But since everyone had already started to try and “surpass” the Heavenly Dao, not discussing it at this point was rather ridiculous, so everyone put that matter to the side.

As everyone argued back and forth, someone asked, “If there is a source, then where is the Heavenly Dao’s source?”

This was a rather tricky question.

Everyone froze for a moment.

Finally, the Three Sages Ancestor replied, “I have always believed that the source is located at the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel.”

“The source is formless, so why would it take the form of a law wheel?”

“Then what’s the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel?”

“It’s the Heavenly Dao Clock!”

“It’s the manifestation of the source!”

“It’s the aggregation of the Great Daos!”

“It’s just a name given by the ignorant!”

All kinds of opinions were offered, someone even believing that the Heavenly Dao Wheel wasn’t representative of anything. It was just a name given by the ignorant, and there was no guarantee that it had anything to do with the Heavenly Dao.

A voice suddenly butted in.

“Eh? I recall that when Nine Disaster ascended to Saint Immortal, an image of the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel appeared. So why is it that since we entered this bizarre dimension, the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel has fallen silent?”

The speaker was a general of the court.

Everyone fell silent.

They had all come to the same realization.

It was a little eerie.

It was a little inexplicable.

Why? Why was it that the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel, which had always appeared at critical moments, had suddenly gone silent?

The argument stopped as everyone turned to the man.

Perhaps only the violet-clothed man could give them an explanation.

The man smiled. “There are some things that have always been there. You just haven’t noticed them yet.”

What?

Everyone looked at each other in surprise.

They didn’t understand what the man was getting at.

But Tang Jie’s eyes gleamed.

He muttered, “One on the mountain cannot see the true face of the mountain… Could it be…”

“What?” Everyone turned to Tang Jie.

As realization dawned on him, he shouted, “The Heavenly Dao Law Wheel! This is the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel’s dimension!

“We’re inside the Heavenly Dao Law Wheel!”