Chapter 212 - 211: Feng Yao

"I have been meaning to reach you, fellow Daoist."

The voice resonated directly within Lin Yuan’s Sea of Consciousness. It possessed a strange, paradoxical quality. On the surface, it sounded like the innocent, slightly breaking voice of a mortal teenager, carrying an almost youthful fragility. Yet beneath that softness lay an immense and terrifying weight, as though thousands of thunderclaps had detonated simultaneously within the boundless void, their deafening roar compressed into a single voice that shook the very depths of his consciousness.

Lin Yuan did not panic. A cultivatior whose Dao Heart had reached the Unshaken Stage did not flinch, even when the impossible occurred.

He closed his eyes.

With a seamless shift of his divine will, Lin Yuan projected his avatar inward, plunging into the vast expanse of his own spiritual sea.

The environment of his inner world was a breathtaking manifestation of his cultivation. It was a boundless ocean of golden-purple mist, saturated with the terrifying pressure of his Thunder Rain Dao Intent. Above the vast mist, his Nascent Soul, newly stabilized and perfected by the Nine Essence Genesis Pill, sat in a flawless lotus position, radiating a blinding, imperial light.

Yet, within this absolute domain, there was an intruder.

Standing a few dozen yards away, resting effortlessly upon the surface of the golden-purple mist, was a small, unassuming figure.

It was a boy. He appeared to be no older than sixteen, dressed in the simple, unassuming silk robes of the Feng Province. His back was turned to Lin Yuan. The boy’s frail shoulders were slightly hunched, completely lacking the rigid, arrogant posture of a Central Continent prodigy.

Instead of preparing an attack or attempting to hijack Lin Yuan’s spiritual sea, the boy was engaged in a display of baffling, childlike innocence. He held his thin, pale hand outstretched. Hovering just above his index finger was a spectral, bioluminescent butterfly. But this was no ordinary illusion. Lin Yuan’s comprehension instantly identified the composition of the insect.

It was forged entirely from pure Origin Energy—the first breath of creation, a force that was essentially lethal poison to anyone below the Soul Transformation realm. Yet, the boy was playing with it as if it were a toy spun from sugar.

Sensing the arrival of the master of this domain, the child-like figure slowly turned his head.

It was Feng Yao!

The sixteen-year-old anomaly of the Upper Division looked at Lin Yuan. His wide, eerie eyes were completely devoid of pupils, burning with a solid, milky white light that seemed to pierce through the very concepts of time and karma.

"You have a very loud mind, Daoist Lin," Feng Yao said, his voice echoing across the area, carrying that same terrifying resonance. The Origin Energy butterfly fluttered lazily off his finger, dissolving into a shower of white sparks before it could even touch the aggressive Thunder Rain mist. "It is chaotic. Filled with ancient thunder, heavy rain, and an obsession that burns brighter than a dying star. Yet, beneath it all, it is perfectly, immovably still."

Lin Yuan manifested his avatar in full, stepping across his spiritual sea. His black and white robes flowed behind him, untouched by the phantom winds of his own mind.

"It is considered a grave offense to enter another’s Sea of Consciousness uninvited, Feng Yao," Lin Yuan stated, his voice a calm rumble that caused the golden-purple mist to ripple aggressively, a silent warning of his absolute authority in this space.

"I did not force my way in," Feng Yao replied mildly, tilting his head with a teenager’s lazy curiosity. "Your mind was relaxed, open to the music of your companion. I merely slipped a whisper through the crack. You should have noticed that I have been observing you occasionally. Our gazes have met several times."

Lin Yuan stopped a dozen paces away. He did recall those moments. At the Grand Court, before the first preliminary round began, amidst the mocking laughter of the Upper Division, Feng Yao had been the only one to look at him with genuine, unblinking intensity. Their eyes had met. The boy’s gaze had lingered a beat too long, filled with a profound curiosity that Lin Yuan had instantly recognized as the assessment of a fellow monster.

"I remember," Lin Yuan said coldly. "You looked at me as if I were a puzzle missing a piece."

"Not missing a piece," Feng Yao corrected, a faint, melancholic smile touching his young lips. The boy’s expression shifted, the youthful apathy bleeding away to reveal an ancient weariness. "More like a puzzle that was assembled perfectly, but using pieces from an entirely different box. You are an anomaly, Lin Yuan."

As Feng Yao spoke, Lin Yuan silently assessed the balance of power within his own mind.

Following the consumption of the Nine Essence Genesis Pill, Lin Yuan’s true combat prowess had skyrocketed to a terrifying level. He was formally at the Unshaken Stage, the Fifth Step of Dao Resolve, but that was merely the foundation of his cultivation. Coupled with his Rank 10 Ancient Beast Body, which granted him immense physical strength and vitality, as well as his formidable divine skills, Lin Yuan had a clear understanding of exactly where he stood on the Central Continent’s martial ladder.

If he were to unleash his absolute, unmitigated might, he could comfortably match, and likely overwhelm, a cultivator at the Profound Stage (the Sixth Step). Depending on the circumstances and the strategic deployment of his arts, he might even be able to trade blows with a cultivator brushing against the Sovereign Stage (the Seventh Step).

He was incredibly powerful. But as he looked at the sixteen-year-old boy standing before him, Lin Yuan felt a cold realization settle into his mind.

The boy was completely unbound by those steps. The milky white light radiating from Feng Yao’s spiritual projection was not dense Qi; it was the raw, terrifying weight of a fully realized Primordial Spirit.

"I believe you are the fated one," Feng Yao said softly, breaking the silence. He looked around the golden-purple expanse of the spiritual sea, his pupil-less eyes reflecting the ambient lightning. "Or, at the very least, you are in deep companionship with the fated one."

Lin Yuan’s eyes narrowed slightly. The Fated One. And unknown to him, it was the second time within twenty-four hours that this concept had brushed against his existence, unknowingly echoing the silent musings of Emperor Tianxu.

"What precisely do you mean by that, Feng Yao?" Lin Yuan asked, his tone demanding absolute clarity. "Speak plainly. I have no patience for the esoteric riddles of the Upper Division."

Feng Yao let out a soft sigh, his narrow shoulders slumping. For a moment, he looked exactly like an exhausted teenager who had been asked to explain a complex subject he was utterly tired of discussing.

"These eyes," Feng Yao began, raising a pale hand to point at his own milky white, pupil-less gaze. "This light. It is not a technique. It is not a bloodline limit passed down by the ancestors of the Feng Province. It is simply the physical manifestation of what resides inside me."

The boy lowered his hand, looking directly at Lin Yuan.

"I was born with a Primordial Spirit," Feng Yao stated.