The Supreme Being Is Born

The Gou Chen Star Domain had an ancient Great Emperor's mother star sitting within it.

Six thousand years ago, a young boy accidentally obtained this Great Emperor's Wheel Sea Realm scripture.

He had struggled with having no subsequent volumes, yet was unwilling to give up the Emperor Scripture, so he emulated ancient cultivators and specialized in a single secret realm.

He studied the Wheel Sea alone and made breakthroughs over the millennia, achieving Sagehood at two thousand years and reaching Great Sage at five thousand, attaining the pinnacle in this path.

Having obtained the inheritance, this Great Sage voluntarily joined this lineage, taking in disciples on Gou Chen Ancient Star, teaching the methods of cultivation, and spending his old age right in this place.

His understanding of cultivation methods was very peculiar, differing from ordinary cultivators. Some of his views were hard to accept, and his peers called him an eccentric.

Perhaps this was the reason he was able to cultivate to Great Sage relying solely on a single secret realm.

Zhang Huan carried the aura of a Great Sage around his body as he entered Gou Chen Ancient Star to meet this eccentric.

Upon sight, the other party appeared to be in his fifties or sixties. His temples were frosted with grey, his expression stern and humorless, looking like a proper man.

When he spoke, however, he became like a comic old man, beaming with joy, a world apart from how he looked when silent.

"Ever since Great Sage Qin Yu parted ways with me a century ago, it has been a very long time since any fellow practitioners came to find me to discourse on the Dao. Please come right in; today we must have a thorough and satisfying discussion."

This eccentric was delighted, putting his arm around Zhang Huan like a longtime friend upon their first meeting, and repeatedly pulling him into the inner courtyard.

He had no hobbies in his life other than liking to discourse on the Dao. He could expound a great mass of novel views that opened one's eyes.

Conversely, he was also very stubborn about certain problems. If the answers were not to his satisfaction, he would probe to the bottom of the matter and refuse to let up, leaving people helpless.

He possessed quite the demeanor of obsession with the Dao.

Zhang Huan first asked him to display his own Wheel Sea.

Legend had it that cultivators who practiced a single secret realm would successively experience nine deaths and nine births of transformation, and he was quite curious about this.

Upon hearing this, the old man immediately and generously displayed it. His Wheel Sea was special; almost every fellow practitioner who came here would visit it, and it was the creation he was most proud of in his life.

He was confident that across the entire universe, one could not find a few such special secret realms. It was rare since ancient times and held extremely important reference value for tapping into one's own potential.

Otherwise, those fellow practitioners would not have rather come to discourse on the Dao with him just to take a look, all wanting to glean something from it to advance further.

The Bitter Sea opened wide, a scene of vibrant life bubbling like a vast ocean rather than deathly silence, covering a thousand miles.

Two Life Springs stood facing each other on either side, gushing forth vital essence. An iridescent divine bridge connected the Bitter Sea all the way to the firmament, where the Other Shore was vast and hazy, hiding specks of starlight within the pitch-black darkness.

As he displayed it, he excitedly recounted how he had originally remodeled the Wheel Sea into its present appearance.

"I put a great deal of effort into this Wheel Sea, courting death and barely surviving back then.

First, I scrapped a few medicine kings to recuperate before attempting to carve out another Life Spring, using the essence of life to transform the entire Bitter Sea.

Then, I remodeled the divine bridge, newly casting one, and followed that with the Other Shore—"

As he spoke, he began to express his views, unilaterally discussing the Dao with Zhang Huan.

If one did not cut in at this point, some fellow practitioners would simply take their leave after looking, and he still had a huge pile of theories bottled up that he had not yet spoken of.

As it happened, though, Zhang Huan was here to study him, so the more he said, the better.

"In my conjecture, the Wheel Sea contains boundless potential.

If other secret realms can be opened up within it, there is not necessarily no chance of leaping up to the Quasi-Emperor realm."

Zhang Huan looked at him with raised brows; no wonder he was called an eccentric—the moment he opened his mouth, he uttered something that people felt was absurd.

If other secret realms could be directly formed within the Wheel Sea, then what need was there for other secret realms? Wouldn't that be nothing more than a superfluous redundancy?

"You think well of it, but the secret realms are mutually equal within the system. How can other secret realms be integrated into it?"

Zhang Huan shook his head, indicating that it was unrealistic. This sort of thinking belonged to castles in the air and was impossible to achieve.

Taking too big a step meant shaking the foundation of a system; presumably, no one since ancient times had ever succeeded.

"A system? So that's how it is. Cultivation goes from bottom to top, constantly integrating various secret realms, and only then can a complete system be formed.

Then what is a single secret realm, a heretical path? It is forever lacking, which is why it stops at Great Sage?

It indeed seems to be the case. A system... put this way, it's as if there is an invisible hand guiding cultivators to march along this footprint.

If one departs in other directions midway, they will be restricted by the system, with limited achievements, forever incomparable to those who march along the fixed route."

It seemed plausible; a glint flashed in the old fox's eyes as he gazed affectionately at Zhang Huan, as if he had met a soulmate.

"Fellow Daoist, you truly are a genius!"

"If it truly is as I think, then this mastermind behind the scenes must have an unspeakable secret.

We have uncovered a corner of the heaven-shaking secrets hidden through the ages, where even ancient Great Emperors were manipulated without knowing it.

The only ones capable of doing such a thing are immortal immortals with the ability to place moves within the flow of time and plot across the ages..."

Zhang Huan stopped him at the appropriate moment, not letting him continue guessing. What conspiracies and secrets—the more he spoke, the more outrageous it got.

If he did not know the details, he might truly have been led astray by this kind of interlocking thinking.

That piece of history was too far removed to be examined, and later generations could only rely on guesses to patch together one or two truths, most of which were likely nonsense.

Coincidentally, there was someone in ancient times called Imperial Venerable, famous for conspiracies within the circle. Coupled with the cultivation world's law of the jungle and moral decay, it was very easy to make people excessively conspiratorial.

"Let's talk about your development of the secret realms."

Zhang Huan said that compared to conspiracy theories, he cared more about how to develop one's own potential.

He could see that the other party was not following the beaten path or walking the methods summarized by ancient cultivators, but had instead carved out a different path to develop certain unusual divine caches.

Zhang Huan could not help thinking that deeply mining a single secret realm and polishing it to perfection led at most to peak Great Sage.

What if the five great realms were cultivated together, merging them to form the prototype of the interconnecting five great realms of the Emperor Realm? Could one continue to cultivate?

Stepping up and sublimating step by step, polished to the extreme, what would happen then?

Proving the Dao with such a foundation, the five great realms would naturally resonate, and the ultimate leap would be as simple as drinking water.

"Secret realms, well, they are both difficult and easy. It all depends on how your goal is set. If you set it too high, it goes too far and is not as good as following the beaten path.

If the development is too simple, it will fail to release your full potential, affecting your future Dao path.

The key lies in degree; it is not that a secret realm is better the more special and powerful it is. The one that suits you best is the best."

As he spoke, he mentioned why his secret realm was remodeled into this shape, as it was intimately tied to himself.

He had been lacking in his youth, and later obtained certain fortuitous encounters to carve out another Life Spring to make up for it.

His ambitions were lofty, yet his aptitude was insufficient, so he recast the divine bridge for transformation, connecting it with the Other Shore to sublimate together. It represented his pursuit of nine transformations to the extreme, ensuring his aptitude was without worry.

If one wanted to develop a secret realm, they should think about what they lacked, or what they wished to pursue, and use that as a base to develop the secret realm into the shape they desired.

Zhang Huan informed him of the idea of interconnecting the five great realms and asked for his thoughts.

The old man's gaze was like a torch; immediately furrowing his brows, he nodded and praised repeatedly.

"Fellow Daoist's idea has great wisdom! It is not impossible to integrate them into one and transform them into the prototype of the Emperor Realm!"

He spoke of many details at length—the connections between each secret realm from the Wheel Sea to the Secret Realm of Dao Palace, and the methods and possibilities of interconnection.

After finishing, he frowned and shook his head again, stroking his chin and sighing incessantly.

"Sigh, it can be done, but the difficulty is also immense. One's foundation must be profound to a certain degree; presumably, only an ancient Great Emperor retraining from scratch could accomplish it."

Yet which Great Emperor would proactively retrain from scratch? They had walked the path to its end; why would they need to walk it again?

Suddenly, a flash of inspiration struck him and he had another idea. He stood up, fumbled around the bookcase, and took out a volume of classics.

Divine Emperor Biography

"The Great Emperor closest to our era passed away over a millennium ago. Let me first introduce him to you.

According to my speculation, this Divine Emperor was a Great Emperor who practiced a single secret realm. The book details his life in full.

If something can be researched out of it, perhaps it can unlock the secret of how the Divine Emperor was able to achieve the Dao."

The various interpretations and big and small biographies within the book were enough to consume a lifetime to study, and what was recorded was extremely detailed.

The Divine Emperor fought the Dao Palace with his Wheel Sea, a Sage counter-killing a Great Sage; the old man guessed that he had first cultivated a certain secret realm, which was why he possessed such heaven-defying combat power.

Moreover, his combat power remained peerless even upon reaching the Emperor Realm; it was very likely he had pioneered a new path. If one could catch a glimpse of it, they might be able to solve the problem of a single secret realm being unable to achieve the Quasi-Emperor realm in one fell swoop.

"Ever since I obtained this classic, I have been researching it for many years. I feel that I have already vaguely sensed something."

The old man said with a serious expression.

Zhang Huan's expression was strange; he himself did not know he had practiced a single secret realm.

He advised the old man not to put effort into this aspect; classics were written by people after all, and contained fictional elements.

Let alone an ancient Great Emperor; it was normal for them to be mythified.

If he truly wanted to research it, he had to base it on reality, just like his past cultivation, rather than toying with words here.

The old man did not take it in and stubbornly believed in his own judgment. Zhang Huan did not advise him further, knowing it was a waste of effort.

After asking a few more concerned questions, he took his leave hastily.

Generally speaking, there were gains, but the person was a bit unreliable; for his ideas to land in reality, he still had to verify them himself.

Returning to the Ji Family and sitting within a secret chamber, Zhang Huan opened the Divine Emperor Biography he had originally obtained from the Divine Domain.

The book was very thick, boasting a full thousand pages, and recorded the life of the Divine Emperor inside.

The first chapter had only two large characters: [Divine Emperor (Heavenly Emperor)]

"Divine Emperor? I remember it should be called Demonic Emperor, right?"

Zhang Huan flipped to the annotations.

The Great Emperor beheaded demons to uphold the Dao, suppressing turmoil with his body. He had great achievements, resembling a god yet not a demon, so later generations called him the Divine Emperor out of reverence for him.

He flipped back to the first page and continued reading.

The Divine Emperor originated from the Big Dipper Emperor Burial Star. According to data, the moment he emerged into the world, he was accompanied by the sound of the Great Dao.

At the age of three, an immortal crane snatched him away, determining that he would surely become a Great Emperor in the future and entrusting him with the mantle of an ancient Great Emperor.

At five, he mistakenly entered a dragon pool and absorbed the true dragon's essence and blood; at eight, he obtained a piece of divine wood carved with the inheritance of the Nine Mysteries.

Entering the Dao in his youth, he took protecting all living beings as his own duty, fighting the younger generation of Qi Shi Mansion all the way to be matchless, with holy lords and saintesses all admiring him.

At twenty, he achieved Sagehood, entered the Starry Sky Ancient Road, fought his way through it in ten years, permanently resided in the Divine Forbidden Zone at the Sage realm, shattered two major boundary barriers, and easily beheaded Great Sages.

Afterwards, he drifted away with the wind, viewed by the youths of the ancient path as the goal of a lifetime of pursuit, cultivating to Great Sage to annihilate a Quasi-Emperor.

At the Quasi-Emperor stage, facing ten Quasi-Emperors of the Underworld plus an imperial weapon, he faced them with calm composure, caught the imperial weapon bare-handed, and slaughtered them all.

In his old age, several Supremes plus an immortal artifact wanted to launch a sneak attack on the Divine Emperor, only to be suppressed and slain with a flick of the Divine Emperor's finger, not even meeting a single clash.

Zhang Huan was left speechless. He guessed in an instant that this was concocted by the Divine Son; stories such as a Sage counter-killing a Great Sage could even be compiled, misleading the younger generation.

The realm barrier between the Saint King and the Great Sage alone was something countless people could never cross; only the most monstrous handful of people could counter-kill the weakest Great Sage.

Yet the book directly spanned two major realms. Compiling stories required some limits; this mythification of him was far too outrageous.

"No wonder Gou Chen's Great Sage said I had practiced a single secret realm. Only this kind of train of thought could explain it away."

A beam of light swept across the void, and an unadorned ancient precious mirror appeared.

"Oh, this is... So it is it. Is it seeing things and thinking of the past?"

The Void Mirror asked calmly. He knew the Divine Son had once joined the Demonic Court and had a very deep relationship with Zhang Huan.

Zhang Huan shook his head.

"Oh, you're reminiscing about your own past, recalling the vanished years of youth."

Zhang Huan raised his eyes to look at it.

"Don't you think there's something amiss with this book?"

"Is there? I think it fits quite well. Your identity is worthy of it."

The Void Mirror did not feel there was any problem.

Coupled with an ancient Great Emperor, everything would appear reasonable, and a lifetime of experiences was an epic legend.

Let alone Zhang Huan, who was peerless and possessed illustrious achievements; no matter how exaggerated the brilliance he penned was, no one would question it.

He shrugged. In any case, he was merely an avatar; it didn't matter whether he was the Divine Emperor or the Demonic Emperor, as it couldn't affect him.

"The mysterious bird recently became a Great Sage, and the origin symbols within its body have manifested somewhat again."

The Void Mirror cut to the theme, asking Zhang Huan to investigate the origin. They had been cultivating this mysterious bird all along, probing the Dao of Fortune within its divine abilities.

This mysterious bird's bloodline would purify somewhat and its origin would be enhanced every time it broke through a major realm.

"Mhm."

Zhang Huan agreed, his gaze piercing through the void to see that within a courtyard, it was frolicking and playing with several Ji family young girls.

Ever since it was brought out of the Underworld and hatched, the mysterious bird either enjoyed itself or played, living a carefree life.

Even so, it had still advanced to Great Sage within a thousand years, making a group of Ji family elders green with envy.

He sent a voice transmission telling it to come over and display its innate divine ability to see whether it differed from the past. Zhang Huan reached out to touch it, his spiritual sense engraving the newly generated origin symbol.

The Dao of Fortune was profound and abstruse; few people could delve deeply into it. If it could reach completion, it would be immensely beneficial.

Before he could even deduce it, a majestic pillar of light shot out from the distant horizon, piercing the firmament and soaring straight up to the clouds.

A Supreme Dao Pressure surged toward all directions, sweeping across the cosmos and rolling across tens of millions of miles!

The pressure made people unable to breathe, and the Ji Family Holy Lord's legs trembled involuntarily.

Those with even weaker cultivation bent their knees, supporting themselves with great effort, simply unable to withstand this aura from the boundless distance.

A storm was coming; a Supreme was about to emerge.

The Void Mirror hummed softly, flying to Zhang Huan's side, wanting to join the battle together.

So many years had passed, and it worried that Zhang Huan's life blood in his old age would no longer match his peak.

"No matter, I alone suffice."

"I thought I would have to crouch for another few thousand years, but I didn't expect that after a little over a thousand years, I couldn't wait any longer."

He said with cold eyes, his words revealing absolute confidence. No matter how many Supremes came out, he could refine them all into human great medicines.

"Lord of the Demonic Court, do you still survive in this world? Can you still suppress the turmoil? We have arrived."