The agonizing pain of his Divine Soul being torn apart was the first beacon that guided Yang Chen back to consciousness.
It was not physical pain, but a more fundamental, more metaphysical sensation of collapse.
It was as if an invisible hand had forcibly peeled his existence from a painting, crumpled it into a ball, and thrown it into an entirely new world.
Before his eyes was a chaotic torrent of colors.
Beside his ears was the thunderous roar produced by countless Laws of the Great Dao intertwining and grinding against one another.
Chaos.
Confusion.
Like a drowning man, he struggled desperately within the torrent of information, trying to seize a single piece of driftwood called reason.
He did not know how long had passed—perhaps an instant, perhaps eternity.
A sweet, gentle breath forced its way into his nose and mouth, surging through his limbs and bones.
This was not air.
It was heavier than air, sweeter than heavenly nectar, carrying the purest vitality from the dawn of creation.
Yang Chen's body—no, this brand-new Dao Body he now possessed—greedily opened every pore, inhaling and exhaling.
His parched Divine Soul was nourished, and the agony of being torn apart rapidly healed.
He suddenly opened his eyes.
His vision finally came into focus.
The sky was a glass-like azure, so lofty it seemed beyond the mortal realm. The drifting clouds were not condensed vapor, but auspicious clouds formed from incomparably pure spiritual energy, flowing and unfurling with elegant grace.
On the ground, every plant was extraordinary. Even the most ordinary blade of wild grass shimmered with faint treasure light, drawing in the essence of sun and moon with every breath.
This place... was...
Yang Chen's gaze passed over the immortal herbs and jade-like flowers nearby, turning toward the distant horizon.
A pillar.
A heaven-supporting pillar whose majesty and grandeur could not be described by any words.
It reached up to the nine heavens and plunged down into the Nine Netherworlds, like the spine of heaven and earth itself, supporting the existence of this world.
Mount Buzhou!
This thought had not arisen through reasoning. It exploded directly from the depths of his Divine Soul, carrying an absolute sense of undeniable reality.
Boom!
At that very moment, countless unfamiliar fragments of memory transformed into a flood and rushed into his mind.
One piece of common knowledge after another about the Primordial World, one secret after another of cultivation techniques, all imprinted themselves upon his True Spirit.
He, Yang Chen, had truly transmigrated.
He had arrived in this Primordial World, where Great Luo were everywhere and Golden Immortals were less valuable than dogs!
This supreme stage filled with endless opportunities and slaughter!
After a brief daze, indescribable ecstasy erupted violently from the deepest part of his chest.
His heart pounded like a drum, his blood surged through his veins, and every inch of flesh trembled faintly from this overwhelming excitement.
This was not a dream!
None of this was a dream!
He had succeeded!
He had come to the ultimate holy land dreamed of by every transmigrator!
Yet this ecstasy, enough to set him ablaze, lasted less than three breaths within his Divine Soul.
Three breaths later.
A chill silently bloomed from the very core of his True Spirit without warning.
This chill had nothing to do with temperature.
It was an absolute freezing that came from a higher level of life itself.
In an instant, every color faded from Yang Chen's world.
The azure sky turned ash-gray.
The luminous immortal herbs became dim.
Even the majestic Mount Buzhou in the distance seemed to become a tombstone leading to death.
The rush of his blood and the pounding of his heart came to an abrupt halt.
Then.
A strange aura, black as ink and thick as an abyss, erupted from the depths of his True Spirit like a volcano!
"Agh—!"
A howl that barely sounded human squeezed from Yang Chen's throat. Pain and terror made him instantly double over.
That black aura was not mist, much less energy.
It had substance.
Thick, filthy, and carrying a viciousness that corroded all things.
It instantly flooded Yang Chen's limbs and bones, coiled around his meridians, contaminated his Dao Body, and finally wrapped around and saturated his entire True Spirit!
Destruction!
Finality!
Malice!
Slaughter!
Hatred!
Despair!
Endless negative emotions transformed into tangible shrieks and curses, crazily echoing through his mind.
Before Yang Chen's eyes was no longer the magnificent scenery of the Primordial World.
He "saw" a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood.
A colossal dragon corpse lay sprawled across the land, endless hatred for the Heavenly Dao flowing from its golden dragon eyes.
A Divine Phoenix had its heart pierced through. Its Nirvana Fire was completely extinguished by tainted blood, leaving behind only the most mournful cry.
A qilin shattered the earth beneath its hooves, only to have its head severed. Its unwilling roar shattered mountains and rivers across hundreds of millions of miles.
Dragon, phoenix, qilin!
The departed souls of the three clans' struggle for supremacy!
He could even "hear" the despairing wails of living beings turned to ash beneath the iron hooves of ancient ferocious beasts.
He could "feel" the madness and determination to perish alongside heaven and earth when Demon Ancestor Rahula detonated the western earth veins!
This black aura was the aggregate resentment of every war, every slaughter, and every fallen life since the Primordial World was created!
It was the karmic sin of the Immeasurable Tribulation... enough to make a Sage's Dao perish upon contact, and reduce a Great Luo to ashes at a touch!
And now, this aggregate malice of the entire chaotic universe had taken his True Spirit as its nest and his Dao Body as its vessel.
His ecstasy had long since vanished.
In its place was a cold despair capable of freezing thought itself.
That cold despair, enough to freeze thought itself, spread inch by inch from the deepest depths of Yang Chen's True Spirit.
His ecstasy had already been crushed into the most pitiful dust.
In its place was boundless terror, so immense that even his soul trembled.
At that very instant.
Boom!
A piece of information—no, that was not information.
It was a torrent, a spiritual imprint formed from pure malice, resentment, and the will of finality. It brutally pierced through his Divine Soul with an irresistible force that tore apart everything!
[Inheritor: Yang Chen] [Inheritance: Demon Ancestor Rahula's lifetime karmic sin]
Demon Ancestor.
Rahula!
Those two words were like two demonic hammers containing the deepest curses since the creation of heaven and earth, smashing viciously into Yang Chen's True Spirit.
His consciousness went blank for an instant.
Then, a number flashed wildly through his mind—a staggering figure enough to shatter any living being's Dao Heart.
Three trillion?
No!
Far more than that!
The moment that number appeared, it was utterly overwhelmed and torn apart by an even grander, more despairing concept!
The karma of the Immeasurable Tribulation!
It could not be measured by any number.
It was a concept, a law, an ultimate taboo capable of shattering the Dao Fruit of even lofty Heavenly Dao Sages, impervious through countless tribulations, reducing them to ashes the instant they were tainted by it!
At this moment, Yang Chen finally understood what that strange black aura upon him truly was.
It was the endless hatred directed at the unfairness of the Heavenly Dao when countless dragons, phoenixes, and qilin fell during the Dragon-Han Initial Tribulation and the three clans' struggle for supremacy.
It was the mad determination to perish alongside the entire Primordial World when Demon Ancestor Rahula detonated the western ancestral veins during the Dao-Demon Conflict, bringing calamity to countless living beings across hundreds of millions of miles.
It was the aggregate resentment, hatred, and despair of every slaughter, every war, and every fallen life since the creation of heaven and earth!
It was the sum of all negative existence in the Primordial World from its birth until now!
And now, this greatest negative asset in the Primordial World had gained a new owner.
It was him, Yang Chen.
"Hrk..."
A meaningless dry heave came from Yang Chen's throat. He wanted to scream, but found that an invisible force had seized his vocal cords, leaving him unable to make a sound.
His vision was completely swallowed by endless blood-red darkness.
"Give me back my life—!"
The phantom of a colossal golden dragon roared before him. Those dragon eyes, which should have been majestic and sacred, now held only hollow emptiness streaming with tears of blood, filled with resentment toward the Heavenly Dao and unwillingness toward the victors.
"Hate! I hate this so much!"
The cry of a Divine Phoenix pierced his eardrums. Its magnificent wings were soaked in tainted blood, and its once-proud Nirvana Fire had been utterly extinguished by karmic sin, leaving only a shriek of eternal damnation.
"Kill! Kill! Kill!"
A First Qilin who had shattered the earth had his head severed, yet his unwilling roar still shattered the void across hundreds of millions of miles. His unending battle intent transformed into the purest curse of slaughter.
Dragon!
Phoenix!
Qilin!
The countless fallen souls of the three clans transformed into endless malevolent ghosts, weeping, cursing, and roaring beside his ears day and night.
Those sounds did not travel through the air. They exploded directly from the depths of his True Spirit, every syllable carrying pain like a bone-scraping steel blade as it crazily tore at his sanity.
Then, a piercing chill and sense of decay came from his fingertips.
Yang Chen lowered his head with difficulty.
He saw black spots beginning to emerge across his immortal body, which had originally been smooth as jade and flowed with faint treasure light.
Those were not stains.
They were alive!
Like living ink, the black spots slowly squirmed beneath his skin, spreading as they greedily devoured the vitality and spiritual power within him.
The nauseating sensation of his flesh being corroded and rotted from within made his stomach churn violently.
This Innate Dao Body he had just acquired, filled with limitless potential, was being polluted and eroded by this immeasurable karmic sin at a visible rate, step by step toward decay and destruction.
The collapse of his physical body was only the beginning.
An even more terrifying change occurred within his primordial spirit and True Spirit!
In his inner vision, his primordial spirit should have been pure and flawless, radiating brilliant light.
But now, black shackles condensed from the purest hatred and curses appeared out of thin air.
They were savage and twisted, radiating eternal deathly stillness and misfortune.
Crack!
Crack!
One shackle after another snapped shut with the piercing screech of grinding metal, locking tightly around his primordial spirit, his True Spirit, and all his vitality!
His connection to the Great Dao was severed.
His ability to absorb and exhale spiritual energy was sealed.
The path to immortality was completely blocked!
The smile on Yang Chen's face, born from his transmigration and not yet fully faded, froze completely.
Then, under the wash of endless terror and despair, it cracked apart inch by inch and turned ash-gray.
A heavenly opening?
The ultimate holy land?
It was all bullshit!
This was not transmigration. This was clearly being precisely reborn into the deepest part of hell, the kind where there was no escape from damnation for all eternity!
Right from the start, he had inherited all the negative assets of the greatest villain in the Primordial World. It was mandatory inheritance, and he did not even have the option to refuse.
How was he supposed to cultivate immortality now? How was he supposed to seek the Dao?
The only ending awaiting him was to be completely devoured by this immeasurable karmic sin, become a walking corpse, and ultimately be reduced to ashes by the combined forces of the Heavenly Dao and the Six Sages!
Just as he fell completely into boundless despair.
The sky changed.
The nine heavens, originally glass-like azure and so lofty they seemed beyond the mortal realm, gathered boundless tribulation clouds in an instant.
They were not dark clouds formed from condensed vapor.
It was black.
The purest ink-black, embodying destruction and finality.
Within the clouds, thick purple bolts of lightning, vast as mountain ranges, churned and surged wildly.
Each flash of lightning painted heaven and earth in a ghastly purple that made the heart tremble.
It was heavenly punishment.
The manifestation of the Heavenly Dao's will!
An icy, merciless killing intent devoid of all living emotion came crashing down from the Ninth Heaven.
That killing intent surpassed every concept Yang Chen had ever known.
It was not an emotion, but a supreme law—an absolute command of rejection and eradication issued by the will of the entire world.
It was as though the entire prehistoric world regarded him as a lethal virus that had to be deleted at once!
That killing intent was like an invisible primordial divine mountain, crushing down upon Yang Chen's True Spirit and locking it firmly in place.
He could not move.
He could not breathe.
Even his thoughts were slowing to a halt beneath that supreme will.
He had been targeted by the Heavenly Dao.
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