New Life

After that, Li Qi began to naturally resume his daily life.

He consolidated his cultivation, gradually improving his abilities. He spent a fixed time reading every day, then went home to take care of his children, living a normal daily life with Rabbit, and occasionally inquiring about Old Ma's situation in the outer realms.

Stable days, a peaceful life, and carefree joy.

This routine continued for fifteen years.

Fifteen years later, Li Shiwei is seventeen years old.

The seventeen-year-old girl decided to leave home and go far away.

Actually, it's not that far. It was originally Li Qi's property, a world group expansion project in cooperation between Li Qi, Mount Luofu, and the Sovereign of Lingxiao Kingdom.

Yes, they have now transformed from individual worlds into clusters of worlds.

The Sovereign of Lingxiao Kingdom was quite efficient. After Shen Shuibi completed the formation, she used it to expand several world groups, totaling more than a million worlds.

Among them, there is one fifth-grade world, more than thirty Sixth-Rank World, and over a thousand Seventh Rank World. The remaining eighth-grade, ninth-grade, and even unranked worlds are countless. They are so numerous that they are not even counted when calculating accounts. Only the person in charge of these worlds knows exactly how many there are.

Even if any random Ninth Rank World has hundreds of millions of people, many worlds will be omitted when making statistics, after all... to the heavens, a Ninth Rank World is too small.

Therefore, it makes one realize just how terrifying people in the world can be.

The population outside the realm is ridiculously large, but the total population of the world is at most ten trillion. Despite this huge population gap, the number of geniuses produced in the world can be roughly equal to the total number of geniuses outside the realm, which shows how outrageous the aptitude of people born in the world is.

Li Shiwei, even if she were born into the world, would be considered to have superior talent. She could not compare to her father, but she was, after all, the child of a fifth-rank and a sixth-rank official. At the age of seventeen, she was already at the peak of the eighth rank, and she was at the peak of combat ability as well.

Her personality was not stable, so she did not choose her father's Shaman Path, but instead learned the direct lineage of Mount Luofu from Yang Ning, making her a little Daoist with a rather strong sense of self.

She has already reached the peak of the eighth rank, and there is no further progress in her skills. Now, what she needs is to see through the illusions, find her own Dao Path, and then attain immortality.

This is something that is difficult to achieve when teaching at home.

So Li Qi agreed to the little girl's request and prepared to let the mischievous child go out to join the next group of Mount Luofu teams to explore the world cluster.

By the way, we can also go and see Old Ma.

Old Ma is over there now, but for some reason, Old Ma still hasn't achieved immortality. However, Dragon Steed still has several hundred years of lifespan left, so there's no rush. Therefore, sending Li Shiwei there now is not a problem.

"Father, Mother, I'll be going now!" The little girl walked out of the cave abode, waved, and waved to her still young father and mother behind her.

Looking at the graceful young woman smiling happily and waving at him, Li Qi couldn't help but feel a touch of fatherly emotion welling up with tears.

Seventeen-year-old Li Shiwei was tall and slender with a strong physique. She wore a beautiful and clean women's long gown with a jade pendant hanging from her waist, looking heroic and spirited. She also carried a long sword on her back as if she were doing something else.

Although she doesn't actually use a sword, it's purely for show.

However, it is indeed beautiful.

She inherited her mother's beauty perfectly, and even appeared more heroic. Unlike Shen Shuibi's aloofness, she was more enthusiastic and lively. So, despite their similar appearances, they had completely different temperaments, just like a female knight-errant who was full of curiosity when she first entered the martial arts world.

Watching his daughter run excitedly outside without even turning her head, completely ignoring her elderly parents' longing gazes behind her, Li Qi couldn't help but call out, "Shitou, you're smarter than her, remember to give her a little pointer!"

But then the Xuanjing Jade at Li Shiwei's waist swayed and vibrated, proclaiming, "Your Shaman is hereby granted!"

Yes, the Xuanjing Jade that broke out of the rock simply named itself "Stone," and it has been called that for thousands of years, so it has gotten used to it.

After that, Shen Shuibi polished it into a jade pendant.

Such carving allows him to "become a vessel," as the saying goes. After this treatment, the jade itself can radiate greater brilliance and become easier to cultivate.

Li Shiwei liked it very much, and Shi Tou had no objections, so Shi Tou became her childhood playmate and has been with her ever since.

Of course, as a spirit of a piece of Xuanjing Jade, the stone is very clever and seems to be even smarter than Li Shiwei.

However, Li Shiwei quickly quickened her pace.

I've wanted to leave home for a long time!

It's been over a decade! I can finally see the real world.

Unlike her father's lingering reluctance, the young girl ran happily out of the house, embracing her new life.

To live an independent life.

Yeah!

The little girl, like a petrel learning to fly for the first time, quickly disappeared from her parents' sight.

Only over there, Li Qi gazed longingly, unwilling to return to his cave abode for a long time.

Shen Shuibi walked to his side and laughed, "Having a child has turned you into a demon?"

"Alas, only now do I understand why the Great Witch Yun Fang planted demonic thoughts deep in his heart to maintain that senior brother's 'immortality'," Li Qi sighed and said.

He had once spoken with the great shaman Yun Fang, who had helped him greatly. (See Chapter 225 for details)

During that conversation, Li Qi learned that the Great Shaman Yun Fang could easily extinguish those demonic thoughts. These demonic thoughts posed no threat to him at all; they were merely persistent and would hinder his cultivation from continuing to improve.

However, when Li Qi asked this question, the Great Shaman Yun Fang replied, "If you can let go so easily, how can it become a demon in your heart?"

Yes, it's easy to get rid of materialized demonic thoughts, but how do you get rid of the obsessions in your heart?

This is the real demonic thought.

If Li Shiwei were replaced by that senior brother, and Li Qi were replaced by the Great Shaman Yun Fang, Li Qi felt that he would probably make the same decision.

"Alas, I still can't see clearly, I can't understand it," Li Qi sighed. "On the Dao Path self-cultivation, only oneself matters. It's an easy saying, but who can truly live by it?"

Those Dao Pursuer need to abandon those 'low-level pleasures'. What are low-level pleasures?

In reality, it refers to everything except the Dao Path itself.

This is also a matter of making a choice.

Those who live forever possess theoretically an endless life. This endless life must have something to do, otherwise living would be meaningless. Living means doing something. If you don't do anything, you give up thinking and become a stone floating in the universe. What's the difference between that and being dead?

Therefore, immortals will definitely do things. They do many things, such as enjoying themselves, making achievements, creating works of art, improving their skills, and creating a country they like.

However, none of these things last long.

Yes, although for ordinary people, this kind of thing requires several lifetimes or even more than ten lifetimes, with more than ten generations of people working together, sometimes lasting for two thousand five hundred years or a hundred generations.

However, all of this seems too short-lived in the face of 'immortality'.

A monumental undertaking that lasted for 2,500 years, pushing the inhabited world out of the world group? Is that a long time?

So what if it's a hundred generations?

In the face of endless life, these things are but a fleeting moment.

All great achievements, all joys, and all sufferings, in the end, within the span of 'infinity' time, will turn into dust and vanish into the torrent of time.

Infinite time means that an infinite number of things can be done; there's even a term for it called the 'Poincaré Return'.

This means that in a closed system, after a very long period of time, everything will inevitably return to a position infinitely close to its initial position, even though the length of this time is far beyond imagination. Such a cycle is called a Poincaré regression.

Although we cannot actually determine whether the state of any physical system can truly revert, we can use such a cycle as an example, since it is the largest possible annual cycle in the conventional sense.

This cycle is roughly 10 followed by a billion zeros in a year.

It's very long, isn't it? Almost infinite for the average person, isn't it?

However, in the face of infinity, a Poincaré returning seems pitifully small.

Infinity means there are infinitely many Poincaré recurrences.

An endless cycle of return.

You will endure endless anger, endless loneliness, endless fear, and endless joy; everything will repeat itself endlessly.

All your thoughts, all your possibilities, will become fixed and infinite under the quantifier of eternity.

There is no end, it is eternal.

Ultimately, you will know everything in the world: the position of every atom, the distribution of every beam of light, and the time of every quantum fluctuation.

Even after knowing all this, the immortals will continue to reincarnate endlessly, repeating the same cycle over and over.

This is eternity, this is 'infinity'.

This is fundamentally different from 'living a long life'.

Forever—that word is too grand. The immortality of immortals is something even many immortals themselves cannot bear.

In this world, nothing can contain 'infinite' life; the life of an immortal will become Curse as it stretches infinitely.

Do not use the word 'infinite' lightly, because 'infinite' is bigger than we imagine.

How can we give meaning to this Curse 'infinite life' and find a target to which this infinite time can be entrusted?

Then there's only one thing that can be done.

In this world, there is only one thing that can bear the weight of endless life.

That is the 'Tao' itself.

Everything in the world is born from the 'Tao'.

The end of all things, the source of everything, is the 'Tao'.

The end of the Dao Path is the end of everything; only this supreme goal can withstand the Curse brought by infinite life.

Li Qi is now aware of this, but at only a little over a hundred years old, it is difficult for him to truly grasp its reality.

Let alone Li Qi, even the Great Shaman Yun Fang didn't manage to get out of there, did he?

Therefore, on his current Dao Path, Li Qi could only sigh in front of his daughter.

I'm so worried about this seventeen-year-old girl...

However, Rabbit was quite open-minded. She took Li Qi's arm and said with a smile, "If it were really possible, what would be the point of having Dao Lineage? Wouldn't everyone just become a lone wolf?"

Li Qi smiled and brushed those unrealistic thoughts out of his mind.

A hundred million years is a terrifyingly long time; what are you thinking about Poincaré's return?

"Yes, if we could really do that, what would be the point of having Dao Lineage? Let's go home." Li Qi said with a smile, and walked back into his cave abode.

There's no need to worry about those things; at least for now, on this Dao Path, you're by my side.

However, unlike her elderly father and mother's melancholy and thoughts, Li Shiwei was now truly like a trapped dragon entering the waves, a hungry tiger entering the mountains, a fish leaping freely in the vast sea, and a bird soaring high in the sky.

She ran wildly until she was a full thousand miles away from the Xuanjing Mountain cave abode before she stopped.

"Phew! We've finally escaped the mountain's boundaries. We shouldn't be able to see anything from here, right?" Li Shiwei breathed a sigh of relief, looking around at the surroundings.

They probably can't see it anymore, right?

However, the jade pendant at his waist vibrated and hummed. "Boss, I need to remind you that the Divine Man's Palm Observation Technique allows him to see you even if you run ten thousand miles away."

"What should I do! Then I'm no different from being at home!" Li Shiwei exclaimed in alarm.

Stone sighed helplessly and continued in a clear voice, "Wake up, boss. If they can't even let you go, you'll never have a chance to go to the outer realms. Do you think Shaman and True Lord are fools? They've already agreed on their words and actions. If they say you can go, they'll go. Why are they watching you? Do you think they don't even have that much guts?"

"Oh, that's right. They don't want me to go, so I can't leave the house either... Hey, you're so smart. I was so worried." Li Shiwei patted the jade pendant.

Stone sighed and said, "If you go to the outer realms like this, I seriously doubt you'll be able to come back. The people there may be less talented and the environment may be worse, but they're not stupid."

Although it is a piece of jade and does not breathe, it still has a sense of panting, perhaps because it feels that it cannot express its emotions in any other way.

"It's okay, I still have you, don't I?" Li Shiwei laughed and said, not worried at all.

Stone helplessly reminded him, "Me? I am a rare jade in the world. Although I am still a rough jade and waiting to be discovered, if you use me to forge Law Treasure, I can be used as the base for a sixth-grade Law Treasure. So if I start talking all the time when we go to the outer realm, you may not be able to come back, boss."

"What, is there anyone who dares to kill and rob?" Li Shiwei drew her sword. "Perfect, all my skills were trained for that very time!"

Stone didn't speak, he just stared silently at the seventeen-year-old girl in front of him.

This is bad.

The eldest brother usually seems quite smart, but did he forget his brain when he went out today or what happened?

(A New Chapter)