It was said that when Great God Pangu opened the heavens, Heaven and Earth first separated. The clear rose to become the sky, while the turbid sank to become the earth.
Pangu transformed his body into the myriad things of Heaven and Earth, and only then did this nascent world begin to teem with life. Afterward, it endured the Great Tribulation of Fierce Beasts, the Great Tribulation of Dragons and Phoenixes, and the War of Immortals and Demons. By now, no one knew how many kalpas had passed...
In the Western Primordial Desolation, there was an unnamed valley. In Soul Splitting Valley of the Western Primordial Desolation, leaden-gray tribulation clouds shrouded the sky, while bottomless ravines crisscrossed the cracked earth. Earthfire slithered through the fissures like scarlet snakes. White bones lay scattered among the charred rocks, and the air reeked of sulfur mixed with decaying matter.
This place had once been near the main battlefield of the War of Immortals and Demons. Now, the land outside the valley lay shattered, Innate Spiritual Qi was thin, and leaden-gray tribulation clouds covered the sky. Bottomless ravines spread across the cracked earth. Earthfire slithered through the fissures like scarlet snakes, while white bones lay scattered among the charred rocks. The air was filled with the pungent stench of sulfur and decaying matter, mingled with faint traces of demonic qi that drifted like wisps of smoke. Near the valley, the smoke followed the contours of the mountains and floated inward, eventually gathering in the center of the valley.
At the very center of the enormous valley stood a nine-zhang pool. The smoke that gathered there spiraled down from the sky and melted into the pool water. The water was as black as ink and as viscous as silk. In the center of the pool stood an immortal bamboo glowing with spiritual light, its upper end bearing only a few yellowing leaves.
I was a Cloud Bamboo, a Cloud Bamboo growing in a mountain-valley pool. My roots were planted in the bottom of the pool, whose water was black as ink, giving off a gloomy and terrifying feeling.
I did not know how long had passed or when it had begun, but I developed a hazy consciousness.
I could feel painful groans rising from deep beneath the surrounding ground. They were the earth's lamentations. Every crack was like a wound, bleeding without end. I could hear sobbing carried by the wind—the lingering resentment of countless living beings.
Jiang Yun's consciousness struggled up from the chaos. The first thing he sensed was not sight, but the agony coming from his roots, as though ten thousand steel needles were piercing his soul along his meridians.
He tried to raise his "hand" and rub his temples, only to discover in horror that his body had become a seven-foot-tall Cloud Bamboo. Roots as thin as strands of hair clung tightly to the soil. Aside from the main root, only a few lateral roots remained unbroken.
The leaves trembled and rustled in the wind. Every sway brought a knife-like pain to the roots.
"Did I become... a vegetable?" Jiang Yun forced himself to remain calm.
In his previous life, Jiang Yun had been an ordinary office worker in IT. One day, he had attended a weekend gathering with his colleagues. After drinking, he had taken a taxi home and fallen asleep on his bed in a daze. When he woke again, he was already here.
There had been no melodramatic resentment toward the world. Everything had happened quietly and ordinarily.
Jiang Yun merely felt his mood sink. It was a pity that he could no longer fulfill his filial duties before his parents. Everything would have to be left to his eldest brother. Fortunately, he had left several hundred thousand yuan in his bank account for his big brother before he departed.
Suddenly, a stream of data flowed into Jiang Yun's consciousness. It was information passed down through his origin. It was as though he had experienced countless years in the blink of an eye, and Jiang Yun understood his current situation.
He was an illegal immigrant, inexplicably reincarnated as an Innate Spiritual Root!
But since he had come, he would make the best of it. Since he had encountered the legendary cultivation world in this life, he might as well properly experience the joy of cultivation.
Through the information inherited from his true body's origin, Jiang Yun learned that he was currently in the Primordial Desolation created by Great God Pangu. Having often read novels in his previous life, he was familiar with many myths and legends. The current point in time was ten thousand years after the War of Immortals and Demons between Old Ancestor Hongjun and Demon Ancestor Luohu.
Back then, Demon Ancestor Luohu and Hongjun had fought in the Western Land, leaving it ruined beyond recognition and destroying an unknown number of Spirit Veins and Blessed Lands and Grotto-Heavens.
The place where Jiang Yun's true body stood had also been caught in the aftermath of the battle. Fortunately, it was far from the main battlefield. Though it had suffered grievous damage and countless roots had been severed, it had barely survived.
It was precisely because of this that the soul of someone from a later age could occupy this spiritual root. After merging with the spiritual root's origin, he finally awakened.
Jiang Yun's true body was a Low-grade Innate Spiritual Root, the Cloud Bamboo. It had originated from the Chaos Spiritual Root, the Heavenly Pillar Tree, after its origin split apart during the Great Tribulation of Heaven Opening. During that tribulation, countless Chaos Spiritual Roots had suffered calamity, their origins splitting and forming countless Innate Spiritual Roots.
His inheritance also included a cultivation technique called the Jianmu Tongtian True Scripture. It could be cultivated up to the Grand Unity Realm and contained some common knowledge and fundamentals of cultivation, allowing Jiang Yun to understand the realms of cultivation: Mortal Realm, Human Immortal, Earth Immortal, Heavenly Immortal, True Immortal, Mystic Immortal, Golden Immortal, Grand Unity Golden Immortal, Grand Luo Golden Immortal, Primordial Golden Immortal (Quasi-Saint), and Primordial Grand Luo Golden Immortal (Saint).
As for the realms of cultivation beyond Sainthood, the inheritance contained no information about them.
Just as Jiang Yun was preparing to continue examining the remaining information, a strange sensation came from his leaves and roots. Wisps of weak demonic qi were surging in from all around.
He instinctively absorbed the demonic qi while spreading out both his leaves and roots.
"Hmm, did the innate divine ability of an Innate Spiritual Root awaken along with my consciousness?
"It can devour and refine all kinds of spiritual qi to increase one's cultivation. It can also replenish its origin through other spiritual roots of the same source. Once the origin is sufficient, it can trace back to its source and evolve into a higher-grade spiritual root."
Jiang Yun was pleasantly surprised to discover that after devouring a wisp of demonic qi, his branches, leaves, and roots seemed to have become tougher. Originally, aside from the main root, most of his lateral roots had been torn into tatters, apparently because his true body had nearly been overturned in the aftermath of the tribulation.
He tried to dissect his current situation through programming logic. If his body was treated as a server, then his leaves and roots were data interfaces, while demonic qi was clearly some kind of energy source.
The problem was that because of the tribulation, the "hardware" of his true body had become far too fragile. His roots could no longer absorb enough spiritual qi to supply his entire body, and his leaves were severely malnourished, having turned yellow.
Fortunately, Jiang Yun's consciousness had awakened. Once he devoured all the demonic qi in the pool beneath him, it should be enough to heal the injuries within his body.
Thinking this, Jiang Yun calmed down and slowly absorbed the demonic qi, gradually repairing the wounds in his origin.
Some of the severed roots also reconnected without him noticing.
Three years passed in the blink of an eye. Jiang Yun consciously circulated the Jianmu Tongtian True Scripture, and with the origin transformed from his diligent absorption of demonic qi during this time, the injuries to his true body had already mostly healed.
After his damaged roots were repaired, his speed of absorbing demonic qi increased as well, making the process twice as effective with half the effort.
The leaves that had once been yellow and withered had now regained their original green, brimming with vitality.
The branches and leaves that had initially stood seven feet high suddenly surged to a height of one zhang. His exposed roots grew thick and gnarled, their ends piercing into the yellow soil at the bottom of the pool and reaching more than ten zhang underground.
After several more months, the state of Jiang Yun's consciousness continued to improve. As he cultivated the technique, he began imitating the Cloud Bamboo's breathing.
Unintentionally, Jiang Yun's consciousness fell into the same rhythm as the Cloud Bamboo's. At once, a continuous stream of pure qi nourished Jiang Yun's soul.
Only at this point did Jiang Yun truly fuse completely with the Cloud Bamboo's true body. From then on, the Innate Spiritual Root Cloud Bamboo was Jiang Yun, and no one within the Heavenly Dao could detect that soul from another world.
At that moment, the Cloud Bamboo's origin fed back into Jiang Yun's soul body. In an instant, his previously feeble soul condensed into a three-inch primordial spirit.
Jiang Yun's primordial spirit continued refining the pure qi without end, and the little primordial-spirit figure grew stronger day by day. On this day, as the final, slightly stronger stream of pure qi entered him, Jiang Yun's primordial spirit finally grew to three zhang tall, and his cultivation leaped to the Early Earth Immortal stage.
At this point, Jiang Yun could finally project his spiritual sense outward.
"Hahaha, I can finally get a good look at my surroundings."
Jiang Yun released his spiritual sense and carefully examined everything around him. Unexpectedly, what entered his spiritual sense was a barren stretch of flat land. Within a ten-li radius of his spiritual sense, not a single blade of grass grew besides himself.
"I didn't expect the Western Land after the War of Immortals and Demons to be this miserable. Anyone who heard about it would weep, and anyone who took one look would turn and run without hesitation!"
By now, all the demonic qi in the pool beneath him had been absorbed, revealing the Mysterious Yellow Soil. After being tainted by demonic qi for so long, the soil had not rotted or changed color. Moreover, after the demonic qi within it was absorbed, spiritual qi began surging up continuously from below. He did not know why.
"Earlier, the black demonic qi filled the surroundings, and I couldn't extend my spiritual sense outside my body, so I didn't notice this. Now that I look, could there be some Origin of Spiritual Soil beneath me?" Jiang Yun muttered inwardly as he desperately drove his roots deeper underground.
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