Understanding Cause and Effect

"So."

Hongjun said slowly, his hollow eyes seeming to reflect that end which had swept over everything.

"You stagnated here, wandering in this chaos of 'ruins' and 'possibilities' that you created with your own hands, observing, waiting, perhaps also hoping for something that could break this stagnant 'variable' of yours?"

"You could put it that way." Daoist Bengtian admitted it frankly and looked at Hongjun.

"For example, your appearance, and what you are doing now, are very interesting. Trying to rebuild order from the ashes, sowing Dao traces upon the fragments... how is that not another form of 'destruction' and 'new life'?"

"It is only that your direction is utterly opposite to mine. Observing you may let me see something different."

Hongjun shook his head and no longer discussed the similarities and differences between their "Daos." Some karma had to be settled.

It had nothing to do with right or wrong, only existence itself.

"Fellow Daoist's Dao, I already understand. Yet the Prehistoric World was shattered, and trillions upon trillions of living beings were annihilated. This karma must be settled."

When Daoist Bengtian heard this, not only was he not angered, a glimmer almost like "anticipation" instead flashed through his eyes.

"Settled? How will you settle it? The power you have left now is merely between the Primordial Realm and the Wuji Realm, while I, though my path has stagnated, am still in the 'Wuji Realm.'"

"For you and me to settle karma would be no different from striking stone with an egg."

"Not necessarily." Hongjun's voice remained calm. "Fellow Daoist's Dao lies in 'collapse,' in driving that ultimate 'change.' Now that Fellow Daoist's Dao has reached a bottleneck and can advance no further, has this body and this realm, to Fellow Daoist, also become a kind of shackle?"

Daoist