Everything Jiang Chen had done was what she had dreamed and longed for.
But she hadn't been strong enough... She hadn't had the heart to be ruthless, either, nor had she been fortunate enough to get such an opportunity.
Even her arrival in the Human Race Forbidden Zone and imprisonment there had been because, in that moment, she'd sensed a fate ordained by Heaven.
Seeing the resolve in Houtu's eyes, Jiang Chen said no more.
He turned and looked toward the countless Human Race living beings beneath Shouyang Mountain.
They stretched as far as the eye could see.
At last, he rested his gaze on the few sages of the Human Race standing before him.
Xuanyuan Shi, Shennong Shi, Suiren Shi, Zi Yi Shi, Youchao Shi...
"The Human Dao has been established, and I have forged two paths for the Human Race to rise."
"Attain Dao by devouring ten thousand flames, or attain Dao by making the self the seed. Whichever path you choose, the one suited to you is the strongest."
"Whether there are one, two, or even five or ten paths to transcendence, that is too many for the Human Race as it stands. Too many paths will only leave you confused and waste more of your energy."
"That Heavenly Chasm Great Abyss won't hold the Human Race Forbidden Zone for long."
"So the Human Race needs to quickly raise up the strongest. One Great Luo is worth far more than a million who become Immortals on the Spot..."
"For the time being, I'll be leaving."
"When I return, the Human Race will be thriving once more!"
Jiang Chen's voice was calm, yet it reached the ears of every member of the Human Race.
No one questioned Jiang Chen's intentions.
Every member of the Human Race believed in their Human Emperor.
Jiang Chen had opened up a new world for them and pointed the way to true prosperity.
"Human Emperor! The karma in your body..." Xuanyuan Shi struggled to his feet, his gaze fixed on Jiang Chen with deep concern.
He, too, was a member of the Human Race who had used the Great Law of Self-Transformation and Freedom. He knew just how devastating that terrifying karma could be.
Take him, for instance. With his Mystic Immortal cultivation, he had forcibly raised himself to the Great Luo Realm.
Yet the immense karma within him had never dispersed. He feared he would never make another advance.
So, after Jiang Chen had raised himself to the level of a Sage with the Great Law of Self-Transformation and Freedom, Xuanyuan Shi could only imagine the karma within him. It had to be beyond anything Xuanyuan Shi could fathom.
"Don't worry about me. Take good care of the Human Race. In a thousand years, when the Heavenly Chasm Great Abyss is gone, the Human Race must not be as passive as it is today."
With that, Jiang Chen turned his face and nodded to Houtu.
Houtu understood.
The two of them vanished from Shouyang Mountain in a streak of light.
Xuanyuan Shi, Shennong Shi, Suiren Shi, and the other powerful figures watched Jiang Chen depart.
Time meant little in the Primordial Wilderness, but the Human Dao had just been established.
Year One of the Human Race Calendar!
Jiang Chen and Houtu left Shouyang Mountain and traveled across the Human Race's lands, journeying through the Human Race Great Wilderness.
The Human Race's lands could almost be said to have been forged from blood and flesh.
From the heavens, the land of the Human Race stretched out beneath them.
Everywhere they looked, the twilight gloom lingered, and the air was heavy with death.
The living members of the Human Race numbered in the hundreds of millions, but the dead were counted in hundreds of millions, too.
Among the ruins of the most primitive Human Tribes, stone dwellings had become rubble.
Piles of bleached bones covered every part of the valleys, rivers, deserts, and plains.
The blood had dried, staining the earth red, yet even after a long time, it had not faded.
Before the remnants of one group of fallen Human Race living beings had disappeared, another group had fallen in the very same place.
Jiang Chen spotted the ruins of an unremarkable primitive tribe and descended from the heavens.
The bones had almost weathered away. No one had buried them, and even their hair had nearly crumbled to ash. They had been dead for a very long time.
He walked forward like an ordinary man, approaching a skeleton that would turn to dust at the slightest touch.
He crouched down, burdened by a feeling he could not shake.
As the Human Emperor, the Lord of the Human Race, and the one who had founded the Human Dao, he was the object of their faith.
Every member of the Human Race was a living being beneath the Human Dao.
"Is this... the Blood Calamity upon the Human Race's lands?" Houtu murmured, her voice tinged with sorrow. She could not bring herself to let it go.
She looked at Jiang Chen's lonely figure.
She compared the Human Race with the Wu Clan.
"I used to think that after the Wu Clan and the demons had fought for countless years, with countless casualties, theirs was the bloodiest conflict in this world."
"But what I've seen today from the heavens, and the mountains and rivers I've traveled through, are covered with so many bones."
Jiang Chen fell silent for a moment. He knew that Houtu had never left the Wu Clan's territory or ventured deep into the Primordial Wilderness.
Then he said quietly:
"The Wu Clan is strong. The Human Race is weak."
"Those who fight in the Wu Clan die in battles between evenly matched opponents."
"When the Human Race faces an enemy far stronger than itself, it cannot fight back. It is trampled and devoured like an ant."
"Since its birth, the Human Race has endured terrible misfortune. Its Great Destiny was stolen. Goddess Nüwa, who created the Human Race, was close to it at first, but gradually grew distant."
"Ultimately, this calamity befell the Human Race because it was too weak."
"..."
Jiang Chen spoke evenly, as if he were describing something entirely objective.
"The Wu Clan and the demons fought each other, but in the end, the Human Race suffered for it... I'm sorry..." Houtu felt a weight settle in her heart.
She looked at the heaps of bones on the ground. Blood still flowed through the ruins of the mass grave, spilled from Human Race members who had died not long ago.
It was as if their blood stained her hands.
"You don't need to apologize for something you didn't do," Jiang Chen said calmly.
Then he used his immense power to dig a great pit in the mass grave.
"I'll help you bury them..." Houtu offered, seeing that Jiang Chen was about to bury the Human Race corpses and bones.
Jiang Chen said nothing. Houtu stepped forward and carefully began to help.
The methods of a Quasi-Saint were far more powerful than Jiang Chen's—not only because he was at the peak of the Perfected Grand Unity Golden Immortal realm, but also because he bore immense karma.
In the time it took to brew a cup of tea, the tombs were complete. Their gravestones bore no names; every one of them was blank.
If not for the Human Race, where would Jiang Chen have found his strength?
How could he have stood against a Sage, let alone founded a Human Dao that could stand alongside the Heavenly Dao?
How could he have become the only one beneath the Sages able to endure a Tribulation without perishing?
The Human Race had made him who he was.
But Jiang Chen hadn't kept himself aloof, towering above them all.
He wasn't like Grand Pure.
He wanted to do something for the Human Race: bury the bleached bones scattered across its lands and give them a final resting place. It was a way to cleanse and cultivate his own heart.
"If their spirits still linger in the world, they must be comforted and proud. With a Human Emperor like you, they'll be smiling even in the land beyond."
Standing behind Jiang Chen, who had sat silently before the tombs for a long time, Houtu offered him words of comfort.
Jiang Chen's thoughts stirred.
He seemed to have overlooked a crucial point.
Beneath the Great Dao stood the Heavenly Dao, the Earthly Dao, and the Human Dao. Beneath the Heavenly Dao lay the Primordial Wilderness.
The Human Dao had just been born, and Jiang Chen had established himself as its foundation. He could no longer rely on either of the other two Daos.
Besides, Jiang Chen believed that the Human Dao was in no way inferior to the Heavenly Dao or the Earthly Dao.
The Six Paths of Samsara had appeared, and the Earthly Dao had been established.
Wasn't that precisely what Houtu had done?
Though establishing the Six Paths of Samsara and the Underworld required someone of pure character, fairness, and compassion, if he could help the Human Race seize a greater advantage when Houtu established the Earthly Dao...
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