News that the five great masters had joined forces to assassinate the demonic being and failed soon spread. Though Daoists across the land all knew that the Heavenly Demon descending into the world would surely be vicious, none had imagined it would be vicious to such an extent.
By the time Liu Guangzheng learned of it in the imperial palace, more than a month had already passed. He was not surprised by the news.
Those Human Immortals had let a single leaf blind their eyes to Mount Tai. Every Human Immortal possessed a firm sense of self-awareness; that was naturally a good thing, but sometimes, when one's convictions were too firm, it amounted to ossified thinking.
Those Human Immortals had all viewed the descent of the Heavenly Demon through the lens of their own "common sense." So they died.
As a modern man, however, Liu Guangzheng's thinking was undoubtedly not constrained by much of this world's "common sense."
As early as the night he had written the imperial edict, he had known that this journey would bode ill for those people. At the same time, he knew he could not possibly dissuade them and have them use their Human Immortal mana to stoke furnaces and build industry for him.
How could immortals, roaming free between Heaven and earth, allow themselves to be commanded by an emperor?!
Indeed, some frustrated Daoists might choose to become the court's dogs. But more often than not, even with missions assigned by the immortals, Buddhas, and divine beings of the Upper Realm, those Daoists would never revere imperial authority. Liu Guangzheng could not make them do whatever he told them to do, even if his choice was the right one.
*The hearts of this world can never truly be made one. Before I crossed over,