Ke Zixiao instantly seemed to have aged tens of thousands of years, and the air of effortless control vanished from his face.
His body trembled slightly.
Though he had anticipated this scene all those years ago, truly facing it was naturally another matter entirely.
"Ke Zixiao." Chen Xun spoke without the slightest emotional fluctuation.
"This junior is here." Ke Zixiao lowered his head with difficulty.
"What I hoped for?" Chen Xun said coldly. "It seems you have always harbored resentment toward this Dao Ancestor."
He tilted his head slightly, a glimmer flashing through his eyes as though he had seen through Ke Zixiao's thoughts of countless ages.
At those words.
Ke Zixiao's expression turned grave and complicated. The vicissitudes in his eyes transformed into an absolute rationality that belonged to no living being. "It seems nothing can be hidden from Dao Ancestor. This junior naturally bears resentment!"
He bit down hard on the final two words.
"Dao Ancestor could have left the Heavenly Dao a path to survival, a contingency, yet you completely suppressed and sealed it away. You watched helplessly as it slowly approached death, and in the end dragged the Dao Lord into it, turning him into the Heavenly Dao..."
"Dao Ancestor not only left nothing behind, you even deliberately departed early, declaring that you were entering seclusion Beyond Heaven."
"How could this junior not resent it..."
Ke Zixiao raised his head and looked at that familiar yet unfamiliar back. "I know Dao Ancestor will surely say that your actions were meant to prevent the Heavenly Dao from targeting the common people and Eternal Ancient, and that allowing it to linger on its last breath could also ensure Heaven-and-Earth Sublimation continued."
"But looking across the ages and spanning two great eras, this junior has seen only that everything