On the Snowfield, everything was a vast expanse of white, yet two small dots of black and bright yellow had appeared within it.
Perhaps they had drawn the Snowfield's displeasure, for a wisp of ghastly white appeared on the black dot, then spread in an instant, dyeing the black white.
Zhao Li awoke from his enlightenment and withdrew the Bone Chilling Flame, his heart still trembling.
In truth, back in Death Mountain, Zhao Li had already died, because he had already seen his own obsessions. His state at the time had been just like the beings within that Flood of Obsessions.
But unlike them, although Zhao Li's realm was not that of a Dou Di, it was in no way inferior to a Dou Di's, and might even have been higher. That was why his consciousness had not immediately collapsed. He had seen everything about himself and recondensed his conviction.
In a certain sense, he had completely died just now. It was merely that death was a relative concept. Death on the mortal level meant the dissipation of the physical body; for ordinary cultivators, the soul had to dissipate; while in Death Mountain, what was required was the collapse of conviction, leaving obsessions with nothing to cling to.
Zhao Li had died, but not thoroughly enough. One could only say he had died a tiny bit. Relying on his obsession, he accepted himself, regathered his conviction, and allowed his soul to return to its innate indestructible state, enduring it all.
Because when he was about to dissipate, a powerful unwillingness had been stirred within him, making him refuse to vanish just like that. His curiosity toward that unwillingness, as well as his own will to resist, allowed him, in that neither-living-nor-dead state, to comprehend life, death, and reincarnation within the