Shen Ni Falls, Great Luo Revealed After Twelve Epoch Cycles

The path of Great Luo.

Since taking form, Qing Xuan had seen only one Great Luo: Hongjun.

From afar, he had also sensed the auras of Luohou, Yang Mei, Yin-Yang, and the others.

He had even witnessed Hongjun kill three Taiyi Fierce Beasts with a single finger.

Yet seeing a Great Luo act and truly witnessing the path of Great Luo were ultimately two different things.

Hongjun did not give a lengthy explanation of the mysteries of cultivation realms. A thread of clear light descended from the depths of the three thousand Dao Resonances and entered the world manifested by Qing Xuan.

Within that world, the sun and moon revolved.

Mountains and rivers changed.

Countless Great Daos arose as heaven and earth moved, then vanished alongside the world when it returned to Chaos.

Only that thread of clear light remained unchanged.

No matter how the world evolved, it stood within it.

It did not appear with the birth of heaven and earth.

Nor did it disappear with their destruction.

Qing Xuan's gaze fell upon that thread of clear light. For the first time, he truly saw the difference between Taiyi and Great Luo.

"What Taiyi sees is still the Dao of heaven and earth."

Hongjun's voice came from within the three thousand Dao Resonances.

"What Great Luo seeks is to make one's own Great Dao truly stand within heaven and earth."

"If heaven and earth endure, the Dao endures."

"Even if heaven and earth undergo change, one's own Great Dao will not be shaken because of it."

Only a few brief words were spoken.

Yet the world behind Qing Xuan had already begun to operate on its own.

Chaos evolved.

Heaven and earth were opened.

Mountains, rivers, sun, and moon appeared one after another.

When the world returned to Chaos once more, all Great Daos vanished with it.

The World Dao Qing Xuan had cultivated in the past could contain all things and bear countless Daos.

Yet no matter how complete the world's evolution became, it was still only a world he had manifested through his Great Dao.

Once the world disappeared, everything within it ceased to exist.

But the thread of Great Luo Dao intent Hongjun displayed no longer relied on any phenomenon of heaven and earth.

It belonged to Hongjun alone.

Qing Xuan did not rush to imitate it.

That was Hongjun's path of Great Luo, not his own.

What he truly needed to see was merely the door that had always been hidden behind the endless Great Daos.

Now, that door had appeared.

How to reach it was still something he had to decide for himself.

Qing Yi sat quietly to one side.

A phantom of a green lotus bloomed behind her, and boundless Creation flowed into Qing Xuan's world.

The plants that had vanished alongside the world's return to Chaos left behind a trace of their original life imprints under the protection of the Creation Great Dao.

When heaven and earth opened again, those life imprints fell once more into the mountains and rivers.

New plants grew from the earth.

They were not continuations of the former plants.

Yet they inherited the same creation.

Hongjun watched this scene, and his Great Dao changed accordingly.

"The world has birth and destruction, yet creation can allow vitality to continue."

"If heaven and earth are destroyed, how should the World Dao continue to exist?"

Qing Xuan did not answer at once.

He merely allowed the world behind him to evolve once more.

This time, heaven and earth did not return completely to Chaos.

After the sun and moon fell and the mountains and rivers crumbled, a patch of the most primordial World Dao Resonance remained in the depths of Chaos.

A new world opened anew from that patch of Dao Resonance.

Hongjun's three thousand Great Daos were immensely vast.

Qing Yi's Creation Great Dao was incomparably pure.

Qing Xuan's world, meanwhile, could bear both at once.

The three paths confirmed one another, yet none was replaced by another.

Hongjun remained the one with the highest cultivation among the three.

Many of the Great Daos he displayed could only be glimpsed in part even by Qing Xuan and Qing Yi.

Yet Qing Xuan's World Dao and Qing Yi's Creation Great Dao were likewise paths Hongjun had never seen before.

This was not Hongjun giving a one-sided lecture on the Dao.

It was a true discussion of the Dao.

The Primordial World did not count the years.

The Dao phenomena behind the three appeared again and again, then returned to stillness again and again.

Time passed swiftly amid their discussion of the Dao.

One Epoch Cycle.

Three Epoch Cycles.

Six Epoch Cycles.

The Innate Grand Formation shrouding the Lotus Pond never opened.

Qing Xuan did not waste his efforts repeatedly deducing a single divine ability.

He merely searched within Hongjun's and Qing Yi's Great Daos for what could truly complete his own world.

Yin-Yang gave order to the sun and moon.

The Five Elements stabilized the mountains and rivers.

Space-Time allowed heaven and earth to extend.

Creation gave a world the possibility of truly enduring without end.

These Great Daos did not become Qing Xuan's foundation.

They were merely borne by the world, becoming part of that heaven and earth.

The twelfth Epoch Cycle.

The world behind Qing Xuan unfolded once again.

There was no earth-shaking display.

The sun, moon, and stars took their places in turn, while the mountains, rivers, and Four Seas each operated according to their own order.

The countless Great Daos that had once required Qing Xuan's active maintenance could now circulate through the world on their own.

Yin-Yang alternated.

The Five Elements generated one another.

Creation continued without end.

For the first time, the entire world formed a complete cycle.

An invisible shackle naturally vanished at that moment.

Qing Xuan's aura rose accordingly.

Late-stage Taiyi Golden Immortal.

He had not forcibly broken through.

Nor had he used merit to directly increase his magical power.

The twelve Epoch Cycles of discussing the Dao had merely allowed everything he had accumulated in the past to finally gather into this result.

Qing Xuan opened his eyes.

The world behind him slowly drew in, and the aura surrounding him returned to calm.

Hongjun looked at him.

"Though you have yet to set foot upon the path of Great Luo, Fellow Daoist, you already know where that path must begin."

Qing Xuan did not grow complacent over his breakthrough.

"Only after seeing where the door stands do I know how far away it still is."

Hongjun smiled.

"To be able to see it already puts you above many Taiyi."

On the other side of the Lotus Pond, Qing Yi also opened her eyes at that moment.

Her innate Dao body, which had not yet fully stabilized when she first took form, had completely merged with the Creation Great Dao after twelve Epoch Cycles of discussing the Dao.

The green lotus mark between her brows had grown increasingly distinct.

The aura of a Middle Taiyi Golden Immortal flashed past before quickly withdrawing once more.

Qing Yi did not attempt to continue breaking through.

She had only just shed her identity as a spirit treasure.

Compared with simply increasing her magical power, what mattered more now was forging a Creation Great Dao that truly belonged to her.

All three had gained something.

This discussion of the Dao, which had lasted twelve Epoch Cycles, finally came to an end.

Just as Hongjun prepared to put away the Creation Jade Disc.

A sorrowful cry that resounded through heaven and earth suddenly came from the distant north of the Primordial World.

The sound crossed endless mountains and rivers, passed through layer after layer of space, and caused all of Buzhou Mountain to tremble faintly.

Beyond the Innate Grand Formation, the baleful aura that had permeated heaven and earth for countless years began to dissipate rapidly.

The skies, which had always borne a trace of dark red, became clear for the first time.

Hongjun raised his head toward the north and brought back a piece of information from the distant battlefield.

After a moment, he spoke slowly.

"Shen Ni has fallen."

As those words fell, boundless merit gathered from the skies of the Primordial World.

Part of it descended upon the northern battlefield.

The remaining merit divided into three golden rivers that spanned heaven and earth, surging respectively toward the Four Seas, Undying Volcano, and Qilin Cliff.

A vast dragon's roar rose from the Four Seas.

The southern sky was dyed crimson gold by boundless Phoenix fire.

West of Buzhou Mountain, the sound of Qilin treading across the earth spread through the mountain ranges.

The Dragon, Phoenix, and Qilin tribes.

As the main forces in this campaign to purge the Fierce Beast Tribe, they finally received the merit and Fate Aura that belonged to them.

The Fierce Beast Tribulation, which had swept through the Primordial World for countless years, had finally come to a complete end.

And on that day, the era belonging to the three tribes truly began.