Fortune Dao Venerable sat amid a blaze of golden splendor, his expression calm once more, with not a trace of his earlier anger. Apart from the Immortal Garden switching sides, little about what had happened surprised him.
He had never expected Chu Mo to actually take on Xuanming's karmic debt. He had merely wanted to use it as a smokescreen to achieve Upper Mound's true objective.
Xuanming was dead, and the karma they had invested had gone down the drain. There was no point dwelling on it now. What mattered was keeping their losses to a minimum.
Though Fuli had reincarnation, Heaven's will was deeply partial: the karma of this life would never carry over into the next. Once a cultivator died, Upper Mound could often recover only the principal on its loans. The losses were simply too great.
But if the Netherworld had a master, things would be very different.
People were not the Heavenly Dao. Their hearts held the seven emotions and six desires, so favoritism was inevitable.
With just a little manipulation of reincarnation, karma could continue into the next life, the life after that, and even life after life without end... The same held true for karmic debt. Though it could not compare to the vast scale of "loans owed by all living beings," it would still be enough to strengthen Upper Mound's Dao.
At that thought, the corners of Baoyun's mouth lifted slightly.
If he directly proposed "passing debts on through reincarnation," Chu Mo would refuse, and Harmony Truth would never agree. But if he revealed his intention to seize control of the Netherworld, Harmony Truth would begin considering the feasibility of the former option.
People always preferred a compromise.
"I'll have to stoke the fire under Youxuan a little more." After a moment's thought,