The heavens held endless primordial chaos, permeating all existence, governing through nonaction, as though it were the purest Dao, without flaw or deficiency.
The earth presented an entirely different scene.
Or rather, it was not the earth, but something that blanketed it, ravenously hungry and thirsty, bleeding without cease, like congealed crimson-black, corrupted blood.
This thing existed in eternal agony, stretching in every direction, issuing wave after wave of wails and furious roars.
Xu Xuan trudged alone across this earth, his body heavy and his spirit exhausted. He had lost all his divine abilities and magical power, as though he were the most ordinary of mortals.
"Was this Suspended Chaos's dream?"
Xu Xuan felt only horror, his mind violently shaken.
This was a world of Dao, devoid of any sentient existence. Only pure Dao flowed through it, eternally unchanging.
He looked at the thing beneath his feet.
This crimson-black clotted blood was boundless. It had swallowed every patch of earth and stretched to the end of the world, as though it were some dead spirit monster.
"Was this what the world would look like after heaven and earth were opened anew?"
Xu Xuan gazed silently at this place, an involuntary desolation rising in his heart.
[ I have reached the end of the Dao; there is no turning back ]
He trudged step by step through this world. Everywhere he looked, there was only primordial chaos and clotted blood, with nothing but pure Dao evolving here, making him feel as though he had entered the Great Luo Heaven.
[ Unable to live, unable to die ]
Xu Xuan reached the center of this world, where the crimson-black clotted blood beneath his feet had piled together into a small mountain.
Around the edge of this blood-colored mountain lay a dark-gold ring,