The instant the Divine Stele took shape, the entire Outer Chaos Region fell still.
That stillness was no ordinary deathly silence, but a hush as though all things had returned to their source and the ten thousand laws to their ancestral root.
The Chaos Storm that had raged for endless ages became a beast seized by the throat, letting out a low whimper yet no longer daring to stir.
Space-time turbulence froze like rivers turned to ice, suspended in the void and refracting eerie, dazzling light.
Even the disordered laws of the Great Dao, which gave even Sages headaches, seemed to answer some mysterious summons. They began to rise and fall, swirling in mist as they circled the Divine Stele like pilgrims paying homage.
Gu Changqing stood before the Divine Stele, his posture as crooked as ever, the Wine God Gourd still cradled in his arms. He reeked of wine, his eyes hazy with drunkenness.
Yet now, those eyes, whose drunken haze had never faded through the ages, reflected the dense, strange, uncanny patterns upon the Divine Stele.
At first glance, those patterns seemed utterly chaotic, like traces left by chance by the Chaos Storm, or lingering shadows of space-time turbulence woven together without order.
But closer inspection revealed that those densely packed patterns faintly outlined an ineffable dao rhythm.
They were neither any known script nor any inherited runes, much less the manifestation of any laws.
Rather, they were something older, more primordial, closer to the root of all things.
A Divine Stele condensed by the Great Summoning Technique, with the origin of Chaos as its guide.
What it bore was not Gu Changqing's will, nor the imprint of any divine ability or dao art.
It was the projection of that wisp of aura Lord Taisu had left deep