The moment the voice rang out, Shangguan Wan'er whirled around. "What did you say?!"
Elder White Brow did not answer immediately. His eyes remained fixed on the distance, his facial muscles twitching slightly. He seemed to find it hard to believe even the name he had just called out. Only when the tail of the gray-white beast disappeared silently again did he take a deep breath, his voice hoarse with extreme shock.
"The Primordial Beast Luminary... the Gongpiluo Huang!" He raised his trembling hand, pointing at the gray-white figure, the horror in his eyes completely overshadowing his previous fear. "The Primordial Beast Luminary is neither an auspicious beast nor a ferocious beast, neither god nor demon, but the twelve Seal of End and Beginning cast by the Source of Wuji upon the Twelve Zodiac Aspects!"
Upon hearing this, the expressions of the surrounding elders changed drastically. Elder White Brow's chest heaved violently as he continued, "The twelve Primordial Beast Luminary all Wuji the same origin, without any order or hierarchy. It is only because people are fixated on the rat being the first of the zodiac animals that Gong Pi Kumbhira is forcibly named the first one. But if we investigate the truth, Wuji Beginningless, so how can there be a first one?!"
I once saw a fragmented record about it in the clan's ancient books. It mentioned the Twelve Primordial Beast Luminary, each of which carried an ancient form of the Source of Wuji. The Gongpiluo Huang corresponds to the rat form!
"Elder White Brow' voice trembled as he spoke, his eyes filled with disbelief as he gazed at the small beast hovering before the horde. 'I always thought those records were just ancient legends... I never imagined I'd actually see them today...'"
Shangguan Wan'er's breath hitched. "Gongpiluo Huang..." she repeated the name softly, a flicker of memory awakening flashing deep in her eyes. Then, she abruptly raised her head, her face instantly turning pale. "Before the chaos was divided, before the Wuji was named..."
Her voice was initially soft, then gradually became clearer, as if she were trying to recall a passage from an ancient text of the Shangguan Lineage: "When the Source of Wuji first stirred with the thought of 'being named,' twelve radiant beast shadows simultaneously appeared within Beginningless. Kumbhira was the first to open his eyes, biting off that 'first thought,' preventing Wuji from falling into words or being named..."
She stared at the small beast's tightly closed eyes, her shock growing ever stronger. Her fingers, gripping the ancient seal of the array's core, trembled slightly. "Later, all living beings saw that the rat was the first of the twelve zodiac animals, and thus called it the first. But in reality, what it bit off was precisely 'first' itself!"
Several elders turned to look at her. Shangguan Wan'er's voice was noticeably urgent. "It neither World Creation nor World Extinguisher; it merely roams the Rift of Beginningless, guarding the silence before any 'beginning.' If Gongpiluo Huang truly appears, it means that a certain cause and effect, a certain lineage, or a certain being has been deemed—to have never had a beginning!"
As soon as she finished speaking, no one in the entire formation dared to respond. Shangguan Wan'er's gaze fell again on the twelve faintly visible star-shaped spots, and the panic in her eyes became even more obvious.
"It shares the same origin as the other eleven Primordial Beast Luminary, yet differs in appearance. They are neither older nor younger than each other. The Twelve Beast Huangs originally manifested simultaneously. Kumbhira is a rat, but because Wuji) projected this convenient form into the perception of all beings, it was later given the title of the first of the zodiac animals..."
Her voice suddenly trailed off at the end. She had come to a realization that she couldn't accept—how could such a being possibly appear in the Being As It Is Secret Realm?!
The secret realm personally sealed by the Venerable of the Great Dao's Root and Fruit, the boundless world after the three trials of the Dao Heart, the hundreds of millions of ancient divine beasts and divine beast supreme beings, and Gong Gongpiluo Huang standing at the forefront of the beast tide—these images intertwined in her mind, making her feel increasingly incredulous.
"How could it appear in this secret realm...?" Shangguan Wan'er's lips trembled slightly, her gaze fixed on the small, grayish-white figure in the distance. "This is impossible... This is impossible!!!"
Her voice suddenly rose, startling several deacons behind her. Low gasps of surprise also began to emerge from among the tens of thousands of disciples. Those who had heard Elder White Brow recount the origins of the Primordial Beast Luminary felt a chill run down their Fate Soul. Their previously stable Fate Soul essence began to tremble again, and fine ripples spread across the surface of several layers of defensive light screens.
Shangguan Wan'er suddenly noticed this change, her expression changed drastically, and she immediately turned to face the tens of thousands of clansmen.
"Stabilize the formation!" She pressed her right hand forward sharply, and the Fate Soul essence of the Eternal Silence Realm · Supreme surged into the formation's core. A deep purple halo spun rapidly behind her, reconnecting several points of the life essence that were about to become disordered along the formation's patterns.
"Everyone, don't panic! All elders, guard the array's core; deacons, watch over your respective disciples. No one is allowed to move!" Her gaze swept over the pale young faces, her chest heaving with rapid breathing, cold sweat beading on her forehead, yet she gritted her teeth and delivered her voice throughout the entire array, "Don't panic!!!"
Under her command, tens of thousands of Shangguan Lineage disciples held their positions firmly. Everyone pushed their Fate Soul essence to the Ultimate, and layers of light screens re-condensed. The ancient bell, sword soul, life wheel and mountain and river map intertwined and floated in the formation. The radiance of the entire formation became more and more intense, illuminating the surrounding mountains and plains for dozens of miles as bright as day.
Outside the great formation, the palm-sized gray-white beast remained silently suspended, its eyes closed, its mouth agape, and it took no step forward. Only its slender gray-white tail continued to disappear and reappear in the void.
Shangguan Wan'er and several elders stood at the forefront of the great formation, their eyes never leaving that figure. Behind them, the Fate Soul essence of tens of thousands of disciples was connected. Everyone held their breath, desperately maintaining this defensive formation that had been formed with all their might. In the distance, the beast tide was subdued and the world was silent. Gongpiluo Huang still did not open his eyes.
Above the bluish-gray mountain plains, the Shangguan Lineage's vast defensive array perpetually radiates brilliant light. Tens of thousands of clan disciples steadfastly guard their positions, their Fate Soul essence flowing continuously along the crisscrossing ancient array patterns. Multiple layers of solidified light curtains rise from the earth to the heavens.
The ancient bell, the Wheel of Fate, the Sword Soul, and the Mountain and River Dao Diagram, suspended high in the array, slowly rotated, and layers upon layers of Daoist energy barriers firmly locked down the territory within a radius of dozens of miles. Shangguan Wan'er stood at the very core of the main array eye, her deep purple robe fluttering wildly in the surging primordial energy.
The Eternal Silence Realm · Supreme flowed continuously into the array base from his palms. Several sect elders beside him were tense and focused on guarding the four directions. The deacons of each department patrolled and supervised the array, their eyes fixed on the tens of thousands of clansmen under their command, for fear that someone would be frightened, lose their Dao heart, and sever the connection between their Fate Soul and origin.
In the distance, the overwhelming ancient divine beasts and supreme divine beasts all lowered their bodies, their roars that had previously shaken the heavens and earth completely Annihilation. Even the colossal beasts that spanned several mountain ranges all held their breath and lay motionless. In front of the entire beast tide, only a small, palm-sized, grayish-white beast quietly floated in the void, its twelve ancient star spots on its back flickering with light, except for the rat-shaped star spot which was always surrounded by a faint, cold light.
With a gentle sway of its Gongpiluo Huang, grayish-white tail feathers, the light and shadow at the tip of the tail vanished for a moment, then reappeared out of thin air. Its eyelids, which had been silent for a long time, trembled slightly, and its left eye, which had always been tightly closed, slowly opened a crack.
Shangguan Wan'er's breath suddenly caught in her throat, and her eyes narrowed sharply. In the instant her pale eyelids twitched slightly, a bone-chilling cold silently seeped into the very essence of her Fate Soul. This cold did not invade her physical body or follow her meridians; instead, it took root directly in the deepest part of her being, causing the eternal Stillness Dao that flowed around her to suddenly become stagnant.
She stared intently at the seemingly tiny beast, her lips trembling as if to warn it, but her throat tightened, and no sound came out. Gongpiluo Huang's left eye opened fully, a buzzing sound emanating from it.
There was no earth-shattering divine light, no destructive torrent; deep within the pupils lay only an undefinable abyss, devoid of stars and ages, devoid of the laws governing all things, and even Space Silence itself could hardly leave a trace there.
As the eyelids were fully raised, a Beginningless Ancient Rhyme from before the beginning of time slowly diffused, passing over the lurking beasts, sweeping across the broken and desolate mountains and plains, and silently touching the outermost light screen of the Shangguan Lineage's defensive array.
In an instant, a chilling scene suddenly appeared. The array's patterns were still suspended in the void, the middle section shining brightly, and the ends connected by cause and effect. However, the very origin of each pattern was silently dissolving and dimming.
Without any external force tearing it apart, without any burst of spiritual light, the array patterns slowly blurred from their source, fading away inch by inch. Even the entangled causal bonds between them quietly broke under the erosion of this ancient charm.
"What happened?!"
The deacon guarding the western array eye's expression changed drastically. He immediately activated his Fate Soul essence, attempting to reconnect the array pattern that was about to collapse. However, the moment he poured his essence into it, the entire light pattern suddenly dimmed, and the already solidified Fate Soul light chain disintegrated from its source. The power he poured in completely lost its support and vanished without a trace.
Crack—The first fine crack spread across the outer layer of the light barrier. Immediately afterward, the second and third cracks spread out in all directions, densely covering the surface of the barrier.
Shangguan Wan'er suddenly raised her palm, and the deep purple Fate Soul halo behind her burst open. The powerful origin of the Eternal Silence Realm · Supreme surged and spread along the main array eye, doing its best to stabilize the loose and swaying defensive barrier.
But when her Dao power touched the edge of the crack, she clearly sensed an unsolvable strangeness—the light curtain was still there, the array patterns were not destroyed, but the fundamental source that maintained the birth, operation, and existence of the array had been quietly stripped away by an unknown force, and the cause-and-effect connection was completely broken.
Elder White Brow's eyes snapped open, the aged wrinkles on his face taut with Ultimate horror, and his voice suddenly rose in a deep, sharp voice. "Beginningless... This is the Beginningless Ancient Rhyme! It is severing the very foundation of our formations!"
Without any unnecessary movements or offensive preparations, Gongpiluo Huang's deep eyes swirled gently, causing dozens of the True Annihilation Realm disciples in the southeast who were maintaining the array patterns to tremble in unison.