Old Master, Times Have Changed - Chapter 683 (Patreon)

Chapter 683: No Intention of Being Your Enemy

It was clearly nothing more than a self-mutter with a hint of helplessness, not mixed with the slightest power.

Yet when it fell into Xu and Ci’s ears, both of them tensed up so hard they didn’t dare move an inch.

An unknown language.

Chi had come this time bearing the supreme existence’s peerless power. Even the pinnacle among true gods shouldn’t be able to discover them through the protection of that peerless power.

Even more, under the influence of that supreme power, anything that might threaten their existence would proactively “keep its distance” from them.

And yet, this presence that felt like a mere mortal had appeared right in front of them, neither偏 nor off by a hair…

This was the Chaos Sea!

A being that hadn’t ignited divine fire and forged a godhead—if it appeared in the Chaos Sea without relying on a world—would be torn apart by the raging chaotic energy in no time.

So the person before them…

Just as the two were tightening to the breaking point, the figure in front raised his head and looked at them.

In an instant, it was as if endless doubts were erupting deep in their minds…

Alright, no. That didn’t happen.

Huo simply looked at them, and he even deliberately reined in his own existence so the power wrapped around them wouldn’t notice him.

“Xu? Ci?”

Just two simple syllables, yet the two of them went even tenser.

Because this time, what Huo used was their language.

In a single encounter, this unknown existence had learned their language!

Able to see through the supreme existence’s peerless protection, and able in an instant to see through the essence of a true god—could this be the “Dao Ancestor” who had established the transcendent order and forced the supreme existences into slumber?

“The witness of the world’s end, Xu, pays respects to Your Excellency,” Xu said calmly.

Chi also reacted at once.

“The proxy of limit power, Ci, pays respects to Your Excellency.”

Whether the mysterious being before them was the legendary “Dao Ancestor” or not, he was far above them—a higher-order existence.

This was the first lesson every transcendent in their world was required to learn—

When facing a great existence, you must understand humility.

“Interesting.” A faint smile hooked at Huo’s lips.

Whether it was their language, or their very existence, both were interesting to him.

The language they used contained “power.”

More precisely, the language they used was a shallow-rule manifestation of the transcendent system they walked.

If their transcendent system was an unimaginably vast, boundless “ritual,” then their language was part of that ritual, each character a “node” of it.

When the two had just “introduced” themselves, they were also using the power of “language” to convey what was happening here back to somewhere else.

Huo naturally welcomed that. His gaze passed over the two, pierced through the surging chaotic energy, and looked toward the distant far shore.

Compared to these two Soul Transformation realm beings, the unknown Dao-attaining one behind them was the real “big fish.”

While Huo waited, Xu and Chi only grew more tormented.

At last, Chi gritted his teeth.

“Your Excellency, are you the ‘Dao Ancestor’?”

That sudden question nearly scared Xu to death on the spot.

What was this skintight-suit freak doing?!

Didn’t he know the best thing to do in front of a great existence was to do nothing at all?

However, Huo only glanced at him.

“No.”

Then he added with a smile.

“You may address me as the ‘Demon Ancestor.’”

Demon Ancestor!

In a daze, the two seemed to glimpse an incomparably enormous shadow—present in boundless chaos, born from the hearts of all living beings.

The lord of deluded thoughts and doubt, the dread of all beings in chaos!

In that moment, both their bodies began to tremble uncontrollably.

Xu’s body even showed signs of collapsing, dense runes writhing across every inch of her.

Not the “Dao Ancestor”!

But this “Demon Ancestor” was clearly even more… than the legendary “Dao Ancestor.”

Huo did not care about their reaction. His gaze once again passed over them, following an unseen connection toward the distant far shore.

There was an eye.

In its pupil, roaring “divine fire” leapt. It was as if countless gods manifested within, and immeasurable worlds rose and fell with each flicker of that divine fire.

Supreme and holy, holy beyond holiness, divine beyond divinity!

Huo’s gaze met it across the distance. Wills that transcended the level of “worlds” collided head-on.

In an instant, the eternally silent Chaos Sea boiled.

The rolling chaotic energy became sky-high waves, and uncountable worlds were swept along and hurled in all directions.

The Chaos Sea, once “orderless” and “chaotic,” was redefined under the peerless might of two wills. The nature of world after world was rapidly rewritten.

Destruction or rebirth—every concept lost its meaning.

Rumble!

The Chaos Sea shook. A giant hand凝 from divine-fire radiance reached from the far shore, spanning boundless chaos, forcing everything aside as it grabbed toward where Huo was—

Or rather, toward where Xu and Chi were.

As that blazing hand rose from the far shore, a sentence came with it.

“Demon Ancestor, I have no intention of being your enemy.”

Hm?

“Your” enemy?

Huo had intended to block that hand and seize both Xu and Ci.

But hearing those words, he changed his mind. He left only Xu behind and let Chi go, allowing the blazing hand that crossed over to clamp down and seize him in one grip.

“What do you know?” Huo asked.

“‘Dao Ancestor’ once invited me. I refused.”

After leaving that single line, the blazing hand grasped Chi and withdrew. It had realized that Huo would not possibly let Xu go.

In the blink of an eye, the boiling Chaos Sea returned to calm. The worlds that had been swept away flowed back with the returning chaotic currents, each returning to its original place.

Huo stared toward the far shore of the Chaos Sea, but he could only see a blur, as if nothing had happened at all.

Even in his memory, impressions of the blazing hand and the unknown Dao-attaining one seemed to be rapidly fading under the influence of some power, until they vanished completely…

Yet in the very next second, everything that had just happened became clear in his mind again.

Didn’t expect that, did you?

I remembered again.

“…”

This time, no inexplicable power appeared to try to erase his memory.

To give up so easily—what a lack of perseverance.

With that thought, Huo looked at the abandoned Xu.

She wore a blank, bewildered expression, as if she could not remember what had just happened at all.

She only remembered that she was a true god wandering the Chaos Sea.

Not long ago, she had taken a fancy to a special world and wanted to subdue it, but was blocked by a strange true god.

Fortunately, that true god was extremely naive. When she had no choice but to test her methods against the world, he actually chose to help her resist!

And the utterly self-serving yet utterly holy Heaven’s Will also sensed an opening and decisively chose to cooperate with her.

In the end, that world’s Heaven’s Will proxy—relying on a sliver of power she had secretly ferried over—caught the moment when that true god and she were locked in a direct clash, and delivered the decisive strike…

After that, badly injured, she left that world’s vicinity, planning to return after her injuries recovered somewhat.

Until today. After witnessing twenty-four worlds and two great worlds fall into extinction, her injuries had recovered a bit. She was about to head back, when a mysterious existence suddenly appeared before her.

Recalling those past events, she looked at Huo with extreme caution.

“Your Excellency… what would you have me do?”

Huo looked at Xu in silence. With a single glance, he saw through her essence and read all her memories.

From Huo’s perspective, Xu’s cognition and memories—even her very existence—had lost the trace of that “unknown Dao-attaining one” and the original world.

No matter how he looked at it, she was a Soul Transformation realm wanderer in the Chaos Sea with no past.

“It seems the power ‘It’ granted you wasn’t only protection, but also an insurance policy.”

So that at critical moments, certain necessary information could be erased.

Truly cautious…

Xu was utterly at a loss, completely unable to understand what Huo was talking about.

“Now I’ll ask you a question. Your answer will decide whether you get a chance to stay alive.”

A chill rose in Xu’s heart. Even the fog of altered cognition was crushed by the instinct to survive.

“Xu listens to Your Excellency’s instruction.”

“What race do you think you belong to?”

Hm?

…

…

Several days later, the Tai Xuan Realm.

Sword Sect.

Halfway up the mountain where the Sword Sovereign Hall stood, by the bamboo grove and fish pond.

Xu Xing and Bie Xuening sat separately on bamboo chairs.

Yue Ling stood between them, holding a plate of cut fruit. Her eyes were a little unfocused, looking exactly like someone who had “lost her dreams.”

That’s right. Her punishment still wasn’t over.

During this time, she could only live each day according to the Guide to Cultivating the Hundred Crafts Chi Jiuyu had written.

So many days without gaming!

Why did Jiuyu have to write this damned Guide to Cultivating the Hundred Crafts?!

When she could move freely again, she would definitely hang her up and beat her up hard!

Yue Ling fumed inwardly, making a secret decision.

But very quickly, as Bie Xuening’s gaze swept over, Yue Ling jolted, and her mind instantly went blank.

She reflexively offered the fruit plate.

Seeing that, a trace of satisfaction flashed in Bie Xuening’s eyes. She took a piece of fruit from the plate.

“You can move freely now.”

“Oh.” Yue Ling pulled the plate back and looked toward Xu Xing’s side.

Would Sword Ancestor also want fruit…

No, wait!

“Huh?!”

She finally reacted.

“Master, what did you just say?!”

“You’re free.”

Huh?!

Free!

At first she couldn’t believe it. Once she realized it was real, wild joy surged up.

Free!

She was really free!

She took a deep breath, gently set down the fruit plate, stepped back, then bowed deeply.

“Thank you, Master!”

“Go. Do whatever you want.”

“Okay!”

Yue Ling clenched her fists and tiptoed outward.

Only after leaving the bamboo grove did she pump her short legs and sprint madly down the mountain!

As she ran, she screamed in her heart.

Jiuyu!

Are you ready?!

By the fish pond.

Not long after Yue Ling left—

“From Huo’s description, that unknown Dao-attaining one seems to know something about the Tai Xuan Realm’s situation,” Bie Xuening said.

Just earlier, Huo had talked in the chat group about running into that unknown Dao-attaining one.

“Do you think It’s a threat, Junior Brother?”

“From Fellow Daoist Huo’s description, It probably learned about the Tai Xuan Realm’s situation from Xuan,” Xu Xing said, watching the spirit fish swim in the pond. “But it doesn’t seem like It intends to get involved in our conflict with the Cang race.”

After all, for an existence at the Dao-attaining level, something like deception had no meaning at all.

And the Cang race was completely on the losing side.

“Still, it’s a Dao-attaining one. Making some targeted arrangements is necessary.”

He paused, a sharp glint flashing in Xu Xing’s eyes.

“If it truly comes to it, I’ll suspend the Ascension Web core supply and personally make a trip.”

Even if the First and Second Realm-Domains lose contact in the process, worst case they can be rebuilt later.

Of course.

If that Dao-attaining one on the far shore of the Chaos Sea could behave, that would be best.

“We can also use the last method,” Bie Xuening reminded him.

They didn’t lack manpower. It wasn’t necessary for Junior Brother to go in person.

“Mm.” Xu Xing nodded slightly, his gaze shifting to the phone screen.

At this moment, in the workhorse group chat, everyone was still discussing what Huo had just said.

Overlord: “This kind of ‘ritual’ transcendent system is very different from the grand system Xuan originally set. No wonder that guy fell into slumber because of it.”

Xuan’s birth laid the framework of transcendence, giving all beings across the heavens and worlds a path to cultivate.

In the earliest ancient era, the great cultivation system used by all races—Fetal Breathing, Coalescing One, Forging God, Nourishing the Self, Deriving the Void, Dao-reaching, Unification of the Mystical Way, Integration realm, and Soul Transformation realm—was the grand system set by Xuan.

And the current Human Clan system—Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Golden Core, Nascent Soul, Soul Transformation, Return to the Void, Dao-reaching, Unification of the Mystical Way, and Soul Transformation realm—

was the new cultivation system Xu Xing opened up after becoming an Immortal, spending many years building on the original grand system.

The essence of the two differed, but in many aspects they were similar.

In a sense, the new system Xu Xing opened up did not surpass the original grand system by much.

But the “ritual” transcendent system opened by that unknown Dao-attaining one had completely deviated from the original grand system. Calling it an “innovation” wouldn’t be wrong.

That said, it didn’t mean that unknown Dao-attaining one had more talent than all True Immortals of the Tai Xuan Realm.

Lord Hong: “I analyzed that ritual transcendent system. I found that its endpoint is a ‘Dao-attaining ritual’ that represents transcendence.”

Lord Hong: “The reason that guy chose to deviate from the original grand system is very likely that this is one of the steps in Its Dao-attaining ritual.”

Lord Hong: “If nothing unexpected happens, It should have seized a sliver of opportunity when Xuan was weak during the final decisive battle between us and the Cang race back then, which is why It could reach this point.”

Group member ‘Lord Hong’ uploaded a file.

Lord Hong: “These are some of the Dao-reaching-below rituals I inferred.”

Lord Hong: “I’ll wait until I also deduce the Dao-attaining ritual, then send everything to you through the Ascension Web.”

Lord Hong: “About one or two months.”

Overlord: “That fast?”

One or two months and you’ve already stripped the guy down to his underwear?

Lord Hong: “Isn’t it just that my cultivation improved a tiny bit? It’s really nothing. /shrug”

Overlord: “…”

Why did I have to ask that?

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