Super Gene Ascension Chapter 42 (Patreon)

Heading down into the tunnel with a torch as my only light source. I didn't take me long to find the end even as the tunnel had several tight turns and corners that hid its depths.

"And here is the temple Master Dongxuan made before he died here in the Sanctuary." I muttered softly as I walked into the temple and found him.

Master Dongxuan. A being who had transcended humanity in it's earliest of ages, before we even invented teleporters to accidentally even enter the Sanctuary itself.

He was a monk, a martial artist, a Xianxia-tier cultivator who, when Earth wasn't fighting against foreign aliens and monsters, didn't have much in the way of any kind of supernatural world.

Using his temple's Dongxuan Sutra, he steadily over the course of many years, refined his body and his understanding of the world. He had one goal, and only one reason to exist in life. He wanted to break through the void to reach heaven itself with his own body.

He succeeded... Sorta. He overtrained to the point that as he punched through the dimensional walls of the universe and entered the Sanctuary. He was so strong that the Sanctuary System just dumped him here at the Second Sanctuary.

But without humanity having stable teleportation technology. And without the baptism of ascending from the First Sanctuary to the Second, he wasn't in the system. So he couldn't gain any geno points naturally!

And being unable to gain strength through geno points. The far stronger dimensional barriers between the Second and Third Sanctuary prevented him from ever advancing any further.

In the end... The Taoist master who ascended beyond his dimensional level of being died of old age in this very temple.

I slowly knelt in front of Dongxuan and bowed my head respectfully and said quietly. "Master Dongxuan, I thank you for the opportunity of your life's work."

Because while the basis of the Dongxuan Sutra was based in the temple he trained. He had also enhanced and all but made it anew with the points of all of the various Taoist practices of the old earth.

Dongxuan's remains were slightly tattered, but this cave was sealed from the elements. So his remains were still greatly preserved beyond the mere ravages of time.

And most importantly. I took the large voidsilk scroll that lay on the long-dead man's lap and with a sigh of whispering shifting silk I opened up the large scroll.

'Damn! This scroll is fucking massive! Actually memorizing a Geno Sutra that's over 30,000 words long is going to be a major pain in the ass!' I thought helplessly.

But. 

The Dongxuan Sutra was just too damned worth it! It could allow me to breathe through my very cells so that I could breath in the worst possible environments.

Its most important feature was allowing me to synergize my energy with other energy sources so I could use any geno martial art I wanted to learn. As well as understand the future attacks my enemies could make as well by reading their energy flows.

And later on. It would be pivotal in helping me unlock my Gene Locks in the Third Sanctuary. To say nothing of it also helping me survive the demigod 'Life-or-death' breakthrough.

I carefully turned the silk scroll to the side and I spent the next while reading Dongxuan's last testament that he wrote on the back of the scroll with his very blood.

It was a rather simple thing really. He named himself, explained the Dongxuan Sutra without any bragging, despite what others would call wild such bragging with its astounding power.

But in the end. It came across that Master Dongxuan was clearly bitter.

Bitter that this wasn't the 'heaven' he dreamed of with immortal peaches and a Jade Emperor. No, this land was controlled by spirits who normally treated humans as little better than slaves!

[In the end, my Dao became a mere dream. And dreams always fade away as cold truth takes hold as the waking sun breaks the night's embrace.

If you find this scroll and the Dongxuan Sutra useful. I beg of one thing. Do not submit to those Spirits; they are fiends and deserve to be skinned alive and packed with salt for their own casual cruelty.]

"Well, alright then, Master Dongxuan. You got a deal! I get your legacy, and in return I won't submit to a spirit! Good deal. Damn good deal I tell you haha!" I laughed as I carefully rolled the scroll back up to fit it into my bag.

Then after calming my racing heart gathering another of one of the most powerful cheat's in the setting. I took a deep breath and with a shake of my head, I took out the sole, tightly compressed blanket I had in my pack to wrap up Donxuan with it.

A bright golden ring floated behind me as I activated the Golden Lion Beast's own Aura Beast soul. And I got to work breaking a portion of the cave's wall with a spear.

So while I couldn't give Dongxuan a true burial with a coffin and everything... I could at least bury his remains respectfully within his temple's walls, seal it with rocks, and melt them into place with my yang energy.

Once I was done, the wall where I buried him was subtle so with that I gave his grave a final light bow before I left the cave. As it's not like I had time to sit around and spend days trying to learn even the basics of the Dongxuan Sutra.

I very much had a limited supply of water at this point. And I had a VERY long way to reach human-controlled territory.

Leaving the cave, I saw that there was probably a good four, maybe five hours before the sun started to rise. "Gotta also find shelter before the sun rises as well. This desert get's way to damned hot, and I would rather not die of being literally slow-cooked to death."

With that, I resummoned that soldier ant, and we shot into the desert sands as we headed into the distance.