Chapter 313: The Great Jing Immortal Dynasty (Part 1)
Inside the Reverse Fate Space, Su Chen gave a self-mocking smile.
"Seventeen lifetimes of accumulation… and the path to immortality lies right before me…"
Yet he had chosen to surrender that path to someone else.
Su Chen even wondered if he had been possessed. He activated the characteristics left behind by the True Immortal within the Immortal Pearl and the Heaven's Mandate Pearl, allowing them to annihilate each other. Perhaps this was the best possible ending.
Su Chen stared at the Reverse Fate Scripture placed before him. He had not opened it in a long time. He simply gazed at it blankly.
A long, long time passed. Only then did he finally place one hand on the Reverse Fate Scripture.
"It's only one opportunity to become an immortal! I still have a hundred lifetimes, a thousand lifetimes… countless chances to start over. Can I really not achieve immortality?"
Su Chen opened the Reverse Fate Scripture.
[Seventeenth Lifetime: Before you awakened your memories, you obtained the True Immortal's legacy treasure, the Heaven's Mandate Pearl. News of it leaked, leading to the extermination of the Jiang Clan. When you awakened your memories in time and faced mortal danger, you chose to merge with the Heaven's Mandate Pearl and become its spirit to survive.
After an unknown stretch of time, you finally woke up. The one who awakened you was an ordinary young man. Seeing him carry the blood feud of his clan's destruction and burn with boundless hatred, and seeing him gain the Heaven's Mandate Pearl's recognition, you decided to give him a chance at revenge. Along the way, you would also study the pearl's wondrous uses.
The young man's name was Dongfang Yunxing. His aptitude was poor. In your eyes, he would likely die one day on the path of cultivation, but you did not care.
What surprised you was that his willpower far exceeded your expectations. No matter how difficult or grueling the training, he persisted. You decided to teach him some techniques so he would not die so easily.
Through Dongfang Yunxing, you gradually understood the uses and activation conditions of the Heaven's Mandate Pearl. This filled you with regret. You were already dead, nothing more than a wisp of soul residing within the pearl.
You watched Dongfang Yunxing rise step by step. You seemed to see your former self in him.
Moved by this realization, you decided to help him further and impart all the knowledge you had accumulated in your lifetime.
You wanted to see how far this young man—who resembled your past self—could go.
Looking at his clear and earnest expression, you simply smiled faintly.
You knew… things were never as simple as the young man imagined.
You were perhaps not a noble person.
The you from the past had already fallen on the road to realizing your ideals.
You watched Dongfang Yunxing gradually lose his youth. He matured from a naive boy into a man. He married, had children, survived the tenth-layer Emperor Tribulation, and stepped onto the path of transcendence.
When master and disciple reunited, a faint warmth stirred in your heart.
Soon, you crushed that feeling.
While in slumber, you discovered a secret concerning the Heaven's Mandate Pearl.
You chose not to tell Dongfang Yunxing about it. Instead, you hid the pearl's secrets related to the True Immortal. In your mind, a plan to achieve immortality took root. Though the chances of success were slim, you wanted to seize that opportunity.
You orchestrated the death of the only other being who knew of the Heaven's Mandate Pearl's existence.
To prevent the mastermind behind your death in the previous life from discovering you were still alive, you chose to remain dormant within the Heaven's Mandate Pearl. You would not emerge again and would quietly wait for the right moment.
You experienced many things.
Those experiences had long since left you numb.
The only one who knew you still existed was Dongfang Yunxing.
Sometimes, as you watched him, you wondered whether everything was merely an illusion.
You never appeared.
Time… changes a person.
You watched Dongfang Yunxing live through one ten-million-year span after another. The once ignorant youth had become a stranger.
You were pleased. Only then could you scheme without any reservations.
After the great tribulation, you used Dongfang Yunxing as bait to lure out the mastermind who had caused your death in the previous life. Hidden in the shadows, you severely wounded him, stripping away all his means of escape. You succeeded. Watching Great Yang Emperor Lord and Dongfang Yunxing gravely injure each other, you achieved your goal.
You stopped suppressing the True Immortal aura within the Heaven's Mandate Pearl and allowed it to erase Dongfang Yunxing's traces.
You had believed that after endless years, you had become someone who would stop at nothing to achieve immortality—even abandoning your closest kin if necessary.
You had believed that after countless years, Dongfang Yunxing had become like you, his original pure heart long since worn away.
This was a contest for the Dao. Even the closest master and disciple would turn against each other when facing the Great Dao.
You realized you were wrong.
You had taught a "foolish" disciple.
He had never changed from beginning to end… You were the one who had changed.
In the end, you still acted. You made a very foolish move. A foolish master raising a foolish disciple—that was only right.
You died.
In this life, you began with your clan destroyed and yourself on the verge of death. Using a broken body, you controlled events from behind the scenes, scheming everything. The opportunity for immortality was within reach, yet you ultimately chose to shatter your own Dao heart, abandon your path, and help your disciple achieve immortality in a glorious, resounding fashion.
Evaluation: Two Star (Red)
Reward: Two Million Reverse Fate Points]
Red two-star. Two million Reverse Fate Points.
Su Chen should have felt happy.
Yet at this moment, he could not bring himself to feel any joy.
[Talent: 0 (+)]
[Comprehension: 0 (+)]
[Background: 0 (+)]
[Dao Heart: 200,000 ]
If he had become an immortal, he might have walked the path of severing emotions and desires, turning into a heartless immortal who would stop at nothing for the sake of the Great Dao. But in the end, he had rejected that version of himself. He shattered his own Dao heart and perished together with the True Immortal within the Heaven's Mandate Pearl.
"Whatever," Su Chen sighed.
He was not ready to give up on the path of cultivation.
He simply needed to walk a different road.
Talent: 100,000
Comprehension: 1,500,000
Background: 400,000
Su Chen had not left behind a single Reverse Fate Point.
"In this life… I shouldn't end up dead right at the start, right?" he thought.
No one could stay unlucky forever.
Su Chen opened the Reverse Fate Scripture.
Eighteenth Lifetime.
Commencing.
..
The Great Jing Heavenly Dynasty was a colossal entity that had once ruled over three thousand provinces. Even in its decline, it remained one of the supreme overlords.
Inside the Heavenly Palace, Su Chen observed the people who had appeared around him. They were all dressed in luxurious attire and emanated profound auras. He was being held in the arms of a graceful and noble consort.
"Imperial Consort… His Majesty is currently waging war in the Barbarian Wolf Heavenly Domain and cannot return to see the Ninety-Ninth Prince…"
Su Chen noticed a trace of loneliness on the consort's face.
"His Majesty is the ruler of the Great Jing Heavenly Dynasty. How could he return to the court over such a trivial matter and delay the war between the Great Jing Dynasty and the Barbarian Wolf Heavenly Domain? That would cause the blood of billions upon billions of the dynasty's citizens to flow in vain."
Only then did Su Chen realize something. He was no longer inside the Void Cosmic Sea. Instead, he had arrived in a land called the Great Jing Heavenly Dynasty.
...
Time passed in a blur.
Su Chen was now three years old, yet he had never once met his father in this life. He did not care. In this lifetime, his name was Chen Chen.
However, his body had developed a small problem. His comprehension was too powerful—one million five hundred thousand points. It had undergone a qualitative change.
This caused his state of mind to plummet, creating complications. His mind could not bear so much at once. In the end, he had no choice but to seal away a large portion of the memories in his sea of consciousness.
Chapter 314: The Great Jing Immortal Dynasty (Part 2)
Snowflakes filled the sky, swirling into profound scriptures in Su Chen's eyes. With a single thought, he could create an immortal divine ability.
One million five hundred thousand points of comprehension was truly terrifying. But his body remained completely still, with no trace of qi stirring inside.
Su Chen smiled bitterly. His current body was far too frail. Even though his mother in this life had used the Wei Clan's connections to gather countless supreme treasures in an attempt to reshape his foundation, it had all been in vain.
In truth, his aptitude was not bad at all. With a physique of one hundred thousand points, reaching the Emperor realm would not have been difficult. Across the three thousand provinces, a Great Emperor would still count as a powerhouse.
Yet his greatest problem was not his aptitude. Even the greatest physician in the Great Jing Heavenly Dynasty, the Heavenly Physician Great Emperor, could not identify the true cause. He had declared that Su Chen would not live past a hundred years.
No one doubted the words of the Heavenly Physician Great Emperor.
In the vast Great Jing Heavenly Dynasty, Su Chen's existence stirred almost no ripples. He was nothing more than a waste who could not cultivate. No one paid him any attention.
This was actually a good thing. At least he could stay far away from the imperial clan's struggles and live quietly as a small, unnoticed figure.
The weather outside was still bitterly cold.
Just as Su Chen was about to turn back and return to the house to warm up, a small figure charged straight toward him.
"Little Chenzi, so you're here!"
The neatly arranged flowers and trees were knocked into complete disarray by the tiny figure.
Su Chen stared speechlessly at the dizzy person before him.
It was a young girl dressed in fiery red battle clothes. Her long black hair was tied up neatly, and her usually spirited eyes were now brimming with tears.
The girl's name was Nan Hongsang. She had been born on the same day, at the same time as Su Chen.
Unlike Su Chen's unremarkable birth, Nan Hongsang's arrival had been accompanied by auspicious signs. Immortal phoenixes had descended, and strange phenomena had spread throughout the Heavenly Captial Dao Domain. She had been born a saint.
Great experts of the dynasty had declared that this girl would one day become a supreme Emperor.
Her talent was terrifying.
While Su Chen's birth had gone unnoticed, Nan Hongsang's had shaken the entire dynasty.
However, the Nan Clan had sealed away her saint-level cultivation so she could rebuild her foundation from the beginning, hoping she would achieve even greater heights in the future.
The Nan Clan and the Wei Clan shared a good relationship.
Still, Su Chen's acquaintance with Nan Hongsang was an accident he preferred not to mention.
After spinning around a few times on the spot, Nan Hongsang squatted down, clutched her reddened little head, and wailed, "Little Chenzi, why are the trees here so hard?"
"It hurts… waaah…"
She cried pitifully.
Nan Hongsang had already broken through to the Spirit Soul realm. At that level, one could split mountains and rivers.
But Su Chen was still the Ninety-Ninth Prince of the Great Jing Heavenly Dynasty, backed by the powerful Longevity Wei Clan. Even the ordinary flowers and trees in his courtyard were sacred herbs and treasures that countless cultivators outside would fight over.
Su Chen thought that she truly deserved her reputation as a heaven-defying battle physique. After crashing into so many sacred trees, she was only dizzy, with no real injuries. Any other Spirit Soul realm cultivator might have needed to consider their next life after such an impact.
Seeing Su Chen remain unmoved, Nan Hongsang cried even louder.
Su Chen felt a headache coming on. If anyone else saw this, they would think he had bullied her. His reputation would be ruined.
He flipped his hand, and a delicate orange-yellow pastry wreathed in immortal energy appeared in his palm. In an instant, it created an illusion of spring's return, with a dreamlike floral fragrance that seemed to wash away all worries.
Nan Hongsang's delicate little nose twitched. She stopped crying at once. Her eyes sparkled with stars, and crystal drool trickled from the corner of her mouth.
This was the Worry-Free Pastry, inherited from the vanished Worry-Free Palace. It was known as a heavenly immortal delicacy.
Only Su Chen's mother in this life, Wei Qingyi, knew the recipe.
Su Chen had little interest in pastries. Every so often, his mother would send some over. He never ate them and simply stored them all away. After all, he would not refuse good things. Everything had its use.
Watching Nan Hongsang obediently eat, Su Chen smiled with satisfaction. This was exactly the right time to put those pastries to use.
Nan Hongsang swallowed a Worry-Free Pastry in one gulp and looked at Su Chen with eager eyes. She had eaten it too quickly to fully savor the taste.
She immediately set her sights on getting more.
"Little Chenzi, this young lady is so badly hurt. One pastry isn't enough. At least…"
Nan Hongsang struggled, counting on her fingers. She kept changing her mind, afraid of asking for too much. Finally, she held up three fingers.
With a grin that revealed two adorable little canines, she declared, "At least three pieces!"
Three pieces meant nothing to Su Chen.
But…
"Two. No more," he said firmly.
If he gave her three today, it would become six tomorrow and twelve the day after. He would go bankrupt.
Bargaining had to start early.
"Two it is…" Nan Hongsang's face lit up with a triumphant smile.
A few bumps on the head in exchange for two Worry-Free Pastries seemed like a very good deal.
She carefully held the pastries Su Chen handed her, her eyes narrowing with delight as she nibbled them in small bites, her face full of pure enjoyment.
A fire phoenix flew out and transformed into a barrier that blocked the falling snow.
...
"What a heavy snow."
In the depths of the palace, a graceful and noble consort extended her hand. The pure white snowflakes landed in her palm and turned into ice-blue crystals.
"Consort… the Snow Emperor has broken through in her cultivation. To celebrate, the entire Heavenly Captial Dao Domain will see three months of continuous snowfall," the maid beside her answered carefully.
The consort gave a disdainful chuckle.
"So this is a warning to me?"
The maid lowered her head and dared not speak further. Beings at the level of the Snow Emperor and her mistress were far beyond her ability to comment on.
A water mirror appeared before the consort. In it, two small figures sat on a railing, watching the snow drift over the river.
"It's the girl from the Nan Clan…A natural Martial Immortal Physique with a True Phoenix destiny. Good. She is the perfect guardian for Chen'er."
The consort smiled as she watched the scene.
She turned to the maid.
"Go to the Nan Clan on my behalf and propose marriage for Chen'er."
The maid trembled and asked cautiously, "Consort… that is the Nan Clan's Martial Immortal Physique. Would they agree to this marriage?"
A Martial Immortal Physique was far too valuable. No matter how close the relationship between her mistress and the Nan Clan was, would they really allow their prized genius to marry the Ninety-Ninth Prince who could not cultivate?
One misstep could cause the entire Nan Clan to turn against them.
The consort smiled faintly.
"The Nan Clan… they will agree. They must agree. No force dares to renege on a debt owed to me."
The maid felt an overwhelming chill upon hearing those words. She suddenly recalled that before entering the palace, her mistress had once been the figure who struck terror into countless dao domains…
The Absolute Heaven Demon Emperor!