Chapter 1881: To Cross Swords (II) |
Li Hao gathered a tiny star and summoned a longsword in his hand. He stared at Panther for a while.
“The miniature dao river needs a space to contain it. You won’t be leaving it in one place, it has to travel with you. You have a space inside yourself that contains Silver Moon. I’d like to enter your body and see if we can create another independent space to put a miniature universe in!”
This would be a different type of world creation. At the same time, Li Hao was quite curious what made the structure of a chaos beast so unique? Why could they so easily devour a world? There had to be something special about them apart from the innate durability of their bodies. This was a chance to stay them!
He could try cutting Panth open…
Meanwhile, the dog looked at Li Hao leering at it. Panth’s… scalp was starting to crawl. What did Li Hao want to do?
The young man stroked the dog’s head, seeing its nervousness. “Don’t worry, it’ll be fine. It’s not like I’ll kill you. I’m just going to try and create another small area within your body, then extrapolate how I can do so within the human body.
“The Human King built an internal world, so I’d like to see if I can transform my body into the chaos. I’ve just never really had a good angle to approach the problem with.”
This was what the young man had been hesitant about, that no matter how he trained his physical body, he could not catch up to the chaos beasts. Even if he did, he would not be able to carry a world within him as the chaos beasts did.
He could absolutely rival Panther right this moment since Panth was only fifth rank, but he would have to compress a world to travel with it. He would not be able to simply carry a world of ten billion humans in his stomach.
Why can’t I do it? Chaos beasts can do it, the queen’s divine nation can do it. There was supposedly no commonality between the two, but now Li Hao was speculating that it had to do with the chaos dao that the two employed.
Chaos beasts and the queen could both lead innumerable people and build their own territory. It might have to do with their attachment to chaos dao that they were able to do so. If that was the case, further study was required before he could imitate them.
As nervous as Panther might be, it docilely opened its mouth for Li Hao to walk into. The young man smiled and tightened his grip on his sword, setting foot into a mouth that yawned like a black hole.
……
Silver Moon was within Panther’s body. The inside of a chaos beast seemed to be a pocket of space that was independent of heaven and earth. This was a method that compressed large entities into the size of a mustard seed!
Li Hao hadn’t paid attention to such concepts before. But now that he had thoughts about creating his own chaos, the first issue to resolve was that of nurturing dao within his body. He only had one thousand worlds at present. If that proved too much for his body and too difficult to keep under control, how would he withstand the strain posed by even more worlds in the future?
The young man took a look around after entering Panther’s stomach, then set his eyes on Silver Moon.
It was very hard to discern anything.
The spirit of his auras materialized without further word. Perhaps it could glean some clues that his human eyes could not.
As expected, Li Hao saw something as soon as his auras manifested. The chaos!
There was something that imparted the sensation of the chaos within a chaos beast’s body. It was like a large passageway leading to the depths of the chaos was rooted deep within the chaos beast. They might all be connected to the chaos due to their dao.
“So this means that it’s not chaos beasts that can carry a world within themselves, but that they are internally linked to the chaos. They can communicate with it, which imparts the ability to contain a world within themselves?”
But in that case, how was he to attain the same capabilities as a chaos beast if he didn’t attach himself to chaos dao as well? Could the queen construct a divine nation because that was also rooted in chaos dao?
What was chaos dao?
It was a motley assortment of disorder and unordered dao. However, it contained something that was not part of that collection of dao either—such as the ability to produce life. There might be a massive life source within the chaos.
“In that case… this will be hard for me to imitate. Will I be able to simulate one part of it if I employ the life origin of a world and disorderly chaos strength?”
Li Hao did not wish to attach himself to the mess that was chaos dao. That would completely negate his earlier efforts and require a large amount of time to organize everything. Since he could not integrate with the true chaos dao, then could he create an imitation, then extend it out of his body like the river of dao?
It would then absorb chaos strength, assimilate into the chaos itself, and bequeath him the ability of a chaos beast and permit him to run around with a world?
Traveling easily with a world was not his final goal. He wanted to create a world within his body.
Various ideas popped to the fore as Li Hao once more sank into contemplation. After a long time, he slashed with his sword and severed a portion of Panther’s inner space. A tiny world hovered over the longsword in the next moment.
The world stabilized within Panther’s body and slowly began producing a dao net. The dog didn’t feel uncomfortable from these actions. Li Hao swiftly built the world, creating a new universe with stars embedded in the sky. It rather resembled a dao universe.
The next step was to connect Silver Moon’s dao to Silver Moon.
Li Hao wove together tiny stars in a web that covered the world. The two dao masters sensed what the young man was doing, but did not show themselves. They allowed Li Hao to do as he would, threading the daos of these tiny worlds into the river of dao, passing them through Silver Moon, then returning to their starting point.
A peculiar system of a thousand worlds surrounding Silver Moon took shape.
……
Thunder Region.
Panther kept still as Li Hao busied himself, despite knowing that this meant it wouldn’t be able to be independent of Li Hao in the future. Why would it want that?
It’d been a stray dog before, freezing and starving. It’d nearly starved to death on the streets. Li Hao had taken it home. Although it’d only received a simple dog bed beneath the stairs, it had food and shelter. It was no longer kicked around from place to place. Life had seemed incomparable then.
As for the cultivation and growing stronger later on, that was just so it could continue staying by Li Hao’s side.
How grandiose could a dog’s dreams be?
It wasn’t born a monster spirit, just a mundane dog. As for being the so-called descendant of the Monster Spirit Envoy… that was a farfetched claim. Panther had some hints of this possibility only after it started cultivating. But even so, it was possible for such a descendant to die of hunger. It didn’t matter if it was the descendant of the Monster Spirit Envoy of the Heavenly Dog.
Who knew how many dogs had starved to death or been butchered in Silver Moon’s past one hundred thousand years? Perhaps they’d all been descendants of the Monster Spirit Envoy.
It was now a fifth rank and was the world master of Silver Moon. That was incredible!
Everyone was aware of New Martial’s Ash Cat and Heavenly Dog. They were renowned throughout the four regions. Panther had never sought to attain the same heights of fame, however. Why should it?
What was the purpose of that?
It was better to maintain a low profile and stay by Li Hao’s side forever. Even if that meant it didn’t talk for the rest of its life, that would only be normal, wouldn’t it?
Could a dog that talked still be a dog?
It’d always been a dog and had never wanted to be a human. Did humans live as carefree as dogs?
So whether Li Hao wanted to conduct some research or something else, Panther crouched down in Thunder Region. Although a thunder tribulation threatened to develop over its head, the dog ignored it.
Something seemed to be changing in its body.
Li Hao was creating a minor domain of calamity within its body. Panther didn’t care whether or not it would succeed, if it would be strong, or if the dog could strengthen it in the future.
After an indeterminate period of time, Panther suddenly felt a closer kinship to Thunder Region. It subconsciously wanted to capture some strength of thunder and lightning.
With that, part of the tribulation over its head disappeared. It reappeared in the blink of an eye, but just as promptly disappeared in front of Panther.
The tribulation didn’t take shape.
……
Li Hao walked out of Panther’s stomach and glanced at Thunder Region with some regret. “The construction went smoothly, but I’m yet to fully grasp the power of calamity. If I have, then I would be its master! I can only say that I can barely manage to control part of it. You can try to make thunder and lightning the core of your strength, not calamity!
“You used thunder and lightning before, so you can continue that same habit of manipulation. Use it for offense first, then slowly integrate your own ideas and dao into it. The water attribute would be a good candidate since water lightning is also lightning…”
The young man chuckled and looked at the eager dog. Panther twitched its claws, summoning some lightning. It didn’t erupt when the dog swiped its claws—Panther’s paw sank into the void and collected more energy instead.
Tendrils of thunder and lightning gathered, spraying some water energy at the same time. With that, Panth produced so much static electricity that it bristled all over!
“You can take it slow. You’re bound to be unused to it at first. It’ll get better with enough time.”
“Arf arf…” Panther nodded its ponderous head with great excitement. This was great!
A multitude of emotions ran through Li Hao’s heart when he looked at the dog. Panth was the same as ever. He had many monster spirits by his side, ones such as Number Two, Capsize Sea, and the plant spirits…
Number Two was very strong and he’d always been very polite toward it. Only when he faced Panther could he act comfortably and not have too many reservations.
This is a dog that I raised with my own two hands! Number Two is not. Even though the cat looks cuter, is stronger, and is quite nice toward me… I just feel a bit that I’m facing an elder when I see Number Two.
It’s different when it comes to Panth because I raised the dog myself.
……
Li Hao dallied in Thunder Region a few more days and absorbed more energy to replenish his depletion. It further perfected his system and strengthened his sword of calamity. He also helped Panther capture a certain portion of the tribulations to store as cultivation resources.
Li Hao didn’t wait to reach seventh rank before he stopped cultivating. He didn’t really care about seventh rank. The young man had stopped cultivating a while after reaching peak sixth rank. He might arouse more attention once he became a seventh rank, so stopping at peak sixth rank was fine.
That level of strength was neither here nor there. He wasn’t a weakling, but wouldn’t make others take note of him like they would if he was a seventh rank.
This perfectly suited Li Hao’s personality. Peak sixth rank wasn’t too flashy, but wouldn’t lead him to be underestimated by others either.
……
Thunder Region.
Fog Mountain returned with the Orchid Forest master. The latter had been perfectly willing to come with Fog Mountain since he’d also sensed the unrest in the four regions.
It hadn’t been long since Orchid Forest set foot into seventh rank. Despite swallowing a large sum of Red Moon strength, he wouldn’t be able to withstand the Dragon master’s fury if he was the target.
Having worked with New Martial and Li Hao before, the Orchid Forest master readily agreed when Fog Mountain visited. His world was stored in Number Two’s stomach as they traveled back. The cat behaved differently from the others within Thunder Region. It could freely travel through it, just not at a fast pace.