Chapter 1092: The Mad Heavenly Dao
Chapter 1092: The Mad Heavenly Dao
"So, it wasn't that Mr. Bai was inferior to the Dharma Spreader Heavenly Sovereign, but simply that he attained the Dao after him."
"Conversely, had Mr. Bai been the first to change the Xuanhuang Realm, the Dharma Spreader Heavenly Sovereign would likely have been powerless to stop him."
"Unfortunately, there are no 'what ifs'."
A deep sense of regret colored old Xu Ke's words.
After a long silence, Li Fan could only respond with a sigh.
"I see."
"But..."
Li Fan frowned. "Mr. Bai sacrificed his life for his cause... was it really that simple?"
"In the end, mortals were still treated as livestock by cultivators, and the Xuanhuang Realm remained on the brink of collapse. Since Mr. Bai could foresee events thousands of years into the future, he surely would have understood this."
"Knowing his character, how could he have made no other preparations? How could he have simply departed so hastily, leaving things unfinished?"
Unwilling to let it go, Li Fan pressed on, hoping to coax more secrets out of Xu Ke.
He had a nagging feeling that there was more to Mr. Bai's demise than met the eye.
To his surprise, Xu Ke simply smiled and shook his head. "Like me, you see Mr. Bai as some omnipotent saint. But in reality, to use his own words..."
"'He was just an ordinary man who couldn't bear to watch others suffer.'"
"From his helplessness when facing the tragic deaths of a girl named Liu'er and the innocent people of Ningyuan City, to the setbacks he suffered when he later tried to defy destiny itself. Mr. Bai's entire life was a struggle against his own powerlessness. He never believed he had the ability to save everyone. All he could do was give it his absolute all."
"And he truly did give far too much."
After another moment of silence, Xu Ke asked, "Do you know what lies in the coffin behind me?"
Li Fan's gaze shifted to the space behind Xu Ke.
Looking closer, he realized the ghastly white coffin seemed to be connected to the towering stone mountain on Xu Ke's back.
Or rather...
Li Fan narrowed his eyes. After a long moment of observation, understanding suddenly dawned on him.
In an instant, his perception of the small world flipped upside down.
The earth was above and the sky was below.
The towering stone mountain on the coffin looked as if it were holding up the entire sky.
Or maybe, the weight of the entire world was pressing down upon that single coffin.
And from within that coffin, Li Fan sensed an intensely familiar aura.
It was an aura that no cultivator from the Xuanhuang Realm could ever mistake.
He then recalled Xu Ke's earlier introduction: "the man who stands against the world."
"This... could it be?" Li Fan felt a chill crawl up his spine. He snapped his head up, his eyes fixed on Xu Ke.
Xu Ke's expression remained unchanged, a faint smile still playing on his lips.
"Mr. Bai was blessed by the Heavenly Dao of the Xuanhuang Realm; he was practically its incarnation."
"Not only did he ascend from mortality in a single step to become a Longevity Heavenly Sovereign, but he was also tasked with a mission from the Heavenly Dao itself: to lead it in abandoning the realm."
"But in the end, Mr. Bai chose not to leave. Instead, he went so far as to join the proponents of the New Law and took part in reversing the logic of heaven and earth. To the Xuanhuang Heavenly Dao, this was an absolute betrayal."
"The more favored one is by the Heavenly Dao, the greater the backlash from betrayal. This is one of the reasons Mr. Bai was killed by his own creation—the very thing born from that reversal of logic. He had already grown incredibly weak by then."
Xu Ke patted the coffin behind him. "In truth, with the extent of the Heavenly Dao's favor upon him, it should have been impossible for him to reverse its logic. He likely would have perished from the backlash before he could even succeed."
"So..."
"Before he attempted the reversal, Mr. Bai first stripped that heavenly favor from himself. And then, he sealed it away."
As if in response to Xu Ke's words, a muffled pounding suddenly echoed from the coffin behind him.
A wave of dizziness washed over Li Fan. A face, pale and hauntingly similar to Mr. Bai's, suddenly materialized before his eyes.
It spoke with a deeply seductive voice, urging Li Fan to help it open the coffin.
It promised that once the deed was done, he would be rewarded a thousandfold upon his return to the Xuanhuang Realm.
An ordinary cultivator might have been swayed in that instant, reduced to a mere tool for its escape, and would have immediately turned on Xu Ke.
But Li Fan was no ordinary cultivator.
Setting aside the sheer resilience of his will, the sliver of caution he had always harbored toward Mr. Bai alone ensured he would not be swayed by this unsettling apparition.
With a cold snort, the vision before him shattered.
Li Fan snapped out of the illusion, only to find Xu Ke watching him with a cold, hard gaze, poised to strike at the slightest provocation.
However, upon seeing that Li Fan was unaffected by the phantom, the killing intent in his eyes subsided.
"The sealed heavenly favor? What in the world was that?" Li Fan asked, feigning a lingering sense of dread.
"It's the self-awareness of the Xuanhuang Heavenly Dao that had attached itself to Mr. Bai. He stripped it away from himself. After so many years of being sealed, it has gradually become... extreme. If it were to be released and returned to the Xuanhuang Realm..." Xu Ke's expression was grim.
"A catastrophe ten times more terrifying than the Law of Incompatible Cultivation would descend in an instant. That's why I haven't dared to leave this place for a single step all these years, not even when Xiao Hei died. The stakes are too high; there can be no room for error."
"An extreme version of the Xuanhuang Heavenly Dao?" A peculiar glint flashed deep within Li Fan's eyes.
"Indeed. I can feel it. Over the long years of its imprisonment, the consciousness of the Heavenly Dao within has grown increasingly... bizarre. I truly worry that a day will come when I can no longer contain it." A flicker of deep anxiety crossed Xu Ke's face.
"Lately, I've been secretly searching for a suitable successor, but I have yet to find anyone I can truly trust with this duty. And now today, fellow Daoist, you have arrived here by a stroke of fate..."
Xu Ke's tone suddenly shifted. "Perhaps this meeting was fated, don't you think?"
"From what I can see, your temperament and character are of the highest caliber." He looked at Li Fan with genuine sincerity in his eyes.
Li Fan considered this, saying nothing.
"Of course, the duty of suppressing the Xuanhuang Heavenly Dao is an incredibly lonely and perilous one. If you are unwilling, I would understand. But I have one request..." Xu Ke continued.
"Please, speak," Li Fan said, his expression solemn.
"If the day comes when I am controlled by the thing in this coffin, when I lose my own consciousness... I ask that you strike me down." Xu Ke's voice was heavy with gravity.
Meeting the old man's gaze, Li Fan nodded. "Very well. I promise."
"And as for finding a successor... you need not worry about that either."
Xu Ke looked slightly taken aback.
"You may not believe this," Li Fan said, "but I am not alone. I am a member of the Federation of All Worlds."
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