Chapter 436: Demonic Disintegration
"Your path isn't necessarily correct either," Gaia retorted. "Whether it's the Destiny Dynasty, the Divine Path, or your current thought network, fundamentally, they are all paths of gathering power with unstable foundations, clever tricks. How can they compare to the sole path of cultivating the true self?"
"Go on your way then." After hearing these words, Bai Mo replied expressionlessly.
Those three simple words, imbued within the overwhelming white radiance, carried the anger he once possessed. His sharp gaze revealed a sliver of Bai Mo's true thoughts.
Anyone capable of discerning his look could perceive the gloom contained within, like a brewing storm.
Had it not been for the Disciple of the Crimson World abruptly stirring up chaos, forcing Bai Mo to prematurely break into the Myriad Aspects Realm at least a decade before he was fully prepared, he might not have found himself in his current predicament.
Given the situation in the Huaxia Federation a few years prior, his conflict with the others had not yet reached the point where an immediate internal war was necessary. Even a superficial peace could have been maintained for another twenty or thirty years.
With decades of time at his disposal, he would have had ample opportunity to conduct experiments, letting the test subjects gradually clear the way for him, sweeping aside any potential obstacles on his path to advancement.
Instead of being forced, as he was now, to become the very subject of his own hypothesis, the first to walk the path he had merely conjectured.
Alas, Bai Mo, gradually losing his emotions, found even the expression of anger itself becoming increasingly difficult. He could only utter those three words, accompanied by a sharp gaze.
This was the irreversible path he conjectured he was most likely to embark upon in the coming centuries.
...
"We—Cultivators—Why—Fear—A—Fight!!!" Facing Bai Mo's relentless advance, a magnificent, symphonic voice erupted from the center of the battlefield.
The crimson and violet entities continuously shed specks of light, reforming themselves into the appearance of human cultivators, each surveying the world with disdain.
One was a red-robed young man transformed by the Disciple of the Crimson World, his Earthly casual wear replaced by a fiery red Daoist robe.
The other was an intrepid youth (or girl?) of indeterminate gender, transformed by Gaia, their purple dress now an ancient and elegant purple robe.
Although the human race of Tianxuan Continent had completely different physical structures from Earth's humans, there was little difference in their outward appearance.
The forms they now revealed were precisely their looks when they still possessed their physical bodies.
The red radiance, symbolizing defiance, and the purple radiance, symbolizing destiny, at this moment unleashed their full power, pouring into the Nine-Character True Words to resist the relentless crushing force of the white light.
Even though they knew Bai Mo lacked the ability to truly kill them, only to continuously strengthen the seal.
But if he truly cast aside all caution and used all his power before death to maintain this seal, Gaia estimated that it could last for at least several millennia after his demise.
No one could predict what a monster, devoid of emotion and desire, on the verge of Daoization, would do next.
A thousand years of dark imprisonment—Gaia did not believe her will was resilient enough to endure until the seal dissipated. A void-like sealing space meant the continuous erosion of one's very existence.
Without input of information, even an almost immortal information-based life form would be slowly worn away by boredom under the dulling effect of time.
Perhaps the experiment would last for millennia, but it was ultimately Bai Mo's attempt.
...
"Fellow Daoists, I'm tired." In the midst of the fierce battle, a casual remark from the Creator filled the other two with a sudden sense of foreboding.
"This half-dead Demonic Disintegration form, at its core, is merely a failure of a Mahayana cultivator. Our path is already severed. Why cling on? It's better to reincarnate and re-cultivate; perhaps then there's a sliver of hope to reach the peak someday." It continued.
"What are you saying?!"
"I refuse to accept this!" The Disciple of the Crimson World gnashed his teeth after hearing the Creator's words.
"I, Xue Dao Yuan, began cultivating at eight, suffered clan annihilation at eighteen, annihilated my enemies at thirty-eight, and in three hundred years, destroyed thirty-six sects that oppressed me, earning the moniker Blood Dao Yuan. I've fought against heaven and earth my entire life; why should I bow my head to this damned fate and reincarnate to re-cultivate?!"
After reverting to his former human appearance, the red-robed Daoist, who called himself the Disciple of the Crimson World but whose true name was Xue Dao Yuan, cast aside his previous composure, and an unyielding flame burned in his eyes.
"Haven't you realized? This Demonic form is subtly distorting our temperaments, gradually splitting off personalities with different thoughts... The ultimate outcome is still forgetting who we are." The Creator, who rarely spoke, unusually offered a detailed explanation.
"..." The red-robed Daoist fell into contemplation while simultaneously operating his portion of the Nine-Character True Words array.
"Finally, a gift for both of you, Fellow Daoists: Demonic—Disintegration!"
The golden-armored figure projected by the Creator instantly unleashed a terrifying, global shockwave on both the energy and information planes.
The energy-plane shockwave was evenly transmitted to every corner of Earth; almost all humans and animals felt a gentle breeze sweep over them.
But that was all.
If it were still the supreme Grand Cultivator at the Peak of Integration Stage, who once looked down upon the world, the energy impact of this self-detonation would indeed have been enough to shatter the entire Earth into dust.
However, the Creator had never intended for the small amount of energy it possessed to accomplish much; its true killing move lay in the information-plane shockwave!
The information shockwave, released alongside the energy, was somewhat akin to the electromagnetic pulse bomb (EMP) invented by humans, but its effects were infinitely more potent.
Wherever the shockwave reached, all text and data were randomly reordered.
Sentences in books became jumbled words and characters, songs recorded on tapes and discs turned into static, and information stored in memory and hard drives likewise fell victim.
And the most insane consequence was the continuous collapse of the global financial system.
Bank deposit data was randomly modified; ten units could become a billion, and a billion could become ten. Both the main database and backup databases were completely invalidated.
The communication network also temporarily collapsed because all transmitted information lost its meaning.
"You!"
The Creator, who had always kept a low profile, now moved to destroy the very foundation of the information age. Bai Mo could only let his own power continuously extend outward, doing his best to counteract the Creator's influence.
As a result, under the cover of the Creator's Demonic Disintegration, the Disciple of the Crimson World and Gaia were granted a window of several seconds.
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