Chapter Ninety-Five: Water Turning to Light

"Life-and-death tribulation?" Seeing how confidently the White Dragon Daoist had spoken before, and how generously he had offered such a treasure, Clear Void felt a good deal of unease in his heart. He hesitated over whether he ought to continue his journey to the Northern Abyss.

"Just as the White Dragon says, those of us who cultivate the Dao must not shrink from calamity. To flee passively not only harms the Dao-heart, it may even summon greater disaster. It is far better to meet it head-on. In later ages, during the Investiture of the Gods, the Twelve Golden Immortals of the Orthodox Teaching were originally fated to suffer a killing tribulation, yet in the end they merely lost the three flowers and five qi; their path instead became far smoother. When all is said and done, it comes down to one thing: contention. To cultivate the Dao is to go against what is innate and primordial, and so countless trials and hardships are only to be expected." In that instant, it was as though the dust had been wiped from a mirror in his heart.

Putting the matter of tribulation aside, Clear Void turned his attention back to the gauze-like spirit treasure in his hands. It was as light as a feather, as thin as silk, dazzling with radiance and brilliant hues, a hundredfold splendor of rosy clouds. Resting in his palms, it seemed like a mass of auspicious light and cloud.

His spiritual sense surged into the treasure, and at once he understood the many details of this gauze robe.

It was a thirty-fifth-grade acquired spirit treasure, the Ren-Gui Roselight Gauze. It possessed no offensive power, and its defensive strength was only middling. Its sole function was to dissolve into water and light, allowing one to escape and conceal one's form.

"So long as one wears this treasure, one can freely blend into any water of heaven and earth, transforming into rosy light. How terrifyingly useful. Especially in the Northern Sea, I suspect even a quasi-sage would have no way of finding me!"

Having understood the treasure's effect, Clear Void was thrilled beyond measure. This was simply an unrivaled tool for robbery, plunder, and taking lives!

"Such a precious treasure, and I owe the White Dragon Daoist a tremendous favor now."

Crafting the Ren-Gui Roselight Gauze was no simple task. It required years and years of gathering the rosy light of the firmament, condensing the essence-silk of Ren and Gui, and supplementing it with eighty-one kinds of rare refining materials from under heaven. Only after a thousand years or more could it take form. Its effects were simply too heaven-defying: even if an ordinary mortal wore it, they could conceal themselves from a Great Luo Immortal, and even a quasi-sage would not detect it without careful scrutiny. Its only limitation was that it had to draw upon water and light.

"A minor flaw, but where in all creation is there no light? Even at midnight there is the radiance of the lunar glow. Especially in the Four Seas, this is like a fish in water."

As for all magic treasures under heaven, their ranks were strictly defined, yet they were not unchanging. Many lower-ranked treasures, if used well, could even surpass higher-ranked ones. The Falling Treasure Coin, for instance, was far inferior to the Sea-Calming Pearl in rank by more than a little, and its limit of only three uses per day was a severe drawback, yet when the two met, it could still knock away a treasure with a single strike. In the end, skillful use came down to one's own mind.

"Though I lost the Ice Soul this time, this Ren-Gui Roselight Gauze is better by more than tenfold."

With everything settled, Clear Void found a secluded place and spent some time refining the Ren-Gui Roselight Gauze. Having the correct method of refinement left behind by the White Dragon Daoist, he completed the process in less than half a day with his early Great Luo cultivation.

Once the treasure was refined into his body, it could be used with a single thought. Clear Void wasted no more time and immediately transformed into a streak of rosy light, heading for the Northern Sea. The journey was practically unobstructed.

"So damn useful. Along the way I saw at least ten beings, and the weakest among them was in the middle stage of Great Luo Immortal rank. Half of them were even in the late stage. If not for this Ren-Gui Roselight Gauze gifted by the White Dragon Daoist, turning into rosy light like this, let alone reaching the Northern Sea, I probably could not even have kept my life."

Clear Void knew his limits well. With his current cultivation, he could still deal with a middle-stage Great Luo Immortal by using a formation to ambush them, but it would take months of preparation. As for a late-stage Great Luo Immortal, he had absolutely no chance of victory. Even with a formation, he could only ensure a safe retreat.

With no beings left to bar his way, the Northern Sea came into view in less than half a day.

Sea and sky were of one color. Waves rolled and crashed, rising a hundred fathoms high, vast and magnificent. Birds of every hue gathered and flew in flocks, large and small, strange and wondrous beyond count, piercing clouds and breaking waves as they played freely, a sight that made the heart feel suddenly broad and untroubled. Within the sea swarmed countless aquatic creatures, their varieties ten or a hundred times more numerous than those on land.

"Compared with the other three seas, the Northern Sea is somewhat inferior, but in terms of sheer expanse it is unquestionably the foremost of the Four Seas. Its waters spread more than ten times wider than the Northern Continent. In the depths of the Northern Abyss lies the Gate of the Heavenly Axis, allowing free passage to the Thirty-Three Heavens, sparing one the peril of the violent winds and thunderfire layers, and one need not ascend step by step; one may go to whichever heaven one wishes. It is incomparably safe, though the time is not yet ripe, so it has not been opened."

The words of the Primordial Lord of Heaven flashed through his mind, but Clear Void was not especially concerned with the Gate of the Heavenly Axis. In his memories, after the demon race unified the world it fought a great war with the witch race, and only when the Dao Ancestor Hongjun mediated was the heavenly realm opened. That was still far off.

In the primordial world, there were twelve gates of heaven and earth in total, six heavenly and six earthly. How they came into being was unknown to all, and not even the sages were an exception. Curiously, once all the heavenly and earthly gates were opened, they would automatically shift every one hundred twenty-nine thousand six hundred years, their positions altered accordingly. No human power could stop it. Yet rumors had long persisted that Pangu had left behind a method for refining the heavenly and earthly gates. In Clear Void's past-life memories, however, no one had ever succeeded, not even the Daoist Hongjun.

In myth, Zhurong and Gonggong fought at Mount Buzhou. In the end Gonggong was defeated, and in his fury he crashed into Mount Buzhou, causing the pillar of heaven to break and the earthly axis to be severed, while the six heavenly gates vanished into hiding. This brought about the first great catastrophe since the creation of heaven and earth, and no one had managed to refine the heavenly and earthly gates before that moment.

In truth, the heavenly and earthly gates were not some great secret in the primordial world. Anyone with a little standing knew of them, and the legendary method by which Pangu had refined them had also circulated widely. Unfortunately, many mighty beings searched the primordial world exhaustively without finding even the slightest clue. As time passed, people came to treat it as nothing more than a false rumor, and hardly anyone believed it anymore. Yet Clear Void knew from the Primordial Lord of Heaven that all of it was true. Still, even a Chaos Sage, though able to calculate heavenly secrets and harmonize with the Dao of Heaven, had no way of finding Pangu's refining method. Moreover, on the surface, the heavenly and earthly gates seemed to do little more than allow free passage to any place within heaven and earth, something even a sage could accomplish with ease. For that reason, he had not paid it much mind.

As for the legendary method by which Pangu refined the heavenly and earthly gates, Clear Void held no particular hopes. Though he had transmigrated, he was not arrogant enough to believe himself the sole protagonist through all eternity. Since the dawn of antiquity, countless mighty beings had searched in vain. Could he really expect to be exempt from common sense?

Upon reaching the Northern Sea, Clear Void dispelled his transformation of rosy light and began walking atop the waves, savoring the sea's boundless fellowship. In both his former life and this one, it was the first time he had seen the real sea, and his emotions were stirred. For a while he stepped on the waves, then entered the water, then played with the spray, carefree and untrammeled. With birds as companions and fish, shrimp, and crabs as friends, and now and then diving beneath the sea to search for a few spirit herbs, he truly felt as though heaven and earth were his to roam at will.

With his heart thus opened and in harmony with the natural flow, Clear Void's cultivation improved considerably.

Before he knew it, he had gone deep into the sea. Looking around, he saw only an endless expanse of ocean. Every so often there were islands, but most were desolate, with only a few possessing any true spiritual grace. Even the rare spiritually rich islands were occupied by water cultivators, and Clear Void had no desire to invite trouble.

Unnoticed, a day had already passed. That morning, as Clear Void was still moving forward, he suddenly saw a young man in splendid robes coming straight toward him from afar, breaking wind and cleaving waves in great panic. Behind him trailed several hundred armored soldiers in pursuit. At the forefront was a figure in golden battle armor, spear of bright silver in hand, multicolored plumes streaming from his shoulders and waist as he rode like a divine general descending from heaven. What drew Clear Void's attention most was that both the armored figure and the fleeing youth had two or three-inch deer antlers growing from their foreheads.

"Someone of the dragon race?" he muttered, his brows knitting.