Chapter 237: Three Transient Lifetimes
The scroll flew up and slowly moved to the rock wall above the Floating Stone Elder, embedding itself within.
The red-robed girl walked to the side, found an empty spot, and sat down to meditate, closing her eyes.
Shen Daoxing also found a smooth, large stone and sat down.
In a daze, he saw the old man on the floating stone seem to come alive. He suddenly opened his eyes, which radiated a dazzling light.
When Shen Daoxing looked at himself again, he had become a general clad in armor. Before him, an enemy army of thousands surged toward him like a tide. He raised his weapon and charged forward without hesitation.
Countless battle cries filled the air, and endless volleys of arrows rained down over his head. He watched his soldiers fall one by one around him until the battlefield had turned into a sea of blood.
When he, drenched in blood, walked down alone from a mountain of corpses piled high with countless soldiers, what awaited him was not glory, but a merciless prison, endless humiliation, and cruel torture.
In the blink of an eye, you became a tattered beggar, humbly begging on the roadside. But all you received were scornful looks and endless disgust. Even your fellow beggars could freely bully and beat you.
Starving and battered by the cold wind, you hid in a ruined temple in the desolate countryside, on the verge of death.
Just then, you saw a lovely girl kindly extend her hand, offering you the steamed bun she held. A light suddenly appeared in your eyes.
But in the next moment, all you saw were torn clothes fluttering in the air and the girl’s hysterical screams. You could only watch numbly from the side, completely helpless.
The next moment, you became a learned scholar. You had a virtuous and beautiful wife who didn’t mind your poverty, faithfully enduring hardship by your side.
You studied for thirty years and finally returned home after passing the imperial examinations with high honors. But when you arrived, you found your wife already in another man’s arms.
What followed was the crushing pressure of overwhelming power and authority. Watching your wife flirt coquettishly in another man’s embrace, you could only be subservient, bowing and scraping, not even daring to glance their way.
Rage, resentment, humiliation—countless violent emotions flooded your mind.
’The world shouldn’t be like this!’
You were enraged!
You were resentful!
You were humiliated!
You picked up your battle blade once more, but this time you faced not the enemies of your country, but your so-called former comrades.
’All who have wronged me must die!’ Overnight, the entire imperial city became a river of blood, with bodies littering the ground. You were no longer a hero, no longer a general, but a murderous fiend in the eyes of others.
You raised your broken bowl high and smashed it down again and again. BANG! BANG! BANG! Brains splattered, and blood stained the entire ruined temple. The girl, however, fled in terror as if she had seen a Demon. From then on, you no longer begged. Through one massacre after another, you became an Evil Demon whose name struck fear into all who heard it.
You cast aside all restraint. You gave up on power. You raised a kitchen knife and hacked away at the adulterous pair before you, their gushing blood dyeing the entire estate crimson. You no longer just clutched books; you picked up a blade and hacked your way through the corrupt imperial court, becoming a rebel reviled by the entire nation.
Wushuang slaughter and endless rage filled your mind. If the world was unjust, you would destroy the world. If the heavens were unjust, you would destroy the heavens.
You raised your weapon and hacked at the sky. You became the enemy of the world order, the enemy of the entire world.
All you could see was endless slaughter, your vision filled with red.
「A hundred years passed in the blink of an eye.」 You emerged from a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood. Everything before you was corrupt and unjust. It all had to be erased, to be eliminated.
Countless murderous emotions assaulted you, and boundless, maddening rage flooded in, consuming your entire mind.
’No!’
’This isn’t me!’
’I am Shen Daoxing.’
’I am not a general!’
’I am not a beggar!’
’And I am certainly not a scholar!’
’But what if the world is unjust?’
’What if the Celestial Dao is unjust?’
’The world is unjust?’
’Then I will build a world of peace and order!’
’The Celestial Dao is unjust?’
’Then I will become the high and mighty Celestial Dao myself!’
Shen Daoxing’s eyes snapped open. He was surrounded by a vast expanse of white.
Before him stood a kindly-faced old man, smiling at him.
The old man’s white hair was incredibly long, trailing to the ground and spreading out wildly to both sides. He looked identical to the withered old man who had passed away in meditation outside.
The old man looked at Shen Daoxing with a gentle smile. "The vanities of the world are false. The indifference of the Celestial Dao is an illusion. The Great Dao of longevity is a long and arduous path. I hope you will not forget your true self, nor allow your eyes to be clouded."
Shen Daoxing was stunned and opened his mouth to ask something.
But the old man dissolved into a white radiance, which faded into specks of starlight and vanished.
Shen Daoxing looked down at himself. It had only been a brief moment, yet he felt as if he had lived through three lifetimes, accumulating ages of experience. One moment he was a general, the next a beggar, and then a scholar. He had nearly been lost to an endless cycle of slaughter and rage.
But because of this, Shen Daoxing inspected himself and found that his Divine Soul had grown much stronger and far more resilient than before.
The previous levels had all been tests of his strength. This level, clearly, was a test of his character and the power of his Divine Soul.
"CRACK! CRACK!"
Suddenly, a crisp cracking sound echoed from the sky above.
Shen Daoxing looked up and saw that a fissure had appeared in the sky at some point. The crack spread rapidly outward like a spiderweb.
"BANG!"
With a shattering sound, his entire surroundings broke apart. The original scene of the cave gradually reappeared before Shen Daoxing’s eyes.
Shen Daoxing looked up and saw that the withered body of the old man on the floating stone was still sitting there quietly. But compared to before, it seemed to have lost all its spiritual essence, all its vitality. It had become a completely lifeless object.
Shen Daoxing turned his head and saw the red-robed girl nearby, her eyes still tightly shut.
Her brow was furrowed one moment, her expression icy the next, and then filled with extreme anger. It was impossible to know what she was experiencing.
Shen Daoxing didn’t disturb her. He collected himself and reflected on everything he had just been through. The various experiences had benefited him greatly, and he needed some time to properly digest them.
Shen Daoxing then slowly closed his eyes.
However, just as he was about to shut them, his vision suddenly went black.
Shen Daoxing froze. He looked forward and saw a pair of cold, emotionless black eyes right in front of him, staring intently at him.
Shen Daoxing paused and looked closer. He saw a young man about his own age with long black hair draped over his shoulders. A long black robe enveloped his body, embroidered with crimson bats. It was one of the disciples brought by the black-robed man who had fought fiercely with Ge Ye earlier.
’The ones with the blood bats.’
Shen Daoxing’s senses instantly sharpened, and his body tensed.