180: Chapter 177 The Heavenly Dao?

These words were like a thunderclap from the Nine Heavens, exploding within Chen Zhiwen's Sea of Consciousness.

His Dao Heart, which was as firm as a rock and had remained unmoved through countless life-and-death trials, trembled violently at this moment as never before, as if it might shatter at any second, revealing shocking cracks.

The Dao of heaven and earth... is incomplete?

This short sentence contained more information than all previous descriptions of the "Taboo" combined, and it was even more chilling, even more... desperate!

It was as if a Mortal had spent their entire life climbing a mountain they believed to be the highest in the world.

Yet, when they had endured countless hardships and finally stood upon the Peak, wanting to look down upon all other mountains, they were horrified to discover that the very top of this mountain was broken.

Ahead lay an endless abyss.

Behind lay a path that could never be retraced.

That feeling was enough to cause anyone with a firm will to collapse in an instant.

"Since it is incomplete..." Chen Zhiwen's voice became somewhat dry, each word seemingly squeezed with difficulty from the depths of his throat.

"Then why is it incomplete?"

"Those Seniors who stepped into the Taboo Realm, did they gain insight into this truth, and that is why... their temperaments changed?"

The doubts in his heart surged out like a breached flood.

He urgently needed an answer, an answer that could explain all of this.

However, the zhandao sword spirit fell into silence once again.

This silence was filled with helplessness and sorrow.

"I... do not know."

After a long time, the sword spirit's voice sounded faintly, carrying a hint of desolation.

"My master only managed to come to this conjecture at the very last moment of his life."

"He did not have the time, nor the opportunity, to tell me too much."

"Perhaps even he himself could not see the... full truth behind that incompleteness."

The sword spirit's words caused the glimmer of hope that had just ignited in Chen Zhiwen to slowly subside.

Was this a secret that even the previous master of the dao-slaying sword, that peerless and brilliant supreme swordsman who had stepped into the Taboo Realm, had failed to fully comprehend?

For a moment, this ancient battlefield seemed to become even more deathly silent.

The wind wailed, as if mourning for those departed heroic spirits, and for this severed path ahead.

Chen Zhiwen stood still for a long time, the turbulent waves in his heart gradually suppressed by his strong will.

His gaze returned to a calm like an ancient well.

Yet, in the depths of that calm, there was an unprecedented heaviness.

The Dao is incomplete... So what?

His Dao is the Overbearing Dao, the Extreme Dao!

It is to walk a path where there is no path!

It is to open up a sky within a desperate situation!

If Heaven has no Dao, then I shall make my own body the Dao!

Just as Chen Zhiwen's Dao Heart, in the face of this desperate truth, not only did not collapse but instead became increasingly firm and burst forth with even more brilliant light.

A voice sounded within his body without any warning.

That voice was not as desolate and ancient as the sword spirit's, but carried the resonance of metal and stone.

It was deeper, heavier, as if it bore the weight of endless years, and as if it had just awakened from an eternal slumber.

"Incomplete?"

The voice carried a faint, lazy tone, as if it had just woken up, mixed with a hint of mockery from one who had seen through the truth of eternity.

"Has there ever been a Heavenly Dao in this Realm?"

Boom!

Chen Zhiwen's body jolted violently!

His eyes widened instantly, and his pupils were filled with incredulous horror!

Where did this voice... come from?

It did not come from his Sea of Consciousness, it did not come from his Divine Soul!

He could clearly feel that the source of this voice came from his own... limbs and bones, the depths of his flesh and blood!

Using his Divine Thought to look within, in an instant, he found the source.

The prison suppressing pagoda!

That mysterious black tower which had always been silent within his body, serving as the Foundation for his Body Refining, was now emitting an unprecedented, faint yet incredibly heavy aura.

That voice was coming from within the tower!

"It is it..." Chen Zhiwen's mind shook violently.

He remembered that above the North Sea, after the prison suppressing pagoda devoured the Yao Race treasure, the Myriad Yao Bell, it had fallen into a deeper level of silence.

So, it was not silent, but rather... awakening!

"Senior, are you... the tower spirit of the prison suppressing pagoda?" Chen Zhiwen asked tentatively in his heart.

"You could say that."

The deep voice sounded again, clearer this time.

"I awoke from the long river of time, and just happened to hear your conversation."

"Little guy, the conjecture of this sword of yours is wrong."

The tower spirit's voice was unhurried, yet carried an unquestionable tone.

"Wrong... outrageously so."

Hearing this, Chen Zhiwen's heart was in turmoil.

The previous master of the zhandao sword spirit was a supreme existence who had stepped into the Taboo Realm!

The conjecture he had spent his whole life deriving was actually wrong?

And, in the words of this mysterious tower spirit, it was outrageously wrong?

"I ask Senior to enlighten me!"

He had a strong intuition that this newly awakened tower spirit might know the ultimate secret that could subvert the entire Desolate Province, and even subvert the cognition of all Martial Artists!

"Those who stepped into the so-called 'Taboo' did not have their temperaments changed because of their Realm."

The tower spirit said slowly, each of its words seemingly carrying a strange magic, causing Chen Zhiwen's mind to involuntarily become immersed in it.

"Nor was it because they discovered some 'Heavenly Dao is incomplete'."

"But because, when they had exhausted their lives, given everything, hacked through thorns and brambles, and climbed to the Peak of this world..."

"They saw a... cruel truth that they could not accept."

The tower spirit's voice paused, as if giving Chen Zhiwen time to buffer.

Chen Zhiwen held his breath; he knew that what followed would be truly earth-shattering!

"They discovered..."

The tower spirit's voice suddenly became deep and profound, carrying a chill that seemed capable of freezing the Divine Soul.

"The Peak of cultivation they pursued their whole lives, the heaven-reaching cultivation they were proud of, everything they guarded, everything they fought against..."

"In the end, was nothing but a... joke."

"This world is just like a huge cage, a vast pasture."

"And the so-called all living beings, whether human, Yao, or other myriad things..."

The tower spirit's voice was enunciated word by word, clearly entering Chen Zhiwen's mind.

"Are all merely... kept cattle and sheep."

"..."

Deathly silence.

An unprecedented deathly silence.

Chen Zhiwen froze in place, as if he had turned into a stone statue.

His mind was blank.

Kept... cattle and sheep?

These four words were like a magic hammer containing the most vicious curse in the world, smashing ruthlessly, blow after blow, upon his Dao Heart.

The supreme arrogance of "If Heaven has no Dao, I shall be the Dao" that he had just re-condensed in his despair was, at this moment, smashed into pieces and vanished completely!

If the whole world was just a pasture, if everyone was just cattle and sheep waiting to be slaughtered.

Then, what was the meaning of the so-called Overbearing Dao, the so-called Extreme Dao?

A sheep, no matter how strong or fierce, could it resist... the butcher's knife of the pasture owner?

A chill that seeped into his bones spread from his tailbone all the way to his crown.

Making his whole body feel as if he had fallen into an ice cellar.