415: Chapter 415 Sending the Buddha to the Western Paradise, Guiding Merchants on the Road to Prosperity

Dark, cold, and deep.

The void turbulence of the Chaotic Star Sea was like countless invisible steel knives, silently cutting through this lightless abyss. The trans-realm merchant ship, snapped into two halves, was like a withered leaf in a vast ocean, drifting powerlessly within the violent spatial undercurrents.

Zhou Wannian's spotless green cloth shoes had already stepped onto the stairs of the void. With his hands behind his back and the hem of his green robe snapping in the cold wind, he walked with steady, leisurely strides toward the gray mist zone on the periphery of the Taiwu Ancestral Court.

However, after only a few steps, his slow pace came to a halt.

Zhou Wannian did not turn around. His eyes, deep as an ancient well, looked at the bottomless black Star Domain ahead, and he let out an imperceptible sigh.

He knew very well just how overbearing the conduct of that Absolute Truth Realm fleet—the ones he called "tin cans"—was. Since they had already set up a death cordon around the periphery of that mist, even going so far as to directly silence and erase passing merchant ships, it meant that this Star Domain, spanning millions of miles, had been unilaterally designated by them as a restricted zone where no living Soul was allowed.

This broken ship, snapped in two, was stopped right at this location.

Even if he had just used the Great Perfection Space Law to forcibly smooth out the void turbulence within a hundred miles of the merchant ship, allowing the wreckage to float steadily for the time being; even if that wisp of Wood-attribute vitality had sustained the fat merchant's last breath...

In this dead land blockaded by the Truth Realm, it was fundamentally impossible for a second passing merchant ship to come and rescue anyone.

Leaving a Mortal merchant with a broken leg and only half a life behind here was, in truth, no different from drawing a blade and killing him directly. Once the pitiful remaining Spiritual Qi at the bottom of the ship was exhausted, the absolute zero of the void would instantly freeze that fat man into a rock-hard ice sculpture.

"Forget it."

Zhou Wannian shook his head, a faint, somewhat helpless smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

"Since I've already lent a hand, I can't just watch this living thing I just fished up fall back into the latrine. As the saying goes, if you're going to escort the Buddha, escort him all the way to the West. I'll treat it as a way to pass the time."

He turned around and took a step.

With a seemingly casual stride, Zhou Wannian's figure vanished from the spot, instantly crossing the vast distance of the void to land steadily once more on the deck of the tilted merchant ship.

On the deck, the portly merchant known as Old Jin was shivering on the wooden planks covered in blood-colored ice crystals. He still clutched his white jade abacus, which was snapped in two, and his dilated pupils were filled with the fear and despair of death. He had thought that the unfathomable expert in the green robe had already departed, leaving him to wait for death in this icy darkness.

Hearing footsteps, Old Jin raised his head with great difficulty.

When he saw that familiar green robe appear in his vision again, an incredible burst of wild joy suddenly erupted in his dim eyes.

"Bene... Benefactor..." Old Jin's lips trembled, his voice as hoarse as a broken bellows. He tried to struggle up to kowtow, but the movement pulled at his wounds. He gasped in pain and fell heavily back onto the deck.

"Lie still, save your strength."

Zhou Wannian stood before Old Jin with his hands behind his back, looking down at him.

"This place has been sealed off by those tin cans ahead. Even if you lie on this broken plank until you die, no living person will pass by. If I leave, you'll have three days of breath left at most."

Hearing this, the wild joy in Old Jin's eyes was instantly doused by a bucket of cold water, and the color drained completely from his face. He was a clever man who had spent years doing business in the star sea; he naturally understood the meaning behind Zhou Wannian's words. With the Truth Realm clearing the area, who would dare approach?

"Benefactor... I, Old Jin, have such a hard life..." Old Jin's eyes were red, and his tears froze into ice shards before they could even fall. "I have a whole family at home waiting for the income from this trip to eat. If I die here, how will the orphans and the widow survive?"

Zhou Wannian did not respond to his wailing. He was most impatient with listening to such domestic lamentations.

He turned his head, his gaze crossing the edge of the deck to look at the other half of the merchant ship's hull floating hundreds of feet away.

On that half of the hull, many sliced-open cargo crates remained, with some Ores and herbs emitting a faint spiritual light slowly spinning in the weightless environment. The cuts were as smooth as mirrors, reflecting the irrational geometric cutting logic of the Truth Realm.

Zhou Wannian slowly raised his right hand.

His slender, fair fingers opened plainly toward the half-wreckage hundreds of feet away.

"A broken wooden ship, yet you cry like this over it."

Zhou Wannian's voice rang out on the deathly silent deck.

As his fingers opened, an invisible and intangible yet domineering force erupted centered on him.

There were no fluctuations of True Qi, no brilliance of techniques.

This was the pure, unadorned Great Perfection Space Law.

Absolute Mass!

Under Zhou Wannian's control, this mass did not suppress downwards, but instead transformed into a terrifying lateral gravitational force, locking onto the half-wreckage floating in the void with pinpoint accuracy.

"Boom!"

That massive hull, weighing millions of catties, was like a piece of iron filing attracted by a super magnet. It jerked in the void, then hurtled toward the half-hull where Zhou Wannian stood with a violent acceleration that defied physical common sense.

Lying on the deck, Old Jin watched the black shadow looming over him like a small mountain, so terrified his breathing stopped. If it actually hit, never mind him, even the wooden planks beneath his feet would be smashed to powder.

"Benefactor! You mustn't!" Old Jin subconsciously closed his eyes and let out a scream.

However, the expected world-shaking crash did not occur.

When the massive half-wreckage was only three feet away from Zhou Wannian, its violent kinetic energy was instantly swallowed by an invisible maw, coming to an abrupt halt.

The two severed sections of the ship hovered in the void, cut-to-cut, fitting together seamlessly.

But a physical fit could not restore this merchant ship that had been sliced by the Truth Realm's death light. The broken ironwood keels and damaged Formation lines were still two non-intersecting parallel lines.

Zhou Wannian lowered his raised right hand and lightly rubbed his thumb and forefinger together.

"Merge."

His lips moved slightly as he uttered a plain word.

In the instant that single word was spoken...

The Great Perfection Space Law revealed its terrifying side that transcended universal common sense.

Zhou Wannian did not use any Artifact Refining methods of the cultivation world, nor did he use spirit fire to smelt it. He directly overlapped and compressed the spatial coordinates of the two hull sections' cuts on a microscopic dimension!

"Creak... Creak..."

A tooth-aching grinding sound came from deep within the hull.

Under infinite spatial pressure, the molecular structures of the severed deep-sea ironwood keels were forcibly broken and recombined. The hard wood grain seemed to come alive, intertwining and tangling with each other, growing together by sheer force.

The thick bronze armor plates on the outer layer emitted a piercing sound of metal twisting. The broken bronze was flattened and fused by an invisible giant hammer, leaving not even a hint of a welding seam.

Even the air molecules scattered around the cut and the frozen blood were completely expelled under this spatial compression.

In the blink of an eye.

A trans-realm merchant ship that had been snapped in two and was on the verge of becoming space junk was perfectly pieced back together before Old Jin's stunned eyes.

Except for the broken mast which could not be restored, the ship's hull and keel were actually stronger and smoother than before they were cut.

Not only that.

During this forced Fusion process, the extremely faint aura of the Space Law that Zhou Wannian used to manifest Absolute Mass silently permeated every corner of the merchant ship along the reorganized wood grain and metal gaps.

For this merchant ship, which was originally just an ordinary Magical Artifact, this was no different from a fundamental leap and transformation.

The ironwood that grew at the bottom of the abyss saw its originally dull color gradually shift into a grayish-black that shimmered with a mysterious, eerie light. The texture of the wood was no longer that of tree rings, but had twisted into profound trajectories similar to void turbulence.

The bronze armor wrapping the hull lost its original metallic luster, becoming dull and deep, as if it could swallow the faint surrounding light.

After unintentionally absorbing a wisp of Zhou Wannian's Space Law, this ship was no longer an ordinary mundane merchant ship. Its materials had mutated, and its resistance to void turbulence and gravitational pressure had reached an inconceivable level.

It was as if it had put on an invisible cloak of high-dimensional physical properties. As long as it did not actively emit energy fluctuations, even the Divine Sense of a Soul Transformation Stage expert would find it difficult to discover its existence in the complex Chaotic Star Sea.

Zhou Wannian did not care about the strange changes occurring to the ship. To him, this was merely like picking up two pieces of clay and kneading them together; that the clay picked up some of the warmth from his hands was nothing extraordinary.

He walked over to Old Jin, who was lying on the ground, completely dumbfounded.

"I've reconnected the ship for you. Although the fancy defensive Formations and sails are gone, the shell is hard enough that it won't leak. The spirit stone furnace at the bottom still works; it's a bit slow, but at least it can move."

Zhou Wannian's voice was calm, his hands behind his back.

Only then did Old Jin snap out of his daze. He blankly touched the deck beneath him—which had been the site of the break but was now incredibly smooth—the real tactile sensation of the wood making him feel as though he were dreaming.

Kneading a trans-realm merchant ship back together with bare hands.

[part:gemini-3.1-flash-lite]

And he didn't use a single bit of spiritual fire or an Artifact Refining furnace.

Such a method—let alone for a lone Mortal merchant like himself—was something even those high-and-mighty Grandmasters of the cultivation world could absolutely never achieve!

"Benefactor... you... who exactly are you?" Lao Jin swallowed, his voice filled with a reverence that stemmed from the depths of his Soul.

He suddenly recalled that terrifying bounty he had seen on the shadow recording stone screen, the one referred to as the "Absolute Mass Black Hole."

Could it be...

A guess that made his hair stand on end flashed through Lao Jin's mind.

Zhou Wannian did not answer his question.

He lowered his head slightly, looking at Lao Jin's chubby face, which was somewhat distorted by terror.

"Don't pry. If you know too much, I'm afraid that half-leg you just reattached won't be able to be saved again."

Zhou Wannian's tone carried a hint of casual warning. He then raised his hand and pointed toward the pitch-black, deep starry sky on the right side of the merchant ship.

"You cannot go the way ahead. That bunch of tin cans has set up a death trap on the outskirts of the Taiwu Ancestral Court. If your broken ship dares to approach any further, the next thing that cuts you won't be as simple as a single beam of light."

Lao Jin looked in the direction Zhou Wannian was pointing. There was nothing there but darkness, yet he seemed to see a star-devouring beast with its bloody maw wide open, and he nodded repeatedly in fear.

"I will listen to you, Benefactor. I definitely won't go forward anymore. But Benefactor, the Chaotic Star Sea is isolated on all sides; without the Formation Plate to guide me, where should I steer?"

Zhou Wannian swept his deep, profound eyes across the starry sky.

With his vast Divine Soul perception combined with the complete Star Map in his Sea of Consciousness, he instantly plotted a safe and hidden route through the complex and intricate Chaotic Star Sea.

"Don't go east. That's a blind spot for the Truth Realm patrols, but it's filled with spatial rifts. If your ship enters there, it will be torn into wood shavings. Don't go north either; there's a dead nebula there, and the gravitational fields inside are all chaotic."

Zhou Wannian was like an idle villager standing by the roadside giving directions to a lost carriage driver; his tone was casual, yet every word was worth its weight in gold.

"Follow that invisible Void Realm undercurrent on your left. The fluctuations of this undercurrent are very small, which is perfect for masking the movements of your ship. Follow the undercurrent toward the southwest, and just keep going."

Zhou Wannian described the landmarks along the route in detail.

"On the way, you will see three red meteorites connected together, shaped like the character ' product'. When you encounter those three stones, don't go straight. Circle around them for half a turn, and slip out through the interstellar gap on the back side."

"After you slip out, keep sailing forward for about half a month's journey. There is a meteorite belt there, and behind the meteorite belt is a Lower Realm called the 'Canghai Realm.' Although the Spiritual Qi in that world is thin, the water routes are well-developed, and trade is quite prosperous. Sail your ship there and find a port to dock. Although most of the Cold Star Iron on your ship is gone, what remains is enough for you to buy several streets of storefronts in that world and live comfortably as a wealthy man."

Lao Jin lay on the deck, his ears pricked up like antennas, engraving every word and every landmark Zhou Wannian said into the deepest part of his mind.

This was a life-saving route. In this treacherous Chaotic Star Sea, a safe passage that avoided all high-dimensional forces and spatial traps was worth even more than his entire cargo.

"Your great kindness, Benefactor, I, Lao Jin, will never forget!"

Forcing himself to endure the excruciating pain of his broken leg, Lao Jin used his hands to prop up his upper body, turned to face Zhou Wannian, and with all his might, slammed his head heavily onto the hard wooden deck.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

Three loud kowtows in a row left his forehead broken and bleeding.

This was the heaviest gesture of respect in the Mortal world, and it was the only way he could express his gratitude at this moment.

"My life, Lao Jin, was given by you, Benefactor. This ship was also repaired by you, Benefactor. A great kindness requires no thanks. If there is a chance in the future, as long as you say the word, Benefactor, I, Lao Jin, will go through mountains of blades and seas of fire without even blinking!"

Lao Jin raised his head, his blood-stained face full of sincerity and determination.

Zhou Wannian looked at this determined, chubby merchant and curled his lips slightly.

"Save it. In your half-dead state, you're going to go through mountains of blades and seas of fire? Hurry up and get the ship out of here; finding a doctor to stitch up your leg is the sensible thing to do."

He brushed off the hem of his washed-out cyan robe.

Saving someone was just a casual act; he had never expected any reward from a Mortal merchant from the Lower Realm. The Chaotic Star Sea was boundless, and after parting today, he feared there would never be a chance to meet again for eternity.

However, the Karma of the world is often sown in such casual, offhand gestures, planting the seeds of towering trees.

Zhou Wannian did not foresee this.

The chubby merchant named Lao Jin, whom he had casually saved today.

The mutated merchant ship he had casually repaired with a thread of Space Law.

In the future, when he fell into that ultimate maze that swept across the entire Universe, this seemingly insignificant idle move would secretly play a huge role that even the Truth Realm's super matrix could not calculate.

An intelligence merchant who controlled an invisible merchant ship, wandered the edges of the myriad worlds, and was deeply grateful to the "Absolute Mass Black Hole" would become Zhou Wannian's most secretive and sharpest hidden blade right under the noses of the high-dimensional forces.

Of course, all of this is a story for another time.

At this moment, Zhou Wannian just felt that the smell of blood on the deck was too pungent and only wanted to leave as soon as possible.

"I have given you the route, and I have repaired the ship. How long you can live depends on your own fortune."

Zhou Wannian turned around and stopped looking at Lao Jin.

He took a step, his spotless cyan cloth shoes leaving the merchant ship's deck and stepping back onto the invisible stairs of the Void Realm.

"Benefactor!"

Lao Jin shouted from behind, his voice echoing in the dead silence of space.

"May I dare to ask, Benefactor, what is your honorable name? Even if you only leave a title, it would allow me, Lao Jin, to offer incense every morning and evening to pray for your safety and good fortune!"

Zhou Wannian did not look back.

His slender and upright cyan-robed figure gradually blurred in the deep darkness.

"A chance encounter, nothing more than a passerby."

His calm and lazy voice drifted back to the merchant ship's deck along the turbulent currents of the Void Realm.

"There are plenty of monsters in this Universe who want my life. You'd better save those incense sticks to pray for your own safety."

As his voice faded, Zhou Wannian's figure completely merged into that pitch-black sea of stars.

Lao Jin lay on the deck, staring blankly in the direction where Zhou Wannian had disappeared.

After a long while, he took a deep breath, dragged his broken body with difficulty, and crawled toward the power cabin at the bottom of the ship's structure.

When his hand touched the bronze-wrapped cabin door.

Lao Jin keenly felt that this ship seemed to have become different.

The originally cold and rigid hull now possessed an indescribable sense of flexibility. Moreover, the creaking of wooden planks and the humming of Formations that usually accompanied sailing had completely disappeared.

Gritting his teeth, he stuffed a few remaining Low-Grade Spirit Stones into the dilapidated drive furnace.

"Hum—"

The spirit stone furnace lit up with a faint red light.

The merchant ship did not make a single sound.

It was like a ghost that had merged into the darkness. Under the scouring of the Void Realm currents, it did not stir up a single ripple. The grey-black spectral light on the surface of the hull flickered slightly, and the entire massive merchant ship slid silently into the hidden undercurrent pointed out by Zhou Wannian in an extremely smooth manner that defied aerodynamics and spatial resistance.

It was moving more than ten times faster than it ever had at its Peak.

Sitting in the cockpit, Lao Jin watched the afterimages of starlight flying backward past the window, his hands gripping the helm trembling uncontrollably.

He finally understood what kind of all-powerful existence he had encountered.

"Absolute Mass Black Hole..."

Lao Jin muttered the name from the bounty order.

He hugged the broken white jade abacus tightly to his chest, his eyes flashing with the crazy light that only a merchant has when they see a peerless business opportunity.

"Benefactor, you may not care for my reward. But I, Lao Jin, am a businessman. Businessmen value gratitude and righteousness, but they also value investment."

"This life, this ship. From now on, they are your eyes in this Chaotic Star Sea."

The ghost-like merchant ship completely disappeared into the long, starry journey toward the Canghai Realm.

On the other side.

Zhou Wannian was alone, his hands behind his back, walking on the path through the Void Realm toward the Taiwu Ancestral Court.

Without the burden of the Mortal merchant, his pace seemed even more relaxed and free.

The starry sky all around grew darker and darker, and the dry, desolate aura belonging to the Taiwu Ancestral Court became increasingly intense. The deep grey mist that seemed to devour even light was already looming faintly at the edge of his vision.

"Cleared out a few dogs blocking the way, saved a chubby shopkeeper."

Zhou Wannian raised his hand and stretched his shoulders casually.

"The overture to this walk is quite long."

He looked at the forbidden zone of life ahead, which hid layers of death traps and was tightly blockaded by the Truth Realm.

On his handsome face, that touch of casual smile was gradually replaced by a sharpness like a blade.

"I've finished watching the excitement outside the door."

Zhou Wannian did not stop his steps; facing that suffocating Death Qi, he walked straight forward.

"Now, it's time to go see what kind of play has been set up inside this door."