199: Chapter 199 Battle Against the Demon God's Thoughts (Part 1)

Golden dust was still scattering behind him, but Lu Mingyuan had already continued walking forward.

The tree in his Dantian had shrunk to one and a half zhang, but he did not stop to rest. There is no time in Chaos, and there is no difference between resting and not resting. Rather than stopping, it was better to keep moving. As he walked, his Qi would slowly recover, and the tree would slowly grow tall. It was not Chaos helping him, but his heart. When the heart is unmoved, all dharmas return to themselves. When the heart is still, the Qi returns.

Bai Ze crouched on his shoulder, remaining silent for a long time. It was thinking about what had just happened, about how Shi looked when it was being completed, and about that golden dust. It had lived for tens of thousands of years and had seen countless Cultivators deliver demons, but it had never seen deliverance like this. No killing, no destruction, no suppression. Just completion, just love, just light.

"Lu Mingyuan."

"Hmm."

"When you were delivering Shi just now, what were you thinking?"

"I was thinking about why it hated."

"Why?"

"Because it was lacking. It lacked the heavens, the earth, and the Dao. Pangu opened the heavens, and it lost its place to stand. It did not hate Pangu for opening the heavens; it hated that Pangu did not give it a place after opening them. There was no place for it between heaven and earth, nor was there one in Chaos. It was forgotten, abandoned, and ignored. What it hated was being forgotten."

"So you remembered it."

"Yes. I remembered it. It was called Shi, and it controlled the Dao of Devouring. It lived, it existed, and it was once slain by Pangu. It was no nameless nobody; it was a powerhouse among the Three Thousand Demon Gods. Since I have remembered it, its life was not in vain."

Bai Ze did not speak again. It buried its face in Lu Mingyuan's hair and closed its eyes. It remembered a long time ago, in the East Sea Ruins, when Lu Mingyuan saw the carvings left by Daoist Songyun. He had said something similar then: 'He lived, he wrote, he left something behind.' This scholar could always see things that others could not. What others saw as resentment, he saw as the pain of being forgotten. What others saw as a demon, he saw as a lack."

As they walked, Chaos changed.

It didn't get better; it got worse. The gray mist thickened, becoming as dense as paste. There was a sound in the mist, a buzzing like bees flying. But those were not bees; they were resentment. Vast amounts of resentment gathered together, turning into a giant vortex. The vortex spun, sucking in the surrounding Chaos, the dust within it, and everything that drew near.

Lu Mingyuan stopped and stood at the edge of the vortex. The corners of his clothes fluttered loudly from the suction, and his hair blew backward. But his feet did not move, because his heart did not move. When the heart does not move, the body does not move.

"Bai Ze, what is that?"

Bai Ze unfurled the bai ze map, and golden light flickered. But this time, the golden light was sucked away by the vortex and could not shine far. Bai Ze's expression changed because it could not see clearly what was inside the vortex. Not being able to see clearly meant danger. Danger meant there might be no return.

"I don't know. It could be a Remnant of the Demon God, it could be Great Tribulation remains, or it could be something even more terrifying than Shi. Whatever it is, it's strong. So strong that even my bai ze map cannot see through it."

"Stronger than you?"

"Stronger than me. And stronger than you. You only have a one-and-a-half-zhang tree left in your Dantian, and your Wanxiang True Qi is at less than thirty percent of its peak. You are no match for it."

Lu Mingyuan was silent for a moment. He wasn't thinking about whether to retreat, but how to advance. Retreating was impossible because if he went back, he would never reach the depths of Chaos. Advancing was the only option, but it required a method. He couldn't use brute force, for that would be seeking death.

"Bai Ze, you said it might be a Remnant of the Demon God?"

"Possibly."

"Does a Remnant of the Demon God have intelligence?"

"It does. But it's not as complete as Shi. Shi had an afterimage pieced together from true spirit fragments; it could speak and think. General remnants of Demon Gods only have instincts. The instinct to devour, the instinct to attack, the instinct to guard. No reason, no emotion, no logic."

"Then there is a way."

Lu Mingyuan sat down cross-legged at the edge of the vortex. He did not rush in, did not circulate his Wanxiang True Qi, and did not try to complete anything. He just sat there, closing his eyes and using his heart to feel the vortex. Feeling its resentment, feeling its hate, feeling its lack.

He felt it.

It was a vast amount of resentment, not from one person, but from many. It was the resentment of living beings who fell during the Great Tribulation, the resentment of those forgotten, abandoned, and ignored souls. They had no names, no faces, no stories. They were just resentment, pure resentment. Gathered together, they became a giant vortex. The vortex spun, sucking everything, swallowing everything, yet it could never be filled. Because resentment is a lack, and a lack can never be filled.

Lu Mingyuan opened his eyes and stood up.

"I'm going in."

"Going in? Are you crazy? You only have thirty percent of your Qi; going in is seeking death."

"It's not seeking death; it's deliverance. It's not a complete Remnant of the Demon God and has no intelligence. Without intelligence, one cannot reason with it. Since I cannot reason with it, I can only use another method."

"What method?"

"Using light. It's not that it's afraid of light, but that it lacks light. When there is a lack, it must be filled. I will use light to fill it; once it is complete, it will dissipate."

Bai Ze did not object. It knew this was the only way. If they retreated, the path ahead would be cut off. If they tried to go around, they wouldn't be able to. There are no roads in Chaos, only walking. If one does not walk, one will never arrive.

Lu Mingyuan took a step and walked into the vortex.

---

In that instant, he felt as if he were being torn apart.

It wasn't his body being torn apart, but his consciousness. There was too much resentment in the vortex, too much hate, too much lack. They flooded into his mind like a deluge breaking through a dam. The dam was shaking, cracking, and collapsing.

He saw countless faces. Faces of men, women, the elderly, and children. They were crying, shouting, and screaming. They were asking him: "Why? Why must we die? Why must we be forgotten? Why is the world so large, yet there is no place for us?"

He did not answer. He could not answer. He was not Pangu, not the Heavenly Dao, and not fate. He was just a scholar who had walked out of Heyin City, a Cultivator who had traveled for less than a hundred years, a Quasi-Saint whose own Dao had not yet been fully established.

But he could not fall. If he fell, no one would remember them. If he fell, those sentinels would have waited in vain. If he fell, Zhao Sanniang's lamp would have been given for nothing.

He gritted his teeth and walked forward into the vortex. With every step, the resentment grew heavier. It was as heavy as a mountain, pressing down on his shoulders. His legs were shaking and his back was bending, but he did not stop. He knew that if he stopped, he would never be able to move again.

Bai Ze was on his shoulder, unfurling the bai ze map. Golden light flared brilliantly, shining into the vortex. The light was bright, like the sun. But the vortex was too large; even the sun could only illuminate a small patch. A small patch was enough; illuminating even a little bit counted.

Lu Mingyuan circulated his Wanxiang True Qi. The tree in his Dantian shrank from one and a half zhang to one zhang. It was shrinking because it was giving all its nutrients to the light. Light radiated from his body—not golden, but white. White as snow, bright as lightning.

When the white light touched the resentment, the resentment began to melt. It wasn't disappearing; it was transforming. The black resentment turned white, and the white resentment became transparent. Transparent resentment was no longer resentment; it was light. The light glowed within the vortex, weak like a firefly. But with enough fireflies, the darkness could be illuminated.

The vortex began to grow unstable. It sensed a threat and began to counterattack. The resentment condensed into a giant hand that reached out from the depths of the vortex and swatted down at Lu Mingyuan. The hand was so large it covered the sky. No, there was no sky here. It was so large it covered everything.

Lu Mingyuan did not dodge. He knew he couldn't. He raised his hands to support the giant hand. It was heavy, like a mountain. His legs sank into the Chaos, disappearing up to his knees. His bones groaned with a cracking sound, as if they were about to break.

"Bai Ze!"

Bai Ze exerted all its strength to unfurl the bai ze map. All the characters on the map lit up with a blinding golden light. The light shone on the giant hand, and it began to melt. It wasn't being destroyed; it was being transformed. Black turned to gray, gray to white, and white to transparent.

The giant hand shrank, but it did not disappear. It turned into a fist and smashed down toward Lu Mingyuan.

Lu Mingyuan had no time to dodge and was struck in the chest. He went flying, tumbling through the vortex. Blood welled up in his mouth—the blood was golden because his Qi was golden. Golden blood splattered into the Chaos, onto the resentment, and into the vortex.

He hit something and came to a stop. It was a wall condensed from resentment. The wall was covered in faces, all of them looking at him with eyes that held no malice, only sadness.

"What do you want?" Lu Mingyuan asked.

No one answered. But he knew the answer. They wanted to be remembered. Not to be delivered, not to be transcended, but to be remembered. To have it remembered that they lived, that they existed, and that they were not nameless dust.

"I remember you," Lu Mingyuan said. "Though I do not know your names, I remember your faces. Your sadness, your hate, and your lack. Since I have remembered, your lives were not in vain."

The faces on the wall changed. The sadness diminished, replaced by peace. They looked at Lu Mingyuan, at this blood-covered scholar. His chest was caved in, and several ribs were broken. Yet he was still smiling, a beautiful smile. Like a spring breeze, like summer rain, like autumn leaves, like winter snow.

The wall began to shatter. It wasn't broken from the outside; it shattered on its own. Because the resentment had dissipated, and the lack had been filled. What filled it was not light, but remembering. To remember is to fill, and to fill is to remember.

Lu Mingyuan crawled out from the shattered wall and stood at the center of the vortex. The vortex was still spinning, but it had slowed down. Because the resentment was less, the lack had been filled. He continued forward, toward the deepest part of the vortex.

There lay a skeleton. It was not the skeleton of a Demon God, but a human one. It was very small, like that of a child. The skeleton lay at the center of the vortex, surrounded by resentment. Resentment seeped from it like blood from a wound.

"This is..." Bai Ze's voice trembled.

"It's the last person of this world," Lu Mingyuan said. "The last person of that broken world. Everyone else died, leaving only him. He lived alone until the very end. Then he died too. Before he died, he absorbed all the resentment into himself. Because he didn't want that resentment to scatter into Chaos; if it scattered, no one would remember. By taking it into himself, at least someone would remember him."

Lu Mingyuan knelt down before the skeleton. He reached out and touched its head. The skull was cold, like ice. But he felt a warmth—the last bit of temperature left by this child.

"I remember you," Lu Mingyuan said. "And I remember them too. Everyone is remembered."

The skeleton began to glow. Not golden, but white. White as snow, bright as a star. Light radiated from the skeleton, illuminating the vortex, the Chaos, and everything.

The vortex stopped. The resentment dissipated. The lack was filled.

Lu Mingyuan stood up, his body covered in wounds. His chest was caved in, his ribs were broken, and blood flowed from his mouth. But he stood tall. Because his heart was not bent; when the heart is not bent, the body does not bend.

Bai Ze looked at him, tears in its eyes. It had lived for tens of thousands of years and had never seen a person like this. He was on the verge of death himself, yet he was still delivering others. He was almost shattered himself, yet he was still completing others.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. I won't die."

"Your tree..."

Lu Mingyuan looked inside his Dantian. The tree had shrunk to one zhang. One zhang—as short as a shrub. But it was still alive; the roots were there, the trunk was there, and the heart was there. As long as it lived, it would grow.

"It's fine. It will grow back."

He set off, continuing forward. Not hurried, not agitated, not attached. Walking slowly, walking steadily, walking gently.

Behind him, the skeleton was still glowing. The light was weak, like a firefly. But the light did not go out, because it was remembered. Because it was remembered, its life was not in vain.

The oil lamp glowed in his hand, flickering like a heartbeat. That light was a single beam in the Chaos, weak like a firefly. But the light did not go out, because Zhao Sanniang had given him her heart, and he had brought that heart into the Chaos.