My Simulated Road to Immortality Chapter 2352 - 1755: Layers of the Shadows of All Gods (2)
Previously on My Simulated Road to Immortality...
"Mountain and Sea!"
A sudden tremor jolted through Li Fan’s consciousness.
Right then, a brilliant glow erupted from the emptiness.
The shadows retreated, pulling Li Fan back into the real world.
Unlike the profound shocks from studying the Mountain and Sea Change Outline or the Starlight Pulse Outline, this [Gods List] offered no extraordinary effects.
It felt just like a fleeting dream; once Li Fan pulled away, its hold on him faded swiftly.
"This doesn’t imply the True God holds less power than the mountains, seas, and stars."
"Instead..."
"The recollections and wisdom from my previous lives have at last become useless in this situation."
"His perception lies far beyond my grasp, yet it mirrors my own in essence. That’s why only such empty visions arise."
"My inheritance has truly exhausted itself."
The onset of this moment didn’t catch Li Fan off guard.
Truth be told, he had already surpassed his former limits, grasping the essence of mountains, seas, and stars while witnessing the reviving True God on the verge of arrival.
"The path forward demands complete reliance on my own efforts."
As this realization dawned in his spiritual awareness, Li Fan spotted what appeared to be an alternate self standing before him.
A subtle grin crossed its face before the figure shattered entirely.
It dissolved into myriad beams of starlight, rushing straight into Li Fan.
A torrent of past experiences flooded toward Li Fan.
If earlier it had been merely a glimpse,
this time it became a full and unfiltered transmission.
After meditating for what seemed an eternity, Li Fan at last absorbed all his former memories.
Beyond the endless cycles of rebirth, these included his deep understandings of the various Mountain Sea techniques.
"This forms the bedrock of how true and false Dao truly function, the core secret behind realizing Hai Zhen."
Even though these memories and perceptions belonged entirely to Li Fan himself,
as he received them now, a subtle distance lingered in his mind.
"The old me was myself, but also not quite."
"The previous Li Fan has perished for good. Only this absolute break can foster an entirely new path to transcendence."
Deep down, Li Fan grasped this truth.
While he couldn’t instantly convert all his prior divine arts and cultivation levels, this handover felt almost like a sudden enlightenment bestowed upon him.
Moment by moment, Li Fan’s comprehension of the Mountain Sea Path and the shifts between true and false deepened.
Viewed differently, it was as if Li Fan and Hai Zhen were starting to merge.
Slowly blurring into one.
"When the merging finishes, that’s when Hai Zhen vanishes completely."
"Yet one could argue Hai Zhen doesn’t vanish at all."
"Because I am Hai Zhen, and Hai Zhen embodies me."
With utter serenity in his heart, Li Fan turned his gaze toward the origins of Mountain and Sea.
"The true and false Dao serves only as a shield for survival. To shatter the impasse for real, the way to slay the gods must be uncovered."
"The [Gods List] remains too obscure. As Mountain Sea splits apart, clearer hints ought to surface."
"I’ll stick to the set course and trace the route back to Mountain Sea’s dawn."
"Even at my present cultivation level, spanning a billion years feels like an endless voyage. Take it step by step."
"By the time I reach there..."
"Maybe the integration and assimilation of Hai Zhen will be almost done."
Li Fan’s mind churned gradually as his body shifted into a slender beam, vanishing into the void domain.
Within the immense void domain lurked not just the peril of Dao Yan’s consumption but also the chaos of timeless eras blending together.
This stood as the ultimate obstacle for any typical saint attempting a backward journey.
Li Fan remained uncertain how Sun Piaomiao had navigated each stride to Mountain Sea’s inception.
Yet for him, moving in reverse posed no real challenge anymore.
The veil of true and false alterations shielded him, rendering Dao Yan utterly powerless against him.
Drawing from innumerable prior journeys and rebirths, Li Fan had explored every corner of Mountain Sea and the void domain firsthand.
Places where past and present blurred into one felt intimately known to Li Fan.
He wandered at ease,
pressing onward without pause, crossing vast distances.
Bypassing the fierce clashes between Mountain Sea and Dao Yan, his sole focus stayed on any signs of Sun Piaomiao or Qiu Tianhui.
Sure enough, echoes of Sun Piaomiao’s passage appeared, confirming her backward trek.
Oddly, though, Qiu Tianhui and his spouse had seemingly dissolved into the fabric of mountain and sea.
"Faint vital energies linger, yet no glimpse of their forms."
"From Mountain Sea’s close to its start, what drives their hidden agenda?"
As the one who had shaped both Li Fan and Hai Zhen, Qiu Xinhui could faintly detect their essence.
Qiu Tianhui and his wife might have picked up on it too.
"That so-called Mountain Sea revival scheme... It fails to deliver true redemption. They must realize this."
While retracing his steps, Li Fan pondered deeply.
He roamed Mountain Sea like a ghostly wanderer, slipping through every nook without a single mark left behind.
He lost track of time’s flow, until...
With one more step, the entire realm seemed to whirl in turmoil.
The towering Upper Mountain and the endless flow of Infinite Sea faded away inexplicably.
In a flash, he stood amid a barren landscape.
"Taichu Immortal Realm."
A sharp spark ignited in Li Fan’s gaze.
This marked the early phase of Mountain and Sea’s union, including their desperate bid to defy fate.
But the True God Finger’s meddling had wrecked this domain from within.
"Inside, the saints dimly sensed the peril, so they resorted to severing the future for a fragile truce."
"The Primordial Saint..."
"Hmph, nothing but self-serving schemers."
Across his myriad rebirths, Li Fan had crossed paths with these Primordial Saints.
None, however, proved worthy allies in the fight.
"Too feeble to challenge the gods, powerless to rescue the realm. They just squabble in this confined space."
Disdain filled Li Fan, yet he refused to dismiss their threat lightly.
The Taichu Immortal Realm appeared severed from Mountain Sea, its time and space frozen in stasis.
The saints’ endless internal strife dragged on eternally; those who endured carried the spark of divinity. They merely awaited the right spark.
Li Fan had seen two fresh gods rise in different timelines before, serving as stark proof.
He peered upward, straining to glimpse even more ancient depths.
But an invisible wall blocked his view, leaving everything hazy.
Pushing ahead to invert the currents felt like sinking into thick mud, trapped and unable to budge.
"That’s precisely why Taichu Immortal Realm draws in all these saints yet stifles any real contest for godhood."
"Prior to Taichu Immortal Realm lay the era of Mountain Sea’s division."
"Of course, Mountain Sea wouldn’t allow their offspring to meddle. Hence, this barrier between divine and mortal realms was forged."
"It severs time and space, breaks all links of cause and effect."
Li Fan extended his hand, attempting to pierce the divine and mundane barrier with the True Yet False technique.
But the instant he moved, every saint in Taichu Immortal Realm locked their senses onto him!
Immediately after, a barrage of Taoist spells descended like a raging tempest.
"Mountain Lian Three Saints and my old rival [Suo] are among them."
"Hmm, plus [Transformation], [Determination], [Flow]..."
Ripples of luminous waves surged before him, deflecting every assault.
Even as he brushed off the saints’ onslaughts, Li Fan sensed his strength draining away at a frantic pace.
The safeguarding true and false Dao started to quiver faintly.
With a furrowed brow, Li Fan’s silhouette blurred once more.
He vanished right in front of their eyes.
Though a few divine senses managed to follow his trail, repeated shifts allowed him to slip beyond the saints’ reach.
"First off, the divine and mundane barrier stems from Mountain Sea itself, impossible to shatter lightly."
"Second, with all saints on high alert, any push to cross it—success or failure—draws a united assault. Eliminating one rival boosts their own odds of ascending to godhood."
"The chance for divinity looms now. What exactly breaks this deadlock?"
Concealed in hiding, Li Fan swiftly analyzed drawing from the god-forging events across his two prior existences.
"The gods have clashed endlessly, locked in an odd balance."
"No side dominates, none progresses an inch."
"It’s like water gone completely still."
"In such stagnation, nothing shifts; that’s when a forceful outsider’s stone must crash in."
A eerie flicker lit Li Fan’s eyes; as he shifted position anew, he materialized soundlessly next to [Suo].
[Suo] had fallen to Li Fan’s schemes multiple times, his name etched in the Great Dao True Hall.
Naturally, he couldn’t evade Li Fan’s pursuit.
Innumerable dark shadowy threads writhed about, detecting Li Fan immediately and forming a web to trap him tight.