Xu Ziqing steadied his breathing and gathered his concentration, never letting down his guard for a moment.
Before long, his mind was full and clear, his vital essence abundant. He had returned to his best possible condition.
At the same time, countless mysteries of life and death flowed through his eyes like a mighty river, surging endlessly onward.
The Dao of the Cycle of Life and Death was the Great Dao Xu Ziqing had pursued his entire life, the path by which he sought immortality!
Beneath this profound and unfathomable will, his entire being seemed to grow clear and empty.
He entered a peculiar state, as though he were himself and yet standing beyond the heavens, gazing down at his own body from some distant, misty height.
Within his dantian, the Golden Core pulsed ever more violently.
More spiritual energy poured in. The Great Art of Myriad Woods Heart-Planting circulated furiously, transforming spiritual energy into true essence and filling the Golden Core with it.
Xu Ziqing focused his will upon the Golden Core, wearing away its outer shell little by little, peeling it back layer by layer.
“Thump! Thump! Thump!”
The pounding sounded like a series of demonic incantations, threatening to destroy his heart and soul!
A voice demanded harshly, “You possess excellent aptitude, yet your intentions are impure. You will never attain the Great Dao!”
Keeping his eyes tightly closed, Xu Ziqing met the accusation head-on. “Since I began cultivating, I have devoted myself earnestly to it, never daring to indulge myself. How are my intentions impure?”
The speaker sneered. “Your heart is filled with romantic attachment. Love has shaken your Dao heart again and again. Unless you forsake affection and abandon love, there will be no Great Dao for you!”
Xu Ziqing’s heart trembled. “The Dao I cultivate has never been a path of emotionlessness. Love allows me to remain true to myself. It is certainly no obstacle to attaining the Dao!”
The voice continued. “You cling to your senior brother at every turn. Without him beside you, your weakness would leave you unable to accomplish anything!”
Xu Ziqing calmed himself and replied, “Senior Brother and I are inseparable in heart. How is that clinging to him? As Dao companions, we should move forward hand in hand. In the past I relied on Senior Brother, but in the future he may well come to rely on me. If I brood over everything and calculate every tiny grievance, my thoughts will lose their freedom, and I will only breed inner demons.”
For a time, that voice and Xu Ziqing argued without end.
One said, “Your senior brother’s talent is extraordinary. Were you not holding him back, he would long since have cut through every obstacle and attained the highest Dao!”
The other answered, “Senior Brother’s resolve is firm. Nothing of this sort would shake his Dao heart. Whatever he pursues must truly be what his own heart desires!”
One said again, “You fall short of your senior brother in everything. How could you ever be worthy of him?”
The other replied, “If I fall short, I must strive to catch up. Falling behind now does not mean falling behind forever. I will not look down on myself, nor will I look down on Senior Brother!”
One pressed on, “You are softhearted and indecisive, unfit for greatness. Rong Jin is steeped in murderous qi. One day it will seize your soul!”
The other answered, “Rong Jin gained awareness long ago. With proper guidance, it will not go astray. My Dao heart is firm. How could it seize me?”
One said, “Your senior brother follows slaughter, while you follow life. Life and killing cannot coexist. In the end, you and your senior brother will part as strangers!”
The other replied, “Where there is life, there is death. The cycle of life and death is the very Dao I cultivate. Even amid ten thousand killing intents, there remains a thread of life. Senior Brother and I complement one another. How could we become strangers?”
The voice chattered on, as though it had countless more accusations to make.
Xu Ziqing drew a deep breath and spoke clearly. “Say no more. You cannot shake my resolve.”
“You dig out the obstacles hidden in my heart, hoping to control me. I may not be outstanding, but I am no shallow fool.”
“Do not try to deceive me. You are my inner demon. Whenever you find a crack, you seize upon it to make trouble. Leave at once!”
His voice rang like spring thunder, each word resounding in his ears. “Whether you are an inner demon or a barrier of the heart, I, Xu Ziqing, have long since settled my convictions. However much you prattle, you cannot disturb me!”
After these words, the endless buzzing arguments finally vanished.
Xu Ziqing had broken into a cold sweat that soaked half his body.
The inner demon had taken advantage of an opening to return, but this had also been an interrogation of his own heart.
Had Xu Ziqing not been tormented by his inner demon once before, and had his primordial spirit not mingled with Yun Lie’s to dissolve the barrier in his heart, it would not have been so easy to drive it away this time.
After this confrontation, however, he should enjoy another long spell of peace.
He slowly regulated his breathing and looked inward once more.
He discovered that a crack had appeared on his Golden Core.
As true essence poured in ceaselessly and the will of his primordial spirit continued to wear at it, that crack widened. Countless fine fissures also appeared along the outer edges.
At the same time, his primordial spirit began to ache sharply.
The green light that had descended from it suddenly withdrew, plunging directly into the embryonic Minor Cosmos.
Then the Golden Core shattered.
In an instant, it became a cloud of golden powder!
An even more powerful surge of vitality erupted, filled with the joy of new life.
When the golden powder dispersed, the place where the Golden Core had been was occupied by an infant!
It was an infant no bigger than a fist, completely green, yet possessing clearly formed eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.
Its form was solid, its features distinct though still childish. On closer examination, was it not the exact image of Xu Ziqing?
The Nascent Soul had formed!
This was Xu Ziqing’s very own Nascent Soul!
Yet even though the Nascent Soul had taken shape, his task was far from finished.
At that very instant, the Heavenly Dao sent down a vast and surging will.
The will was terrifying beyond measure. Against it, Xu Ziqing’s consciousness was an ant, a drifting leaf on the open sea, utterly weak and insignificant.
But it could not shake him.
He steadied his mind and conveyed his own Dao through his primordial spirit.
The cycle of life and death, the turning of death into life. There was life and death, and beyond them neither birth nor extinction.
His will became an immovable pillar in the sea, a rock standing firm against the crashing surf, indomitable and unyielding.
Under the laws of the Heavenly Dao, the Great Art of Myriad Woods Heart-Planting also underwent a peculiar transformation.
It was a legendary cultivation art, and such an art allowed its practitioner to seize a greater share of the Heavenly Dao’s gifts when forming a Nascent Soul!
In no more than the blink of an eye:
Within the Purple Palace, the embryonic Minor Cosmos expanded and matured without cease, rapidly forming a true Minor Cosmos. Its space grew tens of millions of times larger, and all the world’s rules that had previously existed within it became clearer, on the verge of taking tangible form.
Inside this newborn Purple Palace Minor Cosmos, the ten thousand woods grew even faster. It was as though a thousand or ten thousand years had passed in an instant. Their vitality abruptly increased, making them older and more powerful than ever before.
Rong Jin, the Bloodthirsty Demon Vine, continually split and grew its tendrils. In just a few breaths, it possessed over ten thousand, even tens of thousands of vines!
Every single vine was tremendously thick, so broad that even two or three people together could not wrap their arms around it, and they rose high into the sky.
Its roots pierced deep into the earth of the Minor Cosmos, occupying an immense expanse. Its wild, grasping tendrils already covered half the heavens.
This was the Bloodthirsty Demon Vine’s true appearance!
Only after Xu Ziqing had reached the Nascent Soul realm could it finally reveal its real form!
Once the vine had fully unfurled, three Sword-Shaped Trees shot up from the earth, surrounding the territory occupied by the demonic vine and establishing a domain of their own.
Flesh Upon Bones had previously been reduced to nothing more than seeds. Now, under the Heavenly Dao’s gift, it immediately grew to maturity again and claimed its own plot of land. When it matured, its seeds fell and grew into new Flesh Upon Bones plants, one after another, until they formed an entire medicinal field.
Several other trees of supreme yang also flourished and established themselves, surrounding the bloodthirsty vine at the center like guards.
The changes within the Purple Palace Minor Cosmos were nothing short of earthshaking.
But at that moment, cracks began to appear in the ground of the Minor Cosmos.
Ordinary plants would have posed no problem. Yet these ancient savage entities, exceptionally rare treasures, and spiritual objects had all fully unfolded. A young cultivator who had only just formed a Nascent Soul could not possibly support them all within his Minor Cosmos.
Not even a legendary cultivation art granted him that kind of power.
Xu Ziqing felt a chill in his heart.
The Dao he sought was not mistaken, but he had overestimated his own abilities…
For an instant, he almost laughed bitterly at himself.
Cracks spread across the ground of the embryonic Minor Cosmos, and its form grew hazy. Unbearable pain surged through him. The Minor Cosmos was about to collapse!
Even the Nascent Soul that had just formed was beginning to dim.
He was… going to fail…
Cold sweat streamed down Xu Ziqing’s face, but he refused to accept it.
If he failed to form a Nascent Soul this time, he might be delayed for a hundred years or longer.
Worse still, after this failure, there was no guarantee he would ever find the right opportunity again.
How could he fail? How could he possibly fail!
Perhaps because his determination had grown so intense, something within his storage bracelet suddenly responded to his thoughts.
It seemed an object was desperately trying to get out…
Xu Ziqing bit the tip of his tongue to force himself to calm down.
In a situation like this, he ought to trust his intuition.
He hesitated no longer. A thought moved, and he released the object!
A streak of light instantly shot toward him.
Xu Ziqing saw it clearly. Floating before him was a brown, hard lump the size of a pigeon’s egg.
It was neither metal nor wood, and looked almost like a clod of hardened earth.
This was…
Before he could make sense of it, the object blazed with intense light.
It seemed to want to break through something and enter somewhere.
An idea stirred in Xu Ziqing’s mind. Could it be trying to enter his Purple Palace Minor Cosmos?
After a moment’s thought, he opened the Purple Palace.
Things could hardly get worse. Why not try?
The next instant, the hard lump flew straight into the center of Xu Ziqing’s forehead, crashing into the Purple Palace Minor Cosmos!
At the very instant it entered, the entire Minor Cosmos underwent another dramatic change!
It seemed… much more stable.
Once inside, the lump instantly began spreading and expanding without limit through the air.
Only then did Xu Ziqing realize that once expanded, it resembled an expanse of fertile soil!
When it had grown to a seemingly boundless size, it descended and immediately merged with the ground that was already there.
After the hard lump fused with the earth, every crack vanished. The soil became hard and strong, and the myriad woods rooted within it flourished with even greater vitality!
At that moment, an idea suddenly occurred to Xu Ziqing.
Xi Rang…
Soil that could grow without limit and never diminish. There was only one such thing: Xi Rang!
It was the legendary divine earth!
Xi Rang was always associated with disastrous floods. Never had Xu Ziqing imagined that an unidentified object he had picked up casually in a secret treasury years ago would prove to be such a treasure.
He had kept it rather than discarding or trading it away because of an inexplicable premonition. Now, at this decisive moment, it had helped stabilize his Minor Cosmos and enabled him to form a Nascent Soul successfully!
The stabilized Minor Cosmos was now a hundred times sturdier than before.
The might of Xu Ziqing’s Minor Cosmos depended on the ten thousand woods. Those woods grew stronger when supported by soil… and what earth in this world could surpass Xi Rang?
This, too, was surely a matter of fortune.
…It even caused Xu Ziqing’s newborn Minor Cosmos to become substantially more solid.
It was far more formidable than the Minor Cosmos of an ordinary cultivator at the early Nascent Soul stage.
Xu Ziqing’s Nascent Soul was no longer dim.
It had become lively and responsive. As it had only just formed, its eyes remained closed.
At least it would no longer collapse easily.
Even now, however, Xu Ziqing still had something else to accomplish.
Once the Minor Cosmos stabilized, the world laws hung high overhead. Yet the laws of the Sumeru Mustard Seed did not entirely belong to Xu Ziqing.
He opened his eyes and once more brought forth his Dao of the Cycle of Life and Death.
Xu Ziqing’s consciousness and personal Dao surged into the Minor Cosmos, becoming an invisible current of green qi that instantly wound itself around the world laws.
This green qi was immensely powerful. It revolved around the laws without ceasing, wearing them down and assimilating them with every turn.
The world laws were like the heavens above the Minor Cosmos, and Xu Ziqing’s will sought to subdue those “heavens.”
Fortunately, they had long since been bound to his heart’s blood and did not reject him too fiercely. That was what allowed him to assimilate them gradually.
Day after day passed. The “heavens” merged with his “Dao,” and slowly the sky overhead became a mass of primal chaos.
Dark clouds formed, swirling like a giant vortex.
Xu Ziqing’s primordial spirit endured the effort, constantly urging the vortex to move.
The cycle of life and death. Death and life turning endlessly!
His own Dao was clear and distinct. How could it be allowed to sink into chaos?
Unless… unless…
Xu Ziqing suddenly raised his head. Green light shot from his eyes.
If chaos was to be divided, yin and yang must first be separated.
Among the myriad woods were yin and yang, life and extinction.
The Dao of life and the Dao of death formed the cycle through yin and yang…
With a tremendous sound like the splitting of heaven from earth, the vortex in the sky changed.
It began to spin relentlessly, drawing countless surrounding clouds inward.
At last its outlines became clear, and in the final instant it took shape!
It was a gigantic pattern.
It contained yin and yang, birth and death, good and evil, turning endlessly.
It was none other than Taiji.
The moment the Taiji pattern formed, every tree and plant seemed to resonate with it.
Beneath the Taiji, the Dao of life and the Dao of death stood opposite one another across the distance, yet remained intimately connected.
The arrangement of the myriad woods within the Minor Cosmos also seemed to change.
Good woods and evil woods, yang woods and yin woods, each took its distinct place.
Xu Ziqing’s consciousness, however, grew clearer still.
He had never understood his Dao so thoroughly as he did now, never felt so perfectly in harmony with the path he cultivated.
Now that he had formed his Minor Cosmos, the immortal path ahead would be much more open.
When he closed his eyes again, the Heavenly Dao’s terrifying will had vanished. Only the will belonging to Xu Ziqing himself remained.
That will would accompany him as he stabilized his Nascent Soul and continued refining his Minor Cosmos.
Only when his cultivation realm, too, was entirely stabilized would he emerge from seclusion.
But at last… he had broken through successfully.