Chapter 154: Awakening, Harvest

The chessboard stretched on endlessly as before, the sound of falling stones crisp and low, never ceasing.

Yet the next moment, the actions of both Daoists came to an abrupt halt.

Hongjun and the other Daoist simultaneously raised their heads to look at the whisk. One of the countless flying horsetail threads connecting them had snapped in two.

"Quite a clever trick. To think I fell for it without realizing—what about you, Daoist friend?"

Hongjun glanced at the whisk, his expression unchanged, as though the matter was of no concern to him whatsoever.

The Daoist furrowed his brow slightly before smoothing it out again, appearing entirely indifferent to the scene:

"Since Daoist friend failed to notice, naturally, I was no different."

They exchanged a glance. Within their eyes, galaxies reversed and heavenly secrets flowed endlessly—clearly, they were jointly deducing something with profound tacit understanding.

At last, reaching the limit, they simultaneously withdrew their gazes.

"Ancestor Qiankun... does he still dare to meddle in the affairs of the Primordial Realm?"

There was a hint of uncertainty in the Daoist's tone. As he raised his eyes to look once more, he let out a muffled snort and said no more.

"Though he possesses wondrous methods, this is not his doing. It rather resembles the work of Divine Monarch Mengzhang."

Daoist Hongjun raised his hand and made a grasping motion, whereupon something seemed to condense. Finally, he grasped the snapped thread of the whisk in his palm and fell into deep contemplation.

After a brief moment of silence, the strand vanished entirely.

Not only that, but even the faint traces left upon the whisk were completely obliterated. He closed his eyes once more, and the sound of falling stones resumed.

"Out of sight, out of mind."

"Ha, 'out of sight, out of mind' is hardly a supreme principle of the Dao."

Hearing this, the Daoist chuckled. Another stone fell, capturing a vast territory of Hongjun's pieces.

The conversation between the two was a game, the whisk was a game, and this chessboard was, naturally, a game as well.

......

Hm?

Have I... returned?

Hongyun's mind sank briefly. When he regained his senses, he found himself once more within the Zixiao Palace, and could not help but fall into a mild stupor.

He probed his surroundings, only to find that he could perceive nothing save for thick, impenetrable barriers.

Aside from himself, all his fellow Daoists remained deeply immersed in meditation.

However, unlike the others, Hongyun had remained standing all this time.

Noticing that Zhenyuanzi beside him wore a solemn expression, he ceased looking.

Instead, he turned his awareness inward to examine his Dao fruit, discovering that the Dao essence within remained intact. More than that, the cracks that had previously appeared upon it were now distinctly visible.

He felt no alarm at this change in his Dao fruit; rather, he found it somewhat unbelievable.

Could it be that he had brought back what he had gained from that place where he met his past self?

At that moment, Hongyun drew in a slight breath, raised his hand, and watched as wisps of cloud vapor condensed, then faded away.

An illusion capable of affecting reality, and reality transformed into a true illusion—it gave one quite strongly the sensation of wishes being fulfilled.

Hongyun began to comprehend this state. As numerous realizations surfaced, the cracked Dao fruit saw its fissures expand bit by bit.

Even tiny fragments peeled off, vanishing in the blink of an eye.

......

"To think one could truly shake the River of Time and extricate one's past self from it without altering anything at all."

The Ancestral Witch Zhu Jiuyin regained his awareness. He slowly opened his eyes and looked around. His eyes, resembling bottomless black holes, rotated obscurely and devoured the ambient aura within Zixiao Palace while he mentally reviewed the technique he had executed last time.

Rather than saying he was beaten back, it was more accurate to say that he, too, had shaken the River of Time, much like the other party; within a single time coordinate, there could exist only one true self.

He had fished his past self from that specific node out of the River of Time for a fleeting moment, causing the past self summoned into that space to overlap and naturally resolve the dilemma.

Yet, holding such authority, who could have imagined that someone would surpass him in the Dao of Time?

Sensing his surroundings, he perceived that the auras of the other Ancestral Witches were all fluctuating irregularly, so he calmed his mind to ponder.

Shortly after he came to, Ancestral Witch Houtu and Ancestral Witch Xuanming not far away snapped out of their trances almost simultaneously.

The two merely exchanged a glance without exchanging excessive words, then plunged back into quiet contemplation.

"Hahaha...... ha—"

A burst of loud laughter rang out as Ancestral Witch Zhurong recovered his senses. Seeing that Zhu Jiuyin, Houtu, and Xuanming were all staring at him, his laughter abruptly cut off, and he swallowed his mirth.

After all, he still had to maintain his dignity as an elder brother.

"To think that the past me was truly a reckless brute who never used his brain!

Still, my gains are not insignificant; refining my authority even slightly can be considered a decent harvest.

Coming to listen to these scriptures is indeed far more stimulating than sleeping back in the clan."

Zhurong thought happily. A flame was already dancing on his fingertip, and the moment it ignited, the surrounding time and space seemed to become part of its fuel, causing Zhu Jiuyin to furrow his brow slightly.

........

Following the awakening of the first Ancestral Witch, all the remaining Ancestral Witches awoke one after another, save for Shebihu, who remained asleep.

Xuanming thought for a moment and lightly flicked her finger, conjuring a massive ice coffin that directly muffled the faint sound of snoring.

As the Ancestral Witches stirred, the Three Pure Ones opened their eyes almost in unison.

Trading a telepathic look of mutual understanding, they began silently transmitting voices to share their respective gains.

The next moment, like a spark starting a prairie fire, Donghuang Taiyi, Di Jun, Zhenyuanzi, Kunpeng...

One great divine power after another awoke in no particular order, either lost in thought or exchanging voice transmissions, though few spoke aloud.

After the supreme divine powers awoke, those of slightly lesser cultivation also opened their eyes sequentially.

"Daoist friend, some of the wondrous methods within truly left me bewildered."

As one great divine power spoke out, the entire Zixiao Palace erupted with the sound of voice transmissions and spoken words.

......

"Brother Hongyun, have you awakened?"

Zyuanzi's voice transmission reached Hongyun's sea of consciousness. His tone was gentle and softer than ordinary transmissions, for he could already sense Hongyun's aura yet remained somewhat uncertain.

"Indeed I have."

Hongyun replied via voice transmission, a subtle ripple in his heart as a wisp of mist drifted forth to envelop them both, transforming into a barrier that isolated all other sounds:

"What I encountered was a battle against my past self. Ultimately, by employing certain methods, I managed to reap modest gains."

"Much the same here. I, too, fought my past self.

Yet you know my methods, Brother; had I not achieved a breakthrough, I fear it might have taken until the end of time to reach a conclusion."

Zhenyuanzi's voice transmission carried a trace of surprise, making no effort to conceal it.

Hearing each other's accounts, both felt genuinely happy for the other and fell into deep thought.

For beings of their standing, even modest gains constituted monumental harvests.

After all, having already attained the pinnacle of the Daluo Golden Immortal realm, even the slightest increment of refinement was exceedingly rare.