Chapter 1584: Bud and Flower

“...so what if we’ve found the reason?” the Dao King sighed dejectedly. “The known and unknown expanses all cultivate ‘nothing’. The only solution to our problems is still to create an even bigger world to dominate the planes and become the source of order.”

“That is true.” Mo Yi drooped and sat back down.

……

“In the Star Sect’s eyes, soul force is true strength that is tangible. The sect only ever looks at soul force when accepting disciples and only takes supplemental grandmasters,” Xing Lan explained seriously. “So it would go against the grain of what the sect stands for if junior brother doesn’t cultivate your soul force.”

Lu Yun frowned slightly with a nod. Still, he didn’t think much of this. He had the six hellfires in his body, not soul force or “nothing”. On his first trip to the fourth realm, he only possessed the hadal hellfire. He’d discovered then that when his true cultivation level reached the fourth realm, the hellfire would gradually give way to the power of “nothing”.

But now that he’d completed the Disordered Hell and the six hellfires were in his body as a combined whole, they’d expelled the power of nothing that’d crept into his body.

There were only two types of strength in his body now—hellfire and soul force.

But hellfire shouldn’t be manifested in the fourth realm.

“Thank you for your pointers, senior sister,” Lu Yun chuckled when his thoughts traveled here. “I will make sure to train my soul force well.” He turned back to his residence.

“Eh? I say…” Xing Lan blinked and called out to him.

“Is there something else, senior sister?” Lu Yun scratched his head with confusion.

“I’m here already, shouldn’t you be showing me some hospitality?” Xing Lan said with some irritation.

Annoyances from the sect had followed after her gender reveal. Many genius disciples of their generation, and even ones of the previous, came to curry favor and fawn over her. Now that she was in front of Feng Feifan’s residence, how dare he not fulfill his duties as a host and pay much attention to her?

“Senior sister Xing Lan!” Lu Yun turned around with a solemn look. “I have heard of the happenings in the sect after your true self was revealed. Many famous true disciples regard you as their goddess. If I invite you in, they’ll come and raze my abode tonight!”

Xing Lan paused. While there weren’t many who had their eyes set on her, there was still a sizable number of people. Indeed, they were all true disciples and, in fact, the head disciple of their various masters.

Lu Yun had hidden his identity to focus on cultivating in the Star Sect; he didn’t want any trouble. He knew why Xing Lan was here—Xing Chen wanted to borrow him to change her disciple’s fate.

However, he didn’t want his peace broken on account of a woman.

Change fate?

He’d only raised a tiny wave out of a big river. He had no idea what lay in store for his future, so how would he be inclined to help someone else change theirs?

He transported into his residence after speaking and sealed off the front door with eighteen restrictions, focusing on training his soul force.

Xing Lan stood with her jaw dropped in front of her junior brother’s door, finally leaving with a rueful chuckle.

“He probably thinks women are trouble… I think women are trouble.” She turned herself back into the appearance of a man with a shake of her body.

A slight shift took place in her thoughts. Whether it was Xing Lang or Xing Lan, man or woman, weren’t they all her? Why be caught up in appearances?

Should she present herself as a woman just because everyone knew her gender? She was Xing Lan!

“Junior brother Feng truly lives a carefree life.” Xing Lan left with a leap into the sky. “Ah, I’ve gotten fixated on things again. What does it matter what I look like? It’s all for other people’s eyes. What the heck do I care about other people? I’ll just hang them up for a beating if they gossip about me.”

……

The door to the nameless residence cracked open and Lu Yun poked a head out, sighing with relief to find his doorstep empty.

“She’s a hard one to read and seems to like hanging people up for a beating… If she ever did that to me…” He shook his head slightly.

“There is no unified great dao in the fourth realm.” Mo Yi walked out of the Disordered Hell and sat down next to Lu Yun.

“Hmm?” He blinked at her sudden appearance. The Disordered Hell couldn’t curtail her freedom; she was only there because she wanted to be.

“The immortal dao will be assimilated by the endless nothing once it enters the fourth realm, becoming just a minor dao in the boundless fourth realm.” She took a seat on one of his cushions and propped her chin up with her hands. “Perhaps my line of thinking was wrong before—I wanted to recreate the original Hongmeng to suppress the fourth realm’s orders.”

“Why not just build a great dao in the fourth realm to fight the boundless nothing?” Lu Yun asked.

“Some daydreams should just stay as daydreams. Not even powerhouses who’ve opened nine doors of sequence can do that.” She looked at Lu Yun. “Not unless you reach the level of the one who holds all of existence in their hand and created the endless reincarnation cycles.”

Lu Yun fell silent. Whether it was reaching that level or recreating the original Hongmeng, both were impossible for him at the moment.

“There’s no need to have the original Hongmeng appear again,” Mo Yi continued. “There is a seed of nothing in the Central Hongmeng as well as creation seeds. It can continuously manifest order and incorporate the seed of nothing into the immortal dao. If we have the immortal dao traverse the fourth realm after that, we can have it create a world of immortal dao.

“If that world is strong enough to suppress the orders of the fourth realm, that will prevent us from dissolving into nothing.”

“How do we go about doing that?” Lu Yun understood her intentions. Someone else must control the seed of nothing for her to craft the solution this way.

“Disseminate dao in the fourth realm and have formula dao bud and flower here,” Mo Yi responded after some thought. “Formula dao was created by the Dao Sovereign. If it flourishes here, that’s the equivalent of immortal dao taking root here!”

“Alright!” Lu Yun agreed without hesitation. He’d wanted to do the same thing, but hadn’t done so because of the withered wood on him. If he recruited disciples in the fourth realm, that would probably bring disaster down on his head. “Should I exile the withered wood into time now?”