Chapter 52
Not out of fear—because he had witnessed far too many horrors to fear an additional eye—but because of something behind that eye, something moving within its depths, something that made the hairs on his neck stand on end even though he possessed ten crystals and stood at the peak of the Vast Cosmos.
"Stop," he said, his voice slightly higher than usual—and to Ling Xu, who was accustomed to his lazy tone, this was equivalent to hysterical shouting. "Don't show that to me. It's terrifying, Liu Xin. Seriously. I'm not joking."
Ling Xu laughed—a genuine laugh, unrestrained, rising from his abdomen that still ached from the torment that had just passed—then closed his third eye, allowing the vertical slit on his forehead to seal once more with the surrounding skin, leaving only a faint scar shaped like a stab wound widened by a blade, dim like a memory that would never truly fade.
"Alright, Zhao Wei," he said while adjusting the bandage on his head that had begun to loosen, his fingers moving carefully, with a gentleness he had never shown to his enemies.
In the silence that enveloped the meditation chamber after the transformation, Ling Xu let his consciousness sink into his new cultivation axis—and there, through the third eye at the center of his forehead that still pulsed faintly with grayish-green light, he began to feel something he had never experienced before, something flowing from his Everlasting Prism like an underground river long hidden beneath layers of stone, soil, and time.
It was not ordinary Qi that could be measured by shards or Longitude, but a kind of energy more refined, older, more… obedient, like a dog that had waited for so long at the door and was finally allowed inside, licking its owner's hand with a warm, damp tongue.
"Is this what it feels like to be a cultivator of the Supreme Dao?" Ling Xu murmured inwardly, and the moment that question crossed his mind, his third eye—without command, without intention, simply because he thought about that energy—projected something into the air before him, something that took the shape of a thin mist swirling into a spiral, then transforming into a sphere of light, then into a sword, then into a shield, then into delicate threads dancing like serpents celebrating their freedom.
Dao, something whispered within the depths of his consciousness.
Not a voice, but knowledge appearing suddenly like lightning across a clear sky—The Dao you wield now can be shaped into various forms of Dao according to your intent, as long as your condition meets the prerequisites required for each manifestation.
Huan Zheng, who moments ago had stepped back five paces with an expression caught between horror and irritation, now approached again with his usual lazy steps—because even though Ling Xu's third eye was terrifying, his drowsiness was even more unbearable, and he would rather face horror than lose sleep.
"You can stop playing with your new Dao, Liu Xin," he said with a wide yawn, his right hand scratching an itchless stomach while his left pointed at the ever-shifting mist before Ling Xu.
"We'll have plenty of time to experiment later. For now, listen carefully—I'm about to explain something important, and don't interrupt me because I'm very sleepy, and if you interrupt me I might get angry, and if I get angry I won't be able to sleep, and if I can't sleep I'll become a grumpy slacker, and that is the worst combination in the entire infinite universe."
He drew a breath—a breath that felt like gathering the remnants of his thinning patience—then continued in a voice that suddenly became more serious, though his eyes remained half-closed like a cat on the verge of sleep in its owner's lap.
"Right now, Liu Xin, we are in the cultivation realm of the Supreme Dao Seed," Huan Zheng said, raising his index finger one by one with each level he mentioned, like a teacher instructing in a silent classroom even though his only student was a bandage-wrapped girl with a strangely pulsing third eye on her forehead.
"The lowest level in the Supreme Dao realm. You're right—the lowest. After your transformation, after passing the Trial of Concealment Within Corpses, after losing both your eyes and gaining three in return, you have only stepped onto the first rung of a ladder that never truly ends."
He exhaled—a breath that sounded like someone tired of explaining the same thing repeatedly but continuing because no one else could—then continued in a softer, more careful tone, like someone reciting a list of treasures hidden in the deepest ocean.
"In the Supreme Dao realm, there are at least five stages divided into: Seed, Root, Branching Vines, Leaves and Fruit, and finally—Dew."
Ling Xu did not respond with words.
He simply remained silent, letting each stage settle within his chest like precious stones being placed one by one into a treasure chest he had never imagined he would possess, and within his heart, between the pulses of the Everlasting Prism that beat in rhythm with his own heart, he murmured in a voice unheard by anyone—perhaps only by the Cancer plague still dwelling in the darkest corner of his consciousness.
"Seed, Root, Branching Vines, Leaves and Fruit, Dew," he repeated inwardly, each word unfamiliar upon the tongue of his mind yet strangely fitting, like shoes found in a flea market that fit perfectly despite never being measured.
And then, without realizing it, his eyes—or rather, his third eye—began to glisten, not out of sadness, but from a gratitude so immense, so deep, so overflowing that it could no longer be contained within his narrow chest.
"Thank you, Zhao Wei," he said, his voice trembling like the string of a zither plucked too softly yet still producing a touching note, his bandaged hand reaching for Huan Zheng's lazily hanging hand, gripping it firmly, warmly, with gratitude that required no words because words would never be enough to describe what it meant to have someone walk beside you for thousands of miles, to die with you eleven times, to never leave you even when you lost both your eyes and transformed into something even you did not understand.
"I am so deeply grateful to have reached this point. And it is all because you are by my side. Because you never left. Because you—"
He stopped, swallowing as if swallowing a thorn lodged in his throat, then smiled.
A smile no longer bitter, no longer hollow, but warm like a cup of ginger tea on a cold night—a smile that appears only once in a lifetime, when someone truly realizes that they are not alone in this cruel world.
To be continued…