Chapter 741
Ren Xue
"Your divinity has not weakened, but rather is being 'purified.'" A hint of inquiry flashed in the eyes of the God of Destruction. "It's like removing impurities and returning to the origin. This is very rare. At least in the historical records of the divine realm, no god has ever been able to do this after losing all his power."
The Goddess of Life took over the conversation, her gaze gentle yet thoughtful: "Wu Lin, what exactly did you experience when you fought against the Eye of Annihilation? What changes occurred deep within your consciousness?"
The courtyard fell silent; even the wind seemed to have stopped. Qian Renxue looked at her husband with worry, afraid that this question would touch upon his painful memories. But Tang Wulin's expression was calm. He pondered for a moment before slowly speaking.
“I saw ‘nothingness’,” he said.
Two words caused both god-kings to change color simultaneously.
"Tell me in detail," the God of Destruction's voice deepened.
Tang Wulin organized his thoughts, attempting to describe the indescribable experience: "When the will of the Eye of Annihilation invaded my consciousness and dragged me into darkness, initially it was indeed a wave of negative emotions—despair, anger, hatred, everything that can destroy a person's sanity. But when I held fast to my principles, using my memories as a beacon to resist the erosion, something changed."
He closed his eyes, as if reliving that moment: "Those negative emotions suddenly faded away, not vanished, but were 'replaced' by something more fundamental. I lost all senses—I couldn't see, I couldn't hear, I couldn't feel my body, I couldn't even feel my own existence. It wasn't darkness; darkness is at least 'existence,' but true 'nothingness,' a state where even the concept of 'nothingness' itself doesn't exist."
The goddess of life's breathing quickened almost imperceptibly for a moment.
“In that state, the only proof of my ‘existence’ was those warm memories.” Tang Wulin continued, his voice soft yet exceptionally clear. “My parents’ smiles, Xue’er’s tears, the children’s calls, and my friends’ trust—these memories were not presented in the form of images or sounds. They were ‘existence’ itself, the anchor points, the coordinates, the only things that could prove that ‘I’ am ‘me’.”
He opened his eyes, and deep within his azure pupils, it seemed as if stars were spinning: "Then, the will of the Eye of Annihilation manifested—not in a concrete form, but as a 'tendency,' a tendency to pull everything into 'nothingness.' It collided with my memories, or rather, with 'existence' itself. At that moment, the embers of the Dragon God deep within my soul were ignited."
“That wasn’t a contest of power,” Tang Wulin concluded with certainty. “It was a contest between ‘existence’ and ‘non-existence.’ The reason why the Dragon God’s Embers were able to severely injure the Eye of Annihilation was not because it was stronger, but because it represented the ultimate in ‘existence’—life, creation, order, everything that constitutes the foundation of this world.”
A long silence fell over the courtyard.
After a long while, the God of Destruction slowly exhaled, a complex light flashing in his eyes: "So that's how it is. No wonder, no wonder."
"No wonder what?" Qian Renxue couldn't help but ask.
The Goddess of Life answered for her husband, her voice tinged with shock: "The divine realm has been studying the Eye of Annihilation for countless years. We have always believed that it is some kind of powerful being beyond our comprehension, requiring even greater power to fight against and seal it. But now it seems that we may have been fundamentally wrong."
She looked at Tang Wulin with the eyes of someone looking at some incredible miracle: "It is not an 'existence', but the opposite of 'existence'. The key to resisting it is not the size of the power, but the strength of the 'existence'—the purer, more steadfast, and more unshakable the 'existence', the more it can resist its erosion."
“Like a candle in the darkness, no matter how faint its light, as long as it doesn’t go out, it proves the existence of light,” Tang Wulin said softly. “Exactly.” The God of Destruction nodded. He paced back and forth a few steps, then suddenly stopped, his gaze towards Tang Wulin becoming fervent. “Boy, have you ever thought about starting your cultivation anew and taking a different path?”
Tang Wulin was slightly taken aback: "What do you mean, Senior?"
“Your soul power is currently weak, but your divinity is pure, and your understanding of the laws is unique.” The God of Destruction spoke faster, clearly excited by this idea. “Why not abandon traditional cultivation methods and start from scratch to build a cultivation system that perfectly suits your current state? Instead of pursuing the accumulation of power, pursue the deepening and expansion of ‘existence’.”
The Goddess of Life's eyes lit up: "That's right! Traditional cultivation works from the outside in—absorbing energy, strengthening oneself, and ultimately touching the laws. But you have the opportunity to do the opposite, from the inside out—using pure divinity as the core and a profound understanding of the laws as the framework to rebuild your power system!"
Qian Renxue's heart raced as she listened. If the two God-Kings' predictions were correct, it meant that Tang Wulin could not only recover, but might even embark on an unprecedented path, reaching a realm that even the God-Kings had never touched.
But Tang Wulin remained silent. He looked down at his hands, the hands that once wielded the Golden Dragon Spear and tore through the sky and earth, now trembled even when lifting a bucket of water. Starting over—it sounded easy, but it meant abandoning all familiar paths and groping forward in the unknown.
He had just begun to speak when hurried footsteps suddenly came from outside the courtyard.
Tang Xuan Yu strode in, his expression grave: "Grandpa, Grandma, Father, Mother, something's happened."
"What's wrong?" Tang San's voice came from outside the door. He had obviously also sensed the unusual fluctuations and rushed over with Xiao Wu.
Tang Xuan Yu took a deep breath: "Over at the Abyss Gate, a crack has appeared in the barrier of the Tree of Life. Although it's small, something is seeping out from inside."
The gods' expressions changed drastically.
Before the Tree of Life, the gods of the divine realm gathered.
The colossal ancient tree still exudes a powerful life force, but beneath its canopy, the rift that stretches across the edge of the divine realm—the Gate of the Abyss—is undergoing a strange transformation. The gate, originally completely sealed by a pale golden barrier, now has a hair-thin crack in its center, from which a jet-black substance slowly seeps out, dripping onto the land of the divine realm like viscous oil.
It wasn't a physical entity, but rather the embodiment of a certain "concept." Where it dripped, the grass didn't wither, the rocks didn't erode, but everything there became "blurred"—not visually, but in a sense of presence, as if those things were "fading out" of the world.
"Back off!" the God of Destruction roared, waving his hand to create a purple barrier that isolated the seeping substance within a radius of ten feet.
Tang San stepped forward, the Trident of the Sea God appearing in his hand, its azure divine light sweeping across the area. Where the divine light passed, the blurriness slightly diminished, but quickly returned—it wasn't dispelled, but merely temporarily suppressed. (End of Chapter)