Chapter 352: A Trip Through Time and Beyond (1) |
There exists a river of time in this world and beyond. Without time, everyone will remain still like any one of the images. Time flows through everyone and allows them to 'move.' Although 'time' is a formless concept and is considered on a similar level as spatial law, grasping the latter is much easier. Why?
Because not only Temporal Law directly passes through the omniscient space and connects the past with the future using the present, but it also affects all forms of lifeforms regardless of their ascension. Gods and mortals suffer over time. It's just a matter of intensity.
Time is one of the forces MEANT to hurt living beings. With time comes life and with life comes suffering. With time comes the passage of life. In time life decays and death prevails. If the omniscient space is meant to accommodate, then Time is meant to regulate what space holds within itself. Not only living beings but every form of creation.
Even the Supreme Dragon God is no more. From the story of the Lady of the Lake and the scene Ja Sun saw not long ago, one may assume that it's because of Evil Sage but what about Time?
Schemes, bloodshed, happiness, decay, and many things more are set in motion due to Time.
However, grasping the Law of Time does not delay the inevitable.
Ja Sun, at this moment, held an unprecedented sense of clarity, "As long as Time moves downstream, everyone must follow its will. Everyone must face time. Even those who eventually become supreme grandmasters in the law of time can only choose to maybe jump upstream, meaning, they can probably look in the past. They can choose to let Time not affect them, but doing so will bring their entire life to a sudden sense of stillness. They will not improve anymore. Or, they can choose to look ahead downstream and see the future. That's how predictions work.
A master of time will see into the images that have yet to pass in the river of time."
Just when Ja Sun had started to contemplate this concept in an orthodox manner since he didn't have his ninth spirit ability— Eye of Causality, he felt something not far from him.
A few kilometers away, Ja Sun viewed various inhabitants of the River of Time.
Every location will have its inhabitants. Even Void is not free from creatures conforming to its nature slowly forming within.
Even the region of the sea that Qian Xunji had infected with blood will form creatures with blood-like nature soon enough. Just because something is poison to one life form doesn't mean that it will be poisonous to another creation.
But the creatures in the River of Time, undoubtedly, are more bizarre despite their simpler shapes. Ja Sun saw a star-like horse with a flowing long mane emerge from this river and splash back into the river. As it does so, the splash of 'droplets' doesn't flow out but unnaturally reverts to its previous state.
'What will happen if these beasts actually displaced some part of the river of time?' He muses and then focuses on the 'image' in front of him. The drop of golden-black blood is distinct and it doesn't merge with the star-like river of time but despite its distinction, it's too minuscule to be noticed by other beasts.
In Ja Sun's senses, he is following the 'image' or better yet, a timeline of a brown lizard. This Lizard represents a very tiny stream of time. This stream of time would intersect with other similar streams and every time it intersects, Ja Sun would see the brown lizard encountering another creature be it a plant or another animal.
'I see... everyone has time flowing through them. The domain of the Devilgod Tiger not only isolates time and space but alongside forcing the body to go through upstream and provide the illusion that the enemy has turned young once again, it also forcibly redirects all the intersections of time. After all, at the age of 6, I wouldn't have met my encounters, and thus, it means, the stream of time flowing through me could not have intersected with another's stream of time.'
Ja Sun deduces as such and watches how this brown lizard would cut the stream of time of others, meaning, how it would kill other animals it came across. These cut-off streams of time did not stop, however. They latch onto a newborn creature during its inception.
Life and Death, most likely, recycle the tiny streams in the river of time.
Ja Sun didn't know how long it would have taken him to conclude so many mysteries if he was back in the sea so, he gratefully accepted this chance and decided to focus on this fortuitous encounter.
At times, Ja Sun also saw different creatures completely carved from the law of time jumping in and out of the river of time.
From tiny rabbits to gigantic dragons in the distance.
'Wait... is that...'
Ja Sun's senses soon discover an oddity.
A greyish mist-like form of an old, wizened dragon could be seen traveling down a stream of time but its tail had a thin stream of mist that remained dipped into the singular spot of time like an anchor.
Ja Sun instantly understood the truth of this matter.
'That Dragon is trying to predict the future...'
He observes intently. The dragon must have a real form in the material space and is moving forward in its own stream of time before it happens but...
'If Time is a stream already formed... how can anyone really change it? Even if you know the future, can you really change it?'
As Ja Sun suspected, the dragon suddenly opened its mouth and let out a terrifying, soundless roar that caused the stream of time to splash out but it soon reverts to its previous state and it causes backlash to the dragon whose form dissipates in a moment.
This made Ja Sun even more curious.
'Is my own fate defined? Then... how can Ja Yin's evil attribute of destiny even work if fate or destiny is already set in stone?'
Ja Sun questions himself.
But despite this question constantly gnawing at him, Ja Sun follows the journey of the Brown Lizard who eventually becomes a 100-year-old beast and then a 1000-year-old beast. But its fate comes to an end as a Lightning Lioness devours this beast and the scene shifts. Instead of following a beast, Ja Sun observes a fetus.
Evidently, this stream of time has found another life to grow and nurture.
'Life and Death... are below Space and Time,' Ja Sun concludes but then feels confused, 'No, that's not right. It's an illusion... even River of Time has an origin and an end. So, instead of calling it the law of life and death, it should be the law of origin or creation and the law of demise or destruction.'
The fetus soon develops into a human baby but it's a little different than what Ja Sun expected.
This 'human' has bestial features and doesn't follow the cultivation of spirit rings. But that doesn't mean the spirit rings don't exist.
According to the Lady of Lake, the origin of Spirit Rings and Spirit Souls was a more direct unification of the soul origins of humans and beasts to let humans not only have the same lifespan as the beasts but also their growth.
But this method has a problem that Ja Sun finds out soon enough after following this 'ancient' teen.
When a spirit master 'fuses' with a beast, they give up their spirituality.
There is a reason why beasts live longer and humans naturally don't. Heaven's mandate is to be fair throughout its existence. If there is life, there will be death. Creation faces destruction. Gods cannot interfere with mortals forever.
So, compared to beasts who live as long as million years, humans, at best, at the peak of their strength, can only push their life to 1000 years at best. In return, however, humans are not only smarter generally, but they also advance more quickly. The fear of death pushes them to surpass their limits in many ways.
But in ancient times, humans escaped the clutches of shorter lifespans by giving up their spirituality and fusing with beasts. This allowed their strength to surpass the usual level of a Titled Douluo but in return, they were no better than beasts.
They either needed to spend hundreds of years to advance by a level or constantly search for heavenly treasures to quicken the pace. Not only that but after losing their spirituality, they couldn't grasp laws easily, too, unless they instinctively learn to wield them after reaching the step of a 100000-year-old beast.
This ancient teen never reached such a realm.
Ironically...
He was killed by the 'new' generation.
The era of the dawn of mortal gods was carved out of war. In this era, a conflict between three factions reached its peak.
The first is naturally the Supreme Dragon God who had gone mad after slaughtering his own prince.
The second faction is called the Bringers of Pain. A group of otherworldy warlocks who could defy fate and the river of time to clash with the Dragons. This group is led by none other than the Evil Sage who tampered with the Dragon God's mind and caused him to slaughter their son.
And the third faction is led by mortals who reached the realm of Godhood. The leaders changed constantly but eventually, one leader came to the seat without anyone questioning his might– the God of Slaughter, Asura.
In this era, a new breed of spirit masters began to take shape.
A breed that used spirit rings and spirit souls instead.
Of course, this cultivation, at the moment, is still unorthodox. To even bring out a spirit ring, a spirit master must put a lot of effort into different techniques. It was an era where heaven still did not recognize this form of cultivation as valuable because it originated from Evil Sage's experiments.
The ancient youth that Ja Sun has been following till now had his life ended due to such a spirit master who wielded 5 spirit rings.
Considering the fact that he got 4 more spirit rings from the Dark Devilgod Tiger and now has 13 spirit rings... Ja Sun considered 5 spirit rings nothing more than rookie numbers.
And once again, the stream of time moved on and surprisingly latched onto a seed.
'Fuck... this is going to be a long ride...'
Ja Sun sighs deeply.
He CAN stop right here. He's not helpless. He can leave this world of memories...
But why would he do that?
Time is a concept too enigmatic to comprehend safely so fortunes like this are hard to come by!
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Alternate Title: Fetus and Seed, Ja Sun is all of em
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A/N: Just adding to the lore baby~!!
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