Chapter 16: The True God's Gaze
“Channeling vitality and blood—this technique is incredible!”
Chen Shi’s curiosity was piqued. Concentrating his will on his palm, he watched as his right hand swelled as if inflated, brimming with immense power.
He picked up the rock he had knocked loose earlier and squeezed it hard. The stone cracked apart with a sharp snap and crumbled to dust after a few rubs. Picking up another rock, he smashed it against his hand. Remarkably, with his vitality surging, there wasn’t even a hint of pain!
“Wherever my vitality and blood concentrate, that area becomes larger, stronger, and impervious to pain!”
With this realization, Chen Shi immediately began channeling his vitality to different parts of his body, testing the effects.
He discovered that concentrating it in his arm joints and fascia allowed his arms to lengthen by four to five inches in an instant. Channeling it to his spine reinforced his muscles and ligaments, causing his bones to emit cracking sounds. In a flash, he grew half a foot taller!
Overcome by an urgent need to relieve himself, Chen Shi impulsively directed his vitality to that area. It swelled rapidly, prompting him to shout excitedly, “I can pee farther now! No one in the village can compete with me!”
Next, he directed his vitality to his neck, causing it to thicken significantly.
“Good luck to anyone trying to choke me now. They’ll have a hard time with this!”
Encouraged by his experiments, Chen Shi began channeling vitality to his head. Suddenly, his vision went black, and he toppled over, unconscious.
It was a long while before Chen Shi woke up, eyes wide open and mind blank. After another pause, he blinked and gradually recalled his experiments with channeling vitality.
Never again would he dare to channel vitality to his head.
The head is the apex of the six yang energies, and recklessly directing vitality there could lead to fainting, hallucinations, or even brain hemorrhages—a perilous risk.
Chen Shi’s cultivation was self-taught and incomplete, leaving him vulnerable to such dangers.
“Without the full Three Radiance Righteous Qi Method, I can’t avoid these hidden pitfalls. A single misstep, and I’d go mad. But with my current strength, I still can’t fully decipher the stone stele in front of the True King’s Tomb.”
As he prepared to continue training, the sky outside turned a deep crimson. He froze as he realized what it signified: the True God beyond the heavens had closed its eyes, and the flames from its eyelids were igniting the skies above, forming a stunning red dusk that stretched eighty miles.
This celestial phenomenon marked the imminent onset of night. Once darkness fell, malevolent spirits would emerge in the wilderness.
“I must have been unconscious for hours. I need to get home before nightfall.”
Chen Shi sprang to his feet and headed outside. But as he exited the temple, he saw the sky darkening further, the celestial flames on the verge of extinguishing.
Given his current speed, there was no way he could make it home or even to the foot of the mountain before darkness enveloped him.
“The best choice now is to stay here for the night,” he resolved after a moment of hesitation. “Staying in the temple gives me a chance to survive. Going down the mountain guarantees death.”
Chen Shi was well aware of the dangers lurking in the moonlit wilderness.
He set about securing the temple, sealing the windows and doors with heavy stones. Among the items in his book chest were talismans his grandfather had insisted he bring, knowing he planned to cultivate at the Desolate Temple.
Chen Shi placed the talismans on the windows and doors, even climbing to the temple roof to hang them over the patched holes. Though he had fixed the roof with wooden boards, the temple still leaked badly in the rain.
He gathered some firewood and lit a fire to warm his dry rations. As he ate, the fire was soon extinguished by the rain that began to pour heavily, accompanied by flashes of lightning and peals of thunder.
The downpour intensified, flooding the temple. Only a few spots remained dry, and sleep was impossible.
“When the rain stops tomorrow, I’ll hire a mason to fix this place. It’ll make it easier to train here in the future,” Chen Shi thought to himself.
The sky outside grew darker as the moon disappeared behind thick clouds. Without moonlight, the malevolent spirits wouldn’t emerge.
Unable to sleep, Chen Shi resumed his cultivation, activating the Three Radiance Righteous Qi Method. Starlight, sunlight, and moonlight gathered around him, merging into seven stars that formed the shape of the Big Dipper, refining his body.
Chen Shi lost track of time. He suddenly noticed the temple growing brighter. Searching for the light source, he was stunned to find a beam of sunlight streaming through a hole in the temple roof.
Outside, the storm raged, the night pitch-black, with torrential rain and muted thunder. Visibility extended no further than a few steps beyond the temple. But inside, the sunlight shone brightly as if it were midday.
“What on earth…”
Something extraordinary was happening. The temple and its surroundings were in different spaces!
Following the sunlight’s path, Chen Shi looked up to see a vast expanse of blue sky—one entirely distinct from the sky of the Western Bull New Continent. He even saw the sun of this alternate world: a golden, dish-like orb radiating light that empowered his cultivation.
With this light, his Three Radiance Righteous Qi Method functioned more smoothly, and the efficiency of the Big Dipper’s refinement improved by 30–40%!
“Could this sun be the true sun?” he wondered. “And the moonlight drawn by my technique—does it also originate from this space? Were the sun and moon here once the same ones revered by our ancestors?”
Lost in thought, Chen Shi speculated about the fate of the sun and moon, the rise of the True God, and the connection between this desolate temple and the celestial phenomena.
“Too bad Grandpa isn’t here,” he sighed. “He’d just tell me to double the dose of my medicine at night!”
Shaking off the musings, he immersed himself in cultivation, entering a state of focused tranquility as the Big Dipper’s stars circled him.
By dawn, the storm had passed. After a night of cultivation, Chen Shi felt more energized than ever, his progress surpassing months of previous effort.
“Grandpa must be worried sick about me!”
Clearing the barricades, Chen Shi stepped outside to find the air misty and fresh. Black Pot the dog awaited him at the temple’s entrance, tail wagging happily.
“Grandpa sent you to find me, didn’t he?” Chen Shi asked with a smile. “Let’s head home!”
Man and dog descended the mountain together. But as they approached Huangpo Village, the sky suddenly brightened. They looked up to see a blazing meteor streaking across the heavens before crashing into the desolate temple.
The resulting explosion shook the ground, sending debris and a wave of scorching heat in all directions. Ducking into a ditch, Chen Shi and Black Pot barely avoided being incinerated.
When the chaos subsided, Chen Shi climbed out to find the temple and its mysterious mountain reduced to rubble. As he gazed at the sky, he saw two suns—the True God’s eyes—watching everything with unrelenting clarity.