Emperor’s Domination

“Come on.” Li Qiye said with a smile as he led Qiurong Wanxue onward.

This time, he was still taking a break here and there, but it was not for understanding merit laws, it was more about finding something else. Qiurong Wanxue couldn’t help but ask: “What is Young Noble trying to find?”

Li Qiye pointed at the sky and replied: “We need to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but first, we have to find a place with real life essence before being able to go up.”

“We can’t fly up there?” Qiurong Wanxue anxiously looked at the sky. She was very curious about what was up there.

“You can try flying up.” Li Qiye laughed and said.

She was very trusting of Li Qiye so she immediately jumped up to fly. However, the moment she reached a certain height, it seemed as if a huge palm was pushing her down from the sky, causing her to fall to the ground and become dizzy.

“Are you alright?” Li Qiye got closer and asked with a smile.

Qiurong Wanxue got up and angrily looked at him to say: “Young Noble tricked me! You knew that there was a suppressive force in the sky yet you still told me to fly.”

Li Qiye chuckled and shook his head: “This isn’t suppression. The two places are not in same world. You don’t know what this place is, so you can’t comprehend the gap.”

Qiurong Wanxue looked at his smile and angrily glared at him.

The two of them continued and crossed many mountains and rivers. They walked for a long time but were unable to find the place Li Qiye was searching for.

After a long while, they eventually reached a certain location. This place was different from the others; there was no grand dao or universal laws creating mountains and rivers here. There were no grasses or fishes, only a scorched earth — bleak and lifeless.

The other places had no life essence, but there were still flying birds and swimming fish with flowers blooming and withering. In contrast, this scorched earth had nothing, there was only a deathly stillness.

“Here!” Li Qiye was immediately attracted by this scorched earth. He quickly stepped inside this land and crouched down for a closer look. It seemed that there was something here that was garnering all of his attention.

Qiurong Wanxue followed right after him. She noticed that there was nothing else besides the little ants crawling on the ground. She couldn’t discern whether these ants were real or whether they were derived from the grand dao.

She then carefully counted and found that there were a total of ten ants constantly moving in a circular pattern.

Wait, no. Qiurong Wanxue looked for a while and found that one was missing and only nine were left. When she counted again, the missing ant came out of nowhere and the group numbered ten again.

She still wasn’t right. Just when she thought that she was seeing things, she then found that there was only one ant. Moreover, she couldn’t see how the other nine had disappeared at all.

“How could this be?” She was stunned for a bit. The group, once again, turned into nine ants, then another came out to complete the circle.

She didn’t know if she was just dizzy or if it was an illusion. She focused her mind again to see how many were truly there. But suddenly, the earth abruptly started to spin and there were millions of ants walking in a circle. This was the last thing she remembered before she instantly blacked out.

As she was about to lapse into a coma, a cold aura capable of enlightening people with perfect wisdom went inside her body, causing her to jolt. She instantly woke up; it was Li Qiye who brought her back from her coma.

“Don’t look. Your dao heart has not been honed to the extent where you can look at this thing.” Li Qiye solemnly said.

In fact, not too many people in this world could tell how many ants there were, unless it was an Immortal Emperor or someone who had experienced a lot of training, like Li Qiye. Otherwise, their dao heart would be shaken!

“Just what is that?” Qiurong Wanxue was extremely alarmed and didn’t know how many ants there were.

“This is something beyond your grasp.” Li Qiye replied since he noticed her inquisitive mind and smiled: “The quantity isn’t important, the essential part is the beginning and end. One is the primordial, nine is the extreme, and ten is grand completion!”

Qiurong Wanxue was still confused after hearing this, but Li Qiye did not find it surprising: “Take a walk to other places to see if you can find anything or the place that I’m trying to find. If there is any danger, immediately message me via telepathy.”

Having said that, he crouched down and carefully watched the ants on the ground. He was completely absorbed and engrossed in meditation.

Qiurong Wanxue didn’t bother him and went elsewhere.

Li Qiye completely forgot about everything since there were only the ants moving in a circle in his eyes. In the eyes of others, the ants were moving, but it was a different story for Li Qiye. The ants had to do with the beginning and end.

After an unknown amount of time, Li Qiye found some clues and stirringly murmured: “Fascinating, no wonder why he ended up like that. He was comprehending a few things, so the villainous old heavens did not spare him. Amazing… Unfortunately this is not complete. If he was able to understand it, then he would have been number one throughout all the ages!”

Those who were unaware would only see ants crawling around in a circle — nothing special at all. However, to those who understood a bit more, they would find that the derivation of these ants were too mystical and shocking. Inside these ants was the derivation of the True Dao of Heaven and Earth. Although they were only ordinary ants, they involved the beginning and end, life and death, Yin and Yang, all existences, and all living beings in this world.

Even Immortal Emperors would be astonished to see such a derivation. Unfortunately, this did not evolve completely and was only a prototype.

Nevertheless, it was still a derivation from the True Dao of Heaven and Earth’s profundity, something to create life.

To put it in a grander manner, this was genesis! However, these ants were only the beginning. Li Qiye continued his projections and was very sure that the direction of this derivation was correct.

This meant that the existence in the past had walked very far on this path. After countless calculations and attempts, he finally began to grasp the wonders of the True Dao of Heaven and Earth. This existence had a different interpretation of the true dao and used it to start a whole new grand dao.

Unfortunately, what this existence created was just the beginning and was a mere outline, something that was far from completion. At that time, for a variety of reasons, this heaven-defying action was not tolerated by the high heavens so this existence eventually forced himself into desperate straits. 1

Li Qiye immersed himself in these derivations. He calculated as countless dao runes appeared inside his sea of memories. All of the erased memories and experiments that were once carried out by him slowly came back.

Li Qiye, as the Dark Crow, was different from sealed undyings. Sealed undyings were reliant on Blood Era Stones; although they were not dead, they couldn’t live normally throughout the long years.

The Dark Crow was different; it had always lived in the actual world and experienced the ups and downs of the nine heavens and ten earths. It possessed knowledge and wisdom that others failed to compare to.

During this long period of time, it lived a very colorful life and had done many things, but all of them revolved around three key points: invincibility, eternal life, and genesis!

Across the ages, the Dark Crow produced numerous invincible existences. This was a form of training to him; a type of accumulation and exploration to reach an invincible state.

Later on, it began to research the topic of eternal life — true immortality. This was a topic that had tempted everyone throughout the eons.

Supreme existences during the Desolate Era and Immortal Emperors during the Emperors Era had always explored this path; everyone naturally wanted true immortality.

The Dark Crow was a special case of true immortality; it knew that this pseudo-immortality depended on a certain thing in the Immortal Demon Grotto. As long as his physical body remained there, the Dark Crow would be immortal.

However, this immortality was putting its life in the hands of others, so during the long years, after accumulating a lot of knowledge on this path, Li Qiye had tried to search for true immortality.

He trod very far on this path, but he couldn’t reach the end. After all, since time immemorial, no one had heard of someone with eternal life unless they depended on some extremely unique existences, such as something from the legendary Nine Grand Heavenly Treasures.

Because the road to immortality was impassable, Li Qiye changed his goal. If he couldn’t attain immortality, then what about creating life like the True Dao of Heaven and Earth? Or even mastering the genesis of an entire new world?

He had tried many times to walk on the path of the origin of life and creation, but this was a means left to the high heavens. Many Immortal Emperors had tried in the past, but no one had ever succeeded.

Li Qiye also persevered for a very long time without bearing any fruit. Like he had said before, no one was able to understand the entire True Dao of Heaven and Earth.

Today, after seeing these ants deriving the grand dao, Li Qiye became extremely shocked. After numerous attempts and projections, he was completely certain that this person found the right path. Unfortunately, that person had only just begun and time did not wait for him.

Li Qiye immersed himself in watching these ordinary ants, hoping to see through these transformations. If this path was truly perfect without flaws, then it would be too terrifying. At that time, Immortal Emperors would be nothing! The high heavens would be nothing!

It was as if he was petrified while being lost in these derivations. This reckless attempt at creating projections had put himself in a crisis.

Li Qiye himself was unaware while these projections were exhausting his blood energy along with his life force.

1. Just a note, I’m using he/him to refer to this existence, but I don’t know if it is a man or a woman.