Pursuit of the Truth

Su Ming did not bother about time passing by him. He knelt beside the coffin and stared at his mother in it. He just watched, that’s all he did.

Scattered on the altar and around it were a few stones shining with a golden light. Those stones… were the fifth stone Su Ming needed.

Yet then, he didn’t even spare a glance at them. He knelt beside the coffin like a wanderer who had left his mother’s side for a long, long time, and one day, he finally returned home, but he did not manage to see his kind mother waiting for him. Instead, the only thing he was met with was a tombstone.

The grief and the unstoppable flow of tears was born of the familial love shared between those of the same flesh and blood, a love that would never end. And Su Ming felt it, even though he had lived his entire life as an orphan.

Xu Hui stood by the side, then in silence came to Su Ming’s side and knelt down with him.

After a long, long time, Su Ming lifted his head and cast a deep glance at the woman in the coffin before standing up slowly.

“I once thought that I was an orphan without a mother and father. The only ones who stayed by my side were my elder, Xiao Hong, and some playmates who grew up with me,” Su Ming murmured.

Xu Hui stayed by his side and listened to him quietly. She knew that Su Ming did not need a person who would talk to him at that moment. What he needed was a listener.

“For my tribe, I could descend into madness. I could eat those herbs, even it meant throwing away my life in the process. I could make myself rush out of the house my elder sealed in the mid of my madness. I could fight together with my tribe members… The song of the xun in the past is something I still remember to this date. Tong Tong said she’ll tell me a secret when I returned. I still remember it…” There was nostalgia in Su Ming’s eyes, along with anguish.

“But one day I realized that all of it was fake. There was no Dark Mountain, no tribe. Even the playmates who grew up with me were a part of a scheme!

“In fact, for a long time I didn’t want to believe that the girl whom I was infatuated with when I was a boy was also fake…” Su Ming smiled, and as he continued smiling, he started laughing loudly.

“The ninth summit is a home I found when I was lost. That is true, but fate loved playing tricks and made me come to the Barren Lands of Divine Essence… Only when I was here did I learn that I did have a mother… and a father.” Su Ming lowered his head. With tears in his eyes, he stared at the woman in the coffin.

“If turning Arid Triad Expanse Cosmos into a place built for the Abyss and carving the language of the Abyss in the universe is your wish… then I will use my entire life to fulfill it!” Su Ming raised his right hand and seized the air in the direction of the coffin. Immediately, a fifth stone turned into golden light and flew into his hand

‘In the past, I wanted to go to the Fifth True World to search for my Master, but now, I want to see Abyss Builders’ homeland… because I am an Abyss Builder!’ Su Ming did not say this sentence out loud. Instead, he shouted these words in his heart in a manner that would shock the heavens.

Before this, Su Ming might have known that he was an Abyss Builder, but in the depths of his heart, he never really acknowledged this status, and neither did he acknowledge that he was an Abyss Builder. All of the stories he had heard were just stories.

He did not empathize too much with them.

Yet now, everything had changed. The voice from his mother and the scenes in Su Ming’s mind… All of these things caused him to no longer feel unfamiliar with the term Abyss Builder. It was no longer something unrelated to him. It did not matter whether it was the threat from the four Great True Worlds or his mother’s words, all of them… caused Su Ming… to take the initiative and acknowledge his identity as an Abyss Builder for the first time.

At the instant he did so, the fifth kiln trembled viciously.

Multiple wills descended around Su Ming from all the dimensions of the fifth kiln. These wills manifested themselves and turned into countless powerful living spirits. At the instant their shadows appeared, they looked at Su Ming, bent their backs together, and bowed to him!

Among these living spirits was the one thousand feet tall tree, some powerful Fire Spirits, ferocious beasts with all kinds of strange appearances. All of them bowed, causing all the dimensions in the fifth kiln to tremble furiously.

Their wills fused together, and with the land where Su Ming was as the center, they formed a gigantic, illusory… kiln in the void!

The kiln was semi-transparent. Light flowed out from it and surrounded Su Ming, making it seemed like he had turned into the core of the illusory kiln. As waves of light shone, Su Ming sensed the fifth kiln’s acknowledgement towards him. At that moment, it did not let out rumbling sounds that were too loud, and neither were there changes that shook the sky and earth. However, Su Ming knew… that he had already become the master of the fifth kiln!

As it shuddered, all the dimensions in it looked as if they were about to crumble. At the moment the wills of the living spirits in it descended, all the people in the kiln sensed the great change, but they did not know the reason behind it.

Xuan Shang had his hands fastened on the ground so that his body could be fixed to the place and he would not be sucked away by the enormous vortex that had suddenly appeared in the sky.

Hua Yu’s face was pale. As he laughed brokenly, he lay in a sea of flowers. His body was buried in mud, most of it already melted into nutrients to nourish the plant life around him.

By his side was Progenitor Long Hai. He stared at Hua Yu with a smile, and his body, which was originally just a Nascent Divinity, was now covered in flower petals, as if he was about to have it gather together again.

Flame Fiends’ Progenitor was charging forward through a dimension when he lifted his head to look at the sky in shock. There, he saw the sky swaying violently.

Reverend Zi Long had an incredibly sullen expression as he stared at the island that was only thousands of feet away from him. On that island was a tree, and on that tree was a crimson fruit.

Yet now, as the ground shook and the mountains swayed in the dimension, the ground where the tree was collapsed.

If there was one person among the people who could have a slight clue as to what was happening, then he would be… Zhu You Cai.

At that moment, he was standing on a mountain. As booming sounds came from it as it swayed, the clouds in the sky tumbled about. While the whole world transformed, Zhu You Cai’s expression changed swiftly.

“This is… the fifth kiln acknowledging its master! Could it be that there is someone among us who is an Abyss Builder?!”

At the same time, beyond the fifth kiln, the continent where Dust Burners lived had long since returned to its original state, but at that moment… all the Dust Burners threw their heads back and roared. Their bodies transformed on their own and turned into those of Fire Spirits.

This had nothing to do with their levels of cultivation. Even Dust Burners’ tribe leader and Progenitor could not control their bodies and turned into Fire Spirits. As they roared, all the Dust Burners heard a voice from their spirits echoing in their minds.

‘The fifth kiln has acknowledged its master!’

Once Dust Burners’ Progenitor turned into a Fire Spirit, a brilliant light shone in his eyes.

While in the void within the core of the fifth kiln, Su Ming sensed that the fifth kiln had acknowledged him as its master, and it would act according to his will. Su Ming remained silent for a moment before he lifted his right hand and swung it forward. Immediately, the figures surrounding the kiln disappeared. The countless dimensions around him also vanished, causing everything around him to return to normal. When Su Ming turned around, he took a step towards the void.

The coffin was still on the altar. And there would still be plenty of life force that would be sucked into the coffin to nourish the woman until she eventually woke up under the effect of the Rune.

If Su Ming wanted to, he could take away the fifth kiln, but he did not do so.

He would leave it in this place to continue attracting powerful warriors through the passage of time. Only by doing so could the Rune remain in effect, and only by doing so would his mother… have the chance of waking up someday.

When Su Ming vanished from the void, he brought Xu Hui and walked out of the fifth kiln to appear in the galaxy.

When he turned his head back, the fifth kiln behind him. Everything that he went through in it was like a dream.

Su Ming sighed softly, but the moment he did so, a flash of golden light instantly shot out of his storage bag, causing the area around him to immediately turn golden.

That golden color was different from the golden light that manifested from Su Ming. A vast amount of power spread out from the light, which seemed to possess a vague feeling that it could absorb the power of the universe. There was also a presence about it that seemed to not fit with Divine Essence Star Ocean, as if its appearance would immediately be detected by Divine Essence Star Ocean and be rejected by the galaxy!

Su Ming was momentarily stunned. When he dipped his head down to look at his storage bag, he sensed that the fifth stone he took and placed in his storage bag was now shining with a golden light that stretched to one hundred thousand feet. With a bang, it forced its way out of the storage bag.

It was as if this item was something that absolutely could not stay inside once it left the fifth kiln. When it flew out, it did not fly into the distance, but floated around Su Ming and rotated around him nonstop.

The galaxy trembled while the golden light continued spreading out in all directions. When it reached a distance when no end to it could be seen, a great disaster that could stir up the entire Divine Essence Star Ocean… appeared!

Dust Burners who had turned into Fire Spirits had just returned to their former selves. At that moment, the heart of Dust Burners’ Progenitor shuddered. He could clearly sense a power that was completely different from Divine Essence Star Ocean and did not fit with the galaxy traveling swiftly towards their continent from the fifth kiln.

“The fifth stone!” Dust Burners’ Progenitor immediately raised his head.

The territory of the Reng Wu Race was in the core of Divine Essence Star Ocean and was pitch-black. When the fifth stone’s presence spread out, countless pairs of eyes immediately opened up in the darkness. Within each of them was a madness that was similar to that of a wild beast.

“The fifth stone… Another fifth stone appeared. Snatch it! We have to snatch it!”

Muffled cries echoed in the darkness, and the madness in the eyes immediately reached its peak.

Virtue Rooters, the race who had the bodies of snakes and heads of humans opened their eyes within the karst cave they resided in as well. Hissing sounds echoed in the air, and a great will swiftly filled the entire planet.

“Find that presence that does not blend with Divine Essence Star Ocean, find the fifth stone… and bring it to me!”