Chapter 329 – A Glimpse at the Possibility of Da Luo

Da Luo Vast Heaven, Primordial Chaos Yuan Gang, and Calamity Qi—these three types of Gang Qi, while powerful, each carry certain risks.

However, Mu Lin had confidence in the True Spirit Karma Diagram, so when refining them, he did not hesitate in the slightest.

After some contemplation, the first Gang Qi Mu Lin chose to refine was—Da Luo Vast Heaven.

“Let me see whether your power of existence and nothingness can erase my True Spirit Karma Diagram.”

“…”

When the True Spirit Karma Diagram absorbed Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi—or rather, when Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi was infused into the True Spirit Karma Diagram—there were no grand phenomena, nor any sound.

However, what made Mu Lin narrow his eyes was that as Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi was infused, his True Spirit Karma Diagram began to blur.

It was as if a layer of mist had shrouded his True Spirit Karma Diagram, giving his True Spirit Diagram a faint, elusive quality.

What was even more unsettling was that as the imagery within Mu Lin’s True Spirit Karma Diagram became obscured, his memories of it gradually weakened and faded.

It was foreseeable that once Mu Lin completely lost all memory of the True Spirit Karma Diagram, his Divine Position and his Cultivation Method would all turn blank.

At that point, all of Mu Lin’s cultivation would be utterly lost. This was the danger of refining Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi, and the reason why, despite its Heavenly Grade, few dared to refine it.

“It actually managed to affect it…”

The potency of Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi startled Mu Lin, but soon, he laughed.

A laugh tinged with exasperation and a sense of the absurd.

—Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi indeed possessed a high level of existence. The areas it shrouded took on a hazy, gradually fading sense of nothingness.

However, there was one thing neither it nor Mu Lin had anticipated: it was too sparse, too scant.

At the very least, compared to Mu Lin’s True Spirit Karma Diagram, this Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi was far too sparse.

“If you were dealing with an ordinary cultivator, you could indeed completely obscure their Divine Soul. And once the Divine Soul is obscured, their connection to reality would be severed, causing their existence to gradually dilute, even vanish entirely from the mortal realm.”

“Unfortunately, I am not ordinary. My True Spirit Karma Diagram contains the legendary Beiwei Army, a County City God presiding over a region, a Prefecture City God equivalent to a Mortal Shedding Adept, the Hebo of the Ink Dragon River, Civil and Military Judges… The convergence of these numerous forces makes my True Spirit Karma Diagram, in terms of both grandeur and breadth, hundreds or thousands of times greater than that of others.”

A drop of ink might taint a bowl of water, but it could never affect a pond.

And Mu Lin’s True Spirit Karma Diagram was that pond. When Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi entered it, it was like ink dispersing into a pond—quickly diluted and spread thin.

As the mist formed by Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi thinned, it could only slightly dim Mu Lin’s True Spirit Diagram, unable to obscure it completely.

Of course, during this process, Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi was not without resistance. It instinctively tried to gather and obscure a single area.

Unfortunately, Mu Lin was no pushover either. Relying on his control over the True Spirit Karma Diagram, he continuously guided the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi, forcing it to disperse as much as possible.

And once spread out and diluted to a certain extent, its influence on Mu Lin’s True Spirit Karma Diagram became almost negligible.

“So the first hurdle was passed just like that. Indeed, more is better, bigger is more beautiful. As long as one’s foundation is solid, many negative conditions can be ignored.”

“Speaking of which, does this count as overwhelming force subduing all techniques?”

…

With the initial progress going smoothly, Mu Lin no longer held back in the following time. He absorbed another portion of Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi and tried to let it spread out within the True Spirit Karma Diagram, which also diluted its power.

Through this dilution, Mu Lin refined five portions of Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi in one go.

However, just when Mu Lin thought he had subdued this Gang Qi, an unexpected event occurred during the fifth refinement.

A Divine Position silently disappeared.

“?!?”

“What happened?”

Mu Lin was completely unaware of the disappearance of this Divine Position and didn’t even notice anything unusual.

Moreover, Mu Lin now couldn’t remember what the vanished Divine Position was.

It was only during a later inspection that he discovered a blank space in the True Spirit Karma Diagram, which made him realize something was wrong.

“I was careless. This Qi is so powerful, but there’s a reason why cultivators don’t even dare to refine it…”

The current situation made Mu Lin anxious, and he frowned in annoyance.

Only one of his Divine Positions had disappeared. While this didn’t affect the True Spirit Karma Diagram itself, it did lower its upper limit…

“Wait.”

In the midst of his annoyance, Mu Lin suddenly noticed something.

He truly couldn’t remember what was in the blank space of the True Spirit Karma Diagram.

However, the positions above and below that blank space in the True Spirit Karma Diagram were still crystal clear.

Clearly, although Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi was powerful, because its quantity was too scarce, it couldn’t conceal or erase too many areas.

And the Divine Positions within Mu Lin’s True Spirit Karma Diagram did not exist independently.

They had numerous lines connecting to various parts of the True Spirit Karma Diagram.

Because of this, Mu Lin discovered something: relying on the connections within the diagram, he could easily fill in this gap.

In fact, by using the connections above and below and reasoning further, Mu Lin even remembered what the missing Divine Position was.

“This is… the Scarlet Blood Jiao, a Divine Position formed by the convergence of the Crimson Holy Grail and Jiao Dragon power. I didn’t expect it to be the first to disappear… Huh?!”

“It actually appeared… as soon as I remembered it, it appeared… That makes sense. Complete nothingness is when everyone forgets. As long as one person remembers, it is no longer nothingness.”

Easily, Mu Lin discovered that memory, existence, and the power of nothingness were closely related.

Of course, this was also related to the scarcity of Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi, which could only barely conceal the name and image, unable to completely erase the existence of the Divine Position. If it were completely erased, relying on the memory of a single person would make it difficult for a blank Divine Position to reappear.

But there are no “ifs” in the world. Mu Lin’s True Spirit Karma Diagram was just that vast and immense, capable of diluting Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi into an extremely weak existence.

And the massive True Spirit Karma Diagram, like the vast territory of China in his previous life, gave Mu Lin plenty of room for error.

“In my previous life, a certain French country had a smaller territory and could be overrun in one wave, but a certain polar bear could exhaust countless people with its vast territory. Even if they suffered setbacks early on, they still had a chance to recover.”

“My True Spirit Karma Diagram is the same. Numerous Divine Positions and a massive foundation allow me to salvage the situation even if I make mistakes.”

“Moreover, many dangers can be directly diluted by the vast expanse of my True Spirit Karma Diagram.”

At this moment, Mu Lin truly understood why so many emphasized laying a solid foundation, and why some would choose not to advance their cultivation but instead diligently train and accumulate their potential within a certain realm.

A profound foundation indeed brought numerous benefits.

…

The erasure of the Divine Position… Although it had reappeared, this still served as a lesson for Mu Lin, making him never dare to underestimate the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi, Primordial Chaos Yuan Gang, or Calamity Qi again.

At the same time, Mu Lin’s gaze toward the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi grew intensely fervent.

By now, Mu Lin had come to understand why this Qi bore the prefix “Da Luo.”

“Existence and nothingness, erasing existence—this ability is indeed terrifying, but it can also be used in reverse…”

What is Da Luo? It is the transcendent immortal, free and eternal beyond all time and space.

As long as its name exists, Da Luo remains eternal.

And the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi? It can conceal everything, making all forget the objects, names, and forms hidden by this Qi.

But conversely, by mastering the power of existence and nothingness, Mu Lin could achieve immortality as long as even one person remembered him, allowing him to reemerge from eternal nothingness.

Just like Mu Lin’s blank Divine Position, which reappeared as soon as he remembered it.

“So, if I can fully master the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi and deduce it to its root realm, I can thereby grasp the power of existence and nothingness, and then catch a glimpse of the Da Luo realm?”

This thought startled Mu Lin.

But soon, he shook his head with a bitter smile.

Using, understanding, controlling the root, and continuing to deduce—these were entirely different levels of difficulty, increasing exponentially.

It was like the sun: everyone could utilize its light, but for a single person to understand how the sun exists was an immense challenge.

And controlling the root of the sun was nearly impossible.

To deduce further beyond that was nothing but delusion, a fantasy.

For now, what Mu Lin was doing was merely the most superficial utilization.

The Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi, like sunlight, was simply there. Many could find it and devise ways to use it.

But if Mu Lin wished to delve deeper, he would need to deeply understand the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi, much like understanding the speed and properties of light or how the sun emits its rays.

However, in his previous life, it took the relentless research of countless scientists for humanity to gain a profound understanding of sunlight.

In this world, research on the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi was nearly nonexistent. This meant Mu Lin would have to rely on his own efforts, like Copernicus, Galileo, Einstein, and Newton, to uncover all the properties of the Da Luo Vast Heaven Qi.

“Isn’t this setting the bar a bit too high for me?”

What was even more despairing was that even if he achieved this, Mu Lin would only have reached the second step—understanding. Beyond that lay the third step of control and the fourth step of further deduction…

“The Da Luo realm is truly difficult. For me, this realm is nothing but a dream-like existence.”

After this lament, Mu Lin was ready to give up. He felt that he might not even be able to achieve understanding.

After all, in this world, there was no legacy from predecessors for Mu Lin to stand upon the shoulders of giants…

“Wait, is there really no legacy from predecessors? This world also has its heroes and sages, its wise men and saints. Have those Celestial Masters and even True Lords truly never explored the forces of existence and nothingness?”

After closing his eyes and pondering for a while, Mu Lin believed there was.

He even speculated where such research might be found.

“Heaven-Rank Techniques!”

“Most of these techniques were created by True Lords and Celestial Masters, embodying their Dao, their understanding of heaven and earth, the world, and all things. The forces of existence and nothingness are likely included among them.”

“So, as long as I find a Heaven-Rank Technique related to existence and nothingness and master it, I won’t have to start from scratch like Galileo or Copernicus, deducing and comprehending everything anew. Instead, I can stand on the shoulders of my predecessors and stride forward.”

It took humanity thousands of years to understand the nature of the sun from scratch, but once that knowledge was compiled, a university student could grasp it completely in just a few months.

This is the importance of inheritance.

If Mu Lin had such an inheritance, combined with his own insight and the Attribute Panel, he could easily comprehend the forces of existence and nothingness.

At this thought, Mu Lin’s heart swelled with excitement.

However, another problem soon arose in his mind.

This world was different from his previous life. People guarded knowledge, especially knowledge related to Cultivation Methods, with extreme vigilance, with no intention of spreading it.

How could Mu Lin obtain a Heaven-Rank Technique, especially one related to the concepts of existence and nothingness?

After some thought, Mu Lin chose to give up for now:

“Forget it, I won’t aim for it just yet. I’ll have Yan Yunyu investigate first and see what techniques related to existence and nothingness exist.”

(End of Chapter)