Chapter 198 – Over the Summit (IV)

Chapter 198

Over the Summit (IV)

The first thing I felt was a slight loosening in my dantian.

It was honestly… strange, even now, as there was no comparison to any feeling I felt back on Earth. Though, technically, dantian was in the center of the abdomen, the sensation of it was felt everywhere. Yeah, I know, it makes no sense, but perhaps in some manifold logic of the higher math and higher dimensions, it all ties together neatly.

Or perhaps not.

I don’t really know.

The loosening, as best I can sense it, was sort of like wearing a belt over already tight pants, going to a wedding, eating an absolute mountain, and then coming back home and undoing that very belt. It was a very perverse comparison, but, you know, the closest that I could tie it to.

Though it started with my dantian, it soon spread out to my meridians–I felt myself heating up, bit by bit, as Qi turned to stir and cruise throughout me, each revolution leading to a slightly denser center of energy.

**

Long Tao opened his eyes and glanced backwards; he’d seen possibly hundreds of thousands of people cross into the Revolving Core Realm in his lifetime.

He’d seen absolute talents causing all kinds of phenomena on their way over the summit–one, four-year-old boy caused a spontaneous appearance of a previously nonexistent species of Spirit Beasts, who all followed him and eventually helped him earn his title, Emperor of the Wild.

A six-year-old girl once caused a pillar of holy light so bright that it blinded the world for seven days. At its end, she merged with a pair of feathered wings and went on to become the Empress of Light.

His Master, for however amazing he was, would not cause anything remotely of that nature, Long Tao knew. It would be a miracle if the man simply crossed over smoothly with a Mortal Core.

Though this specific crossing was of greater importance than perhaps any other on the journey to Immortality, that was only truly the case for those pursuing the absolute pinnacle, the vast skies even beyond the crown of the Emperor.

Otherwise?

None of it mattered.

Just to prove it, he’d once taken an 89-year-old mortal man with absolutely no talent for cultivation and made him an Emperor. It wasn’t even particularly difficult–just inordinately expensive.

Compared to that, his Master was a heaven-defying genius.

If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it’s taken without the author’s consent. Report it.

None of it truly mattered, in the end.

Though his Master would never be able to follow him there, he didn’t want to be followed there. It was his place to go and his war to wage. He’d make of the man in front of him an Emperor, a lasting figure, though it was entirely possible that in order for Long Tao himself to cross that mark, the man in front of him would be needed.

Being perfect across every step wasn’t enough.

He’d seen firsthand that it wasn’t enough.

Something else was needed.

And, somehow, some way, the man in front of him is bound to Dao. Which Dao? How exactly? For what purpose? Those and a hundred more questions levitated like the eternal stars upon the night sky, but none had answers.

However, there was perhaps a chance that the man might know the answer to the looming thought, the Great Barrier, as it was called, that separated the ‘heavens’ and the rest.

He briefly glanced out and toward the ground. Most believed that the ‘heavens’ resided upward, beyond the skies, somewhere in a distant firmament, but, positionally, they were actually ‘below’ all the other layers.