Chapter 1099 498: The Master Doesn't Care

He abandoned resistance, allowing those forces capable of destroying everything to surge into his broken body.

His Daoist Body was torn apart in an instant, worsening the destruction.

His Divine Soul wailed under the impact of the contradictory laws, overwhelmed.

Yet, his consciousness had never been clearer.

"Fire... you were right..."

"I shouldn't define them..."

"I should... become them..."

His Divine Soul ceased resisting and, like a sponge, began to passively absorb, feel, and remember every form of chaos, contradiction, and madness indiscriminately.

He felt the resolve as "water" transformed into "blade."

He felt the heat as "mountain" became "molten."

He felt the malice as "life" turned into "death."

He felt the distortion as "death" became "life."

...

Each sensation was an ultimate pain, a complete subversion of past cognizance.

But he bore it all.

He was no longer the exalted "Dao Sheng"; he placed himself on equal ground with all things of this world. No longer a "god," he became just an ordinary "experiencer" in this world undergoing immense change.

Gradually, a wondrous transformation occurred.

The Laws of Chaos that surged into his body, upon finding themselves unable to destroy him (because he had ceased resisting and merged with them), began seeking a new "balance" within him.

A kind of... chaotic balance.

His shattered Daoist Body no longer emitted a golden divine light. Various bizarre and colorful lights began to flow from the cracks. Sometimes it was flame, sometimes ice, sometimes vitality, sometimes Death Qi...

His aura was no longer pure "order," nor purely "chaos," but something containing all "possibilities"... Chaos.

In the deep, hollow socket of his right eye, a wisp of gray, primordial mist resembling the chaos before the world's creation, silently emerged.

He was dying.

That "Dao Sheng" representing "perfect order" was dying.

At the same moment, he was being reborn.

A completely new entity, indefinable, resonating with this broken world, was slowly rising from his corpse.

Amidst the endless void.

The will of the "Throat of Chaos," after a moment of astonishment, erupted with a furious roar.

"No! This cannot be! He gave up resistance? He is actively embracing the ultimate chaos even I cannot fully control?! He will die! He surely will die!"

It could not understand. In its conception, any vessel of order, upon encountering true "chaos," would only be assimilated, torn apart, and ultimately succumb to meaningless demise.

Yet, on Dao Sheng, there appeared a sign it had never witnessed before, which made it uneasy.

Meanwhile, several other ancient existences fell into long silence.

After a long time, the "Source of All Things" let out a complex sigh.

"Break and then stand... cast into death to find rebirth..."

"He did not repair the 'perfect' porcelain, but chose... to shatter himself as well, then use all the shards to piece together something... completely new."

The ancient indifference of the "Eye of Silence" finally vanished entirely, replaced by an unprecedented... gravity.

"He... has embarked on a path even Fire never completed."

"A path... to take 'change' as the way."

"From this moment on, he is no longer Fire's 'Dao Fruit,' nor the nemesis of 'chaos.'"

"He himself has become this era's... greatest 'variable.'

The chill rising from the heart was not due to the oppression of power, nor from the threat of death. It was a more fundamental cold, as if in an instant, he was redefined from a living, flesh-and-blood, loving and hating 'being' into a cold, selfless 'instrument' that only existed for certain functions.

This chill was more hurtful than the chaotic Laws of Chaos of the "Throat of Chaos," which could disintegrate all things. Chaos still has form and can be comprehended and contained. Yet this thorough "objectification's" indifference is the deepest negation of 'existence' itself.

For eight thousand years he was born for order, and then in the divide between life and death, he embraced chaos, ultimately creating this unprecedented Daoist Body, forging a path no one had trodden. He thought he had jumped off the chessboard, becoming the chess master, but never anticipated he had merely been placed from a small chessboard onto a grander and more ruthless one. And the one who placed him on the chessboard was none other than the "guide" and "savior" he once believed—Fire.

"Haha..."

Dao Sheng suddenly began to laugh softly, with a trace of self-mockery and a hint of desolation in his laughter, but more than anything, it was a kind of madness and relief after breaking free of all shackles.

His laughter wasn't loud, yet it caused this newly "redefined" twisted land to gently tremble. Those black mountains glistening with eerie metallic luster seemed to resonate with him, with deep thundering echoing from within, like ancient behemoths turning in their sleep. The waters of the East Sea, reflecting the Otherworld's sceneries, rippled in circles upon circles, each ripple like a silhouette of a world's birth and demise.

He was no longer the perfect offspring of order, nor the naïve seeker of the Tao.