First Immortal of the Sword - Chapter 2721 - The Scroll’s Strange Movements, a White Toad Floating the Water
Chapter 2721 – The Scroll’s Strange Movements, a White Toad Floating the Water
The blue-green lotus leaf rose like a towering umbrella, protecting Qin Suqing as she led her companions to the River of Destiny.
It seemed like the River of Destiny was close at hand, but the group flew through the void for a full hour before finally reaching it.
When Su Yi gazed down at the endless, coursing river water, he felt more tiny and insignificant than ever before, like a mayfly before a vast ocean.
Compared to the River of Destiny, even Eternals seemed paltry and minuscule, like specks of sand before an endless sea of stars.
Where did the River of Destiny arise? And where did it end?
No one knew.
Throughout the ages, there was only one thing that the cultivators of the Eternal Dao knew for certain: the River of Destiny had a Far Shore!
“If we set off from here, we should reach the Blue Peak Port in less than half a day,” Qin Suqing said softly.
She knew that Su Yi didn’t know much about the River of Destiny, so she’d taken it upon herself to explain things without waiting for Su Yi to ask. She’d taken Su Yi for one of her own.
Pu Xuan saw all of these interactions, but every time, his gaze was a bit strange. Su Xuanjun is no ordinary person, but it’s obvious that both Qin Suqing and Pu Yunzhong take him for just another ‘newcomer’ from a lower realm. They’re taking excellent care of him, even.
Pu Xuan didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, but he didn’t say anything. He could say that Su Yi was deliberately keeping a lot hidden, like the inexplicable way he’d controlled that calligraphy, or how he’d helped an inauspicious spirit find new life through the Yellow Springs Dao Intent.
“Traversing the River of Destiny is extraordinarily perilous. A sudden wave could easily mean certain death.
“Keep this in mind: those beneath the Heavenly Sovereign level should never traverse the River of Destiny lightly!
“We’re somewhat familiar with this region, which is why we dare to risk it, but even so, we’ll proceed with the utmost caution,” said Qin Suqing as she led the group into the distance.
Along the way, Su Yi had gradually come to understand a lot.
For instance, all manner of calamities frequently arose on the River of Destiny, from hurricanes and whirlpools to thunderstorms. Those who ran into them had almost no hope of survival.
That aside, the waters of the River of Destiny were home to all manner of strange entities!
For instance, Soul-Beckoning Grass, a plant rooted in the current of the River of Destiny, would sometimes rise to the surface. Whenever it did, its leaves would beckon like hands, instantly pulling even Eternals’ souls out of their bodies.
Then there was Blood-Engulfing Duckweed, Heaven-Trapping Moss, and all manner of other strange plants and algae.
But the animals living in the River of Destiny were the most terrifying of all!
The most well known were the Life-Stealing Water Ghosts and the Wailing Soul Sirens.
Life-Stealing Water Ghosts attacked en masse, like the yaksha of the ocean. They were individually weak, but they could control the flow and waves of the River of Destiny, using the power of the current to intercept and slaughter cultivators.
However, ordinarily speaking, all you had to do was offer an ample offering of wine, and the Life-Stealing Water Ghosts would happily leave you alone.
The Wailing Soul Sirens looked like women in the primes of their youths, playing the flute and zither. They sat in the waves, playing their instruments as they wept and wailed, their voices choked with sobs, utterly desolate.
Any cultivator who heard it would face an onslaught of negative karma at the slightest sign of mental weakness. They’d then fall into the River of Destiny, destroyed completely.
Experienced cultivators weren’t afraid of Life-Stealing Ghosts, but they dreaded the Wailing Soul Sirens.
There was no blocking the sound of their wails; they bypassed the ears to affect the heart directly.
But there were numerous other creatures that made their home in the waters of the River of Destiny.
Rumor had it that Heavenly Sovereign Wen’s mount, the Star-Swallowing Flood Dragon, was a natural variant species born of the River of Destiny. When it opened its mouth, it could inhale every star in the sky. It was comparable to a Heavenly Monarch in strength.
The Star-Swallowing Flood Dragon currently stood guard over Limitless Palace.
Although the River of Destiny was incomparably dangerous, it was also home to rare strokes of good fortune, the type that could only be happened upon by chance.
Treasure periodically floated to the surface, revealing itself to the world. Anyone who happened upon it could naturally claim it as their own.
For instance, someone once plucked a golden lotus growing on the river’s surface, acquiring nine lotus seeds. With them, he smoothly broke into the Heavenly Fate Realm, becoming a Heavenly Monarch.
Someone else once picked up a silver rock, then refined it into a sword imbued with the aura of the River of Destiny. Divine Reverence Pavilion appraised it as a supreme Eternal treasure, an unparalleled weapon!
Rumor had it that the Red-Robed Heavenly Sovereign paid an enormous price to acquire it, then named it “Smiling Spring Breeze.” It was famed throughout the Eternal Heavens Domain.
When Qin Suqing recounted these rumors, her gaze was full of undisguisable longing. After all, who wouldn’t long to acquire such an unparalleled stroke of good fortune?
Even Luan Yunzhong couldn’t help but add to the conversation. He had a rumor to share, too.
Apparently, the founder of the Heart-Tempering Sword House, Jiang Wuchen, once fished a page of scripture out of the River of Destiny.
Any object that could survive the battering of the current of the River of Destiny was an unparalleled treasure, let alone a page of scripture. Something like that was sure to be incomparably mystical.
Luan Yunzhong said with confidence that it was that very scripture that had let Jiang Wuchen advance further in his pursuit of the Dao, becoming the Greatest of the Unthroned.
Su Yi only half believed it. A page of scripture, that’s all. Even if an unparalleled text of the Grand Dao was written on it, how much could it really help a Heavenly Monarch like Jiang Wuchen?
“Jiang Wuchen…” murmured Pu Xuan, although it was unclear what he was thinking on.
Su Yi could vaguely guess. Pu Xuan was different from before. He was living a new life, and he had none of the memories of his first life.
Still, he carried a masterwork of calligraphy penned by Jiang Wuchen, and he remembered Jiang Wuchen’s face. He would realize who the man in Confucian robes who’d spent three years guiding his cultivation was sooner or later.
Suddenly, Su Yi sensed something. The yellowed scroll he’d slipped into his sleeves was reacting strangely, as if trying to break free and leap into the River of Destiny!
The yellowed scroll was the only thing Xiao Jian had left behind. Neither Su Yi nor Su Wanjun could open it. Neither of them knew what secrets were hidden inside.
According to his first incarnation’s heart devil, some called it the Great Void Dao Realm, while others called it the Scroll of Fortune.
But the heart devil didn’t know what other mysteries it contained. He could, at most, say with certainty that Xiao Jian’s success in seizing a mystery of destiny was connected to that scroll.
And now, it was reacting to something!
Su Yi pondered briefly, then subtly tightened his grip on the scroll and shoved it back into his sleeves.
He instantly sensed wisps of inscrutable power shooting from the depths of the River of Destiny. All of them silently fused into the scroll.
The scroll was like a bottomless pit. It didn’t refuse anything, nor did it change in any obvious way.
Su Yi could tell that none of his companions noticed anything that was happening. He furrowed his brow in thought. Don’t tell me that the yellowed scroll is absorbing the source power of the River of Destiny?
He felt a bit strange. Even though the scroll was in his possession, he couldn’t sense anything strange happening either. Those wisps of inscrutable power were formless, silent, and invisible. If not for the scroll actively absorbing them, Su Yi wouldn’t have been able to sense them, either.
Very well. For now, let’s just see how much power the scroll can absorb and if absorbing all that power changes anything. For now, Su Yi decided to just keep moving and wait and see.
He didn’t know it, but the moment he took the yellowed scroll in hand, something churned deep within the coursing waters of the River of Destiny. A dark current flowed beneath the surface, and the waves rumbled and boomed.
As if in the middle of an earthquake!
But the disturbance happened in the depths. Before it could really spread, the coursing river water washed it all away.
Some of the creatures living in the depths met with disaster, that tumultuous power ripping their bodies to shreds.
The disturbance might have seemed shocking, but against the backdrop of the endlessly vast River of Destiny, it wasn’t at all eye-catching.
It was as if someone had tossed a boulder into the depths. Sure, it might have stirred up hidden currents, but all of them dissipated before reaching the surface.
Su Yi knew nothing of this at all.
As time passed, the yellowed scroll continuously absorbed wisps of inscrutable power, but nothing obvious changed.
Su Yi felt as if the scroll had been hungry for countless years. It seemed the power it was absorbing wasn’t even enough to fill the gaps between its “teeth.”
“We’ll reach Blue Peak Port soon,” said Luan Yunzhong, visibly relaxing. “Fortunately, nothing happened along the way.”
Qin Suqing sighed. “But we didn’t encounter any good fortune, either.”
Pu Xuan couldn’t help but laugh. “Good fortune is a matter of karma; you cannot seek it externally. All you can do… is leave it up to fate.”
When he laughed, he was so charming and handsome that Qin Suqing fell into a bit of a daze, and she instinctively looked away. Who could have imagined that this incomparably good-looking man was once a ruler among inauspicious spirits?
Su Yi was outstandingly handsome too, but compared to Pu Xuan, he looked plain, unassuming, and lacking in charm.
“Fellow Daoist Pu Xuan is right. You cannot force good fortune. It’ll come or it won’t,” Luan Yunzhong said with a laugh.
He and Qin Suqing both planned to keep their lips sealed. Neither would reveal Pu Xuan’s true identity. Thus, they naturally wouldn’t refer to him as Ol’ Devil Golden Spirit anymore.
Su Yi, meanwhile, couldn’t help but glance at the scroll and wonder, Does this count as good fortune?
He had a strong premonition that if he wanted to open the yellowed scroll, he would need to start by absorbing power from the River of Destiny!
He’d only just thought this when a sudden wave arose on the stretch of river they’d only just passed. It was fully one hundred thousand feet tall, like a wall of water rising out of nowhere.
Everyone looked stricken, and they fled into the distance without hesitation.
When the water came crashing down, it would create new waves. If any of them touched those waves, they’d die!
Fortunately, the wave had arisen behind them, and it was now several hundred thousand feet away. It wasn’t cause for undue concern.
Even so, Luan Yunzhong broke out in cold sweats. If something like that had happened earlier, we’d have been finished!
“What’s that?” exclaimed Pu Xuan.
The group suddenly noticed a millstone-sized, snow-white toad-like lifeform riding the waves of the River of Destiny.
