First Immortal of the Sword - Chapter 2855 - The Bizarre and Wonderful World Under the River of Destiny
Chapter 2855 – The Bizarre and Wonderful World Under the River of Destiny
The peacock closed its wings, then shrank and transformed. Its claws turned into legs, and its feathers turned into a set of colorful Daoist robes.
Its face became that of a woman’s. She had a five-colored cloud marking on her forehead, and while she wasn’t particularly stunning, it was hard to take one’s eyes off her. Her face was as smooth as pure as jade, and her eyes shone with wisdom and spirituality.
Only now did Su Yi realize that the “ol’ peacock” the toad spoke of was actually a woman. Ah, so she’s a ‘Peacock Empress,’ not ‘Emperor.’
The peacock made no effort to disguise herself. She gazed intently at the yellowed tome, her brow furrowed in thought.
The white toad was stunned, as she almost never appeared in front of other people in her human form.
It wasn’t just her; when the denizens of the River of Destiny appeared in human form, it was all too easy for others to discern their true names.
Every powerful denizen of the River of Destiny had a true name. Once discovered, it was an exploitable, lethal weakness.
The cloud marking on River Empress Peacock’s forehead was five-colored and striking to behold. If another powerful river denizen used a divine ability to examine it, they could discern her true name. It was for this reason that the toad was so surprised to see her appear before Su Yi in her human form.
A moment later, the toad was ashamed of itself, for as much as it revered Destiny’s Chosen, it had never appeared before Su Yi in human form. Looking back on it now, this choice seemed rather small-minded.
It silently transformed, taking on the form of a long-robed man in a jade crown. He had a striking head of white hair.
This was the Star Toad’s human form. His true name was hidden in the depths of his ink-black eyes.
“Ol’ Peacock, this is Destiny’s Chosen. You two met briefly earlier,” the toad said with a laugh.
River Empress Peacock finally broke her silence. “To the best of my knowledge, someone took the Book of Destiny to the Far Shore of Destiny during the Primordial Era. The denizens of the River of Destiny only know of the book from rumors. None has ever seen it.”
Her gaze shifted to Su Yi. “Forgive my boldness, but where did you acquire that treasure?”
“An old friend left it to me,” said Su Yi. The thought of Xiao Jian filled his heart with melancholy.
“An old friend? Was he perhaps from the Far Shore of Destiny?” the peacock asked thoughtfully.
Su Yi shook his head. “I’m not sure.”
He’d yet to fuse with Xiao Jian’s Dao Imprint, so he naturally had no idea.
He just knew that the River Lord had said that when Xiao Jian should have died, he seized an opportunity from Destiny, seizing Heavenly Fate in a unique fashion. In doing so, he’d survived the alternations of the epochs.
“You aren’t sure?” River Empress Peacock looked stunned. “Then… can you open the Book of Destiny?”
Su Yi shook his head. “I cannot.”
A moment later, he asked curiously, “Do you perhaps know what secrets are hidden in this book?”
River Empress Peacock’s eyes shone with reminiscence. “A River Ancestor from the Primordial Era told me that the Book of Destiny is a wondrous treasure born of the Laws of Destiny. It’s full of endless mysteries, all of them connected to the secrets of destiny.”
But then, she shook her head. “Not even that River Ancestor knew any of the specific secrets hidden in the Book of Destiny.”
She suddenly seemed ot lose interest in the conversation. “Come on, let’s go to my Five-Colored Hidden Realm.”
She waved her hand, and a swath of five-colored light wrapped around them. All of them vanished.
When Su Yi regained his field of view, he found himself in a hidden realm. The sky was deep blue, and the landscape was brimming with vitality. Everywhere he went, he sensed an intense aura of the Grand Dao.
He now stood atop a mountain shrouded in misty clouds. A simple palace was built on the peak.
There was a medicine garden at the foot of the mountain, and thousands upon thousands of herbs grew there. A few attendants, all of them river denizens, were working the soil.
A clear breeze blew past, and the air had a soothing, pleasant quality to it.
Su Yi looked a bit dazed. He would never have guessed that such an otherworldly pure land existed beneath the River of Destiny.
There was no doubt about it. This was River Empress Peacock’s personal cultivation ground.
It was just as the Star Toad had said. River Empress Peacock ruled these waters, but instead of establishing her own faction, she lived in seclusion, seldom venturing into the outside world.
“If you aren’t averse, you can rest wherever you like and stay as long as you please,” said River Empress Peacock. “You needn’t feel on edge. There’s no one here aside from my longtime servants and us.”
Su Yi clasped his fist. “Many thanks!”
Before long, River Empress Peacock called over an elderly attendant and ordered, “Bring Fellow Daoist Su somewhere he can rest his feet.”
“As you command!” the servant said with a respectful bow.
The Star Toad was just about to say something when River Empress Peacock said, “Fellow Daoist Su only just survived a close brush with death. Give him some time to rest and readjust. Don’t bother him right now.”
The Star Toad thought it over, then nodded. She’s right.
The old servant promptly led Su Yi away, while River Empress Peacock and the Star Toad entered the palace.
……
“What do you call yourself, Grandmother?” asked Su Yi.
“I’ve yet to acquire a true name. Fortunately, my mistress granted me a title. You can call me Yun Zhi,” the old woman said politely. “Your Excellency, if you’re not opposed, you can call me that, too.”
Su Yi nodded. The Star Toad had told him that the denizens of the River of Destiny all strove to acquire a true name through cultivation. It was only then that they could become true kings and queens of the river and reign over their own territories.
Those who’d yet to acquire their true names were at best small fries.
Acquiring a true name was like a cultivator establishing their foundations in the Eternal Dao and stepping onto the path of Eternity!
River Empress Peacock was similar to a Heavenly Monarch, and a top-notch Heavenly Monarch at that. Beneath the surface of the River of Destiny, she could even fight Heavenly Sovereigns!
The reason was simple. The creatures born of the River of Destiny could manipulate its flow. Even a casual wave could easily annihilate a Heavenly Monarch.
But that power would do her no good if she left the River of Destiny.
The old woman, Yun Zhi, treated Su Yi with the utmost politeness. Along the way, no matter what Su Yi asked, so long as she had answers, she responded with the utmost seriousness.
Su Yi learned a lot in the process, including that the depths of the River of Destiny had a cultivation world all its own, complete with sects as numerous as the trees in a forest.
Some of the mightier River Emperors had hundreds of thousands of soldiers at their beck and call, a force every bit as mighty as the Heavenly Monarch factions of the Five Great Continents of the Eternal Heavens Domain.
Similarly, there was conflict, strife, and endless enmities among the factions of the river.
Some of the River of Destiny’s most ancient forbidden zones were even home to mighty River Ancestors not one bit weaker than a Heavenly Sovereign!
Su Yi had learned that from the Star Toad a while back. At the time, the Star Toad mentioned an ancestor among apes. The ape reigned over a forbidden zone and had fought Heavenly Sovereigns on numerous occasions. It was famed far and wide.
But Yun Zhi didn’t know much about him.
The River of Destiny was just too long and too enormous; it was seemingly endless. Even those River Kings who reigned over vast stretches of territory were limited to their respective corners; they couldn’t possibly grasp the River of Destiny in its entirety.
That aside, the River of Destiny had numerous mysterious, unknown territories. Not even River Emperors dared to risk themselves inside.
There were limits to Yun Zhi’s knowledge, but it wasn’t like she couldn’t teach Su Yi anything. This was, for instance, his first time learning that places like River Empress Peacock’s Five-Colored Hidden Realm weren’t unique. A world much like that inhabited by cultivators existed beneath the surface of the river, full of cities big and small.
For example, 130,000 miles from the Five-Colored Hidden Realm, there was a city famed far and wide: Spirit Treasure Celestial City. It was extremely prosperous, a place where creatures from all across the River of Destiny bought, sold, and traded treasures.
Su Yi listened with great interest. He could feel his horizons broadening, as he’d never heard of such a strange, rich world hidden beneath the River of Destiny.
But then, it made sense. Ordinary cultivators traversed the River of Destiny with the utmost caution, as if walking on thin ice. The moment they fell into its depths, they were doomed. That meant that the cultivators of the outside world knew almost nothing about what went on beneath the water’s surface.
Perhaps only the experts of Heavenly Sovereign factions knew these secrets.
“This will do.” About ten minutes later, Su Yi chose a place to rest, a lush bamboo grove next to a winding stream.
The old woman promptly used a divine ability to construct a simple residence in front of the bamboo forest. She then asked whether Su Yi needed furniture or any other basic necessities, but he shook his head.
Before long, Yun Zhi bade farewell and set off.
Su Yi, meanwhile, walked into the empty building, took out his wicker chair, and slowly leaned back into it, facing the bamboo outside. Gradually, his whole body relaxed.
He’d been tense from the moment he first left the Literati Continent.
First, multiple Heavenly Sovereigns joined forces to intercept him. Then, he escaped the Literati Continent, only to meet with a carefully laid ambush the moment he reached the River of Destiny.
Only now could he relax. The moment he did, despite his ironclad Dao Heart, a wave of exhaustion washed over him.
The death traps he’d encountered along the way had been too startling. He’d suffered numerous mental blows along the way, too.
The arrival of the monk in white was particularly shocking. Although Su Yi had been confident all along that he could figure out a path to life, he was mentally prepared for the worst.
Fortunately, the worst never came to pass.
He gazed down at the yellowed tome and whispered, “Brother Xiao, you just did me another huge favor. In the future, so long as there’s even the barest hope of success, I’ll do everything in my power to bring you back!”
Gradually, Su Yi closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep, his hands still clenching that yellowed tome.
Beneath the River of Destiny, the tome that Xiao Jian had left him was one of the few things he had left to rely on.
