When the white swordsman woke up, he found himself in a white world. Misty smoke drifted in empty space, and all he could see was white.

‘Is this what comes after death? To think that I, Sheng Jiansui, the youngest Perpetual Emperor, would die like this… But it was a worthy death.” Sheng Jiansui, the Quintessence Sword Saint pondered over his final moments.

From his birth as a lowly orphan in the mortal world, he, a nameless boy understood that the most important thing in the world was power! He pestered a retired soldier to teach him martial arts. With perseverance, even with mediocre martial arts, he built up a strong foundation by practicing since his childhood. Ultimately, he joined a martial arts sect, obtained true legacies and soared into the boundless sky!

From a lowly mortal, he rose step by step, steadily increasing his martial arts and accumulating various experiences. He explored various secret realms, found greater martial arts and more powerful treasures and kept on expanding his horizons. He refined artifacts, talismans and pills and set up formations. But his Martial Dao was founded on the sword, and he never stopped cultivating his sword arts as he rose.

When he broke through to become a Perpetual Emperor, the Nineorigin chaosworld faced the threat of the Starbeast. The black-haired woman brought calamity to the world, destroying major and minor worlds like cutting grass. His three senior Perpetual Emperors implored him to cultivate in seclusion, as his strength wasn’t enough to impact the great battle. Thus, he used a time acceleration treasure as his seniors fought, rose to the absolute peak of power he could achieve and returned to battle.

“An eternity in this white world… doesn’t sound too bad, I suppose.” Since there was nothing to do, Sheng Jiansui closed his eyes, preparing to enter meditation. Just then, a soft voice spoke.

“You are certainly diligent… Anyone else would have at least explored this white space before even thinking of meditating.”

The speaker was a teenager dressed in a white cloak. Even though the cloak covered the majority of her body, it could not conceal her curvaceous figure and jadelike white skin. He facial features emanated renowned beauty. From the distinct aura of chaos and the nine elements emanated from her, Sheng Jiansui realized that she was most likely the Will of the Nineorigin chaosworld.

“I suppose I should thank you for saving me. I am the Worldwill that was formed from the Daocore of the chaosworld. As for my name, you can call me…” The woman tapped her head as she thought of a name, “Nineorigin doesn’t sound bad, I think?”

“Nineorigin, good name, certainly a good name! You may call me Sheng Jiansui or Quintessence Sword Saint if you wish. I have heard about 1,000,000 year old trees achieving the Dao and priceless swords giving birth to sword spirits, but I never expected that a Daocore could give birth of a Worldwill as well!” Sheng Jiansui was certainly amazed.

“Let me call you Quintessence Sword Saint then. It might be easy for swords and tree to gain sentience, but for a chaosworld it is too difficult. In truth, I only gained conscious thought when I absorbed your chaoseed after you used it to destroy the Starbeast’s array formation. It seems that I owe you too many things.”

Hearing this, Sheng Jiansui was stunned. “But you did supply me strength from your Daocore. And you even tried to teleport me away when it seemed that the chaosworld would be destroyed!”

Nineorigin simply waved her palm, dismissing it: “The desire to survive and the desire for revenge certainly aren’t indicators of sentience. If not for your chaoseed, it might have taken billions of years for me to be born, and my intelligence would be similar to a 4 year old at best.”

“After weathering this tribulation, while many things have been lost, I have gained things of more importance. My sentience and the abundant power of the chaoseed means that I can actively control the path which the chaosworld roams through the vast universe. This means that calamities like the Starbeast will not be able to attack this world at their will.” As Sheng Jiansui heard her words, his face brightened before suddenly paling as he realized one fact.

“Does the world have any Perpetual Emperors? After my death, I believe all Perpetual Emperors of this chaosworld returned to dust…”

Hearing Sheng Jiansui’s words, Nineorigin frowned. “…That’s true. While I can bring out the power of a Chaos Sovereign within the chaosworld, it is no replacement for a Perpetual Emperor. That said, the chance of a cultivator entering the Perpetual Emperor realm within the next 1,00,000 years seems near-impossible.”

“While the difficulty of breaking through to Perpetual Emperor is certainly high, all the people who have reached the half-step Perpetual Emperor realm are safely holed up in the supreme worlds. It certainly shouldn’t be difficult for them to break through in 10,000 years or so…” Sheng Jiansui refuted Nineorigin’s words.

“…To enter the realm of Perpetual Emperor, the cultivator must condense a Supreme Dao and fuse with it. However, don’t even speak of the minor and major Dao, even the 9 Supreme Dao were damaged in this great battle! Moreover, four new Supreme Dao of Life, Death, Nirvana and Desolate were formed as well! As it is, even the cultivation paths have to be rebuilt. Those surviving half-step Perpetual Emperors will have to shatter their Dao comprehensions before rebuilding them!”

“…Four new Supreme Daos? Nineorigin, are you going to form four more Supreme worlds from them? And speaking of the cultivation paths being rebuilt…” Just as Sheng Jiansui spoke, Nineorigin interrupted.

“You don’t need to think of those things for now. After all, you are only a discarnate soul. The mortal world is no longer the world you can call your own.” As Nineorigin said this, Sheng Jiansui finally realized that he was dead. As shock filled his face, simultaneously a strange relief came over his heart.

“…I suppose my words were too harsh. You were a Chaos Sovereign, an existence who could ignore the fetters of the chaosworld and explore the vast expanse of the universe. However, you selflessly decided to sacrifice everything to save me… I cannot repay 1/100th of your favor to me, but I will try my very best to grant you a path to reincarnation.” Nineorigin gently spoke.

“But for your rebirth to safely occur without loss of memory, I have to reform the minor and major worlds, stabilize the 9 supreme worlds, soothe the countless Dao, reconstruct the Underworld and the path of reincarnation and form the 4 new supreme worlds… There are too many things to do. But I promise you won’t have to wait long. For now, you can sit and meditate here. This is the Daocore, the birthplace of the myriad manifestations of the Dao across the chaosworld. Normally, no one other than me can ever enter this space, so just think of this as an opportunity.”

+++

In what seemed like the blink of an eye, 500 years passed by. In these ten 50-year cycles where many mortal dynasties might rise and fall, Sheng Jiansui concentrated on sensing the myriad Dao. Abstract concepts like time-space, reality-illusion and void were simplified and easily comprehended. Mesmerized, just when he was on the verge of comprehending an insight…

“Jianjian, why do you cultivators love meditating on the Dao? You have been sitting like a stone all this while. Doesn’t it get boring?” Nineorigin stretched her arms as she interrupted his meditation.

“It isn’t boring at all! Stop interrupting me at critical times! And don’t call me Jianjian!” While Nineorigin had been hard at work reconstructing the chaosworld, after a while, she began to take breaks and slack off. Without sentience, she would have been completely incapable of feeling boredom and would not have faltered from her work.

True to her physical age, she was acting annoying like a teenager. Sheng Jiansui still didn’t understand why he was nicknamed Jianjian.

“The Dao… why is it something you have to pursue with all your strength. Even without a physical body, with only your spirit remaining, why try so hard…? The Dao is something I can control with a flick of a finger…” With a flick of her exquisite finger, space froze and time stood still. A star was born, shining bright, before turning to dust in a supernova. A lake formed before her, with multicolored lotuses floating gracefully. Myriad manifestations of the Dao occurred with a flick of a finger!

Seeing this, Sheng Jiansui could only sigh. This was like the difference between a genius and a ordinary student solving a mathematical problem. The genius would skip a few steps, due to his outstanding comprehension of the problem while the ordinary student could only carry out every single step.

And Nineorigin could arrive at the result by completely skipping the process! For her, the long path of cultivation and the torturous paths of meditation were meaningless. But even so, Sheng Jiansui had to teach her the path tread by ordinary cultivators, those that strived to oppose the Heavens with their own will!

“While you can easily command the Dao, it is something innate to you, like my arm is to my body. You have not meditated for countless years, spent sleepless nights rattled by the imperfections in your arts, desperately fought in life-and-death battles seeking for a breakthrough! You have never realized that the Dao is vast and endless, and with you only taking a single step on the vast path! You have never felt the sinking feeling that your potential has burnt out, that you will never reach the apex of cultivation!”

“Even if you can fully command the Dao, it can only increase your personal power. And you don’t have much need of personal power in the first place. You cannot write that knowledge down in scriptures, cannot create supreme martial arts and cannot create peerless legacies to pass on to talents! Since you have not achieved the Dao by yourself, you cannot instruct the Dao to others.”

“Every single step of the path of cultivation is known to us because of our predecessors who walked that path without any knowledge. Their cultivation arts and legacies are the pavement layered on the desolate road for us successors. So, it is the duty of the next generation to surpass the previous generation!”

“While you have achieved the Dao… you cannot transmit it! You cannot nurture the next generation of cultivators with the hard-earned knowledge.” Sheng Jiansui shook his head.

Hearing his words, Nineorigin seemed to comprehend the difficulties and perils of the path of cultivation. “What you truly want to say is… the Dao that has been achieved by me is worthless, as it cannot be transmitted.”

“I didn’t mean-“ But Nineorigin had already disappeared. Sheng Jiansui sat down in meditation in quietness.

+++

Time passed like river water. With his heart set on comprehending the mysteries of time, Sheng Jiansui ignored all distractions, his heart set on the Dao.

With his heart in meditation, Sheng Jiansui never noticed that the Nineorigin chaosworld was no longer in pieces. All the minor and major worlds were reconstructed, the 9 supreme worlds were stabilized, the Dao was firm enough to hold up the heavens, the Underworld was functioning and the path of reincarnation was reformed!

With all her duties as the Worldwill complete, Nineorigin decided to form a sect in one of the major worlds. In the new world that had formed, she gathered people to form a sect. In the brave new world where even the cultivation paths had to be rebuilt, the ‘Nine Origin Sect’ took the initiative in exploring the unknown.

“‘While you have achieved the Dao… you cannot transmit it! You cannot nurture the next generation of cultivators with the hard-earned knowledge.’” In a large room at the top of a vast tower, the Patriarch of the Nine Origin Sect spoke to herself. Once upon a time, a white haired swordsman said these words to her. “Sheng Jiansui! Even without transmitting my Dao, I still nurtured a new generation of cultivators! I don’t need to transmit the Dao… I am the Dao.”

“I wonder how you will react to my great success… Of course I won’t tell you. It will be a nice surprise…”

Just then, a ripple went through a token on her desk. As the token transmitted a message to her, her divine sense pierced into the Daocore. In that space, a lone man had awakened.

With a single thought, a message was immediately broadcasted, echoing throughout the space inside the Daocore. “So you are up, huh? A long time has passed by. All preparations for your reincarnation are complete. I will send you to your new life right away!”