The Path Toward Heaven

The snow hurled up by the wind blocked the scene outside the atmosphere, making it look like Chaotian.

Standing on the same spot, Jing Jiu said to the back of General Li, “I’d like an explanation.”

In the eyes of General Li and the others, the gunfire on the square, the laser fire let loose upon the praying hall and the battleship in the dark space were part of the test.

However, they were all unacceptable for Jing Jiu.

“Chi Song has been killed by you,” said General Li.

“You asked the grandmaster of the Bloody Demon Church to find Cao Yuan and then receive me, which is tantamount to sending him to his death.”

Jing Jiu had made a similar statement before the destruction of that battleship and the death of the Immortal Chi Song.

The Immortal Chi Song had an immensely high status and Cultivation state in the Cultivation circle of Chaotian. It was not easy to kill him.

General Li couldn’t even achieve the feat.

If Jing Jiu’s calculation was correct, his death by Jing Jiu and Cao Yuan’s hands was the result General Li wanted. As such, it was not an appropriate explanation.

“I have ideas that are different from those held by the Grandmaster, and I don’t like those devil men. But I only intended to teach him a lesson; I didn’t expect you to kill him.”

General Li went on, “The ascendants from Chaotian are few in this world; we have to value them.”

“Now that the ascendants should be valued, why are they tested? And why did you people attack Jian Xilai?” demanded Jing Jiu.

“Like those of the distant ancient civilization who opted to escape, not all of the ascendant will join our cause, and some of them will opt to leave.”

Looking at the wind and snow outside the cliff, General Li continued, “If they left, it would be of no use to this world, and it would be waste of talent.”

Jing Jiu said, “I don’t believe Cao Yuan and Jian Xilai have the intention of leaving.”

“But I’m not sure that they will be cooperative,” said General Li. “If they were allowed to enter the Federation of the Milky Way, they might affect the situation in its entirety.”

“Why didn’t Bai Ren and that disgraced fairy man go through the tests?” asked Jing Jiu.

General Li replied, “They didn’t even have the courage to leave, so they were unqualified to go through the tests.”

Jing Jiu said, “Looks like you need some obedient foot soldiers. Sorry, I’m not the helper you want.”

“You’re wrong,” said General Li. “It’s Green Mountain that needs the obedient foot soldiers.”

“If this is the case, why did you people bother harassing me?” pressed Jing Jiu.

General Li returned, “As I said, this is just a routine process.”

The essence of humans is that they are not a copying machine, but a recycling one, involved in a dead-end recycling process.

The sun rises and descends. The sea of stars rotates. History has its own routine. What one should eat for supper is also a routine.

Everything, regardless of whether it is the daily life or the mental state, is the ever-lasting repetition until the end.

The ascendants came out after breaking through the cocoons. At least they had breached a certain barrier at a certain period of time, ridding themselves of this boring repetition.

General Li didn’t continue on with the topic. Before Jing Jiu could give a response, he said, “You didn’t kill Yunmai. I have to thank you for this.”

General Li and the other cocoon breakers in the Federation of the Milky Way didn’t expect Jing Jiu to go directly to Capital City, charge into the building of the military headquarters, and cause such a fuss after he came to the Main Planet from the Stargate Base.

“I didn’t want the founding grandmaster to not have the chance,” returned Jing Jiu.

General Li didn’t feel surprised at the fact that Jing Jiu figured out the background of Shen Yunmai. “His mind is a little messed up. You should cut him some slack,” said he.

“No way,” said Jing Jiu.

General Li sighed, “I just can’t understand what you young people have on your minds.”

“What is the situation with Grandmaster?” asked Jing Jiu. “How long does he have left in his lifetime? And why?”

According to the subtle rules of the Cultivation circle in Chaotian, the Cultivation practitioners didn’t usually take on disciples or have offspring, unless they couldn’t ascend or their lifetime was near its end.

The rules had been obeyed until now, even though the Immortal Taiping had changed them considerably.

The founding grandmaster ascended forty thousand years ago, but by the standard time of the Federation of the Milky Way, he had come to this world merely several hundred years ago, but why did he produce a son, Shen Yunmai?

Looking at the wind and snow in the sky, General Li said worriedly, “The Grandmaster is in bad shape. He doesn’t have much time left, and he will see you before his departure.”

After a moment of silence, Jing Jiu asked, “Where is Cao Yuan?”

General Li replied, “He should hide somewhere in that forward base, recuperating.”

“What about Jian Xilai?” asked Jing Jiu.

General Li replied, “I attacked him myself. He sustained a minor injury and is going through special training at the moment. He should be able to come out after a while.”

“It’s good that he is not dead,” commented Jing Jiu expressionlessly.

“Where is the Immortal Tan?” asked General Li.

Jing Jiu exclaimed, “Didn’t you find him?”

“No,” answered General Li.

“Maybe he’s not out yet,” said Jing Jiu.

The novel “The Path Toward Heaven” was a story about himself. The content was accurate only for the period of time before his ascension. As for what had happened in Chaotian afterwards, whether the Immortal Tan had ascended, what thoughts Cao Yuan and Jian Xilai had, and what they had experienced, Jing Jiu had no idea.

“Do you have any questions for me?” asked General Li.

Jing Jiu replied, “No.”

General Li said, “I’ll send someone to pick you up.”

Jing Jiu uttered “hmm”. He flicked his finger slightly, a sword fire shooting out from his fingertip, heading toward the blue swimming pool.

The black and sticky dirty oil was ablaze as soon as the sword fire landed on it, exuding an awful smell.

The automatic fire surveillance system of the Art Gallery sensed the heat and spewed out the foams, but it was impossible to extinguish the flames.

The foam dropped onto Jing Jiu and General Li, but they were repelled before reaching their bodies. The foam accumulated on the floor like an ocean of clouds.

It didn’t take long for the black dirty oil in the swimming poll to burn out. And the oil pipe was twisted due to the high temperature and was blocked.

General Li shot Jing Jiu a deep glance before he turned to fly toward the outside of the cliff, disappearing into the wind and snow.

The residual of the red overcoat in the sky looked like a bloody line.

…

…

By the time the bloody line abated, the front end of the line had already broken through the atmosphere and flown past those space stations and battleships, heading toward the deep part of the universe.

A black battleship was slowly readjusting its positions in the soundless space. A flat and square alloy device underneath the battleship was retrieved. It was unclear what this alloy device was, given that it was neither the generating device of the gravitational field nor the main laser gun, and was different from the often-seen powerful weaponry in the military of the Federation of the Milky Way.

In the bridge at the bow of the battleship, a steady and slender finger left the red button. The finger belonged to a middle-aged officer wearing a pair of glasses with a silvery frame. The light of the permanent star streamed in through the window and landed on his eyes, illuminating a deep intent in his eyes as the light slowed down.

The largest space station was the space laboratory of the Science Academy of the Federation. It looked like a huge metal building assembled in a chaotic and irregular manner, glistening brightly under the light of the permanent star.

The old president of the academy walked slowly on the passageway by the edge of the space station, his white hair illuminated by the light streaming in through the window, as if it were ablaze.

Arriving before the door of an ordinary room, he stopped and pushed open the door and walked in. After adapting to the change of weight direction, the president took out a chip and handed it over.

A scholarly middle-aged professor of about thirty years of age took the chip and said politely, “Thank you very much.”

The Science Academy enjoyed a very high status in the Federation of the Milky Way, and the president of the academy had a high status and power. It was unclear what contents the chip contained, deserving personal delivery by the president.

It was unclear what status the middle-aged professor had, but the president showed a great deal of respect toward him. “Please tell me if you have any other requests,” said the president.

Having said that, he turned to leave the room. Rubbing his eyes that were hurt by the bright light, the president waved his hand to lower the streaming rate of the light in the space station. Then, he spun his head to take a look at the tightly closed door while letting loose a wry smile.

In the room, the middle-aged professor read the contents in the chip on the monitor.

The contents were the name list and relevant personal information of the universities and research institutes related to breaking the nuclear fusion reactor in the Federation of the Milky Way.

It didn’t take long before he fixed his gaze on planet Tianpu and noticed Professor Gou at Northwest University.

It was after all rather noticeable that he had become a university professor from a lecturer of the extracurricular classes in about thirty days.

Unfortunately, Professor Gou had left Northwest University a few days ago. It was said that he went to the Main Planet to visit his family; but who knew where he had gone to?

Looking at the picture in his personal file, the middle-aged professor curled up the corners of his mouth to let loose a mild smile, commenting, “He is indeed the son-in-law of the Bai family.”

He got up, walked to the bookshelf, and took out the novel “The Path toward Heaven”, turning to the page regarding the One-Cottage House, and started reading it.

A moment later, he murmured to himself, “I’d better go there and have another look.”

No sooner had he said this than he drew an amulet in the air with his right forefinger.

The amulet entered the device, collecting the signals, after which it was enlarged and sent to the server at the end of the laboratory responsible for analyzing data, and was connected to the civilian network within the interplanetary network, getting in that game eventually.

The battleships and space stations, like the décor of the Main Planet, were hovering quietly in the space.

There was a small planet in the distance, the surface of which had many circular mountains created by meteors many billion years ago.

One inconspicuous circular mountain was very dark in its deep part, where the light of the permanent star could hardly reach, and the temperature was exceedingly low there.

An old man with a cold and gloomy expression on his face sat in the shadow with his eyes closed for a long while.

All of a sudden, he lifted up his head and opened his eyes. Looking at the red color in the sky, he asked, “Are you sure you believe in him?”

The atmosphere was extremely thin on this planet, and it was hard for the sound to travel.

The lips of the old man were a bit dry; however, his voice traveled to the highest point of the circular mountain in an unimaginable fashion.

Standing on the peak of the circular mountain, General Li spun his head to look at the Main Planet that looked like a snowball, saying, “He is a disciple of Green Mountain, and this is a significant matter concerning the entire human race. Why shouldn’t I trust him?”

…

…

The black spacecraft took off from the southernmost iceland and passed through the bright sunlight, heading toward the priest mansion in the northern hemisphere.

The spacecraft stayed in the atmosphere the entire time and didn’t fly very fast. As such, the scenery outside the window could be seen clearly.

Yet, Jing Jiu was not in a mood to enjoy the scene. He sat in the chair with his eyes closed, lost in thought.

The moment the white iceland was superseded by the blue ocean, he suddenly opened his eyes and asked, “How many of them came?”

“The targets you asked me to survey have had seventeen abnormal movements lately…”

Staring at the flow of data on the monitor, Ran Handong added, “Two people came to the Main Planet. They should be right outside the atmosphere.”