Beyond the Timescape

Chapter 786: He’s a Xeno-Immortal

It was a calm and peaceful night for many. But for others, the wind pierced deep into their souls.

For example, there was Seventh Prince. After returning to his mansion, he seemed to simply go into meditation. But the truth was that his heart pounded as if he had been possessed. He just couldn’t stop thinking about the content of that jade slip.

And then there was the patriarch of the Xeno-Immortal School, Chen Daoze. When the violet snowflake floated into his earthchild body, he experienced a dramatic proliferation in soul threads. His soul was stronger than the soul of any other person in the Xeno-Immortal School, and had long ago reached an astonishing level. That was why even the puny green snowflake had pushed his soul threads to the level of 300,000.

But now, with the violet soul seed, his soul thread count quickly climbed to 400,000. Then 500,000. And soon it approached 600,000.

The Xeno-Immortal schoolmaster activated a spell formation to keep the fluctuations concealed, otherwise it would have caused a big commotion. The schoolmaster had no choice but to cover those fluctuations. After all... this speed of cultivation was uncanny. When kept within reasonable bounds, fast cultivation would attract some attention. But heaven-defying speed could provoke terror. Thankfully, the schoolmaster was ensuring that no prying eyes noticed what happened.

Of course, he couldn’t block Xu Qing’s senses. That night, Xu Qing opened his eyes several times and looked in the direction of the Imperial University. His expression flickered between various emotions, and his heart was in turmoil.

I can’t believe Chen Daoze’s soul has reached a level like this....

By means of the soul seed, Xu Qing could sense the soul threads increasing in number. Of course, the godsource increase that he experienced as a result was also shocking.

Overnight, Xu Qing’s soul threads increased by tens of thousands.

The Xeno-Immortal schoolmaster also experienced a dramatic night. As he personally watched the patriarch power up, it gave him a deeper understanding of soul seeds, but at the same time, struck fear into his heart. Although his words from earlier seemed perfectly reasonable, and also very convincing, the reality was that he had known the truth about soul seeds from the beginning, thanks to Xu Qing. But in the end, this was a chance to truly revive the Xeno-Immortal School, so even if the soul seed had been pure poison, he still would have consumed it. Maybe his decision would create a rocky future for the Xeno-Immortal School. He had no way of knowing. He just knew that the place was quietly dying, and thus, he’d chosen to make a dramatic gamble.

Even still, what was happening right now was shocking and fear-inspiring. Slowly but surely, Chen Daoze’s earthchild form opened its eyes, and the schoolmaster suppressed his fear.

“This is godsource,” a profound and ancient voice said.

“Greetings, Patriarch!” the schoolmaster said, bowing excitedly.

“Someone... has tread the path ahead of us, and thus proven that our Xeno-Immortal School techniques are feasible on a theoretical level. We use soul threads to imitate godsource. But this person reverse-engineered our process. They used the result to determine the method. And in doing so, they used Xeno-Immortal School techniques as a personal blessing.

“Either a god or an immortal, determined with a single thought. Or perhaps... this is what a xeno-immortal truly is.”

Chen Daoze’s huge earthchild form blurred. Then rumbling sounds echoed out as the body became innumerable soul threads that shrank down and ultimately disappeared, revealing his true body, which hadn’t been seen for 5,000 years. He had deeply sunken eyes and a face full of wrinkles, a testament to the years of hardship he had experienced. His hair was light gray, and he was very skinny. Yet his eyes glittered with bright light; he had such indescribable wisdom that he could burn all souls and see through the substructure of humanity.

After speaking, he checked his body, and then a wistful look appeared in his eyes. He really had never imagined that he would wake up. He had long since resigned himself to slowly sinking away into death.

But now that he was awake, his heart filled with determination. Striding over to the schoolmaster, he clasped the man’s shoulder.

“There’s no need to think too much into this. In your heart, think of him as a xeno-immortal. Then all those complicated thoughts will be made much simpler.”

“Xeno-immortal...” the schoolmaster murmured. Nodding, he gritted his teeth and forced himself to forget about his fear and suspicions. When those attachments disappeared, and he truly opened his heart, the violet snowflake transformed again, this time becoming more deeply bound to him.

At the same time, his soul thread count increased. Breaking past his previous shackles, he reached the level of 100,000.

“You can’t go past that,” Chen Daoze said. “You’ve already surpassed the limitations of your soul. Given the nature of your soul, you previously wouldn’t even have been able to reach 100,000. This is the blessing that comes from those green snowflakes of yours.” Chen Daoze seemed as if he could see into the very depths of the schoolmaster. “If you want to break through, you should try to help those students absorb the green snowflakes. See if their soul thread count can climb high enough for you to... form the next level of dao seed!”

The schoolmaster’s eyes glittered brightly, and he nodded.

Seven days passed.

Xu Qing kept the same routine during that time. He would go to the Xeno-Immortal School tower every day, work on cultivation with the conclave students there, and benefit from the Xeno-Immortal School techniques. He had long since come to realize that as more people cultivated these techniques, the fluctuations in the tower became increasingly beneficial to his breathing exercises. The vortex in his sea of consciousness rotated even more freely.

As a result, Xu Qing liked this environment. He took note that the schoolmaster wasn’t staying upstairs constantly. Instead, he came down to the main hall to give advice to students. It seemed almost as if he was trying to make some sort of decision.

He included Xu Qing in that process, but apparently, Xu Qing’s cultivation speed was too slow. What was more, he didn’t act as fawningly as some of the other students. And thus, as everyone else worked harder, they slowly surpassed Xu Qing.

That wasn’t the case just with Xu Qing. There were other conclave students who fell behind as well, whether they had hesitated about the dao seeds or not. As of now, there were actually hundreds of conclave students in the Xeno-Immortal School, and there were plenty among them who had extraordinary souls. As a result, it was a given that some people would quickly catch up to the old guard.

Wherever large numbers of people gathered, different personalities could be found. And when you added in the fact that no one knew the true identity of anyone else, it meant that many people would reveal aspects of themselves that they normally kept hidden. For example, many people were much more ready to be disdainful or overbearing. Xu Qing had already experienced it a few times. That was especially true after the schoolmaster gave up on him. The new person the schoolmaster had chosen as his favorite would look at Xu Qing and the longtime students with pure arrogance.

Xu Qing didn’t really care. He had already guessed what the schoolmaster was doing, and was actually curious to see how it worked out. Would the schoolmaster be able to use the green soul seeds to make a more advanced type of soul seed? The person he chose for the experiment was indeed extraordinary. With the help of the schoolmaster, that person’s soul improved dramatically. His soul threads increased as well. In a single day, he became the first person among all the students to reach the level of 50,000 soul threads.

A tempest of soul thread fluctuations filled the tower, attracting quite a bit of attention. That was when the schoolmaster hurried that student up to the top level of the tower. No one had any idea what they discussed. But two hours later, that student came back down, and the schoolmaster announced that he was a chief student.

All the other students bowed their heads respectfully.

In any school of thought, the position of chief student was a very important one. Such a person’s every word and action was as a representative of the school and its honor. Of course, chief students also earned instant respect from all the other students in that school of thought. The chief students were also quite the center of attention.

Xu Qing observed from some distance away. As he studied the preening chief student, he realized something.

It worked. The schoolmaster made the next type of soul seed.

The chief student didn’t just have a green soul seed now. He also had a white snowflake, in the middle of forming.

As the other students clustered around the chief student and offered well-wishes and congratulations, Xu Qing left the tower.

The other longtime students left also. Among the group of students clustered around the chief student, some looked with disdain at those who were leaving. Others seemed outright hostile. Regardless, the Xeno-Immortal School now had a chief student, and that only attracted more attention. It also made one certain person even more determined than ever.

And that was Seventh Prince.

At the same time that the Xeno-Immortal student was forming 50,000 soul threads, Seventh Prince was in his mansion thinking about what the God-Merging schoolmaster had said about the Xeno-Immortal dao seeds.

“Evil....”

Seventh Prince’s eyes slowly closed, concealing the strange glow within them. He had made his decision. That night, he went to the northwest of the imperial capital.

There, in a building near Grand Prince’s mansion complex, faint lamp light flickered. A figure was there, seated cross-legged at a wooden table. He wore a voluminous black cloak that covered his facial features. At a certain point, he extended his arm, revealing a withered finger that toyed with the burning wick of the lamp. This person seemed like a black hole; the flickering light wasn’t capable of illuminating them, and instead, was sucked away. He sat there quietly. Waiting.

Sometime later, the sound of a breeze could be heard outside. Three people appeared outside the building. Pushing the door open, they entered, heads bowed, unspeaking.

A raspy voice spoke from the depths of the dark hood.

“One. Don’t try to figure out the identity of our employer. Not even I know.

“Two. Once this matter is concluded, all of you are free.

“Three. If anything unexpected happens, or if you’re discovered, you must self-detonate your fleshly body and reveal the Xeno-Immortal dao seed inside of you. All clues need to point to the Xeno-Immortal School. You can make your own decision about how to best make that happen.

“Four. Our employer wants 30,000,000 human souls. It doesn’t matter if they’re mortals or cultivators, as long as they’re human. Put them in these kettles and return them to me.”

The lamplight flickered as the cloaked individual disappeared into thin air, leaving behind three pitch-black kettles.

The three individuals looked silently at the kettles. Without a word, they picked them up, then vanished into the night. Each used their own ways of leaving the imperial capital, and going to other rings in the region, or even other regions....

Around the time they left, Xu Qing, who was currently in his private chamber focusing on the white snowflake, suddenly opened his eyes and looked off into the distance. He had just sensed three green soul seeds leaving the imperial capital.