Chapter 684: Forced to merge

Li Qi's question directly pointed out a fact.

That is the oppression of this Heavenly Dao.

In other words, if the conditions were a bit more lenient, then the Heavenly Dao of Immortal Heaven would be a wild, Acquired First Grade Star Officials!

Although he had no relation to the Dao Orthodoxy of Gods and did not follow that system.

Li Qi could tell from the way the other party accepted sacrifices.

Before him, this Heavenly Dao probably refused to accept any sacrifices or communication.

For this world, everything was for its own growth, for its own survival.

This was the ultimate of the Dao of Heaven’s Evolution.

Call it selfish, call it overbearing, it doesn't matter.

Only those who survive have the right to explain everything.

For the existence of the Dao of Heaven’s Evolution, if everyone enjoys blessings, can enjoying blessings still be called enjoying blessings?

The food web has only one apex, and all existences of the Dao of Heaven’s Evolution aim solely for that unique position, even including the Old Ancestor of the True Dragons, who is simultaneously a 'Star Officials' and a 'First Gods', and also the progenitor of the Dao of Heaven’s Evolution, that revered Heavenly God, the legendary Azure Dragon, is also like this.

This also explains why his Star Officials could make the Fifth Grades of Immortal Heaven flock to him, actively 'harmonizing with the Dao'.

Because they really couldn't distinguish whether they were harmonizing with someone else's Heavenly Dao or the Heavenly Dao of their own world; for them, the ultimate goal of everything was to harmonize with the Dao.

Returning to heaven and earth, becoming the nourishment of the Heavenly Dao.

They were completely consumed.

The highest level of Immortal Heaven, where existences above Fourth Grade reside, is solely the will of the Heavenly Dao itself.

Just as Li Qi gave this answer, Li Qi's Heaven Offering ceremony was suddenly forcibly interrupted!

The Heavenly Dao refused to continue responding, directly leading to the destruction of the Heaven Offering ritual.

The 'great path' was destroyed, the sacrificial vessels shattered, and the backlash even rushed into Li Qi's Physical Body, directly leading to the complete collapse of the ritual.

Li Qi was holding a Grand Ritual, so the failure of the Grand Ritual also caused a vast amount of power to leak out, and terrifying pressure to pour out towards the surroundings!

Destruction!

Almost in the blink of an eye, the ground for ten thousand li around was completely crushed, all mountains and rivers flattened into one piece, and the earth was compacted.

All living beings, plants, and even cultivators were flattened together, turning into two-dimensional forms.

Under the terrifying pressure, many Heaven-Penetrating Realm immediately emerged, casting their gaze towards this place!

Who is this person?!

Why is there such terrifying power?

And so, under the gaze of so many people, Li Qi's body flew out.

He uncontrollably rushed into the sky!

Holy crap!

"You damn it! Thief Heaven, I advise you to be careful!" Li Qi couldn't help but curse loudly, directly scolding a First Grade Heavenly Dao.

Because, he was about to harmonize with the Dao!

In the distance, the Heaven-Penetrating Realm who peeked out from various places cast envious glances.

Another powerful expert successfully harmonized with the Dao.

From then on, he would live as long as heaven, free from any constraints.

How wonderful.

But Li Qi, as the center of the event, did not think this was a good thing.

He panicked.

A First Grade wanted to attack him, and he couldn't control it; he could clearly feel the Heavenly Dao's greed.

Mother, help!

Li Qi cursed while trying to resist, but facing the Heavenly Dao of a First Grade world, resistance was clearly meaningless; he was quickly pulled, and a Heavenly Gate appeared before his eyes.

Above the Heavenly Gate was the perfectly good and bright place he had seen before!

He was truly going to harmonize with the Dao!

Amidst the envious gazes of the onlookers, Li Qi broke through the Heavenly Gate, and his Physical Body entered it.

After that, it was 'digestion'.

Li Qi clearly felt a special Dao enveloping him.

These Dao were absorbing Li Qi's cultivation and understanding his Dao Orthodoxy, even trying to devour his memories.

Damn it!

He must not sit back and do nothing, even if he was facing a First Grade.

Li Qi immediately sat down, guarding himself, and with his True Knowledge Dao Resonance fully activated, he swept away the Dao that rushed towards him.

It was truly 'rushing towards him'.

Li Qi knew that the other party obviously didn't have a Physical Body, but rather a special 'area' or 'force field' composed of rules.

This strange, indescribable, and untouchable feeling was like arriving in a Universe with completely different physical rules.

Yes, the other party's body was not matter, but an 'area'; within the 'area', there were completely different rules. When he reached out to Li Qi, it was essentially these 'areas' spreading towards Li Qi, eventually completely enveloping Li Qi. The Qi, matter, and even memories within Li Qi's body would decompose as a result, and then operate according to the Dao within these 'areas', thereby completely transforming into the other party's appearance while maintaining its nature.

Must resist.

And the method of resistance was obviously very simple: to adhere to one's own Dao and let one's understanding of the world cover one's own area.

To use one's own Dao to form one's own 'area', and then resist the other party's decomposition.

Behind Li Qi, his Inner World opened, enveloping him.

The world barrier opened, which was the world's self-protection measure. The existence of the world barrier could prevent the world from contacting the outside, and it was also the world's strategy to prevent the erosion of external Dao.

The world barrier was actually quite useful in this regard, effectively resisting external interference.

Li Qi calmed his mind; although he was in a hurry, he did not do anything irrational because of his situation.

The more dangerous it is, the calmer one must be.

Holding up the world barrier, he sat alone in his Inner World.

Then, the True Knowledge Dao Resonance unfolded, beginning to scan the external area, looking for the other party's weaknesses, and trying to sustain himself for as long as possible.

He didn't dare to say he could survive, but he definitely had to struggle.

When a fish is placed on a chopping board, it still struggles, and even when thrown into a hot oil pan, it flails a couple of times, splashing oil on people's faces. Li Qi couldn't be worse than a fish.

It was fine not to scan, but with this scan, Li Qi's eyes suddenly widened—

How could this be…

Impossible, right?

Why would there be such self-consistent, such perfect Dao principles?

It was simply… natural itself.

As the saying goes, 'The Dao has fifty, Heavenly Evolution has forty-nine, one escapes', meaning that the Dao is complete at fifty, its evolution is forty-nine, implying that heaven and earth are incomplete, so how can there be Perfection in the world? That escaped one is even a miracle, a variable in the midst of the unknown.

The Heavenly Dao is inherently incomplete, and everything has a glimmer of hope.

This is actually the benevolence of Dao Orthodoxy, or perhaps… instinct?

Dao Orthodoxy, that is, the First Gods, they were like the Heavenly Dao of Immortal Heaven. When the Universe was first opened, all life was still at the lowest level, and no one could defeat the Gods.

In the very earliest stage, the Heavenly God was the controller of everything, and among them were even naturally born First Grades, such as the supreme 'Haotian', or the later born 'Taiyi'.

The 'Ziwei' of Ziwei Heavenly Court refers to 'Taiyi', and Taiyi is the Lord of Star Officials.

The purple Qi, known as the Qi of emperors, exists because of Taiyi's existence.

However, although the Ziwei of Ziwei Heavenly Court came from Taiyi, the Heavenly Emperor of the Heavenly Court was actually Haotian, so there must have been another story, but Li Qi didn't know it.

Putting those aside, with Haotian and Taiyi as the supreme beings at the very beginning of Dao Orthodoxy, the development of other life forms had to rely on the Gods.

This was also the opportunity for the initial development of Shaman Dao.

In ancient times, Shaman Dao primarily communicated with spirits. Its essence was that the Gods at that time were simply too strong, so strong that other life forms found it difficult to resist.

It's hard to say that the Shaman Gods weren't influenced by Dao Orthodoxy.

However, Dao Orthodoxy was not cruel and ruthless; on the contrary, although somewhat willful, Dao Orthodoxy was benevolent and friendly in most cases.

The so-called 'Dao has fifty, Heavenly Evolution has forty-nine' was the gentleness of Dao Orthodoxy. Dao Orthodoxy did not prevent Mortals from growing, and even actively cultivated Mortals.

Xuan Pin once imparted methods to the first Human Emperors, bestowing the Soldier-Tally of Faith.

Haotian once bestowed a mandate upon Shamansan.

The Earl of Wind and Master of Rain were responsible for favorable winds and timely rain, improving the lives of Mortals.

All of this brought little in return, and even invited retaliation from Mortals. For example, Human Dao has always believed that 'man can conquer nature', wanting to replace heaven with man, to replace the declining First Gods.

But the First Gods still continued to sustain the lives of Mortals, including the Star Officials, who still maintain all the 'starry skies' in the myriad worlds to guide the lives and production of Mortals.

Without the 'starry skies', many Mortals in lower-level worlds wouldn't even be able to deduce celestial phenomena, which would be even worse.

This is difficult to understand, perhaps it can only be attributed to the First Gods' almost instinctive doting on Mortals, which allowed Mortals to develop.

However, here in Immortal Heaven, there was no glimmer of hope.

Immortal Heaven had already cut off this glimmer of hope. Of the fifty Dao, as the Heavenly Dao, it firmly controlled all fifty, leaving no room for survival below.

Therefore, it could be so perfect.

As a 'God', Immortal Heaven appeared so utterly good that it was even more terrifying than the Gods Li Qi had seen.

This made Li Qi break out in a cold sweat.

If all the First Gods were like Immortal Heaven, then this world would probably be beyond saving.

The benevolence of Dao Orthodoxy, while leading to their current weakness, also gave rise to other life forms that might touch the ultimate.

Haotian and Taiyi are that one.

And the Dao seekers want zero. If the First Gods held onto everything tightly like Immortal Heaven, then the entire Universe would probably be stagnant, turning into something like Immortal Heaven.

Thinking this, Li Qi suddenly… understood something.

Perfection—

Li Qi had always pursued Perfection, whether it was natural, the will of heaven, or determining the future, its essence was to find the perfect solution.

And the perfect solution was Li Qi's lifelong pursuit because he wanted to be as perfect as possible, wanting to live well himself and also wanting others to live well, for everything to reach the best state possible.

Everyone could have a happy ending.

But…

Now, Immortal Heaven, and Haotian and Taiyi, presented a stark contrast.

Immortal Heaven was so perfect, while Haotian and Taiyi were somewhat dejected, suppressed by other Dao Orthodoxy.

However, the imperfect seed bloomed into a more beautiful flower.

The Dao has fifty, Heavenly Evolution has forty-nine, perhaps there is a reason for this?

It's just that… is that flower truly more beautiful?

Despite being at a life-or-death moment, Li Qi fell into deep thought at this time.

He couldn't help but think, even though it was a matter of life and death.

The Heavenly Gods who left a glimmer of hope, their current situation is well known and not very good. They raised the Mortal races but were squeezed by them, the most typical example being 'Haotian'.

And the Heavenly God who did not leave this glimmer of hope is the 'Immortal Heaven' before him.

Who was right, Immortal Heaven or Haotian?

For Li Qi, he definitely felt Haotian was better, but what if viewed through Haotian's eyes?

As a naturally born First Grade, a naturally Awakened First Grade Heavenly Dao, what did Haotian think? What reason did he use to explain all of this?

Or rather… did he regret it?

Regret raising Mortals to this point?

As Li Qi pondered this answer, his world barrier was gradually being eroded by Immortal Heaven.

But Li Qi had already decided not to care.

His resistance was meaningless in the face of a First Grade's erosion. No matter how the True Knowledge Dao Resonance scanned, it couldn't find a flaw, and whatever he did couldn't delay this erosion.

And Immortal Heaven was clearly not in a hurry; he didn't actively destroy Li Qi, because what he wanted wasn't a corpse, but 'harmonizing with the Dao', so it was best not to rush, to take it slow.

But for Li Qi, this 'taking it slow' was like a late-stage cancer patient counting their days on a hospital bed; the medicine was ineffective, and nothing he did could prevent death's arrival.

True Perfection, without flaws, Mortals have no chance of survival before it. So-called utterly good things are nothing more than this; Li Qi couldn't find an opportunity.

Therefore, blindly resisting now was meaningless.

It would be better to use the difference between 'Haotian' and 'Immortal Heaven' to perhaps find a way to break out of this situation.

And… this kind of thinking was also good for Li Qi himself.

Perfection was also Li Qi's pursuit.

And Li Qi had seen, and the True Knowledge Dao Resonance had scanned, the most perfect thing, which was undoubtedly the 'Immortal Heaven' before him.

However, Li Qi had personally seen the Mortals of Immortal Heaven.

Was the Perfection of Immortal Heaven truly perfect? Or rather, was it the Perfection Li Qi desired?

Li Qi fell into contemplation.

He realized that to find the imperfection of Immortal Heaven, he needed to use the imperfection of Haotian to highlight the other's imperfection, and thus find a flaw in Immortal Heaven, making a slight resistance from within.

He didn't dare to think he could find a way out, because facing a First Grade, even if he found the other's flaw, what then?

Just a slightly more dignified death.

But even so, it had to be done; no matter what, he had to do what should be done, not wavering because of whether it was meaningful or not, just doing it if it needed to be done.

It's just that, a clever housewife cannot cook without rice.

As Li Qi tried to use his understanding of the First Gods to contrast Immortal Heaven, he suddenly realized…

His understanding was too shallow.

He didn't understand Haotian, so he couldn't compare him to Immortal Heaven.

Only—

Just at this moment, he suddenly felt a Qi.

That was… Yao Ji.