288 The Plan of Three Lives

Yaan now knew what he needed to do - he was going to copy the actions of the Primordial Devil back then, splitting apart his Dao Soul to create three different living fragments - his own fragments - from himself.

Back then, after realising that his reincarnation had gone awry, the Primordial Devil resolutely decided to tear apart his Dao Soul into five separate pieces:

The Fragment of Qi, which inherited the Primordial Devil's unwanted 'talent' in cultivation and comprehension over a select few daos which heavily tied in with the Qi refining path.

The Fragment of Soul, which the Primordial Devil removed only to ensure that he himself would definitely successfully reincarnate as a being without any soul cultivation talent. Without any soul cultivation talent, he would become even more compatible with body tempering, and he would definitely reincarnate as a race which possessed the ability to fuse their soul into their fleshly body during the body tempering Immortal Ascension,

The Fragment of Mind, which was born with the potential to cultivate its mind to an extremely high level - a mind that the Primordial Devil intended to devour after restoring his own power, in order to enhance the innate intelligence contained within his fleshly body.

Then there was Yaan, the Primordial Devil's heart demon, and his life's greatest trial. This living heart demon was the tribulation that he needed to overcome, and the cursed monster that had caused his greatest downfall. This foul demon was a being that he truly hated from the depths of his heart…

And finally, there was the 'Fragment of Blood' - which was in reality the core of the Primordial Devil, possessing his true dao heart and the core of his Dao Soul. He only lacked his old level of power and his 3 million years of memories, but he would restore both of those things after defeating his heart demon and moving past this ordeal.

Since then, Yaan had absorbed the Fragments of Qi, Soul and Mind, thanks to the Primordial Sage's interference. Because of this, despite possessing no cultivation of any sort in his current state, Yaan believed that he should be able to tear three similar fragments from his Dao Soul - fragments based upon those three that he had once devoured - and then use those Dao Soul fragments to create three new living beings, each of which would also be him, yet also not.

There were many powerful beings in this world that possessed multiple bodies, but they almost always had a core body, whilst they referred to their other bodies as their 'clones'. As such, since Yaan was essentially going to create three clones of his own, but with a method that had never been used before in the history of the four planes, he decided that the most suitable name for his planned creations, was 'Dao Clones'.

His three Dao Clones would be similar, but also different, compared to the three living fragments that he had devoured in the past…

He wouldn't split apart his Dao Soul just to reproduce the exact same fragments that he had devoured back then. Each of those Dao Soul fragments which had been devoured into his Dao Soul would become the three foundations for the formation of his three Dao Clones. However, the foundation was just the beginning - each of the three Dao Clones would be completely different, dao heart and personality wise, compared to the Primordial Devil's Fragments of Qi, Mind and Soul…

For one, Yaan's Dao Clones would each contain a different part of himself; that was his reason for doing all of this. He wanted to separate the different lives, ideologies and hearts contained within his jumbled mess of a broken Dao Soul, and this was by far the best method that he could think of.

Each of his Dao Clones would be based on a different portion of Yaan's dao heart. The Dao Clones would also absorb a portion of Yaan's Dao Soul and dao heart, adopting all of the qualities that best suited them. This part of the process was necessary for the Dao Clones to become complete.

Yaan would create his own Dao Clone of Qi, giving it his complete talent for Qi refining cultivation, as well as his 'intuitive comprehension' over the earthly daos. But more so than just that, the Dao Clone of Qi would be born from the human part of Yaan's heart. This was the part of him that enjoyed the more simple aspects of cultivation, and just wanted to cultivate by himself in peace. This was the part of him that enjoyed studying spells, cultivating via orthodox methods, and ascending through the realms without needing to cause bloodshed. But also…the Dao Clone of Qi would inherit the simple human part of him that just wanted to go home.

He would create his own Dao Clone of Mind, giving it his intelligence, along with his conscious ability to comprehend dao. This differed from his Dao Clone of Qi, which would gain his 'intuitive' dao comprehension ability. Essentially, his Dao Clone of Qi would excel in 'feeling dao', whilst his Dao Clone of Mind would excel in 'studying dao'. They would both possess extraordinary dao comprehension abilities, but they would pursue dao in totally different ways. His Dao Clone of Mind would also possess the desire to seek the truth, a desire that Yaan had gradually developed in his heart over the years, as well as his innate curiosity towards learning and studying new things.

As for his Dao Clone of Soul…

The Primordial Devil had not given his own Fragment of Soul much at all. The Fragment of Soul was the most pitiful of the fragments, and Yaan didn't really absorb anything valuable from it. However, Yaan had an important plan for his own Dao Clone of Soul…Yaan's Dao Clone of Soul would take the part of his heart that Yaan had inherited from the Primordial Devil's own heart.

Yaan was the Primordial Devil's heart demon - this was the predominant force within his dao heart and soul. This part of his heart existed in opposition to the Primordial Devil, but in order to 'oppose' the Primordial Devil's heart, he also needed to contain part of the Primordial Devil's heart within himself, giving his malicious heart something to actually oppose. His Dao Clone of Soul would combine these two aspects, fusing them into a new entity, an entity that would reflect the Primordial Devil's nature - but making that nature Yaan's own.

Essentially, the Dao Clone of Soul would be prideful, arrogant, and without talent - but he would be disdainful of talent itself. He would cultivate like a demon, using a method similar to the Fiend Transformation Technique to cultivate the spirit soul path via slaughter, opposing the natural order and following only his own dao heart, without ever comprehending a single trace of an earthly dao…

The Dao Clone of Soul would also become Yaan's insight into better understanding the Primordial Devil and his heart.

Each Dao Clone would have its use, and each Dao Clone represented a different part of Yaan's dao heart. Each Dao Clone would be born by splitting apart his own Dao Soul appropriately, a process that would be terrifically painful, no doubt.

And as for what would be left behind, after these three enormous and very substantial fragments were torn away from his Dao Soul?

Yaan didn't know, but he did know that whatever remained of him would be the most important part of all, because what remained of his dao heart after tearing away those three fragments, could only be his truest, deepest core. Creating the three Dao Clones would require removing every single aspect of himself, from himself. As such, the part of his Dao Soul that was left behind…would be the most pure form of himself, unadulterated by anything - not by his origins, and not by his life experiences. Yaan didn't know exactly what he, the true core of it all, would become, but he knew one thing for sure:

He would be exceedingly weak, lacking all talent in all regards, without any strength, and probably lacking even the ability to think. But he was certain that even in this barely sentient state, he would still be the core of his four-way fragmented self.

After deciding on how he would go about this fragmentation of his Dao Soul, Yaan wanted to start comprehending the Primordial Sage's technique right away, but she reminded him that before performing the technique, there was something that he needed to do.

"After you killed each fragment, you absorbed their Dao Souls into your own. You should have also absorbed the entirety of each of their memories, talents and so on, but I was forced to prevent this - a Foundation Step cultivator absorbing the memories, talents and complete comprehension of an Immortal Step cultivator, would typically be an act of suicide. I allowed you to glimpse the Fragment of Qi's early memories before sealing them away, since the Fragment of Qi was only a True Immortal. However, the Fragment of Mind…had attained the Dao Immortal Realm, because the Fragment of Mind lived under my tuition on the Sage Plane since the moment of its birth. Because of this, you never even glimpsed into the Fragment of Mind's memories, and the Fragment of Mind's Dao Soul was fully sealed away within your own Dao Soul, along with the Fragment of Qi's partial seal. Before splitting your Dao Soul, you must first undo these two seals, or else you will lack two of the three fragment foundations which you require to create your three Dao Clones."

When the Spirit Plane Lord heard this, she immediately voiced her concerns.

"Sister, isn't this too dangerous then? Brother is still just a Foundation Step being, he…wait, is he actually a Foundation Step being…?"

"He is." The Sage nodded lightly. "But he is unlike any other Foundation Step being in this world. He possesses no cultivation of any sort, only a Mortal Dao Soul. It might seem like he is extremely vulnerable in this state, without any sort of form to protect himself, but this is not the case. It would be more accurate to think of it like this - brother, in his current state, is unhindered by the limitations of the four forms of being. Without a body, soul, energy or mind, he has no clear areas of weakness, so he cannot be harmed easily."

When the Sage explained it like this, Yaan knew that she was telling the truth, because right now, he could actually feel those two seals within his Dao Soul. He could feel that removing these seals wouldn't be particularly dangerous, so long as he acted with care.

In fact, Yaan had realised something else. The fact that he lacked a real body was almost certainly responsible for his current ability to comprehend any and every earthly dao quickly and with ease; without a anything hindering him, his Dao Soul was directly exposed to the world, allowing him to directly feel the flow of dao itself at all times. This put his earthly dao comprehension ability on a level far beyond any immortal!

But right now, earthly dao comprehension didn't mean much to him. Even if he could comprehend every earthly dao to an extremely high level - so what? It wouldn't help him to achieve his goal.

Right now, he only cared about seeking his heart, and to do that, he needed to split up the different sides of his dao heart by fragmenting his Dao Soul into three separate Dao Clones.

He would also take this opportunity to better his understanding of the Primordial Devil. Whether he liked it or not, Yaan's fate was completely bound to the Primordial Devil - it always had been. So long as he continued living, it was inevitable that one day, the two of them would face one another once again.

Yaan was at a huge disadvantage here, because even if he defeated the Primordial Devil, he would still be destroyed. If he truly wanted to pursue his path, if he truly wanted to live, then he needed to find a way around this seemingly inescapable eventuality, and for that, it was imperative for him to develop a better understanding of the Primordial Devil.

The more he thought about this crazy plan of fragmenting his own Dao Soul and living three separate lives with his three distinct Dao Clones, the more Yaan felt like it was definitely the best course of action. This path of separating his heart would allow him to truly comprehend himself - the various parts of himself. He would also come to better understand the Primordial Devil, but also the part of the Primordial Devil that existed within his dao heart, along with the unquenchable hatred that his heart was forced to feel towards the Primordial Devil due to the original nature of his heart demon's heart.

The Spirit Plane Lord was more than worried about his dangerous plan. Even the Primordial Sage had suggested alternative ideas that he could try first…

But their efforts were pointless. When Yaan decided on a way forwards, it was immediately set in stone that he would stick by his decision and see his path through to the end, no matter what the journey might entail.