Two Steps of Fate

The Sage had her own plans, and likewise, Yaan had his. Establishing a base of operations on the Qi Plane was indeed very enticing, but he was honestly more curious about finding just whom he would find on the other end of this karmic chain of fate. He felt a hint of familiarity, giving him an idea, but he wasn't yet certain.

Divinities all possessed world-shaking travel speeds, which could be separated into two types of travel - considerate travel, and…not so considerate travel. Every Divine Step being had power sufficient to shake the world and damage the fabric of the Qi Plane itself. If they went all out, travelling as fast as possible with no consideration for anything else, they could shoot across the Qi Plane at a terrifying speed, but they would leave a trail of absolute devastation in their wake, and the Qi Plane's realm walls would weaken as a result. For the most part, divinities would avoid travelling like this unless it was absolutely necessary.

However, not all divinities had access to equally shocking long distance travel speeds. Whilst every being at the Divine Step was able to cross the Qi Plane with their own power, something that even Transcendents couldn't do in any reasonable time frame, there were various factors playing into their exact ability when it came to crossing the vast distances of empty space that made up the majority of the Qi Plane.

For example, a divinity with divine stage comprehension in the dao of space would obviously be able to utilise this dao to conceive their own incredible travel method. However, the dao comprehension actually wasn't the key point here - the key point was that they needed to create their own means of travel suitable for the Divine Step.

Defiance Sovereign had not comprehended a single trace of the Heavenly Dao, yet his travel speed was amongst the greatest of all divinities. That said, Defiance Sovereign was also one of the only divinities who never cared about destroying everything in his path and shaking the fabric of the Qi Plane when he moved; he deemed it below him to concern himself with such things. 

Defiance Sovereign should not be able to travel so fast due to his absolute lack of earthly dao comprehension, but Defiance spat in the face of common sense. If logic told him that he could not do something, he would beat that logic to a bloody pulp until it conceded defeat and admitted that he could do whatever the hell he wanted, even if it made no sense.

As for Yaan, he might be an Empyrean right now, but he was yet to develop his own method for long distance travel. He could rely on his powerful dao heart and will, combined with his meagre immortal stage spatial dao comprehension, but this actually put him at a disadvantage, even compared to ordinary Earthly Deities. The difference in experience was a serious issue for Yaan - it was definitely his greatest weakness as a divinity.

Nobody had reached the Divine Step as quickly as Yaan in the history of the 2nd Origin Era. It was common to spend hundreds of thousands of years cultivating to reach the Divine Step, yet Yaan wasn't even 4,000 years old. He somewhat made up for this thanks to the memories he had inherited from his Dao Clones, the original Fragments, the Primordial Devil, and also the Heartless Deity. Even so, sifting through, processing and properly learning from these memories was something that would take him many years to properly complete.

As Yaan followed the illusory chain whilst concealing himself from the world, he watched as the Astral King shot past him, oblivious to his advantage in speed thanks to Yaan's perfect concealment.

Yaan had defeated the Astral King in a single strike. He did this using the killing intent which he had refined from the Primordial Devil and Dao Clone of Soul's domains and killing intents, combined with his own killing intent. He broke down all of these 'real' powers, then had them reborn as a singular 'illusory' power through his Divine Power.

The same was true of his Dao Treasure, the wooden sword. Originally, the wooden sword had been a Dao Treasure with a treasure spirit, this was its nature, its essence. However, it had lost its treasure spirit, becoming a Dao Treasure lacking a part of itself. When Yaan ascended to the Divine Step, he broke down the real wooden sword to its most fundamental essence, then allowed it to be reborn as an illusion, now perfect, lacking nothing. It still had no treasure spirit, but unlike before, this was now its complete state.

This was the nature of Yaan's Divine Power. All of the powers, techniques and abilities that he had created, inherited and stolen, throughout his life, were broken down and fused into one within his Divine Power. Yaan's Divine Power was based upon his heart of fate - with his first step along his path of fate, he crushed every real power, abilities and technique, everything he had ever known, and he used all of these real powers to build the first segment of the path. With his second step along his path of fate, the real powers were transformed into an illusion, and this illusion became the second segment of his path of fate. When he stepped onto the illusory path, his powers were reborn without the flaws which were inherent to all things 'real'.

Reality was restricted by the constraints of possibility, but illusions were not. Others might see illusory abilities as copies, inferior fakes…but to Yaan, it was all things real that were flawed, and only his illusory abilities born from his Divine Power were truly perfect, and perfectly suited to him.

But even so, he still didn't possess any sort of perfect method of travel. He had never really placed much emphasis on developing his long distance travel, since until now, he had never found himself lacking in this regard, even when he relied entirely on the strength of his cultivation. Now, however, he understood that he was lacking.

He could defeat the Astral King in one strike, but he couldn't match even one tenth of the Astral King's travel speed! He watched as the Astral King made use of his divine stage spatial dao to repeatedly teleport across vast distances, soon leaving Yaan's line of sight. At this rate, the Astral King would arrive at the distant Divine Phoenix Sector before him…

Yaan stopped flying and thought about what he could do to improve this clear weakness of his. Honestly, he felt compelled to fix this defect before reaching the Divine Phoenix Sector - to Yaan, his own development took priority above all else, it was even more important than sticking this operation to capture the Four Divine Star System.

If he was found to be lacking, he would lose his standing not only in the group. If his weaknesses were noticed, he would lose his standing with the Primordial Sage…

The Primordial Sage could open portals and send through bodies of any strength she so desired, whenever she so pleased. There were restriction on this of course, and it was something that could be easily detected and countered by others. However, when the entire world was preoccupied, like right now, this ability of hers made her borderline omnipresent.

It didn't take long for Yaan's eyes to shine with the light of inspiration.

Comprehending the spatial dao was important, but this was a longer term goal, he couldn't achieve this right now. What he needed to do, was to find a way to make the most of the powers available to him in this very moment.

'Perhaps I can make use of these illusory karmic chains of fate…' Yaan pondered. As he thought about it some more, his eyes shone brilliantly, and he felt a unique premonition that this…was his own unique power, something that would give him a massive advantage should he properly develop this method into an actual technique.

At the core of his being, was his heart of fate. His Divine Power operated on the cyclic concept of transforming real to illusion, and illusion to real, but this was only possible because the cycle existed within his heart's path of fate.

If Yaan thought of himself as his own path of fate itself, then illusions would be the primarily power born from this path of fate, and the power which he used to further his understanding and journey along his path of fate.

For one reason or another, he had always been drawn to illusions. His understanding of illusions had grown over the years, until now, the way that he saw illusions…was also the way that he saw reality.

If he said reality was an illusion, then reality was an illusion. If he said that illusions were reality, then illusions were reality. This concept was one that others had toyed with, but only Yaan had been able to take this idea, and turn it into the truth…his truth, the truth that only he could dictate.

The Sage had mentioned to him that all Empyreans with a completed dao heart, possessed not only a clear and fully formed dao within their heart, but also other key daos which supported their core dao. Yaan had no doubt that the dao of illusions was his own major supporting dao.

"This illusory chain is a chain of karma, but karma is just the connection. The Heavenly Dao's understanding of fate was too shallow, actually placing it as a mere component of karma, as 'karmic fate'. But in reality, fate is above karma, for fate is the source of all karma in this world! Karmic chains of fate? No…these illusory chains are simply the chains of fate! They are illusory chains of fate that only I can see…but I prefer illusions over reality, since I am also an illusion of my own creation!"

Yaan's eyes shone with a deep light of enlightenment.

His dao comprehension ability had always been shocking, for a simple reason - Yaan lacked any of the usual components of a living being that hindered their Dao Soul from perceiving the true, unadulterated dao! He existed without a real physical body, soul, Qi or mind, he existed as an illusion which reflected his self-perception of his own Dao Soul. In essence, his Dao Soul was constantly in contact with the dao at all times, unhindered by anything, even now, thanks to his illusory state of being!

The cost of attaining this state, was the pain and suffering that he had been forced to battle through, before he could finally exist like this without any detriment to his dao.

Yaan's gaze brightened even further.

"Illusions…are superior to reality! Reality is flawed, limited by the confines of 'possibility'. But illusions exist without these restrictions, illusions are perfect and without flaws! If I say that this illusory chain of fate is a real connection between myself and the other end of my fate, then this is the truth that the world must accept. Since that's the case, let my path of fate overlap with this chain of fate, let this chain transform from a long, illusory chain…into the first two steps of my path of fate, starting at myself, and ending at the fate that I seek!"

As Yaan's eyes shone with the light of his own fate, a light that only he would ever be able to understand, he took one step. His foot landed upon the chain of fate, and for a moment, the entire chain looked like it might collapse…

But he was now standing on the illusory chain of fate with one foot. This was the first step, a real step onto the first segment of the illusory chain, which, in this moment, Yaan dictated must become real!

And so, he was now truly standing upon this 'real' chain, but he seemed to be stuck, with no path ahead to continue walking along.

He took the second step.

With the second step, the real segment of chain beneath him collapsed, reborn through his Divine Power into the remainder of the illusory chain. This chain, previously just a visual illusion, intangible and untouchable, suddenly became an illusion with power surpassing the limits of reality. The real first step was broken down and its essence reborn as an illusion, allowing Yaan to step foot on the illusory chain with his illusory body, and…

There was no sound, there was no obvious movement. From Yaan's perspective, he had simply taken two steps.

Two steps was all he needed to arrive at a source of this fate, a fate strong enough that it could just barely endure the power of his path of fate. He immediately understood that if he tried to repeat this same method with a chain of fate any weaker than this one, then not only would he fail to take the two steps, his dao would sustain severe injuries due to his path of fate being cut off halfway.

He arrived standing in the sky of a giant planet. As he spread out his Spirit Sense…perhaps better described as Illusion Sense, Yaan covered the entire planet with his perception and took in everything upon its surface within mere moments.

"I actually arrived…in just two steps…" Yaan muttered, somewhat in awe of his own achievement.

He immediately knew that he was in the right place, not just because this was clearly a Solar Planet - Planet Phoenix, the grandest of all planets in the Divine Phoenix Sector - but also because he could now see her, the origin of this fate between them, this fate which for some reason bore a similar feeling to the fate he shared with the three Primordial Demon sisters…and many, many others.

Yaan had already discovered hundreds of these similar fates, but this one was by far the strongest below the Primordial Demons. It carried with it a vaguely nostalgic familiarity, and now that Yaan was looking down at the source of this fate, he found that his previous guess had indeed been correct.

"Zue Yin…" Yaan murmured, a wave of nostalgia overcoming his heart.

Very few individuals from Yushu Planet remained alive in this world, and Yaan didn't really know any of them all that well, aside from the girl standing at the mouth of the giant volcano below him. There were three powerful Transcendents speaking with her, each emanating a feeling of ancientness that let Yaan know just how old these fellows were.

A 9th Step Transcendent was a true rarity, and in the past, such a person would be valued by at least one or two divinities for their potential of reaching the Divine Step. Now, however, with the destruction of the Divine Stairway, Transcendents were stuck at their current step, as were Dao Immortals…such as Zue Yin.

If anyone wanted to reach the Divine Step in the current age, their only choice was to ascend with their dao heart. Such individuals were so rare however, that only four had ever appeared in the past three million years of the 2nd Origin Era.

Of course, now that the Divine Stairway was no more, there would be no tribulation for those who completed their dao heart!

Yaan examined Zue Yin closely. As an Empyrean and an expert in concealment, there was no possible way that anyone below the Divine Step could ever notice his observation…so naturally, he felt startled when Zue Yin suddenly furrowed her brows and started looking around uncertainly.

"She noticed me? No, this is impossible…it's because I used the fate between us to reach her. She didn't notice me, but noticed something strange. But this girl…she really did make incredible progress. She actually cultivated a heart of fire - that is, the fire of the Phoenix in her bloodline, not the fire of the Heavenly Dao. With her bloodline, her cultivation and her heart, all of which perfectly compliment one another, she has attained a state of perfection as an immortal that I completely lacked back then. Her current strength should be able to contend against Transcendents up to the 6th Step, this is truly shocking."

Yaan paused, before lightly shaking his head.

"Unfortunately, to reach the Divine Step, she must cultivate the Phoenix Heart, and become the resurrected Divine Phoenix, reborn as a new life, a human bloodline cultivator. Perhaps she could actually succeed given enough time, however…the 2nd Origin Era is approaching its end. Achieving success in these last 20-30,000 years…is basically impossible."

After Yaan finished his assessment, he thought about what he actually wanted to do for a moment.

It didn't take long for an intrigued smile to appear on her face.

"I have never shown my Absolute Domain in this world, have I? I intended to save this ability for a formidable enemy…but comparatively speaking, seeking the answers to my fate is infinitely more valuable than any fight could hope to be. Zue Yin, I wonder…when you enter the world of my domain, when you meet me, the World Demon, within my illusory painted world…what will you see?"

And with that, Yaan took a step, arriving directly before Zue Yin and the three elders. Before they could even realise that they had company, Yaan's domain, his Absolute Domain, the shockingly rare level of domain based upon a completed dao heart, a domain that had only ever been realised by Yaan and five other Empyreans in this 2nd Origin Era…completely covered Planet Phoenix.

In an instant, this entire world, this planet larger than most ordinary life-stars, was draw into an illusion…

In this illusion, the world itself became Yaan's painting.