The Web of Fate

Once the idea of cultivating Possibility Fate appeared in Yaan's mind, it immediately took root as something that he should absolutely focus on. He had many ideas regarding areas to pursue for his future development, but fundamentally, the one thing that Yaan truly desired, was to cultivate his own dao of fate until he could dictate the fate of this world according to his own will. Of course, he also needed to expand his understanding of all things, otherwise, how would he fix this world with his current wisdom?

And now, he had finally stumbled upon the first instance of real hope! If he could properly comprehend the dao of possibility in relation to fate, he might actually be able to transform his overly ambitious dream into a reality!

His heart filled with obsession, Yaan observed the collision between Defiance and Shi time after time. He repeated that one moment, the moment in which the two sides of possibility seemed to collide, until gradually, his perception of the world started to expand.

Yaan completely lost track of time, but really, the concept of time's passage became irrelevant when he was living in a frozen instant, observing a reflection of the world wherein time itself was his to control.

For as long as this instant continued to benefit him, Yaan would continue to observe.

From his initial perception of reality, he started to see past these confines, into the dimension of possibility. The world before his eyes was expanding as these illusory shadow-like variations of the present moment spread out before his eyes, becoming clearer and better defined the deeper his obsession dug.

There were three spatial dimensions, one time dimension, and now, Yaan could also see that there was also a 'possibility dimension'!

It was extremely jarring and almost nauseating at first, trying to process all of this, but he slowly grew more accustomed to seeing through possibility. The countless alternative potential outcomes that could have arisen from the clash between possibility driven by fate and possibility driven by chaos, spread out like a flip-book around him. From the slight variation of Shi lifting her finger a thousandth of a millimetre further, to the completely alternate scene of her imploding her destructive body rather than exploding it. For a brief moment, Yaan could see it all…

This would be the last moment of peace that he knew in the illusion, because as soon as he finally saw possibility clearly…Yaan's mind started to collapse.

He suddenly lost control over space and time as he coughed up bloody miasma uncontrollably and was thrown across half the World Plane and he fell backwards 10,000 years in time. The moment he reached the beginning, a sense of urgency barely managed to contain the disorientation in his mind…and threw him in the other direction.

In near-silence, with only the sound of his own worsening injuries to accompany him, Yaan found himself falling back and forth through time and space, constantly ricocheting between the extreme boundaries of the illusory world. Reality and possibility overlapped endlessly, causing Yaan to fall further and further into a pit of uncertainty, wherein truth and fantasy blurred into a single distorted image, and the world as he knew it ceased to make sense.

Yaan felt like he had been stuck in this god-awful state for countless lifetimes, but at some point, perhaps by pure chance, the countless possibilities happened to overlap perfectly with reality, giving him a brief moment to recollect himself and quickly try to stabilise his condition.

By the time his mind finally regained some degree of clarity, Yaan understood exactly what had happened.

"I saw something that the mind of a living being isn't supposed to see, something that simply cannot be processed…" He smiled bitterly at first, but soon fell silent and stared forwards at his saving grace…

It was himself.

Or rather, it was the illusory reflection of his own self, the past him that had spent 18,000 years meditating in peace, atop Rainbow Mountain.

The entire world around him had descended into a nonsensical mess of possibilities, and because of his insight into the dao of possibility, he unknowingly became 'too perceptive' of these alternative outcomes…so perceptive that he could no longer discern reality from possibility, causing everything to fuse into a single jumbled mess. However, when Yaan stared at himself, meditating atop Rainbow Mountain, he could only see a single possibility…

It was as if possibility was endlessly converging inwards, collapsing into a single frame with himself at its centre!

Yaan felt shocked to see this, because even the 'fate' type of possibility which he observed around Defiance Sovereign was not like this. Defiance Sovereign had honed his focus such that his actions in every possibility were like mirror images of one another; no matter what transpired around him, he was deadest on pursuing Shi. However, he still existed across countless possibilities…he had become 'effectively one possibility', but when Yaan looked at himself, he didn't just exist as 'effectively' one possibility, his entire life existed within a true single possibility!

How could this be? Why was it that even as the world around him exploded into a mess of more and more possibilities, no matter what happened, it was unable to change a single thing about his own experience across these 18,000 years…?

When viewed from a frozen point in time, the countless possibilities were like still images in a flip-book, extending in either direction of reality at the centre. However, after his understanding of possibility deepened, that was when Yaan started having issues – with every second that passed, every single still image of possibility also erupted with its own space-timeline, leading to yet another array of possibilities following in each consecutive moment. With each moment, all of those possibilities likewise branched out further…following the entirety of this 'possibility space', as it continued to branch in this fashion, resulted in the potential possibilities growing exponentially with each following moment compared to the last. This was why Yaan had suddenly lost control…

And yet, as he stared at himself, meditating silently on the mountain, there was just one possibility, and that was the reality which he had already experienced. No matter how much time passed, no matter how crazily his perception of possibility space expanded and the world around him overlapped time and time again…it all collapsed into a single image, unmoved across space and time.

He didn't understand how this was possible, his current comprehension of the dao of possibility told him that this should not be something that could happen…or rather, there should be so much more happening than just this! However, it was thanks to this unusual phenomenon that he was able to readjust himself and focus on reality once again.

The world around him could do whatever it wanted, but so long as he focussed on himself, he would never feel lost or go astray again, this was the feeling that Yaan had right now. 

For a moment, Yaan found himself staring at his own illusory past self dazedly.

"The truth of the world is a sea of Chaos that I might never truly understand…but so what? Do I really need to understand the world's truth? Is that really as important…as my own truth? Rather than pursuing some external understanding into the truth of the world…perhaps I should just shut my eyes and ignore the truth. Perhaps that is the path towards replacing the world's truth, the world's Fate, with my own…"

Yaan watched himself for a long time. The world all around him didn't stabilise at all, but eventually became so oversaturated with possibilities overlapping, that Yaan gradually lost his ability to see anything but himself.

He finally found himself seated within a completely white void, looking at himself more clearly than ever before. To his shock, Yaan found that by watching his past self cultivate, he was rapidly being enlightened into the dao comprehension within him from the Boundless Dao Sea – the 90% that he was still yet to process! It felt rapid in one sense, but in another sense, Yaan realised…he had lost all sense of time, space and possibility. All he could see, was his own Fate.

Not only did Yaan feel like his understanding of all the dao within the Boundless Dao Sea was being elucidated, he also felt like he was developing a much deeper understanding of himself.

"My dao is the dao of Fate, but Fate is such a broad concept, there are many other daos that I have always favoured as a way of properly displaying my power…illusion, painting, sword, truth, possibility…"

"My Truth Dao Art is representative of my journey through understanding. First, I wanted to see the truth of the world, so I developed 'Reveal Truth'. Then, I wanted some peace from the world and the freedom that came with being left alone, so I developed 'Conceal Truth'. Most recently, I realised that I wanted to replace the world's truth with my own, that is why I developed 'Define Truth'…"

"For a long time I believed that in order to overcome the world's Fate, I would first need to see it, to understand it. I believed that in order to redefine the world's truth, I must see it, understand it…but what if that is completely incorrect? What if…seeing the world's Fate, is only clouding my vision of my own Fate? What if I simply decide, here and now…that there is no objective Fate, no objective truth in this world? What, exactly, is preventing me…from claiming the throne of decider of Fate for myself…?"

After a long time, Yaan's eyes started to glimmer with understanding. 

Gradually, the white void started to become clear, and the world around him returned to how it was. His 'understanding' of possibility was reversed – or at least, his nauseating perception of that 'truth' started to backpedal!

He quickly opened his senses to the world, finding that he was once again able to process everything around him. The moment he stopped caring about seeing through the truth, the moment he closed his eyes to the world around him, all became clear. 

Yaan's heart trembled violently as disbelief filled his gaze.

The moment he stopped trying to comprehend the world's Fate…the moment he decided that he would become the dictator of Fate, deciding for himself that there was nothing blocking his way…

"I go my whole life not understanding the world's dao of fate at all, then the moment I decide to shut my eyes and deny the existence of any Fate beyond my own, I suddenly understand the truth of the dao of fate…haha, what is this? What…the hell is this?!"

Yaan had to force a smile. Even with all he had seen, the world before his eyes right now…was unbelievable. He had the distinct feeling that he was being mocked by Fate, as if it was toying with him - hiding from his perception when he wanted to seek his mysteries, then suddenly flipping around and forcing him to face it directly, the moment he attempted to deny the existence of objective reality.

Why did he feel so shaken, exactly?

Well, because now, he was able to see through possibility, and because of this, he could finally see the web of Fate that spread through the world.

He had felt confused for a while now, because at times, the dao of fate seemed to be the derivative of many other daos, such as karma and origin, but then at other times, it appeared to be equal to the dao of chaos, and sometimes…it appeared to be controlling many other daos.

Finally, he could say with absolute certainty, that every single one of his guesses…was absolutely correct.

"Fate is derived from every single dao, placing it below every dao that can be defined…yet simultaneously, Fate controls everything, like an insidious web trapping all within its clutches, because despite being derived from every other dao…every other dao is also derived from Fate. Fate is lower than, equal to, and also above, all other dao…"

In his eyes, the world had become a world of chains, binding and controlling every single little thing within a web of imprisonment and control. The chains of Fate that existed naturally within the world shone with a colour that could only be described as 'Fate', and this colour…was one that Yaan despised immediately.

Yaan clenched his fists as suddenly, an immense killing intent like nothing he had ever felt before flooded his heart. His crimson eyes burned with bloodlust, because the moment he saw this web of Fate, it was like looking into everything wrong with the world.

All the pain and suffering that he had been through…all the pain and suffering that was Fated to be inflicted upon not only himself, but all other living beings…this hateful curse that doomed the world to always straddle the possibility of utmost suffering and despair…he saw it all clearly. The feeling in his heart, the feeling that something was truly and absolutely wrong with this world, was now so blatantly visible before his eyes that he honestly wanted to throw up.

"A power like this is basically omnipotent…so why…why would it make the world this way?! Out of all the possibilities, why does Fate choose this one?! Why is this dao of fate so deplorable?!"

Here and now, Yaan decided that he needed to overthrow this power, no matter what it took to do so. Even if he needed to rip this world apart and rebuild everything from the bottom up just to break apart this web of shackles, Yaan didn't care; if that's what it took, then that's what he would do. In its current state, the world was doomed to dwell within a pit of inescapable despair…this was not a world that he cared to play nice with.

What Yaan fought for was not the current world, but the hope within his heart that this world could become something better.

Yaan reined in his killing intent and buried it deep within his heart, however, a fire had been ignited within his gaze. A true flame of Will had finally erupted from his ever-persistent spark!

"I may be able to see it, but I refuse to acknowledge its power! Acknowledging the truth of an omnipotent force will also entangle me within its cursed web…so I will reject the truth before my eyes! This truth is not my truth…this Fate…is not my Fate!"