The sun rose gently over Qincheng Village, washing the tiled roofs in pale gold. Farmers led their oxen into the fields, wives hung laundry by the river, and children played with sticks and mud.
To the world, it was a morning like any other. But...
"Ugh...uh..huh?"
My eyes were heavy as if I had woken up from a very long sleep, and the throbbing pain was still there, ringing in my head faintly.
I covered my eyes with my hands, pressing their warmth against them.
"Water..." I muttered before standing up and walking behind the old oak tree; the stream flowing down from the forest was serene to my dazed eyes.
I gulped.
My steps were tentative at first, before I dashed my way to the fresh water, satisfying my thirst.
Scooping some water out from the stream, I splashed it on my face. The coldness of the water jolted me up.
Sitting near the stream, I wondered about the events I had gone through. In this moment, I couldn't help but shudder thinking about it.
Yesterday could have been the day I would have kissed goodbye to this world.
"Come to think of it...there were those strange, unknown memories." I put a hand on my chin.
Our souls have supposedly merged, somehow. Therefore, those memories about the wars and heavens belonged to Xuanyuan Wudi.
"He said he was an Immortal Emperor..." I put a hand on my mouth, controlling the laugh that almost escaped.
A cultivator's soul losing to a mortal's soul like mine?
How funny, it seemed!
How pitiful it was!
There might be something helpful in his memories, something that can help me acquire spiritual roots.
I closed my eyes and took deep breaths.
There was a saying that sitting in the lotus position helps in concentrating, and it seemed to be true.
As my mind converged to a single point, solely for the purpose of dwelling deeper in the memories stored in my brain.
The world started to shift—slowly.
As seconds turned into minutes, minutes turned into hours, and hours turned into an eternity, the world around me shuddered.
My eyelids opened, and what was around me wasn't the vast plain lands of Qincheng village but a library.
"Is this the consciousness of that old man? Quite interesting if I say." My words were not audible to anyone except me.
My form was incorporeal, incomprehensible and unreal.
I floated down towards the floor, and my feet touched the supposedly cold ground.
Just looking at this vast structure, I felt a thrill.
Though there were a few doubts in my mind.
How did time work here? I didn't know.
Is there any limit? I didn't know that either.
What I know is that I have to find it, my path of cultivation, as quickly as possible.
Therefore, I was going to scoop everything in.
—FIVE HOURS LATER—
"Fuck it..." I muttered.
To hell with everything. There is nothing, absolutely nothing that could help me; I was a fool to believe that something good would happen to me.
Was there truly not a way, or had I missed something?
Indeed, this place was vast, and the minimal amount of time, like five hours, wasn't enough, but my gut feeling told me that I was close.
I sighed, or whatever it can be called.
My form shifted as it moved around the vast place.
Suddenly, my body halted; before me was a huge chalice, and within it burned black flames.
I felt a strange pull from it.
As if those strange flames were calling me towards themselves, a strong pull of desire that strained this heart of mine.
My steps towards it were slow and deliberate, but then the world around me shuddered, and I...
I was suffocating.
The world crumbled, and what I saw next was the world of water, and what I felt was a crushing grip on my neck.
These bloody bastards!
I kicked my left heel directly into the chest of the person who was strangling me underwater.
Immediately, that person released his grip. I didn't waste the moment and pushed my body back.
Taking a deep breath, I looked behind me.
On the ground, groaning in pain while clutching his chest, was Sheng Rui.
My hairs were dampened by the water covering a majority of my vision, but then my expression turned serious as I heard a familiar voice.
A voice that sickened me to my heart.
"Sheng Rui, come back, who knows what kind of talisman he will pull out of his ass to harm you..kekeke."
Sheng Rui stood up and looked at me with eyes of disdain before running away towards a certain direction.
My eyes followed his trail like a beast, and when I reached its end, there stood a young man slightly older than my age, and behind him were other boys of his age.
The young man was cloaked in fine silk, unlike the rugs I wore; his brown hairs were tied with a hairpin, and his eyes were malicious with the colour of blue.
He was Chen Liang, the village chief's only son.
My hand ran through the dampened hair, slicking it back as my eyes stared at them with the intent to kill.
"My, Oh my, do you want to kill me, huh..." Chen Liang paused, his mocking expression contorted in anger, then he spat with poison laced in his voice:
"Fucking insect, you are born to be always beneath by foot." He smirked and then flicked his wrist.
The lackeys snickered and ran towards me.
There were four of them, except for Sheng Rui, who was stopped by Chen Liang.
Four against one? Well, bring it on.
I am going to beat the shit out of—
—FIVE MINUTES LATER—
61...
-swish
"Guh..." The air in my lungs was emptied.
Chen Liang raised his fist before grabbing my hair, and then he said:
"Fucking piece of shit, things like cultivation aren't meant for insects like you, only heaven-chosen people like me can perform it."
I looked up, my bloodied gaze pierced through his defences, and then I said, while chuckling and coughing blood:
"Oh, is that so? But I remember you don't have spiritual roots unlike your father, then doesn't that make you and me on the same level in the aspect of cultivation, huh, you bloody bastard!"
Just as I said that, Chen Liang's anger flared up.
His grip on my hair tightened, and before he started punching me brutally, my body was already giving up, and this made the process faster.
However...
89...90...94.....98.....9-
Before he could go any further, his lackeys stopped him.
"Chen Liang, he will die at this rate. Stop yourself." Sheng Rui said, while the other lackeys supported him from behind.
Feeling a little pressured, he stopped his fists and left me on the ground, beaten to a pulp.
He turned around and left me behind.
His lackeys looked at me before leaving me behind.
My eyes felt heavier and heavier as I lost my consciousness.
Then the world around me was swallowed by darkness.
...
As Ma Jin delved deeper and deeper into his consciousness, he realised that something was wrong with the darkness within it.
He felt some kind of heat around him, but there was also this feeling of coldness.
Then words resounded in the world of darkness:
"Karma is the absolute law for all things, and whatsoever is born within it shall surely return unto it, for none may step beyond its circle.
To exist with Karma, one must become Karma, for it is neither punishment nor reward but the reflection of being itself, the shadow of every act and the echo of every breath.
Thus, to cultivate Karma, the first and most perilous step is the Devouring. This is not the taking of flesh nor the rending of form, but the swallowing of essence, the drawing of another's weight into the vessel of thine own soul.
Be it the sorrow of man, the rage of beast, or the remnant will of the departed, all may be seized and made thine, and he who devours walketh as a bearer of countless echoes, each burden and each merit pressed into his soul until he knoweth consequence as one knoweth the taste of blood.
Yet this path is fraught with ruin, for that which is taken and not digested doth fester as rot within, corroding the spirit until the cultivator becometh a tomb for alien sins, a grave wherein foreign debts lie restless.
The weak choke upon what they swallow, but the strong grind it upon the stone of their will and break it down to fuel.
Only he who endureth the weight may kindle it as fire within, and thus the Devouring becometh not a curse but a forge, not a burden but a blade.
In such manner the cultivator learneth to wield Karma as both yoke and power, and from the souls of others' fates he shapeth the soul of his own ascension."
As those words resounded, something within his soul shuddered. It made him feel restless, complete, divine yet demonic.
Outside the border of his consciousness, Ma Jin's body burned with dark flames, its heat sending waves.
Feeling such strangeness, Chen Liang turned around, and what he saw next was... terrifying.
Ma Jin's body was moving towards them, burning with strange black flames.