The Essence of Suffering
I sat down on the ground and organized the information Yu-o had given me.
First, the Terminus Ones will one day reach the Heavenly King level. In the cultivation world, those who attain the Heavenly King are called the Seven Flaming Kings and are used as the ultimate goal of training.
According to Tae Yeol-jeon’s explanation, the Seven Flaming Kings are actually bodhisattvas that embody human emotions.
Emotions… mind cultivation…
A thought struck me about the nature of immortal arts.
Are Terminus Ones connected to the very essence of immortal techniques?
Why were we all dropped into this world in the first place?
And why do we keep returning to the Water Realm?
Were we each simply granted one strange ability?
Well, pondering it won’t help.
In any case, the Terminus Ones are Heavenly Kings.
And since Heavenly Kings are linked to emotions, our own lives must be as well.
That much was clear for now.
I moved on to the next set of information.
The Black Jade also turned out to be a Terminus One, and he had met a similarly tragic end.
As I had been listening to Hong Beom’s story, I remembered the tale of the snake he had mentioned.
In Salt Mountain, someone had sealed the snake from entering the world by making a pact with the owner of the name. Yu Ho-deok, or Hyeol-eum, had forbidden the use of symbols related to the black snake because he considered it an ill omen… and in Hong Beom’s tale, the snake had bitten his wife to death.
What was the snake?
I turned to look at Hong Beom.
Hong Beom, when you hear the word snake… is there anything that comes to mind?
Hong Beom had brought up the question naturally, given how often snakes had featured in our recent events.
He stroked his beard as though deep in thought, then replied, “The snake… the snake… Hmm. I’m not entirely sure, but snakes have long symbolized wisdom.”
Wisdom, huh… that tracks.
Endurance and wisdom. The snake was the symbol of regeneration and good fortune.
Some places viewed it as ominous, but in truth the snake was a harbinger of good luck.
Then perhaps, in the myths surrounding the snake, whenever a character suffers misfortune because of a snake, it means they glimpsed wisdom they could not bear?
Hong Beom answered, “The snake is like a kind of poison.”
Poison?
Yes. In truth, there is no such thing as poison in this world. There are only substances that suit one soul but not another. And countless souls take materials that don’t suit them and dilute them into medicine. In short, the line between poison and medicine depends only on whether the quantity is excessive. There is no such thing as a true poison.
Hong Beom’s words continued.
Because he had already surpassed me in knowledge of poison, his explanation carried real weight.
I, too, had once used poison, so I understood him perfectly.
Wisdom is the same. Moderate wisdom benefits existence, but… excessive wisdom is always…
More toxic than poison. It can drive someone mad until their head bursts.
Exactly. The snake symbolizes wisdom, so in the myths, anyone harmed by a snake likely glimpsed wisdom they could not endure and were punished for it.
I see.
I felt genuine conviction in Hong Beom’s words.
When one recognizes the name or essence of a True Immortal, existence itself suffers an inevitable shock.
Yu-o had said that receiving this wisdom came from confronting an even higher being.
Those who could bear the wisdom without shock would survive, but those too weak to endure it would burst and die.
And in Salt Mountain, where the snake was barred from entering, calling the name of a True Immortal level being had posed no problem.
Combining Hong Beom’s words with Yu-o’s made perfect sense. The sealing of the snake meant blocking the wisdom of those who had reached the level of naming.
Their words flowed naturally into each other, so I nodded.
It does make sense.
I rose and stepped outside the cave, climbing to the peak of Mount Yul and sitting in the lotus position.
Hong Beom followed without being asked.
Are you truly all right, Master?
Yeah. My soul has been accumulating too much power of death, and I’m trying to deal with it.
Hmmm!
Fortunately, I received a method from the Saintess to dispel the power of death.
I told Hong Beom about the seal I had received from Yu-o.
With Hong Beom’s help, I could dispel the power of death more effectively.
Being a genius, he would certainly sense that Yu-o had done something more.
Hong Beom listened to the seal, then slowly nodded.
It’s a very good seal. It doesn’t seem to harm you at all. It will help prevent you from being suddenly dragged into the Underworld.
Oh, you think so?
Yes. The Taiji and Sangi seals are especially useful for living beings. They don’t create a reversal that turns them into death seals. This one seems free of traps, so training with it would be wise.
All right. Thank you for the advice.
It’s only natural. Master, you’ll need to study the seal, so I’ll step away for a moment.
Hong Beom bowed and descended Mount Yul.
I watched his back for a moment.
His black hair had grown thicker.
Had he reached the Integration realm?
His appearance had grown slightly younger. He now looked like an elderly man in his late sixties.
After reaching the Void Refinement realm, one looks in their sixties; Star Plate, late fifties; Fissure Opening, early fifties; True Immortal, middle-aged adults.
Beyond True Immortal, the human form no longer matters.
Still, I found myself wondering how far Hong Beom could age. It was a question that intrigued me.
He must have had a special past life. When aging reached its limit, he would regain his memories from that life.
If that were true, would the Hong Beom I knew even remain?
No more pointless thoughts. Time to focus. When Taiji merges, Sangi cycles…
I shook my head and turned my thoughts to the seal.
Taiji and Sangi.
The first thing that came to mind was the sound of the universe itself.
Whoosh!
I sent my physical body soaring into the sky.
In an instant the physical body pierced the heavens and reached outer space.
Boom!
Heavenly Dao.
Earthly Dao.
Now both had reached the realm of origin.
Whoosh!
The colorless Three Absolutes.
The first star, Wecheondae-seong, gathered toward me with irresistible force.
The realm of heavenly void shattering.
The powers of the star of the soul realm and the star of the qi realm intertwined.
At the same time, the force of destiny drew a circle behind me.
Whoosh!
The Three Absolutes began to rotate, and an unimaginable power boiled inside my physical body.
Incredible.
I flicked my tongue as I enjoyed the unprecedented power now amplifying within me.
Boom!
The very force itself surged outward, shaking the entire space around me.
How powerful would this be?
I recalled the Venerables of the Void Refinement realm I had met before.
Jang Ik had been excluded because he had hidden cards, but…
What about the Venerables of Hyeol-eum’s system?
Even Gyeol-ryong and Gye-cheon would be no match for this level of strength.
Of course, this was only the minimum estimate.
I didn’t even know how much stronger I had become, so this was only a rough guess.
And all of this assumed I would defeat them with raw brute force alone, without any martial techniques.
If I added martial techniques, law arts, immortal arts, and Hong Beom’s artificial stars…
I nodded.
I would stand no chance against even the Seven Venerables of Hyeol-eum’s system.
Boom!
I frowned while observing the surging power.
If I could handle the Seven Venerables…
Still, no sign of qi was reacting.
I rotated the Three Absolutes without the slightest change in qi.
Nothing changed.
When Taiji merges, Sangi cycles…
I stopped rotating the Three Absolutes and thought about what Yu-o had meant by “Taiji.”
If I thought about it simply, water and fire. Yin and yang. Opposites. And since Yu-o was the Saintess of Myeong-gwi-gye, what would be the opposite from her perspective?
I paused and decided to activate the Paryeo-dohae-seong to see the world from Yu-o’s viewpoint.
Paryeo-dohae-seong.
Double Flower Long Sky.
Whoosh!
Glass-colored flames ignited in both palms.
One was dark, like obsidian. The other was pure white, like crystal.
All the techniques I had learned were now fused into the Paryeo-dohae-seong.
The Baekran Chukseongmun and Eumhon Gwijumun were now one with it inside me.
The basic method of the Paryeo-dohae-seong was built on the flame called Ruri Jin-hwa.
It burned with the flames of my memories of suffering. Anyone who touched the Ruri Jin-hwa would experience a part of the suffering I had endured, no matter the reason.
At the same time, those who touched the Ruri Jin-hwa would gradually have their cultivation stolen as they suffered.
Of course, those who maintained their sanity and accepted the suffering would not have their cultivation stolen, but that was impossible for all but the strongest beings.
This was the result of combining the characteristics of the Eumhon Gwijumun and the Dae-mak-sa-hae-seong.
And within the flames of suffering, the suffering itself melted completely and fused into the Ruri Jin-hwa, making the Paryeo-dohae-seong even stronger.
The Ruri Jin-hwa of the Paryeo-dohae-seong looked like fire but possessed the properties of glass itself. When it cooled, it would stick and turn into glass.
Precisely, when the soul realm flames of suffering cooled and descended into the qi realm, they became glass.
In any case.
This Ruri Jin-hwa would ultimately contain my own mind.
If I could contain my memories and mind, I would be able to theoretically realize every experience I had ever had.
Whoosh!
Curses and blessings.
The minds of yin and yang were placed inside my palms and fused into the Ruri Jin-hwa.
It looked like black and white flowers.
I activated the technique of the Double Flower Long Sky and used the Myeong-gak to embody the state of Yu-o.
Whoosh!
The moment I activated the Myeong-gak, I felt an enormous world of death calling to me.
Don’t be careless. One mistake and you’ll be sucked in.
I struggled with all my might not to be pulled into the world of death and poured the curses and blessings of both palms onto the outer edge of the Underworld.
Curses and blessings… from the perspective of the Underworld, both were colorless.
How could I possibly tell them apart?
I fused the two Ruri Jin-hwas into one.
From the Underworld’s viewpoint, it was simply two piles of colorless fire merging.
No change at all… Wait.
I suddenly stared at the Ruri Jin-hwa in wonder.
The colorless fire that had fused yin-yang curses and blessings was now drawing in my own qi.
Colorless black drew the Taiji.
When Taiji merges, Sangi cycles.
I turned off the Myeong-gak and looked at the phenomenon in front of me in the real world.
The Eumhon-hwa and Baekran-hwa.
Inside the Ruri Jin-hwa where the two flames mixed, dark power of death burned together.
Chiii—
But the three energies did not stay fused for long. The blessings and curses faded, and the power of death returned to my body.
So this is it.
When Taiji merges, Sangi cycles.
From the perspective of death, both blessings and curses, yin and yang, belong to the realm of life and are therefore colorless.
And when those curses and blessings fuse into a single colorless entity, it symbolizes life itself. Life and the power of death then draw the Taiji once more.
The sight looked like the three energies cycling in the real world.
Actually, even though the three energies seemed to cycle, the mixed power of the two energies and death itself were drawing the Taiji.
I closed my eyes and drew the Three Absolutes, understanding Yu-o’s words.
Insert yin and yang into Heavenly Dao and Earthly Dao to create the colorless.
Correspond death to void shattering to create the black.
And with that, the Three Absolutes began cycling without me needing to force it.
Whoosh!
At the same time, I felt the power of death inside my body rapidly being sucked into the center of the Three Absolutes.
The speed of the Three Absolutes was faster than when I had forced it to rotate.
The amplification rate rose.
If this was the case…
I smiled.
If I had no Middle City and was merely Star Plate, I might actually be able to fight.
Pfft.
However, the Three Absolutes I had created had a slight problem.
Death, after all, carries the nature of stillness.
The Three Absolutes that had consumed my qi would later see that qi fade and return to my body.
There was no major change in cultivation, but the Three Absolutes gained from this method had a higher amplification rate but could not last as long.
In the end, it wasn’t about solving qi but about temporarily separating qi from my body to amplify power.
Of course, as long as the Three Absolutes kept cycling without rest, theoretically I would not be dragged into the Underworld.
But that was the only solution.
I would have to keep activating the Three Absolutes every second of my life to barely avoid the Underworld.
Haa. For now, I need to find a more fundamental solution than what Yu-o gave me.
I sighed and used the Seong-maek-an to locate the direction of the Noe-seong-hae, then slowly began using the floating technique.
I then created a new Three Absolutes by inserting the power of death and began spinning it.
As I rotated the Sa-do Three Absolutes, I briefly separated death from my body even further, and the moment my physical body turned toward the stars…
Hmmm?
For a split second, several scenes flashed before my eyes.
The outer edge of the Underworld.
The outer edge of the Origin River through the Seong-maek-an.
And…
“…!”
Countless swarms of light gathered into a garden in the shape of flowers.
Huh…
I finally understood what Hyeol-eum had meant by “five.”
So that’s it…
Until now I had thought the Myeong-gak and Seong-maek-an were the only senses that could sense the realms of higher Venerables.
But I had been holding another sense all along.
That place… the East Heaven Flower Garden.
The sensation that allowed the beings of the Underworld and the Origin River to return to the current world.
I clearly sensed what that sensation was.
Every single person… no, every living being in this world had seen the East Heaven Flower Garden!
When a dead person was reborn and came into the world again.
When a baby was born, what did the baby see first?
The midwife’s face? Its parents’ faces?
Wrong.
The first thing a baby sees in the darkness is light.
So what was that light that first shone on the child?
It wasn’t just light in the darkness.
Every living being saw the East Heaven Flower Garden they had passed through when they were born.
I… if I think about it, I had “died and been reborn” hundreds of times.
Every time I regressed, I had always seen the “light.”
It wasn’t just the light of regression.
It was perhaps…
The flower of my own life that I had seen when I was granted a new existence.
That sensation I had felt after dying and being reborn hundreds of times. That sensation was… the one that allowed me to perceive the Six Worlds.
As the power of death that had covered me faded temporarily through the rotation of the Three Absolutes, I could clearly sense that sensation.
This was… the sensation that perceived the Five Worlds…
I pulled the sensation of the East Heaven Flower Garden even clearer.
The entire world turned hazy, and places began to glow with light.
At the same time, countless swarms of multicolored light filled the surroundings and bloomed into beautiful flower shapes as they clustered together.
This place was the East Heaven Flower Garden.
These flowers…
They are flowers that symbolize life. The life that will soon be granted. They determine the family, environment, body, and race the self will be born into, and they also represent the lives of the people living here right now.
Oh, I see.
One must not touch them lightly. Tragic lives grow everywhere like weeds, such as the Seol-myeong-wang-ah-sim flower. Of course, those who have mastered special techniques can enter and borrow their aura of calamity to use techniques…
Indeed…
Since you entered, it’s only fitting to give you a gift. Take it. It’s the Seol-myeong flower.
Eh?
Before I could refuse, the old man placed the black flower in my arms and disappeared.