Rise of Humanity

by <unknown>

  “Fuxi, I say, you are guilty!”

  The human faced, sheep-bodied beast opened its hand and ate one of the Fuxi gods, chewing him like a piece of candy.

  “Do you plead guilty?" The beast raised its finger and pointed at another Fuxi god, it asked.

  Chapter 566: The Disaste |

  “No, I bear no guilt!" The Fuxi god’s atman laughed, “The Fuxi Celestial Race’s defeat is an unfair treatment from the heaven, if even the heaven is unjust, what sins do I have?”

  “Fuxi, I say, you are guilty!" The beast clawed the Fuxi god and ate him. It then pointed toward another Fuxi god and asked again, “Do you plead guilty?”

  Zhong Yue was expressionless, he looked around and noticed Mother Da Zhen hiding in the blind spot of the nefarious beast. He thought, So I’m right, Mother Da Zhen is also here even though she did not walk on the bridge.

  Meanwhile, Mother Da Zhen’s eyes became filled with terror and her face was pallid as she looked at the human face, sheep body beast.

  Then, she noticed Zhong Yue looking at her. The young man gave her a smile that made her think, This little brat, he really has gone crazy!

  The trial continued, and the Fuxi gods were devoured one after another by the peculiar beast.

  Soon after, it’s finger pointed toward Zhong Yue, asking the same question again, “Do you plead guilty?”

  Zhong Yue smiled, he said, “Yes, I do.”

  The peculiar beast was startled, it didn’t expect to hear such an answer. It quickly flipped the book in front of it on the table and suddenly, the peculiar beast gave a cold hum, “It’s you! Patriarch Nature has been looking for you! Patriarch Nature, I invite you to come over, the Fuxi you are looking for is here!”

  The palace shook violently and it shattered into parts, revealing that the palace was floating in the air, there wasn’t anything out there other than an endless space of darkness.

  A huge face slowly flew toward the palace and grew larger as it draws nearer. It was Patriarch Nature. He scrutinized Zhong Yue from tip to toe and smirked while saying, “Child, can you still escape from me now?”

  “I already pled guilty, why would I still run away?" Zhong Yue raised his head and laughed back at Patriarch Nature, he said, “You can come and get me anytime you want.”

  The face flew around him and said casually, “The Fuxi are all dead, how can you still be alive? I really do wonder very much. Well then, let me extract your soul and search through your memories…”

  A huge hand suddenly appeared in the darkness but before it could reach to Zhong Yue, a wave of river water came out of nowhere and swallowed Zhong Yue along with Mother Da Zhen away.

  When Zhong Yue came back to his senses again, he was still standing on the bridge. He shook his head while moving forward. Soon after, Mother Da Zhen held a pallid face and walked on the bridge following a distance behind Zhong Yue.

  The bridge was long, it took awhile for the two of them to reach to the other end. When Zhong Yue stepped of the bridge, the darkness that obstructed his vision slowly faded away and the surroundings got clearer.

  Mother Da Zhen also walked out from the bridge, she glanced around and startled, “It looks kind of familiar here…”

  She was right, there was the divine gold mining site and a floor paved with skeletons and bones. Zhong Yue looked around for an eye and continued moving forward. Soon after, he suddenly stopped and looked at a pitch-black log, there was a little hole on it with divine gold glimmering faintly in it.

  It was a divine tree that was fading in spiritual energy!

  Zhong Yue inhaled deeply and walked forward. Mother Da Zhen quickly followed behind while the terror in her unwittingly caused her to walk closer to him. The more she looked around, the stronger the fear in her heart became.

  Suddenly, she stared at the ground vacantly and exclaimed in a quivering voice, “Footsteps… my own footsteps…”

  She looked behind and saw nothing but an endless darkness and the faint image of a bridge.

  “Zhong Yue, we’ve been here before!" Mother Da Zhen shouted.

  Zhong Yue looked back and realized, “Once you enter this gate, there will be no turning back. So it’s not saying that the city gate will be closed and stop you from leaving after you enter the city. Instead, it means that even if you reach he end of the road, there will still be no way to leave at all.”

  “Once you enter this gate, there will be no turning back. And when disaster arrives, all that is left of you will only be your bones." Zhong Yue thought of the sentence written on the city wall.

  So it seems like the gods reached this stage and had been through the same situation they are in now, that’s why the gods left the words behind.

  Nevertheless, Zhong Yue continued moving forward. Mother Da Zhen had no choice but to follow. Soon after, she was already walking right behind Zhong Yue, her body was shivering in fear.

  And right at this moment, she saw a silhouette walking toward the City of Nature.

  It was another Zhong Yue!

  Whereas in front of that Zhong Yue, there was another Mother Da Zhen, the same her when she entered the City of Nature!

  She witnessed herself walking toward the city!

  Meanwhile, that Mother Da Zhen had already reached to the front of the city gate and she watched as her other self walked into the city. A cold chill traveled down her spine and she quickly shouted, “Don’t go in, don’t! It’s dangerous!”

  She shouted at the top of her lungs. However, the other Zhong Yue and her other self seemed to be oblivious to her warnings.

  After seeing herself walking into the City of Nature, the other Zhong Yue also arrived at the front of the city gate.

  “Don’t go in—" she shouted while dashing toward the city gate.

  But her efforts were fruitless, it was as if she was in a different dimension from them.

  She shot past Zhong Yue but when she reached the city gate, the other Zhong Yue had already disappeared into the city. The mother god’s body was swaying to and fro, and suddenly, she collapsed to the ground.

  Behind her, Zhong Yue walked over in a steady pace and stopped right in front of the city gate.

  “There is nothing we can do now, we are all dead already!" Mother Da Zhen raised her head and gave a wry smile.

  Zhong Yue was quiet, he looked at the gate and the bloody words written on one of the sharp teeths, “Danger, don’t enter. Run!”

  The words were exactly the same as what he had seen before, not a single spot was different!

  The skeletons in front of the city gate were laid out in the same pattern as well.

  Mother Da Zhen sounded like a ghost, crying and yet laughing at the same time, “Zhong Yue, we are already dead now! We will never be able to leave anymore! All this hatred and enmity between us matters not anymore now. I will not seek revenge on you anymore…”

  Zhong Yue ignored her, he was still looking at the city with interest.

  All of a sudden, loud and infernal noises sounded out from behind them. Mother Da Zhen quickly looked back and saw the cold winds forming into a hurricane, along with the sands and hollers of war coming within the darkness!

  There were the shadowy figures of war chariots and the war prisoners planted with divine herbs, the images of the Fuxi gods battling with the army of gods and the peculiar beast in the grand palace!

  Everything they experienced in the City of Nature was rushing toward them from behind!

  This was the ‘disaster’ the gods warned about, the final strange occurrence in the City of Nature, the ‘disaster’!

  Before the ‘disaster’ was even close enough, Mother Da Zhen could already feel her mortal body rotting and her cultivation begin sucked into the sky!

  “Finally, we don’t have to be tortured anymore…" Mother Da Zhen heaved a breath of relief, she laughed softly and said, “Zhong Yue, I never thought that I will die alongside with you, I guess fate really pulls us together.”

  “Don’t worry,
I am not dying, nor are you going to die." Zhong Yue turned his head around and smiled warmly, then turning back again. He yelled softly and the Divine Wing Saber was cast into the sky. Altars emerged behind him and the images of gods on the altars bowed down together!

  “Go!" the gods worshipped the saber and enhanced the power of the Divine Wing Saber to an immense level as it slashed toward the City of Nature!

  The saber was like a flash of lightning, it jabbed on the gatehouse, which was also Patriarch Nature’s eyes!

  Blood gushed out and sprinkled on the altars. Immediately, the altars were boosted in power and further enhanced the Divine Wing Saber. Countless Golden Feathery Peng Swords blasted out from the Divine Wing Saber and pulverized Patriarch Nature’s eye!

  “It’s really pain!”

  In front of them, the city gate abruptly closed and opened again, and a wave of strong gale blasted out from the city gate, “My eye—!”

  The strong gale sent Zhong Yue along with the Divine Wing Saber and Mother Da Zhen back into the sky. They were blasted back but before they were swallowed by the darkness and killed by the strange phenomena behind them, the strong gale already blew and dispersed the ‘disaster’ for them.

  Zhong Yue and Mother Da Zhen were launched back for over a hundred mile and before they landed on the ground, the City of Nature quaked violently and stood up as a giant.

  One of the giant’s eyes was bleeding and blinded by Zhong Yue, it was covering the wounded eye with one of the hand.

  Wong, wong, wong—

  Sounds of buzzing repleted the surroundings as the light wheels emerged behind the giant’s body.

  So I’m not wrong., Zhong Yue looked around. Now, they were suddenly back in the center of the City of Nature.

  Mother Da Zhen glanced around and mumbled as if she lost her soul, “How… how did we…”

  “It’s the Yuan Shen secret realms." Zhong Yue answered, “He has six Yuan Shen secret realms, with the biggest one covering the whole city. The moment we step[ed into the city, we were in his first Yuan Shen secret realm. When the cold gale blew over, we are sent to the second Yuan Shen secret realm; there, he toyed and tortured us for some time before sending us back to the first Yuan Shen secret realm. After which, the mist sent us to the third Yuan Shen secret realm, we are toyed and sent back to the first Yuan Shen secret realm again. While that bottomless pit, it seemed like the Fuxi skeletons are the ones that sent us back to witness the ancient history when we were actually sent to his fourth Yuan Shen secret realm.”

  Mother Da Zhen was stunned, she mumbled in disbelief, “Then it would be the jury and the grand palace, that is the fifth Yuan Shen secret realm? But where is the sixth?”

  Zhong Yue replied, “The path we took to get here, that was the sixth Yuan Shen secret realm.”

  “No, no!" Mother Da Zhen suddenly in disbelief, “It still doesn’t make sense! We met with so many gods in the battlefield, the battles and the gods, they are all real. You and I are both really wounded, it can’t be just illusions! It really did happen, I am sure!”

  Chapter 567: Death By A Thousand Cuts |

  “They are not illusions, we are just in the Six Paths Reincarnation." Zhong Yue stared at the giant, he said, “His six Yuan Shen secret realms were already cultivated into the mini Six Paths Reincarnation. From the moment we stepped into the city, we already walked into it. His Six Paths Reincarnation is the place in which all the dead are sealed, including the Fuxi gods and his own army of gods. All of the gods’ souls were ensnared in his Six Paths Reincarnation. These souls would reincarnate one time after another in his Six Paths Reincarnation, their prowess and spiritual energy would be extracted out every time they reincarnate to be absorbed by him.”

  Mother Da Zhen was a little puzzled, she could understand a little but not all it. Even though she was a mother god, her attainments in the Six Paths Reincarnation were much inferior to Zhong Yue’s.

  Zhong Yue continued, “All of the scenes and events we experienced felt real because they are really happening. But all of them were just replays of what happened in the past. His miniature Six Paths Reincarnation is able to reincarnate the trapped souls in his Yuan Shen secret realms, that’s why he could revive the dead gods and replay the scenes and even conversations of what happened. He is the one that is pulling strings behind the scenes, he bestowed the skeletons with flesh and meat, and placed the trapped souls back into their respective corpses. Then, he controlled them to replay the scenes one time after another.”

  The Six Paths Reincarnation was one of the strongest forces in the universe, and reviving the dead was just one of its many uses.

  However, even when the mini Six Paths Reincarnation had only one use, it was more than enough to confuse them into thinking they had traveled between times.

  This was because the illusions were too realistic, even Zhong Yue truly thought that he was sent back in time to witness and even participate in its historical moments.

  Not only him, but even Xin Huo was deceived as well. He had been quiet all this while, thinking that he was really time-traveling between the past and present.

  But he couldn’t been blamed; after all, even the wisest man would have doubts and questions he couldn’t answer. Not to mention that when Xin Huo went into a deep slumber, the Six Paths Reincarnation was yet to be created. It was only natural for him to not know anything about it.

  But the Six Paths Reincarnation of the giant was still flawed and incomplete; otherwise, Zhong Yue wouldn’t be able to see through it either.

  Mother Da Zhen was clueless, she mumbled, “Then how did you discover it?”

  The young man glanced at her and said, “You.”

  “Me?" Mother Da Zhen was puzzled.

  The giant stopped groaning and also listened carefully. It was also curious about what went wrong that allowed Zhong Yue to see through everything.

  Zhong Yue said placidly, “When I was standing in front of the bottomless pit, the light from the Fuxi skeletons was directly on me. That time, you were still far away from me, there was no way for the light beam to reach you. But when the lights faded away, I noticed that you were still with me on the battlefield. That’s when I started suspecting; that maybe, the Fuxi skeletons weren’t the source of the divine lights? After all, they are already dead, there is no way they can still possess such strong arcane energy to send me back in time. Furthermore, you are not beside me, why are you with me as well?”

  Mother Da Zhen was startled, she never thought of it before.

  “The divine light was just a cover for me to think that it was the Fuxi skeletons that sent me back in time to witness the historical moments. But in fact, we were sent from one Yuan Shen secret realm to the other. And what sent us away, was the huge eye underground.”

  Zhong Yue was slowly peeling away the layers that were covering the truth, “But those were just suspicions on my. After all, the scenes were just too real for me to resolutely deny them. So real that only those who cultivated the complete Six Paths Reincarnations can avoid showing themselves in the scenes.

  “At first, I was just thinking that the strong figures wiped away their faces. But when thinking back again, the real reason is that he didn’t possess the souls of the stronger figures, that’s why he couldn’t replicate their images in his Yuan Shen secret realm. And in the underground bridge, I was sure that you were not on the bridge, thinking that you might have still been outside of the tunnel. But then again, you are still with me, making my suspicions seem more plausible.”

  Mother Da Zhen was enlightened, “So we never really traveled through time, nor were the gods under the Bi Xie Celestial Emperor time traveling. They were all just trapped in a never-ending loop around his six secret realms, condemned to remain trapped until their eventual deaths?”

  Zhong Yue pointed at the words written on the sharp teeth, he said, “‘Danger, don’t enter. Run!’ These words prove that there were some gods that managed to reach where we are now, right before
the second loop is about to start. They must have written down this warning after realizing the truth of the matter. This is the truth of the City of Nature!”

  Although one of his eye was blinded, the giant’s other eye still revealed praise for Zhong Yue’s acuity.

  Mother Da Zhen raised her head, she looked at the giant and mumbled, “Why is he doing all this? He could kill us all in just the snap of a finger. Mortals, Qi Practitioners, and even the gods are no different than ants to him. Why take this roundabout method to kill us?”

  The question was like a dark curtain that covered Zhong Yue’s face, he gave a cold sneer, “A lone cat and a school of mice, a hunter met with a group of prey. Like a child, he enjoys toying his prey, slowly torturing them to death.”

  Mother Da Zhen shivered.

  The giant lowered his hand and said in a shuddering voice, “No, you are wrong. I wasn’t toying with you all, I am just… lonely.”

  It wasn’t clear if the giant was crying or laughing as it said, “I am so lonely, way too lonely. I’ve been trapped here for more than eighty thousand years!”

  “We are also lonely—" many souls surged out, trying to come out from the light wheels behind the giant. They were shouting and crying, “We are also lonely, we are also here for eighty-six thousand years already…”

  The souls and the giant were crying together, their voices loud and sharp.

  “Is that giant… Patriarch Nature?" Mother Da Zhen asked softly.

  “Yes." Zhong Yue answered in a placid voice, “But the real Patriarch Nature is already dead, it is impossible for him to still be alive now. This giant is only Patriarch Nature's spirit, controlling Patriarch Nature’s Six Paths Reincarnations while trapped in this city formed by his own mortal body.”

  Mother Da Zhen was stunned, “Patriarch Nature’s spirit is trapped in his own mortal body? Who did this?”

  “Might be himself, but more probably his own father." Zhong Yue jeered, “His father didn’t want his own name to be polluted, that’s why he killed his own son—so that he could bury the events that happened here. Patriarch Nature’s spirit was trapped in his own mortal body and anyone who entered the city would die in this endless loop of Patriarch Nature’s Six Paths Reincarnations.”