Apocalyptic Era: Starting from picking up a Bishoujo

In each generation, there are only four Liangyi inheritors, and this is certain.

Strictly speaking, since Shan Liangyi, the source of the power seeds, can travel back and forth between different eras and reincarnate, it is possible for Liangyi inheritors from different generations to appear in the same era. However, according to the information previously revealed to me by Gua Tianshi, even if Liangyi inheritors from different generations do appear in the same time period, the number of observable Liangyi inheritors will never exceed four, while the other generational inheritors will enter a mysterious state of "identity that cannot be verified by themselves or others".

From this logic, if there exists a fifth Liangyi inheritor, it seems there is no choice but to overthrow one's reasoning premise and first suspect if one of the first four Liangyi inheritors is false.

I, Water Navy Xuanwu, and Ying Lingyun are all confirmed Liangyi inheritors. The only one who has not reached the stage of conclusive evidence so far is Taoyuan Village Master Meng Zhang.

This perspective is not completely untenable. Even if Meng Zhang wields the true Wood Element Green Dragon Power, it does not mean he is the true Green Dragon Inheritor, as a typical case is Zhu Shi, who holds the Yama Sword; and even if the source of the seed of the heart truly is the Seed of the Cyan Dragon, it doesn't prove that the seed belongs to Taoyuan Village Master Meng Zhang himself. Perhaps the original host of the Seed of the Cyan Dragon was King Zhuanlun, who transferred it to Meng Zhang in some form, and with Ying Lingyun's technology, it was divided into numerous seeds of the heart...

Aside from the above reasoning, there is another, more dangerous, and seemingly more straightforward reasoning. The more premises a reasoning has, the less credible it is, so following the principle of "do not multiply entities without necessity," this reasoning is more persuasive—that is, King Zhuanlun is truly the fifth Liangyi inheritor.

The existence of a "fifth inheritor" is not entirely impossible, even the Power Seed has a fifth version. However, we usually do not refer to it as an "inheritor"; there is a more appropriate definition for it—that is the source of all Liangyi inheritors, the "Shan Liangyi" who holds the Earth Element Yellow Dragon Seed.

Water Master Xuanwu's expression became dazed, and he forcefully covered his forehead, seeming somewhat dizzy and unfocused. However, it was obvious that he was making concerted efforts to concentrate, as if mobilizing all his cognitive resources to address the question I posed.

"King Zhuanlun... King Zhuanlun..." he murmured, "Is King Zhuanlun the extra Liangyi inheritor? No... The fifth Liangyi inheritor, this means, this means... Could it be—"

His face worsened and seemed to have finally pierced through the mental barrier, reaching a certain possibility.

How could I not see that his mental state was off? To help him sort through his thoughts, I then raised another point of doubt: "You told me before that King Zhuanlun is also a Liangyi inheritor, even believing that he, like you, has targeted Shan Liangyi for hunting... Where did you get this information?"

"Where did I..." Water Master Xuanwu repeated my question.

"Since you were so certain of this information, you must have directly seen King Zhuanlun somewhere. Merely hearsay, I don't believe you would be so sure," I said. "At the very least, you should be very certain of what kind of Power Seed King Zhuanlun possesses, perhaps he even demonstrated his attributes right in front of you. Otherwise, it would just be hearsay, not worth believing. So, in your memory, what attribute of Power Seed does he possess?"

The more I questioned, the more silent Water Master Xuanwu became. He silently lowered his head, and this lasted for quite a while. Just when I was about to ask again, he suddenly raised his head, looking quite confused.

"I... don't know," he said.

"What do you mean by you don't know?" I asked.

"It means I'm not clear, don't remember, can't recall... Did the past me meet King Zhuanlun? I'm not sure... but as you said, if he didn't showcase his Four Symbols and Five Elements Power to me in person, I couldn't have firmly believed he was a Liangyi inheritor..." Water Master Xuanwu said, "However... I can't recall anything related to it, not even whether we met or not..."

A similar phenomenon seems to have occurred in different forms with others as well.

Gua Tianshi once mentioned this point to me when talking about King Zhuanlun—King Zhuanlun intensely detests being known by others, and this mindset has influenced other people, even other Impermanences. Even such powerful ancient Impermanences as Gua Tianshi and Xuanming have gradually forgotten much information related to King Zhuanlun. No matter how much I questioned Gua Tianshi, I couldn't verify any information related to King Zhuanlun.

Thinking about it carefully, this is really a very peculiar situation. How could the likes and dislikes of an Impermanence influence the spirit of other Impermanences?

Ming Zhuo also likes to operate in the shadows and detests being investigated or tracked. Similarly, his thoughts can influence countless demon hunters. However, he has never once affected any other Impermanence. This type of influence is supposed to take effect only on entities whose status is below his.

King Zhuanlun's presence in Luo Mountain is so low that even if all Impermanences openly acknowledge his existence, there would still be doubt about his existence. One can imagine that without such "official recognition," King Zhuanlun should have been an Impermanence whose name nobody knew. Even the Impermanence himself would be affected to a certain extent by this influence, and non-Impermanence individuals would exhibit even more significant symptoms.

Yet in the past, when Water Navy Xuanwu was at the Great Success Rank, he could investigate a certain identity of King Zhuanlun and even keep it in his mind. This overstepping action is significant in many ways. Of course, considering that Water Master Xuanwu was once an Impermanence candidate, it's understandable for him to do things most at the Great Success Rank couldn't achieve—even escaping alive after a failed assassination attempt on Xuanming.

But from the standpoint of King Zhuanlun, who wants to hide himself, this situation is likely intolerable.

"In the past, I... successfully investigated Shan Liangyi's true identity, only to forget the truth later?" Water Master Xuanwu said incredulously. "Or did Shan Liangyi catch me afterward, yet chose not to kill me because he valued my potential, but instead altered my memory?

"No, this doesn't make sense... If he personally cleansed my memory, why not entirely erase the connection between him and the Power Seed from my mind, but instead let me believe he was a certain Liangyi inheritor?"

As an observer, I could dissect it relatively calmly, "If Shan Liangyi really made the first move—since you were able to successfully investigate his true identity once, even if your related memories were completely wiped and then returned to the starting point, you could possibly investigate the truth again. Instead, it's better to give you a wrong answer and divert your attention to other directions... perhaps something like that."

In other words, Water Master Xuanwu's capabilities might indeed be formidable enough that even Shan Liangyi couldn't underestimate them.

Still... if King Zhuanlun were truly Shan Liangyi, there are some contradictions that are hard to ignore.

As far as I know, King Zhuanlun has a long and ancient history as an Impermanence, while the previous life of Shan Liangyi being killed by the Old Fist God took place just in the last century... Combining these two facts leads only to one conclusion: At the time Shan Liangyi was slain by the Old Fist God, there was a second Shan Liangyi in existence.

Moreover, admitting this reasoning inevitably requires acknowledging another possibility—that following the aforementioned hypothesis, perhaps a third, fourth, fifth, or even more Shan Liangyi were silently lurking in the shadows, witnessing their own demise in the last century.

Could such an absurd thing really be possible?

It truly might be possible.

Since different generational Liangyi inheritors can appear in the same era, different Shan Liangyi could certainly exist as well. I previously only used this theory to explain "how newer generational Liangyi inheritors obtain Power Seeds at points older than previous generations without the former being affected," but haven't seriously thought about the "multiple Shan Liangyi" direction.

This direction can even be used to explain another question—why does King Zhuanlun possess such a powerful hidden nature that even Gua Tianshi cannot thoroughly understand him? Because just as only one group of different generational Liangyi inheritors appears in the same era can be verified; only one of the different Shan Liangyi's appearing in the same era might be recognizable.

The reason Shan Liangyi didn't alter his own history of being killed by the Old Fist God is possibly due to this "compelled to be obscured" mystical nature preventing him from doing so. Or perhaps the power of the Old Fist God fixed this segment of history, making him as a loser unable to comment on it? Or are there other unknown reasons? It's currently impossible to speculate.

Although King Zhuanlun is an ancient Impermanence, perhaps only this era is "the era he should appear." The starting point of this appearance might be closer than expected, possibly starting from when Ying Lingyun obtained the White Tiger Seed—since Ying Lingyun seems to be the last one to obtain a Power Seed, "this generation's Liangyi inheritors" might have only entered the verifiable stage from this point on.

This era is already close to Doomsday, even Gua Tianshi's divinations are becoming increasingly ineffective, and furthermore, despite the present-day Shan Liangyi being far from his peak, he surely retains the essence beyond the third gate... This might provide him with conditions to continue hiding as King Zhuanlun, until today.

I believe I am getting closer to the truth.