NOVEL NEXT Chapter 10: The Awakening: Subtle Awakening ( I ).
Chapter 10
The Awakening - Subtle Awakening (I).
Unique Space Within the Tapestry~
Sky Reaching Pagoda~
Unknown Space Within the Sky Reaching Pagoda~
In a shadowy corner of the Sky Reaching Pagoda, a striking youth with handsome features stood deep in thought. His eyes, a captivating blend of green and brown heterochromia, glinted with mischief, and a pair of fangs peeked from his lips. The dimly lit room seemed to rue light itself, creating a gloomy ambiance.
Suddenly, a playful spark ignited in his gaze. "Lu Xi Tong, is it? This should be entertaining," he declared, a smile spreading across his face as he reveled in the devious scheme brewing in his mind.
Seventh Floor of the Sky Reaching Pagoda~
Meanwhile, Lu Xi Tong found herself in a precarious situation. Miscalculating her step, she landed on a crumbling stone pillar that gave way beneath her.
As she plummeted into the abyss, as a reflex action, her hands reached skyward in a bid for the world above, her white-black hair swirling wildly around her like a ghostly veil amidst the falling rubble.
Xi Tong realized that if she were to fall all the way into the abyss, she would surely meet her end.
Thoughts of her loved ones flooded her mind: her father and mother, her mischievous twin siblings, and her enigmatic eldest brother, Yang Wei. She knew she couldn't let herself meet such a grim end here.
With a surge of indignation, she retrieved the black bead that the strange youth had instructed her to crush whenever she wished to end the trial.
*Thud.*
As she was about to crush the bead, she plummeted onto a long, narrow stone ridgeline. The impact sent her tumbling, and she barely managed to cling to the edge with her bare hands, teetering on the brink of disaster.
After regaining her balance, she climbed aboard the ridgeline before stowing away the black bead. Lu Xi Tong groaned in pain, tears welling in her eyes; she had fallen from nearly twenty meters. Her body ached all over, and it was a miracle she remained conscious after such a harrowing drop. A single misstep had nearly cost her the end the trial.
Something felt amiss. The Primordial Carps had never mentioned trials as perilous as this one. Shaking off her suspicions, she refocused on the task at hand.
Time was running out—less than half an hour remained, and at this rate, she would surely fail the trial.
A quick assessment of her surroundings filled her with a sense of relief. The lethality of the wind blades had diminished significantly, mostly obstructed by the stone pillars above. Moreover, the massive tornado could no longer locate her with it's uncanny eyes, as she was now concealed among the pillars.
But what brought her the most joy was the ridgeline she had landed on—it was a pathway that ran through the entire forest of stone pillars and it also lead directly to her destination: the heptagon jade platform.
With renewed determination, she dragged her sore body toward the platform, now visible at the end of the ridgeline. As she walked, she noticed that the stone pillars were becoming increasingly sparse until they finally thinned out, leading her into a clearing.
Up close, the heptagon jade platform was breathtaking, spanning half a kilometer in circumference. Crafted entirely from fine crystalline jade in a delicate shade of pale pink, it glistened softly, a magnificent sight that towered several tens of meters above the white stone pillars surrounding it.At this point the ridgeline she had traversed was now a bridge connecting the stone pillars to the jade platform, leading her to its summit.
The ridgeline was the only path that connected the stone pillars to the heptagon jade platform, bridging over the dark abyss below. It could said that her falling might have actually been a stroke of good luck.
As she crossed the bridge, Lu Xi Tong's expression darkened. Without the protection of the stone pillars, the winds had become savage and sharp once more. To make matters worse, her nemesis had finally caught sight of her again with it's uncanny eyes.
After rampaging through the stone forest in a frenzied search for her, the tornado had locked onto its target once more. With a deafening screech, it surged toward her like a rabid beast, obliterating everything in its path as it spun faster, its wails echoing in a furious crescendo.
Ignoring the tearing winds and the pain coursing through her body, Lu Xi Tong sprinted forward.
60 meters to the jade platform...
40 meters...
30 meters...
15 meters...
10 meters...
5 meters away from the jade platform, the massive tornado smashed the ridgeline bridge into splinters.
In a desperate last-ditch effort, she leaped off the crumbling bridge, launching herself into the air.
Fortunately, her efforts paid off as she managed to grab the edge of the jade platform. Lu Xi Tong groaned in pain as blood seeped through her fingers, gripping the sharp edges with all her strength.
As her grip faltered, she was forced to use her other hand for support, which quickly became bloodied as well. Summoning every ounce of determination, she pulled herself onto the jade platform, despite the agonizing pain coursing through her.
Ripping a piece from her now-tattered attire, she swiftly wrapped it around her left hand, then did the same for her right.
*Siiiiigh...*
Releasing the breath she had been holding throughout the ordeal, she collapsed onto the floor, breathless. The trial had been extreme, and she had felt her adrenaline surge multiple times; oddly, she found herself enjoying the thrill of it all.
A smile crept onto her face, quickly morphing into wild deranged laughter as she murmured, "I made it!", over and over again on a demure repetition.
But as those words left her lips, a sobering realization struck her: she still needed to claim the wind sanguine essence on the platform to complete the trial.
She had almost forgotten her purpose in her frantic rush to reach the platform. Rising to her feet and brushing off the dust from her attire, she quickly detangled her hair as her eyes were drawn to a deep violet vial nearby.
As she approached, she confirmed it contained the wind layer of the Primordial Carp's sanguine essence. Oddly this time around, a tiny book accompanied the vial. It was dark green, crafted from an unknown material, and no larger than a child's palm. Squinting, she read the title: "Gone With The Winds," the letters shimmering in gold.
The name intrigued her, but what struck her as strange was that the tiny book had no pages. She suspected it was a reward for clearing the trial—another thing the Primordial Carps had never mentioned. In fact, there was no record of any previous trial takers receiving rewards, this trial was getting odder with each subsequent level.
With no time to ponder its mysteries, she quickly tucked the book away.Picking up the vial, she drank the sanguine essence within. As expected, it assimilated seamlessly with her, even healing some of her injuries in the process.
Using the remaining moments to recuperate, Lu Xi Tong reflected on everything she had endured, contemplating the escalating challenges at each level. A mix of dread and anticipation filled her as she considered what the next level of the pagoda might hold.
After a brief rest, the space around her warped suddenly, and Lu Xi Tong vanished.
Contrasting starry space~
When she reappeared, she found herself in a starry expanse divided between brilliant light and a vast darkness. In this contrasting starry expanse, an octagonal jade board of the T'ai Chi diagram floated in each starry space.
Each of the eight sides of the jade board bore inscriptions: Fire, Metal, Earth, Wood, Water, Lightning, and Wind, while the eighth side remained blank, seemingly inactive.
On the side of starry darkness, the octagonal jade board glowed with a pure, untainted white, illuminating the darkness around it. The inscriptions for Yin, Metal, Wood, Water, and Wind radiated sharp black, mandarin, ghostly green, azure, and violet light, respectively.
On the side of the starry light, the octagonal jade board appeared pitch black, seemingly devouring the light around it. The inscriptions for Yang, Fire, Earth, Wood, and Lightning glowed with nebulous hues of white, crimson, yellow, bright green, and indigo, creating a mesmerizing display akin to a rainbow illuminating the starry expanse.
Lu Xi Tong found herself positioned at the boundary between these two contrasting realms. It was a breathtaking sight: on one side, an all-consuming darkness, and on the other, an all-revealing light
She steeled herself, mentally preparing for whatever challenges the next level might present. Yet, this was entirely unexpected; then again, unpredictability had become a hallmark of her journey.
As she pondered her situation, new information flooded her mind. After a brief scan, her eyes widened in shock, and a cold sweat trickled down her face as the implications settled in.
This level was the furthest anyone had ever reached, achieved by the progenitor of the YinYang dynasty, Kong Xi Wang, who became the first martial founder after reverting his surname to Yang, becoming Yang Xi Wang in reverence of the grand Primordial Carps favor and as a mark of his limit in the trial.
While he had faced the eighth level then the ninth level, she would be confronting both the eighth and ninth levels simultaneously, hence, the contrasting starry space.
The vast darkness was meant to be the eighth floor and the bright starry space the ninth floor. The realization made her heart race.
This was an entirely new level of absurdity. Surviving a single level was already a formidable challenge; tackling two levels at once felt like doubling the effort for half the reward.
However, the most shocking revelation was yet to come. She would have to withstand the origin dao pressure of two complementary yet opposing laws simultaneously: the laws of light and total darkness. Moreover, she would need to discern the mysteries inherent in both opposing laws through the octagonal jade boards in each contrasting starry space.
One must understand that origin dao laws are pure principles that transcend dao runes; they represent a fundamental amalgamation of existence that surpasses the superficiality of dao runes. Their mere presence exerts immense pressure, stifling the order of the world around them as they are fragments of a greater order.
In the outside world, these laws were regarded as mere myths and legends, never encountered or witnessed even by the most powerful forces of the current mortal realm, such as the Nine Sacred Light Sect.
Lu Xi Tong had only learned about them through countless mythologies she had read in the dynasty's archives to pass the time since her time becoming a mortal. Yet, strangely, this enigmatic existence was about to grace the starry space before her, what were know as myths were about to become reality. This made her wonder just what powerful figures the grand Primordial Carps must have been during their life time.
The time limit for this trial was surprisingly generous—one quarter of a day, or six hours—to perceive the mystery that conjoined both laws.
*Weng*
With a flash of chilling light, the contrasting starry space came alive. The jade boards in each realm began to rotate in opposite directions, humming softly as they spun.
Then, the origin dao laws descended. They manifested in forms that were both similar but yet contrasting: the origin dao of light appeared as a radiant white sun adorned with intricate golden patterns and runes that danced around and within it.
In stark contrast, the origin dao of vast darkness took the shape of an all-consuming black star, reminiscent of a black hole, even darker than the starry void itself, seemingly intent on devouring any stray light that dared to approach.
Both entities hovered above Lu Xi Tong's head in their respective starry spaces. The pressure they emitted was suffocating, akin to lead, causing the surrounding starry expanse to quiver uncontrollably.
The clash of the origin dao laws was relentless, each striving to negate the other while maintaining a harmonic undertone. Yet, their very existence rendered the starry space increasingly unstable.
Lu Xi Tong understood that the trial had begun. Positioned at the boundary that separated the two contrasting realms, she found herself at the epicenter of the battle between both origin dao laws. The intensity of their conflict grew with each passing moment, a chaotic yet harmonious dance that enveloped her.