Chapter 13: The First Killing Calamity

Huff!

Jiang Ping sat up, exhaling a breath of foul air. He felt a sticky sensation all over his body, and as he looked down, he discovered his clothes were soaked through. He decided to just strip off his wet garments and take a bath.

Warm water cascaded over Jiang Ping, washing away not just the dirt but also the fatigue from his transformation. At that moment, he felt better than ever. Glancing in the mirror, he noticed that his smooth face bore no wrinkles, and his skin had become soft and tender.

“I’ve turned back into a youth,” Jiang Ping chuckled as he admired his reflection.

Now looking like a sixteen-year-old, this time the Elixir of Immortality had allowed him to undergo a significant transformation! The primary function of the Elixir was to activate the cells, enabling a complete metamorphosis. Jiang Ping vaguely sensed that his cellular vitality had greatly increased.

“What is my current maximum lifespan?” he couldn’t help but ask Genesis.

“Considering your current condition, you should be able to live up to 200 years if nothing unexpected happens,” Genesis replied.

Jiang Ping couldn’t help but smile; that was over a hundred years more to live! But it also reminded him that without long-term planning, there would only be near-term worries.

In other words, if Jiang Ping were to auction off the Elixir of Immortality, it could easily fetch astronomical sums in the hundreds of billions!

How many top-tier tycoons would rush for it? Throughout history, so many emperors had succumbed to confusion in their old age, all because their time was running short.

Just based on this, Jiang Ping could confidently say he had surpassed everyone. However, he currently had no means of self-defense and wouldn’t dream of taking out such a precious item for auction. Right now, he regarded money as if it were dirt.

Post-transformation, Jiang Ping was exceptionally pleased. He looked again toward the Original World; this time, Lianshan had stepped into the second era of his twilight years. Could he offer himself another surprise?

In his second life, Lianshan dedicated most of his energy to studying the Stone of Truth. Although the main body of the tablet had been taken away, the runes carved on it had been recorded countless times. The ‘九九歌’ was something everyone could recite.

Moreover, because this was passed down by the Creator God, other powerful beasts could recite it as well.

The song “One yields one, two yields two, three yields three” echoed throughout the Original World, leaving countless beings guessing at its secrets.

Gradually, the application of multiplication tables was being tested, but was this just a simple counting method? Many were skeptical, including the Human King, Lianshan. There must be deeper meaning behind it!

While the entire world was studying the ‘九九歌’, a major event occurred: Lianshan discovered the splitting tribes, only to find out that the clan treasure, the Stone of Truth, had long been lost!

Upon hearing this terrible news, it was said that the Human King was so enraged that his blood rushed to his head, stunning him with a loud thud!

Following that, Lianshan’s health continued to deteriorate, day by day! The Wuyou, who had left back in the day, had long since aged and died. There was no one to hold accountable! “Disgraceful descendants disrespecting our fallen king! How could they lose a treasure bestowed by the gods!” Lianshan wept upon waking! This was the Human King! A man who had suffered countless injuries in his life and had never once bowed down to complain. He had even shattered the doors of life and death, developed the Elixir of Immortality, and lived out his second life!

Lianshan’s hair turned white overnight. With bloodshot eyes, he ordered, “Announce to the world: regardless of which tribe retrieves the Stone of Truth, humanity will ensure their safety; their clan will not perish, and they will live worry-free!”

He paused, gritting his teeth, and added, “If anyone is discovered hoarding the divine treasure, they will be the enemies of all humankind! My clan will do everything possible to retrieve it!”

With the Human King’s command, everyone learned that the divine treasure, the Stone of Truth, had been lost. Humanity’s promise stirred countless tribes.

Other powerful tribes also felt their hearts race. If their clan obtained the treasure, could they surpass humanity and dominate the land? The entire Original World trembled, and waves of bloodshed began. Humanity’s powerful figures nearly went mad, but they never considered that the Stone of Truth was buried thousands of meters underground!

Deep underground, inside a grand and exquisite mother nest, the Ant Queen rotated her compound eyes as she studied the Stone of Truth that had been hidden for months.

“Are these glyphs just a counting method? There must be some worldly truth embedded in them.

Even the usually wise Ant Queen found herself puzzled. The powerful human cultivators had studied it for so many years without clarity. She couldn’t decipher it by herself, so she could only carefully preserve the tablet, taking it out now and then to research its mysteries, hoping to uncover its secrets.

Could what the Creator God left behind be an ordinary object? Not to mention the material alone, the Ant Queen used the hardest metal soldier ants to attack it, and they couldn’t leave a single scratch!

After losing the divine treasure, humans went mad. To prevent humanity from discovering the truth, the Ant Queen decisively ordered the ant groups on the surface to retreat, abandoning their long-established surface base, and return to the dark depths of the underground to hide.

The human powers unleashed a bloody storm across the world, even the depths of the ocean were affected, staining the entire world with blood. Jiang Ping even felt that the points he had previously earned for creating materials for the Elixir of Immortality had all recovered.

He never imagined that merely creating a tablet would lead to such chaos, rivaling the small calamities of the era.

Unfortunately, in the end, no one obtained the Stone of Truth. The aging Lianshan could no longer defy fate. Biological bodies had developed drug resistance, and the Elixir of Immortality could only be consumed once; any more would be ineffective.

In his final moments, he urged the next generation of the Human King to retrieve the divine treasure! The third-generation king was named Cangnan. He was quite wise and, like Lianshan, had studied the glyphs of the Stone of Truth for many years, reportedly able to recite the ‘九九歌’ completely by the age of five.

It was precisely due to his profound understanding of the ‘九九歌’ that he was able to defeat multiple opponents and ascend to the throne of Human King. After taking the throne, Cangnan worked hard to repair relations with allies.

In Lianshan’s twilight years, he had made enemies with countless strong tribes due to the Stone of Truth, resulting in humanity’s weakening. However, Cangnan adopted a policy of recuperation. He believed that what mattered was the knowledge contained within the Stone, not the tablet itself.

He dedicated his entire life to studying the ‘九九歌’, blending countless insights from predecessors, gradually nurturing a sliver of truth within him.

Unfortunately, this was not accomplished overnight; it took decades. He spent from youth to old age contemplating, with sparse, white hair, not knowing how many strands had fallen out. Even taking various precious herbs all year round proved useless.

He became bald but didn’t grow stronger.

One day, he strolled to the banks of the Imperial River. Gazing at the flowing waters, he sighed, “My life has been so fruitless, close to death’s door. I still haven’t grasped the essence of the ‘九九歌’. I genuinely feel I’ve let down the trust of my people.”

Suddenly, he spotted an old man sitting on a rock nearby, seemingly intently observing the rushing river.

Cangnan curiously asked, “Old man, the surface of the Imperial River is bare; what are you watching?”

The old man looked up at him and said, “I’m pondering why the river flows from high places and gathers in lower areas.”

Cangnan laughed heartily, saying, “Isn’t it obvious that water flows downhill? How come you don’t even understand that?”

The old man chuckled back, “You may not be young anymore, but how can you think it’s a given that water flows downhill? There must be some reasoning behind it that we don’t comprehend.”

A sudden shock struck Cangnan; enlightenment dawned upon him, and he immediately bowed respectfully, saying, “Please enlighten me, wise one.”

The old man slowly replied, “I have nothing to teach you. But the cosmic cycles—day and night, spring, summer, autumn, winter—are not as simple as they seem; they encompass various principles.

I noticed the ‘九九歌’ you recited earlier. To me, it appears that the world is much like the numbers in the ‘九九歌’; it consists of many numbers.

In that instant, Cangnan felt as if a thunderclap had struck his head, and he suddenly understood fiercely: “The simplest phenomena in the world all follow their own trajectories, and all can be unlocked with numbers. The ‘九九歌’ is merely the simplest formula for calculating truth!”

As Cangnan awakened, he saw the entire world differently. The most basic changes in his eyes were all imbued with unchanging truths. Just as he was about to thank the old man,

He looked up and saw that there was no one there. Cangnan calmly surveyed his surroundings, unsure if the previous scene was merely his contemplation or if the old man had truly existed.

Suddenly, he knelt in gratitude to heaven and earth, and then bowed to the Mother River.

Jiang Ping, hidden beside him, watched as Cangnan acted and chuckled, saying, “The seed has been sown for you. How far you go depends on yourselves.”

The ‘九九歌’ can be traced back to ancient Fuxi. It contains parts of the truths regarding the world’s changes, and from these simple numbers, one can ultimately derive the rules of all things’ rise and fall.

Then, Jiang Ping turned his gaze toward the depths below.