Chapter Ninety-Nine: Chen’s Mother Clears Up the Confusion, and Chen Chen Faces a Crisis

When Zhu Feng asked his question, Chen Xing fell silent at last and said nothing for a long while.

He raised his head and looked at the disappointment in everyone’s eyes, then let out a bitter smile. “It’s not that I don’t want to tell you. It’s just that, with your current cultivation, if you learn who I truly am, I’m afraid your progress will be halted for the rest of your lives.”

Zhu Feng gave him a look that said, I almost believed that nonsense, and curled his lip. “If you don’t want to say it, then don’t. No need to make excuses and brush us off.”

Seeing that none of them believed him, Chen Xing could only feel helpless. It was true enough: the Primordial Dao Lord was the source of the Dao across all realms, and to know of his existence, one had to reach a certain level.

It was like stuffing the entire life’s learning of a postdoctoral scholar into the mind of a grade-school child. If that child did not go mad, it would already be a miracle. And to expect him to continue going to school afterward? Impossible.

“Is it only that cultivation can no longer advance, or are there other side effects?” Chen’s mother asked after a brief silence.

Chen Xing shook his head. “It only harms cultivation. There are no other effects.”

“Then tell me,” Chen’s mother said simply.

Chen Xing was startled. “Mom, you...” He was just about to refuse when Chen’s mother rolled her eyes at him and said, “When have you ever seen me cultivate?”

Chen Xing was instantly dumbfounded. Thinking it over carefully, it really was true. His mother had long since attained immortality, and her present cultivation had only been obtained after he had personally forced her to swallow a Yellow Center Plum fruit.

Seeing that he had nothing to say, Chen’s mother pulled him to one side and said, “Now you can tell me, can’t you?” With that, she leaned her ear close to Chen Xing’s mouth.

With no other choice, Chen Xing bent close and whispered his true identity to his mother.

The moment Chen’s mother heard it, her pupils contracted sharply. She turned around and stared at Chen Xing in utter disbelief, saying nothing for a long time.

After quite a while, she exhaled a long breath and said, “So that’s it. You child...” She tapped Chen Xing on the forehead and said in exasperation, “You’ve clearly trapped yourself in a dead end, and you still think you’re doing the right thing! You, you...”

Chen Xing stared blankly. He had only revealed his true identity, so why did his mother seem as though she saw through everything?

Seeing his confused expression, Chen’s mother lectured him, “Since your identity has already reached its peak, then your temperament, your state of mind, all of that no longer matters. What you truly need to do is recognize your own existence.”

Her tone was utterly certain.

Chen Xing was speechless. Of course he knew that these things were not important, but why did he not understand what his mother was saying? He had an IQ of 200 back on Earth, for heaven’s sake. Was he really that stupid?

The fat man at the side was even more bewildered. What did it mean for one’s identity to reach its peak? Mother Chen, could you make that a little clearer?

Chen’s mother, seeing this, knew that Chen Xing had not understood her meaning, so she explained, “In other words, you were once an ordinary person who suddenly obtained an invincible identity and limitless power. You lost yourself, and all this time you have wanted to live inside the world you believe in. Take this human calamity, for example. You’ve always believed that humanity must experience disaster before it can truly grow strong, haven’t you?”

Chen Xing nodded and asked in confusion, “Is that wrong?”

Chen’s mother rolled her eyes and said irritably, “Wrong? Wrong my foot! In all the worlds, which thing does not move according to your will? As long as you’re willing, even if you kept humanity in a greenhouse, they could still become the protagonists of heaven and earth. Why must you let them be slaughtered? Are you stupid?”

She paused again, then sighed and said softly, “Or perhaps you have forgotten that you yourself are human now?”

Boom.

Chen Xing’s mind seemed to explode, and he finally understood the knot that had kept his Dao heart from ever becoming complete.

Yes, now he knew. Zhu Feng had been right. When he had suddenly gained power beyond anything he had ever dared imagine, perhaps he really had been unable to fully control it because his Dao heart was incomplete.

But what he had not realized was that this invincible power had caused him, deep down, to place himself on a pedestal high above all others. Even though he always believed himself easygoing, and even married Nuwa and Xiao Yao as his wives, he had never once truly opened his heart to them.

That was the real reason he could never bring his state of mind to perfection.

And yet it also made Chen Xing understand that he must never refine his great will to a flawless state, for that would be a catastrophe.

As these things became clear to him, he suddenly felt his heart brighten all at once.

Sensing that his Dao heart was about to become complete, he sighed inwardly and, with a single thread of power that had just leaked free, forcibly sealed it once more.

But unlike before, this time Chen Xing could release the seal whenever he wished, and he would no longer be troubled by it.

He understood very well that if he truly recovered all of his former power and memories, and then brought his Dao heart to perfection to form an unblemished great will, he would become the true Primordial Dao Lord: thoughtless, emotionless, wholly impartial and utterly righteous, no longer the man he was now.

Then what would he do? Abandon his family and wives? Abandon his daughter? Erase his sister once more and destroy the Mountain and Sea Realm? Chen Xing would never do such a thing. Perhaps, for him, imperfection was the truest form of perfection.

Chen Xing did not tell the others all this. He only gave a bitter smile and said, “All right, let it be this way. I will give humanity a fair explanation.”

Looking at Nuwa and Xiao Yao, whose expressions still carried a hint of doubt, Chen Xing apologized to Nuwa. “I’m sorry. I was the one who stopped you from saving humanity. This is my fault, and I will give you an accounting for it.”

Only then did endless sorrow show in Nuwa’s eyes.

For the so-called trajectory of heaven’s law that Chen Xing spoke of, she, as the sacred mother of humanity, had been forced to watch the race she created being slaughtered by the demon race. What sorrow could be greater than this?

Under the comforting words of Xiao Yao and Chen’s mother, Nuwa’s grief gradually receded after a long while.

Seeing that the main matter had been concluded, Nuwa casually smoothed the flow of heavenly law in this region. But at that very moment, her expression changed dramatically and she shouted furiously, “The demon race is courting death!”

Before Chen Xing and the others could even ask for an explanation, her figure vanished in an instant.

Chen Xing and the others were stunned. In the next instant, fury surged through Chen Xing’s mind as well. With a flash of movement, he disappeared from before the crowd too.

Xiao Yao and Zhu Feng also changed color, but seeing that Nuwa and Chen Xing had already rushed over, they no longer worried. They were just about to help Chen’s mother hurry after them when Chen’s mother said grimly, “What exactly happened?”

After a moment’s hesitation, Xiao Yao said, “Grandmother Yun brought little Chenchen out to the human lands for some fun, and they were surrounded by the demon race. But Sister Nuwa and Brother have already gone there. Nothing will happen, so you don’t need to worry, Grandmother.”

Chen’s mother snorted coldly. “The demon race? If they truly want to die, then I’ll grant them their wish.”

She was brimming with confidence. In their family alone were Pangu and Nuwa, both sages of the Great Dao, not to mention her own son, that unfathomable monster. She did not believe for a second that the demon race could stir up any real trouble.

Zhu Feng, his face cold, said to Chen’s mother, “Godmother, I’ll go first and rescue the remaining humans. When Chen Xing and Sister-in-law Nuwa return, have Chen Xing help me. Hmph. Looks like it’s really time to change the situation in the Primeval World.”

After seeing Chen’s mother nod, Zhu Feng’s figure vanished as well.

Among the humans by the Eastern Sea, after the three forefathers of humanity had led the cultivator army to attack the Heavenly Court, only some ordinary people had remained in the ancestral land.

That day, Chen Xing’s daughter, little Chenchen, had insisted on going out to play with Yun Ke. Unable to refuse, Yun Ke brought her to the human ancestral land. Unexpectedly, they had arrived just as the demon race discovered that the ancestral land was lightly defended and came to launch a sneak attack, trapping them there instead.

Like Chen’s mother, Yun Ke did not like cultivating. After taking a Yellow Center Plum fruit, she too had reached the Great Luo realm, but she had no experience in combat. Surrounded by two demon spirits at the Golden Immortal level, she was already struggling badly, and with little Chenchen in her arms, she could barely defend herself, let alone fight back.

By now, the human ancestral land had already been breached by the demon race. Countless ordinary humans had been slaughtered, and it looked as though they would soon be wiped out entirely, when a furious shout suddenly rang out: “You beasts are courting death!”

The words had barely fallen when a gigantic hand, vast enough to blot out the sky, came crashing down upon the demon race in the battlefield. At once, screams rose everywhere, and huge swathes of demon soldiers were smashed into bloody mist.

Strangely enough, that hand attacked only the demons, while the humans remained completely unharmed.

As the demon race suffered devastating losses, a peerlessly beautiful figure appeared in the battlefield.

It was Nuwa.