Cthulhu Gonfalon

Chapter 978: Surpassing the great Divine Power (Part 2)

Sui Xiong dreamt a very, very long dream.

In the dream, he crossed to an alternate world, became a giant jellyfish and swam freely in the giant ocean while training himself. Afterwards, he left the waters and ascended the ground, went through several weird and intriguing events, gained immense strength and achieved many remarkable milestones. In the end, all was peaceful and well as he returned to the sea and relinquished most of his powers. Sui Xiong did not do anything much but float freely in the sea like a free and unbothered nettlefish.

Somehow, Sui Xiong felt that something was amiss even though everything seemed fine. He thus continued to float in the sea, slowly and freely. This continued for an extremely long time, and he simply went with the flow of the current mindlessly.

After goodness knows how long, Sui Xiong began to feel bored, and his mind began to race again. Just as he wanted to take some sort of action, he felt like he no longer had any control over his own body.

Sui Xiong could still clearly feel his physical body and the movement of every one of his tentacles. He could feel the sea water flow across his body as well as the distant sea breeze that was blowing at him. However, he no longer had any ounce of strength to even move about like a normal jellyfish could. All he could do was float in the sea, moving with the currents and tides without any control and free will at all. Sui Xiong was greatly shocked and panicked as he realized he could not do anything on his own. He no longer had any control over his limbs and could not move of his own free will.

He lay in the sea and floated along with the currents while his heart raced with anxiety. There was simply nothing that he could do. After a while, his heart was peaceful again just like the vast, empty sea. Although there were occasional waves that rose up, it was mostly quiet and still.

It was just strange that even with the long period of floating in this vast sea, Sui Xiong did not meet any other living creature apart from himself. Could this be... the legendary dead sea?

Perhaps that was so, but what did it matter to him? Even if this was really the dead sea, where people were rumored to be able to float even if they fell in and did not need to worry about drowning, to a nettlefish who belonged to the waters, it meant nothing to him.

Even if he wanted to become a coldwater nettlefish, he needed to be washed and bathed to get rid of his excess salt content. As he thought about this, Sui Xiong could not help but smile to himself.

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After another long period of time, he once again fell into a coma as if he were hibernating alongside his dreams. However, in this new coma, he sensed something different this time.

Somehow, he felt like the sky was not just the sky, the sea was not just the sea, the sea breeze was not just the sea breeze, and he was not himself.

Sui Xiong could sense that there was some sort of object hidden behind everything. This was the root of everything and could be considered the infinite object of this world if it appeared appropriately.

What exactly was this?

Sui Xiong fell into deep thought.

He first thought about the book, “Tao Te Ching,” that he had read online, which stated that the Tao started with one, one gave birth to the second, the second gave birth to the third and that this continued endlessly. In reality, Sui Xiong did not truly understand the “Tao Te Ching” and was only able to mindlessly quote a few phrases from it. The lines he remembered taught about how “the Way” was something natural and all-encompassing that had existed before Earth. The “Tao Te Ching” mentioned that the fusion of several base objects would allow the creation of many other living creatures. Yet, those words were of little use to him now.

He was unable to understand it all and thus continued to think hard.

After a while, Sui Xiong suddenly jolted up as he remembered a scene of him sketching in the past.

Scenic views or people, young and old—sketches of these scenes were all created with black and white lines of differing thickness using a piece of charcoal and paper. These mere objects, however, when placed in the hands of professionals, could lead to infinite drawings that evoked strong emotions, allowing audiences to see beyond the physical drawing and experience the intentions that the artists wanted to share. For sketches, the drawing tools and paper demonstrated the concept of how certain foundational objects could open ones’ eyes to an infinite new world. To complete the analogy, the scars left behind on paper by the charcoal were the new objects, while the space left to continue developing were the blank spaces left on the paper.

Sui Xiong smiled as he finally understood everything. From there, through this understanding, he awoke from his coma.

His surroundings were all green, and one narrow, slanted tree that resembled a cane towered beneath him. The tree branched out like blooming flowers and surrounded a temple. This temple was old and ancient, but yet, instead of looking ragged, it was pristine and seemed well-preserved.

Here, every piece of wood and stone gave off a timeless aura and seemed to have gone through infinite time periods. They naturally fused together with several plants which either had been specially planted or had grown over time, allowing the entire temple to give off a warm and enticing aura. When one entered such an atmosphere, one would immediately forget the millions of problems plaguing them and instead feel relaxed and carefree.

The place Sui Xiong lay was in the center of the temple’s courtyard. A short distance in front of time lay the branches of the giant tree. At the base of the branches, cooling spring water was flowing, and a feminine statue that was spraying water and holding vases was smiling at him.

At this, Sui Xiong could not help but smile back at the statue before he clapped both his hands, allowing himself to float to the sky.

“The God of Virtue, where are you?” Sui Xiong asked loudly as he tried to find a green shadow. “Could you explain to me what is going on here?”

Amongst the water vapor in the clean air, Sui Xiong’s cheery voice reverberated endlessly.

“Ah, I knew I couldn’t stay hidden for long!” an old voice replied, somewhat wearily. “You’ve guessed correctly so quickly.”

Sui Xiong glanced in the direction of the voice. Pushing aside several leaves, a green frog the size of one’s thumb sat on an armchair with old glasses on, staring at Sui Xiong somewhat in frustration.

He could not help but laugh, and with a spin of his body, he turned himself into a similar size as the creature before him before landing in front of this Elder Frog.

In the past, Sui Xiong had not been strong enough when he had visited this Old Fairy Temple and was thus unable to witness many magical phenomena. However, as a great Divine power now, without considering the God of Light, only the Master of Order was comparable to him in strength. In fact, it could even be said that he was stronger than the Master of Order. Because of that, he could now tell that every object in this temple gave off a good aura and the entire temple felt rejuvenated, a masterpiece like the good treasure that the Dragon of Chaos had possessed before, only this temple was more detailed and magical.

To create something like this and live amongst it as an owner, well, only the God of Virtue was capable of such a feat. Furthermore, the feminine statue in the fountain was less of a normal statue and more of a dissipated soul of a god who had been saved through time control. If one observed closely, she was of rather high divinity and was actually a Divine Power...

Combining these factors, if Sui Xiong was still unable to guess the identity of the Elder Frog, that would make him a brainless idiot instead of the artist he claimed to be.

“Is the Goddess of Life the one sealed in the fountain?” Sui Xiong asked curiously.

The God of Virtue, who was physically a green frog now, nodded and asked, “Have you now fully understood the source of the world and entered the realm that goes beyond camps and rules?”

Sui Xiong froze and was slightly muddled before fully understanding these words.

He had been beaten hard by the God of Light and, in his semi-conscious state of mind, had followed the teachings of the Master of Order, relinquished all his powers and eventually found the object hidden behind rules and intrinsic attitudes just like the God of Light, allowing him now to find out and understand this world’s most basic power.

“Yes!” Sui Xiong smiled slightly and replied. “I now understand the true great Divine Power Realm.”

“In that case, you should quickly make a move,” the God of Virtue sighed. “Although you have only been lying here for three days, once you were sent here, the God of Light used boundaries to seal up this Sanctuary of mine; I can feel it. The time outside thus has flown by much faster than here...”

Sui Xiong was shocked for a second before understanding the God of Virtue’s words, and his face turned pale. Without further ado, he evolved into a beam of light and rushed out of the temple.