Chapter 1301: The Tenth Extreme

The path to enlightenment of the tenth extreme was foreordained to be extremely difficult. Xu Qing had put a lot of thought into it on his journey to this point, and had even gained certain bits of enlightenment. Immortal Lord Mi Ming had even helped him….

But to Xu Qing, all of those things were borrowed references that he couldn’t choose directly. The development of his own canon needed to be fueled by his own experiences in order to make it his own statute!

This is the process of statute being birthed from canon….

Xu Qing had lifted his foot but not yet set it down. He was currently lost in thought. He was thinking about whether or not he had prepared thoroughly enough.

The five elements are the foundation. I added time and space, and that became space-time…. The chaotic flow corroborated the deficiencies in my own space-time. I came to understand that the combination of correct and incorrect is, in fact, space-time.

In that manner, I laid the foundation to complete my canon of space-time. Next…. If complete space-time is viewed as a singularity, then….

Xu Qing looked up and put his foot down. The moment it made contact with the void, his ninth extreme, which surpassed space-time, became a dao reverberation that swept through the chaotic flow of space-time.

Parallel, overlapping universes.

Those words seemed to have an unusual, almost magical power that connected to Xu Qing’s heart and mind. Then the effect spread, and it was as if he had touched on the most profound secrets of a mysterious universe. The illusions in front of him seemed to shoot to a higher level, causing the chaotic flow of space-time he had been in to shrink down dramatically.

In the end, space-time became a singularity in his perception. All of the information Xu Qing possessed about space-time canon existed in that singularity. Astonishingly, beyond that singularity… Xu Qing’s perceptions contained many more singularities forming.

They grew increasingly numerous and dense, until they filled his field of view. They became innumerable motes of glittering light. The power of space-time also pulsed from each mote. It was as if each mote of light was a world with its own space-time, and its own host of living beings.

The joys and sorrows of all those countless living beings intersected to create different lives. This was the ninth extreme that Xu Qing had previously gained enlightenment of.

Parallel universes!

Back when he wasn’t at the peak of Quasi-Immortal, that canon could only simmer. It was only after he reached the great circle of Quasi-Immortal that he was able to manifest its true potential.

Xu Qing looked on. Within the motes of light were countless versions of himself. He could see countless different versions of life. They were like pictures being unfurled in front of him.

***

In one picture there was a scholar. The scholar wore a white robe and had his hair bound with a silk band. He had a scroll of ancient records in his hand as he hurried through a very elegant palace courtyard. The courtyard was full of luxuriant plants and fragrant flowers. But the scholar was frowning, as if he were racking his brains about the deeper meaning of life. Or perhaps he was worried about his future prospects as a government official.

Occasionally he would sit at a stone table, grind some ink, and put pen to paper. His calligraphy was delicate but tenacious, as if each brush stroke was testament to his relentless pursuit of knowledge. Little did he know that there was another version of himself looking on intently.

***

In another instance of space-time there was a heroic swordsman.[1]

He wore a conical hat and black clothing. A long sword was strapped to his hip, its sheath was decorated with ancient and mysterious designs. He strode down the public thoroughfare, tall and straight, his every footfall filled with a sense of ease and heroism.

On occasion, brigands or warlords would block his path. The swordsman’s sword would flash through the air, and the villains would fall dead to the ground. The swordsman would sheath his sword and continue on his way. As the sun set in the dome of heaven, the shadow he cast grew longer and longer.

He was the kind of person who had many stories to tell. Stories of the jianghu, filled with passion and vengeance, stories from another life of hot-blooded chivalry.

Eventually, the sun set.

***

The Xu Qing outside that particular space-time looked away. A profound look could be seen in his eyes as he looked at the scroll painting. It was as if this painting could help him to see the familiar parallels that existed in the great flow of space-time.

He saw artisans, government officials, butchers, bandits, children, and old men. He saw all versions of life. And in every one of those versions of space-time, it was himself that he observed.

***

In a crude physician’s hut, he saw himself treating injured patients. Occasionally, he would frown thoughtfully, and occasionally, he would console the sick. With deft familiarity, his hands would combine medicinal ingredients, whether boiled or crushed into powder, to ease the pain of the patients. Sometimes he would go out with a medicine box into the marketplaces and back alleys, a warm smile on his face as he diagnosed commoners and helped them patiently. He used his skill in medicine to help the meek and the lowly, and to keep the people healthy. It was an ordinary thing, but at the same time, extraordinary.

***

Different versions of himself. Different lives. There were similarities and differences among them all. It was like how seeds that were grown in different ways would produce flowers that were similar but different.

As Xu Qing calmly watched, the enlightenment became more prominent in his eyes.

In the past, I was wrong…. My canon comes from my perceptions, and it’s also limited by my perceptions. When it came to my ninth extreme, in the past, I was obsessed with what I perceived to be the path of cultivators. That’s why, in all of those versions of space-time, I was a cultivator.

You could say that they were all parallel versions of what I imagined myself to be. And those are false parallels. The true parallels, and the true parallel and overlapping universes, are actually a complete space-time version of myself. When you dispel the fog of chaos, what is revealed… are lives full of all states.

Each of those lives has a unique flavor. They all contain their own happiness, anger, sorrow, and joy. They all have unique trajectories….

This was the true ninth extreme of parallel universes. Countless choices and possibilities, as well as countless destined opportunities, formed into one magnificent painting.

Sadly, I can’t control it right now.

Xu Qing closed his eyes and sighed softly.

In this second phase, I’ve seen countless parallel space-times, but I can only observe them. That said, I predict that there is more I can do. Everything I did in the past was a minor dao… it was like my eyes were obscured by a single leaf. But what I’ve seen now represents the first step onto a major dao.

Xu Qing thought about it for a moment. So is the tenth extreme about going from seeing to affecting?

He pondered the situation. There were still some things he didn’t understand fully. Eventually, he opened his eyes.

It seems that manipulation actually falls within the range of what the ninth extreme can do. At the most, that might be half a step into the tenth. But not all the way out of the ninth….

Xu Qing shook his head. He was still not quite at that anticipated tenth extreme. He continued to observe the different versions of himself in the paintings. He had no idea how much time passed.

Eventually, his attention came to focus on one specific version of himself. That space-time was somewhat unique.

He was a painter. The painter painted a lot of paintings in his life. Some were beautiful maidens. Some were magnificent landscapes. Some involved very lifelike animals. The painter became very famous.

In his later years, it was for unknown reasons that he burned all of his paintings up with fire, leaving behind only one blank canvas.

And then, after looking at that canvas for a very long time, he put down a single brushstroke on it. The moment the tip of the brush stopped moving, Xu Qing, who was outside of that space-time, was stunned.

“Unification….” he murmured. “It’s unification! The tenth extreme is unification!”[2]

Xu Qing’s eyes gleamed with unprecedented brightness as all of the confusion vanished from within him.

Now the only question is… how to do the unifying!

Xu Qing looked at the painting and all the countless versions of himself, and he realized he already knew of a way to unify them.

I need to make all of the space-time versions of myself in these parallel universes develop a will of unification. With that as the attractant, I can create a line stringing together all of my space-time selves! And then I can combine the wills of unification among all of the parallels, and unify them! As for exactly how to do that….

Xu Qing’s eyes narrowed. He knew that the biggest obstacle he would face was that his ninth extreme wasn’t complete. Though he could use the ninth extreme to see, he couldn’t do anything with it.

I can only meddle in a tiny portion.

Using that tiny portion to unify all of his space-time selves would be extremely difficult. There were just too many instances of space-time, and too many versions of himself with too many different types of lives. All of those complications would make it hard to combine their consciousnesses.

He really needed to fully command the power of parallelism. Xu Qing’s eyes glittered brightly.

There’s actually another thing I could try…. The god of pain….

He waved his hand, and from within the immortal palace in his immortal embryo, he extracted the coffin with the god of pain sealed inside. When he put the coffin down in front of him, fluctuations rolled out. Without any hesitation, he reached out and put his right hand down on the coffin.

The coffin trembled as Xu Qing forcefully sent his consciousness inside. Inside the coffin was the god, like a candle about to wink out in the wind. To a certain extent, Xu Qing just possessed the god.

Having accomplished that, his eyes glittered. His plan was to use the god’s godly authority to weave an illusion for all of the space-time versions of himself. The illusions would vary based on their lives, experiences, and desires.

Eventually, all those versions of himself would be immersed in the illusion, and would have a hard time distinguishing reality from illusion. What he wanted was to give those space-time versions of himself an exit from their versions of space-time. And the exit would be the will of unification.

This method would meet all the requirements. It would create a will of unification in all space-time versions of himself. Illusions were limited. And illusions couldn’t affect real life. They were like dreams.

But illusions… could contain reality!

1. The author uses the same character (xia) as the one from wuxia and xianxia here. It imparts a sense of chivalry and righteous heroism. Sometimes translators will call this kind of hero a “knight-errant,” because the typical wuxia hero is a wanderer who fights for righteousness based on a personal code of honor/ethics. So in this case, the martial arts hero is essentially the protagonist of a typical wuxia novel. Yet again I’ll remind everyone that Beyond the Timescape is not wuxia. ☜

2. Interestingly, this specific term has already been used with the various extremes. Check chapters 1080, 1180, 1181. Incidentally, this term could also be rendered ‘combine.’ In past chapters, I used both depending on the context. There was one instance in the chapters related to the extremes that I previously used ‘combine,’ but have since gone back and changed it to ‘unify’ for continuity’s sake. Incidentally, the characters literally mean ‘return to one,’ and as such, the term contains a hidden implication that the things being combined or united were already together at one point. To be clear, the dictionary definition both in Chinese and English does not mention that. But in a xianxia setting where wordplay is key, it’s something to consider. Another thing to consider is that this painter only made a single stroke that caused Xu Qing to come up with the concept of unification. Except that the term in Chinese is made of two characters that have a total of five strokes (four for the character ‘return’ and then you add ‘one’ which is a single character). So… what stroke was it that prompted Xu Qing to think of unification…? ☜