bioinnovel Chapter 384 Chaos Larva
Chapter 384 Chaos Larva
The stalactites of law at the edge of the chaotic gray fog belt are denser than those outside the cracks of the Tai Sui.
So densely packed that there is an upside-down stalagmite every three steps, and what drips from the tip of the stalagmite is not sap, but fragments of chaotic laws condensed into liquid.
The fragments dripped into the gray mist, splashing out a tiny, faint ripple of law, which was swallowed up by the denser gray mist before it could spread more than three feet.
Su Fan walked at the front, carrying the Pangu Axe on his right shoulder. The chaotic primordial light on the axe blade cut a very narrow passage in the gray mist.
The law stalactites on both sides of the passage were forced to tilt to the sides by the light, and the law fragments dripping from the tips of the stalactites were evaporated into extremely fine gray-white steam before they even hit the ground.
Nezha followed Su Fan on the right, the flames of the Wind Fire Wheels were suppressed in the gray mist, leaving only two thin rings of flame close to the soles of his feet.
He pressed the Pure Yang Talisman on his chest, specifically the Tanzhong acupoint. The warm current of the talisman spread along his meridians to his limbs, and the law mark on his left shoulder lit up for a moment in the warm current.
Xu stood barefoot behind Nezha. The scorch mark on his right index finger had completely healed, and the new skin was a very light transparent color, the same color as the transparent runes after the water essence was sealed.
He held the stone core in the palm of his left hand, the silvery-white crystal on its surface facing a very blurry shadow deep in the gray fog.
The outline of the shadow kept expanding and contracting, each expansion and contraction accompanied by an extremely low-frequency hissing of the law.
"The egg is shifting to the left. It sensed the aura of Pangu's axe and is circling around it."
With his eyes closed, the laws on the surface of the core of the Eastern Emperor's heart flashed with each beat in Xu's chest.
When he flashed for the third time, he suddenly opened his eyes. His pale golden pupils reflected the latest position of the dark shadow, which had circled to the left edge of the gray fog and was accelerating outwards.
"It wanted to bypass the gray fog belt and enter through the side of the Guixu rift. The detour route was a belt of rubble from the remains of the Five Elements Mountain, and in the rubble belt were fragments of the Golden Cudgel that the Great Sage had shaken off when he was pressed under the Five Elements Mountain."
"Those fragments bear the imprints of the primordial laws of the Chaos Stone Embryo. It is following the imprints to find its way."
Xu stuffed the stone embryo's core into Nezha's hand, then pressed his right hand back onto the pale gold thread on his chest, using the resonant frequency of his heart's pulsation network to synchronously transmit the egg's orbital trajectory to the direction of the South Heavenly Gate.
"We can't let it get around to the flank. The Ruins Crack on the left side of the gray fog belt isn't completely sealed yet, and fragments of the Buddha's Mount Sumeru seal still remain in the rubble belt."
"If the egg comes into contact with those fragments, it will also swallow the Buddhist principles sealed within them."
"It was originally a mixture of the laws of chaos and the laws of life of ancient gods. After swallowing the laws of Buddhism, the three laws catalyzed each other in its body. Its first instinct after hatching was to expand instead of build a nest."
Su Fan kept moving, shifting the Pangu Axe from his right shoulder to his left, and freeing his right hand to pull out the half of the broken mirror left behind by Yang Jian from his waist.
The shattered mirror was reduced to a blurry afterimage due to the interference of the laws of the gray fog, but the afterimage was enough for him to see the current coordinates of the egg.
Sun Wukong, carrying his golden cudgel, walked from the back of the group to Su Fan's left.
The monkey's eyes reflected the swirling shadow deep within the gray fog. It lowered the staff from its shoulder; the staff thickened, and it gripped it with both hands.
"I'll go block it. I know the rubble like the back of my hand. It's been there for five hundred years, I remember how many pieces of rubble there are underneath."
"I broke off the Golden Cudgel myself back then. It shattered at the bottom of the Five Elements Mountain and is still deep in the scree belt. The egg followed the marks on the fragment to find its way, so I went to the front of the scree belt to intercept it."
"What if the eggs hatch prematurely if the Great Sage goes to the gravel area alone?"
Nezha slammed his fire-tipped spear to the ground.
"I stayed in Zixiao Palace for a whole year, and I read the words that Hongjun carved on the wall nine times. One line of words was carved on the dome of the main hall, which described the hatching conditions of the ancient god's egg."
"For an egg to hatch, two conditions must be met simultaneously: the density of the law of chaos must be reduced to a sufficiently low level, and the density of the law of life must be increased to a sufficiently high level. If either condition is missing, it will not be able to hatch."
Sun Wukong took the fragment of the Jade Tablet of Creation out of his pocket. The third branch of the rune on the fragment, facing downwards, was pointing directly at the gravel belt on the left side of the gray mist belt.
At the end of the forked branch, a tiny dark red dot of light shone, and inside the dot was a line of extremely small characters that Hongjun had personally carved.
"I looked at this line of text in Zixiao Palace for a whole year and still couldn't understand it. Just now, after the axe handle fragment recognized its owner, the jade tablet fragment completed it. It is a Buddhist law that prohibits such behavior."
"The essence of Buddhist principles is a structure of principles formed by the condensation of the vows of all sentient beings. Its density of life principles is so high that the life principles inside the eggshell are diluted by Buddhist principles."
"If the eggs come into contact with the sealing fragments of Mount Sumeru, they will not only fail to hatch, but will be forced into a deeper state of dormancy."
Sun Wukong stuffed the fragments of the Jade Tablet of Creation back into his robes and slammed his golden cudgel on the ground.
"So it won't hatch in the scree belt. It's going around the scree belt to bypass the front entrance of the Ruins of Return and sneak in from the side."
"I blocked it from the front of the gravel belt, and it slowed down as soon as it touched the stone embryo imprint left on my stick. It mistook me for the original body of the Chaos Stone Embryo."
After listening, Su Fan put the Pangu Axe down from his shoulder, touched the ground with the axe blade, and turned to look at Sun Wukong:
"There is a blind spot on the left side of the gravel belt. The blind spot is located at the junction of the Five Elements Mountain remnants and the side of the Ruins of Return, where it is doubly covered by the seal fragments of Mount Sumeru and the law residue of the Five Elements Mountain remnants."
"Yang Jian's shattered mirror can't see it, nor can the heart network of the Ruins detect it. If the Great Sage blocks the front of the egg, it will burrow into the blind spot. The spatial structure inside the blind spot is extremely complex, and once it burrows in, it will be difficult to find."
"I'm familiar with the blind spot too. When the Five Elements Mountain pressed down on me, that blind spot was right under the soles of my feet. There was nothing there except a broken piece of the Vajra Pestle used to stabilize the mountain's foundation when Buddha pressed it down."
"The Vajra is a supreme treasure of Buddhism, and the density of Buddhist laws is even higher than that of the sealed fragments of Mount Sumeru. If an egg enters a blind spot and encounters the Vajra, it will be directly suppressed into a deeper state of dormancy by the Buddhist laws, saving it the trouble of even having to detour."
Sun Wukong carried his golden cudgel toward the gravel area, and after a few steps, he turned back to look at Su Fan.
"But only I can enter the blind spot. The Vajra was personally placed there by the Buddha, and it is engraved with the sealing laws of Buddhism. Those laws have a natural repulsive force against chaotic beings."
"I was born from a stone, and even the Vajra Pestle rejects me as a chaotic being. But I have the Golden Cudgel, which contains fragments of the Heaven-Opening Axe. The chaotic laws of the Heaven-Opening Axe can neutralize the Buddhist laws of the Vajra Pestle."
"You guys stay outside and wait until I force the egg into the blind spot, then it won't be able to come out again."
"What if the Vajra Pestle is still alive? The Buddha has been on Mount Sumeru for 30,000 years, and he personally planted the Vajra Pestle. What if the remnant of the Buddha's will is still attached to the Pestle?"
"When the egg touched the pestle, it also encountered the afterimage of Tathagata's will. Could this trigger some pre-set contingency plan?"
Nezha slung the gun barrel over his shoulder.
"I have long since experienced the Buddha's hidden tricks. He suppressed me for five hundred years, saying he was waiting for the pilgrim to come, but in reality he was waiting for the Void to emerge and then return to the Void to seal the secret."
"Now that the Void is sealed, his scheme to suppress me is over. Even if there are still remnants of his will on the Vajra Pestle, they are old wills that haven't been updated for 30,000 years."
"The old will recognizes the old situation, not the current situation. The egg is not in its old situation, so the pestle will not take any initiative to react to the egg."
Sun Wukong's voice was very calm.
Su Fan watched Sun Wukong's figure disappear into the depths of the gray mist, then turned around, slung the Pangu Axe back over his shoulder, and made a brief tactical adjustment to Nezha and Xu:
"The Great Sage blocks the front, while we intercept the egg's flank on the right side of the gray fog belt. After the egg is forced back by the Great Sage, it will have a very brief period of hesitation. When it decides whether to go into the blind spot or break through to the outside, the activity of its laws will be at its lowest."
"In the instant it hesitates, use the Pangu Axe to split its shell, without killing it, just crack the shell. After the shell cracks, the life laws inside the egg will be forced to be released prematurely."
"The released life laws will be diluted by the fragments of chaotic laws floating in the gray mist. Once diluted to a certain extent, the egg will never hatch."
Nezha, carrying his Fire-Tipped Spear, walked to Su Fan's right side. His Wind-Fire Wheels barely maintained two extremely thin rings of flame amidst the dense gray mist and law stalactites.
He took the stone core from Xu's hand, and the silvery-white crystal on the surface of the core suddenly brightened as it approached the right edge of the gray mist band:
"The egg is shifting to the right. It has sensed the Great Sage's presence and is circling around us. It's less than twenty miles away."
The Law Stem on the right side of the gray fog belt began to drip fragments at an accelerated rate.
The frequency of the droplets is directly proportional to the speed of the egg's movement; for every mile the egg moves forward, one more droplet of fragments falls from the tip of the mammary gland.
Su Fan stopped, took the Pangu Axe off his shoulder, gripped it with both hands, and aimed the blade outward at the rapidly approaching shadow deep within the gray mist.
The outline of the shadows became clearer and clearer in the gray fog.
The egg is not round, but an extremely irregular oval shape, and its surface is covered with an extremely complex network of laws formed by the interweaving of chaotic laws and life laws.
The outermost layer of the texture network is wrapped in an extremely thin membrane of chaotic laws, and inside the membrane, a dark shadow can be seen slowly wriggling.
The writhing rhythm of the shadows was perfectly synchronized with the beating rhythm of the Eastern Emperor's heart in the Ruins' chest cavity.
"The life-law patterns on the surface of the eggshell resonate with the pulse of my heart. It takes the density of the laws of the foundation of the Ruins as the heartbeat of the mother, and it is searching for its mother."
"Before the ancient god of chaos was shattered by Pangu, he used his last bit of life force to condense this egg. The offspring sealed inside the egg has been waiting for the mother's heartbeat to reappear."
"After the mountain root was incorporated into the foundation of Guixu, the density structure of Guixu's laws resonated with the residual heat of Pangu's spine in the remains of Buzhou Mountain."
"The resonance frequency is exactly the same as the frequency of the heartbeat of the ancient Chaos God. It took this as the mother body returning to the void."
Xu spoke extremely fast.
"Then let it continue to believe it. Don't interrupt it, wait for it to get closer."
Su Fan did not move his hand holding the Pangu Axe.
The axe-shaped brand on his left palm began to feel slightly warm when the egg was about fifteen miles away.
The Pangu Guardian Law automatically activated upon sensing the life law of the ancient gods' descendants, flowing along the axe handle into the axe blade and overlapping with the chaotic primordial light on the axe blade.
He glanced at Nezha, who stuck his Fire-Tipped Spear into the ground, released his grip on the shaft, and pulled out the remains of the command flag, which had been burned to a mere flagpole by the flames of the pool, from his waist.
He flung the command flag into the gray mist, and the flagpole disintegrated in the air into extremely fine fragments of law. After the fragments dispersed, they condensed into an extremely thin lotus-shaped law membrane in front of Nezha.
The Fire Law flowing on the surface of the membrane was reignited under the blessing of the Pure Yang Talisman, and the firelight illuminated the approaching shadow in the gray mist.
"The egg is still ten miles away from us. Its detour is slowing down, and the Great Sage has already reached the front of the scree belt."
Nezha stared at the real-time position of the egg reflected on the membrane wall.
The egg's trajectory made a very obvious bend directly in front of the scree belt, at the very spot where Sun Wukong, carrying his golden cudgel, was squatting on a piece of Five Elements Mountain remnant at the edge of the scree belt.
The monkey placed the golden cudgel across his knee, and white arcs of electricity from the aftermath of the calamity danced on the cudgel, the frequency of which was perfectly synchronized with the writhing frequency of the patterns on the surface of the eggshell.
The eggs suddenly stopped when they were still three miles away from the gravel belt.
It stopped very suddenly; it wasn't blocked by anything, it stopped on its own.
It hovered in the gray fog, all the law patterns on its surface stopped moving, and the outermost layer of the chaotic law membrane of the pattern network began to shrink on its own.
The contraction rhythm was very regular, contracting once every three breaths. After nine contractions, a very fine crack appeared on the surface of the membrane wall.
A wisp of extremely dense life force energy surged from inside the opening, penetrating the gray mist and striking Sun Wukong's monkey face.
The monkey took the golden cudgel off his lap; the cudgel thickened, and he gripped it with both hands, grinning.
"Good heavens, it's already learned to test things before it's even hatched. This aura isn't its own; it's the last breath of life essence that its mother, the ancient god of chaos, sealed inside the eggshell before her death. It's spitting out this life essence to test whether I, Old Sun, am the mother it's looking for."
Sun Wukong did not move.
He held the golden cudgel horizontally in front of him, and the primordial law imprints of the chaotic stone embryo remaining on the cudgel activated automatically the moment they came into contact with that life essence.
The vital energy coiled around the rod, then automatically retreated after sensing the stone embryo mark, shrinking back into the eggshell.
After the egg's vital energy receded, its entire shell suddenly contracted, and then it began to retreat backward, heading in the direction of Su Fan and his two companions on the right side of the gray fog belt.
"It mistook the Great Sage for the Chaos Stone Embryo, but it wasn't the one it was looking for. What it was looking for was the resonance frequency of the mountain root in the foundation of the Ruins of Return. The Great Sage's stone embryo imprint was too primitive and didn't match the resonance frequency of the mountain root. It retreated and came towards us. It's still eight miles away from us."
Xu opened his eyes.
Su Fan raised the Pangu Axe above his head.
The chaotic primary light on the axe blade cleaved a bright rift of law in the gray mist. The rift extended from the tip of the axe blade to the right edge of the gray mist, forming a straight vacuum of law within the gray mist.
The law stalactites on both sides of the vacuum zone were forced to tilt to the sides by the primary light, and the law fragments dripping from the tips of the tilted stalactites automatically evaporated at the edge of the vacuum zone.
He aimed the axe blade at the center of the vacuum zone and said:
"Let it enter the vacuum zone. There are no law fragments in the vacuum zone, so its law activity will be at its lowest. Crack the shell when its activity is at its lowest."
The eggs retreat into the vacuum zone at an extremely rapid speed.
The law patterns on its surface stopped flowing the instant it entered the vacuum zone, and the outermost layer of the chaotic law membrane began to thin rapidly after losing the supply of surrounding law fragments.
The slowly writhing shadow inside the membrane was exposed after the membrane thinned. The shadow's outline was extremely blurry, only the size of a fist, but a very bright dark red dot was jumping in the very center of the shadow.
With each jump of the light spot, the density of chaotic laws inside the eggshell increases.
"That speck of light is the heart of a descendant of an ancient god. It's using the force of the laws governing heartbeats to forcefully break through the vacuum zone's suppression. The vacuum zone won't hold for long; it's about to burst forth!"
The sound of the void suddenly increased by half a beat when the frequency of the light spots jumping inside the eggshell accelerated to its limit.
Su Fan swung his Pangu Axe down.
The axe blade, unaffected by any laws within the vacuum zone, slashed down at full speed, precisely striking the narrow opening that had previously appeared on the eggshell's surface.
The shell cracked, and the crack extended to both sides from the narrow opening. After the crack, the life force sealed inside the eggshell suddenly exploded. The exploded force rushed around in the vacuum zone, shattering all the law stalactites at the edge of the vacuum zone.
Inside the egg, the dark red dot of light was exposed in the vacuum zone. The surface of the dot was covered by an extremely thin membrane of chaotic laws, and the ancient god's offspring, sealed inside the membrane, was only the size of a fingernail.
Nezha attacked at the same instant.
The tip of the fire-tipped spear was inserted into the edge of the crack, prying the eggshell open.
The flames of the Wind and Fire Wheel exploded into two extremely bright tongues of fire under the blessing of the Pure Yang Talisman. The tongues of fire enveloped the eggshell fragments and burned them into gray-white powder. The powder was diluted into nothingness by the law of vacuum in the vacuum zone.
After the eggshell was completely split open, the true form of the ancient god's descendant was exposed at the boundary between the gray fog zone and the vacuum zone.
It was a tiny, dark purple larva, its body covered with an extremely complex network of laws formed by the interweaving of chaotic and life laws. At the very center of the network, a dark red dot of light was still pulsating.
Xu squatted down and placed his right hand directly above the larva.
The last wisp of extremely faint flint embers emerged from the transparent scorch mark on the index finger. The embers formed an extremely thin membrane of law on the larva's body, and the resonant frequency of the stone embryo's core was sealed inside the membrane.
He gently pressed the membrane wall against the larva's heart, and the larva's heartbeat rhythm, guided by the membrane wall, began to synchronize with the density resonance frequency of the laws of the Guixu foundation.
It is no longer the heartbeat frequency of its mother body, but the new law frequency formed after the foundation of Guixu merges with the root of the mountain.
"It has made the Ruins its new home. Once it has fully adapted to the frequency of the Ruins, it will no longer seek the old frequency of the Chaos God."
Xu stood up.
Su Fan pulled the Pangu Axe from the ground. The chaotic original light on the axe blade dimmed for a moment after the larva's heart frequency changed, and then it shone brightly again.
He looked down at the larva that was slowly crawling towards the direction of Guixu, then turned around to face the direction of Nantianmen, and walked towards the crack in Guixu with his axe on his back.
Nezha drew his Fire-Tipped Spear, glanced at the larva, then at Su Fan, and followed behind him with the spear on his shoulder.
Xu walked barefoot at the back, and with each step, the Eastern Emperor's heart in his chest beat once, its rhythm synchronized with the new frequency of the larva's heart.
The density of the laws of the Guixu foundation jumped up by half a percent after the larva's heart frequency completed its conversion.
On the ruins of the South Heavenly Gate, the Primordial Celestial Venerable sat cross-legged on the spine, his whisk resting on his lap, and all one hundred and eight runes had been restored.
He looked down at the dark purple larva slowly crawling in the direction of the Ruins of Return, and used his whisk to draw a very simple law seal in the void.
The talisman flew out of the South Heavenly Gate and landed directly above the larva, transforming into a faint protective shield of light. The shield enveloped the larva and escorted it slowly crawling along the side wall of the Ruins of Return into the deepest part of the foundation.
Deep within the Ruins of Return, the larvae crawled into the deepest part of the foundation, following the direction indicated by the Clear Light Shield.
The chaotic law patterns on its surface merged into the pale gold pattern network of the foundation the moment it came into contact with the Guixu White Rock, and interlocked with the chaotic law traces left when it merged with the root of the mountain.
The density of the foundation's laws jumped another half degree, and the newly grown golden patterns on the bricks of the South Heavenly Gate flashed once at the same time.
Su Fan stood at the edge of the Guixu Crack, put the Pangu Axe down from his shoulder, and touched the ground with the axe blade.
The axe-shaped mark on the left palm became slightly warm after the larva merged into the foundation, indicating that the fusion of Pangu's Guardian Law and the will of all living beings had been pushed forward a little further.
He turned around and walked towards the South Heavenly Gate.
When Sun Wukong brought it back from the rubble, he was carrying the Golden Cudgel on his shoulder, and the staff was still covered with fragments of Buddhist laws left over from the Demon-Subduing Pestle.
The debris was a very pale gold color and dissipated on its own under the golden light of Mars.
The monkey walked over to Su Fan, slammed the stick on the ground, and squatted down on the edge of the stack.
"The vajra in the blind spot is still there, but the tip is broken off, and the break is fresh."
"It wasn't me who interrupted it. It was the shockwave of the law generated when the egg exploded in the gray fog belt that traveled along the side wall of the Ruins of Return into the blind zone and broke the tip of the pestle."
"The broken tip of the pestle shattered into three pieces, all embedded in the pile of Mount Sumeru seal fragments at the bottom of the blind spot. I didn't touch it; let Tathagata deal with his own things."
Sun Wukong took the fragment of the Jade Tablet of Creation out of his bosom. The third branch of the rune on the fragment, which was facing downwards, dimmed on its own after the tip of the pestle broke off, and the dark red light at the end of the branch had been completely extinguished.
"The fragments of Rahu's true spirit are sealed at the bottom of the pool. His left arm has been severed, and the egg of the ancient god has also been dealt with. There are still six sleeping bodies deep in the chaos. The seals on three of them have loosened, but there are no signs of them awakening yet."
"The coordinates that Hongjun carved on the stone slab mark the locations of the remaining three fragments of the Heaven-Opening Axe. One is near the seal on Rahu's torso, one is near the seal on Rahu's left leg, and one is at the ruins of an ancient battlefield."
"Your torso is pressed down under the Purple Cloud Palace. You know that path well, Great Sage, since you just came out of the Purple Cloud Palace."
Su Fan slung the Pangu Axe over his shoulder.
"I may know it well, but I've been climbing the steps of Zixiao Palace for a whole year, and the weight of the laws on my back hasn't completely worn off yet. If I go again, I'll need to rest for a few days."
Sun Wukong grinned and placed his golden cudgel across his lap.
The white arcs of electricity from the aftermath of the great calamity danced on the rod, but the frequency of the dances was a beat slower than before.
The hematoma on his left scapula had completely disappeared, and the dark gold scab on the broken bone of his right rib had healed firmly under the infusion of the will of the Path of All Beings, but his grip strength had only recovered to 70%.
"Let's go back to Nantianmen first. We'll repair the city wall once everyone is here."
Su Fan turned and walked towards the South Heavenly Gate.
Nezha followed behind him, carrying the Fire-Tipped Spear. The law mark on his left shoulder brightened even more after the larva merged into the foundation.
Xu walked barefoot at the back, and with each beat of the Eastern Emperor's heart in his chest, the pale gold patterns on the foundation of Guixu flashed once.
Behind them, the dark purple surface of the bottomless pool of law completely returned to calm.
The three laws of the Creation Jade Seal flowed steadily deep within the mud, permanently locking the last fragment of Rahu's independent consciousness within the sealing membrane woven by Hongjun himself.
Deep within the foundation of Guixu, the dark purple larva, enveloped by a protective shield of clear light, slowly sank into the white rock layer. The chaotic law patterns and life law patterns on its body surface simultaneously merged into the law network of the foundation, transforming into a faint pulse of new life deep within Guixu.