Chapter 587: The Dao is fundamentally nameless; principle gives rise to form

On the battlefield, the golden nebula was constantly being eroded by the gray tide.

Qin Wu's attacks grew increasingly feeble; he felt his soul mired in a swamp, each swing of his battle blade consuming ten times the usual will.

That gray 'self' opposite him,

simply blocked calmly, using that suffocating law of inertia to incessantly wear down his fighting spirit.

Qin Zheng's spatial blockade was completely shattered, and the Yanhuang Legion's formation was cut into disarray.

The soul links among the clansmen were severely disrupted by the logic virus released from Qin Si's mirror image, filled with various false commands and suspicious messages.

And the most deadly of all was the attack from Qin An's mirror image.

That pure, icy despair spread like a plague through the hearts of the Yanhuang people.

Many warriors whose will was not steadfast even gave up resistance, letting the gray enemy devour and assimilate them.

The scales of victory had completely tipped toward Yuan Chu's side.

Yuan Chu calmly watched all this, as if appreciating a painting whose ending was already predetermined.

"Do you see? This is the principle."

His voice echoed in Qin Hao's ears.

"Principle is certain, calculable, absolute. Before absolute principle, your so-called will and emotions are merely variables that can be easily analyzed and restrained."

"Your defeat was destined from the start, for your very existence is irrational."

Qin Hao's body remained weak, but his gaze grew ever brighter amid Yuan Chu's words.

He did not look at the gruesome battlefield; instead, he immersed all his mind and spirit in memories of the Xuan Du teachings.

"The system is technique; the Dao is the foundation."

"You cold-blooded programs cannot comprehend this principle."

"Principle…… what exactly is it?"

"Before,"

Qin Hao thought principle was a higher-order command than logic, imbued with vital will.

He used this principle to forcibly alter the foundation of the Executive Bureau Headquarters, erasing the existence of the Chief.

But now, his principle proved ineffective before Yuan Chu's absolute principle.

Why?

Could the Xuan Du teachings be wrong?

Or… have I misunderstood myself?

Qin Hao's consciousness sank into deep contemplation.

He emptied himself, no longer thinking how to break the situation, no longer worrying about his people's safety.

His soul became a speck of dust, drifting silently in this world forged by principle.

He saw Yuan Chu's principle.

It was a system composed of countless interlocking chains of law, a perfect, flawless, self-consistent closed loop.

Within this system, 1+1 always equals 2, for cause inevitably leads to effect.

Everything is certain; nothing happens by chance.

The Mirror of Truth is the system's core processor.

And what was the principle he himself had previously used?

It was a will of "I think this should collapse, so it shall collapse."

Such will, in essence, is also a definition, a result.

He used an illogical result to oppose a logical result.

When the opponent's logical level is far beneath his, he can easily win.

But when the opponent's principle is the most fundamental, absolute principle of the Cosmic Sea, his rough, unsystematic principle naturally cannot withstand a single blow.

"I was wrong……"

Qin Hao murmured to himself.

"I treated the Dao as a more overbearing principle to use; from beginning to end, I remained within the principle's framework, playing the game of definition with it."

Yuan Chu noticed Qin Hao's change, but he did not care.

In his view, this was merely a meaningless epiphany of a worm before death.

"Only now do I understand; it's too late."

Qin Hao, however, paid him no heed.

At this moment, consciousness completely broke free from the bonds of principle and drifted toward a broader, more primordial level.

He recalled the ancient classic, the Dao De Jing, from the Blue Star.

"The Dao that can be spoken is not the eternal Dao; the name that can be named is not the eternal name."

"That which can be spoken of as Dao is not the eternal Dao."

"That which can be defined as a name is not the eternal name."

Yuan Chu's principle is an extreme form of name.

He defined everything, named everything, and thus could overcome everything.

And the principle I previously used was likewise a name.

I defined that the Chief should die, so the Chief died.

We all fight within the world of 【Name】.

And the true Dao is without 【Name】.

"Nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth; named is the mother of all things."

When there was no name, no definition, heaven and earth had just begun.

With names and definitions, all things could then be born.

The Primordial's power comes from having a name, comes from all things.

And the power of the Dao comes from being nameless, comes from the beginning of heaven and earth.

That is an uncertainty that transcends all certainty.

It is the possibility that gives birth to everything!

Thinking this, Qin Hao's lips slowly curled into a faint smile.

"So this is the true Dao."

He slowly raised his head, looking toward the Primordial.

That body, which had been illusory due to damage to the soul, at this moment instead became incredibly real and substantial.

The Primordial's brow furrowed slightly for the first time.

From Qin Hao, he sensed an aura that could not be analyzed or defined.

The light of the Mirror of Truth flickered wildly, as it tried to read Qin Hao's current state, but the feedback returned was a blank.

Like a top‑tier computer scanning an object that fundamentally does not exist.

"What did you do?"

In the Primordial's voice, caution appeared for the first time.

Qin Hao did not answer.

He merely slowly raised his right hand, gently waving it toward the Yanhuang battlefield that was suffering successive defeats.

He used no power, issued no command.

He simply injected uncertainty into this certain world.

The next second.

Qin Wu, who was fiercely battling the Gray Mirror,

suddenly noticed that the enemy perfectly countering him, whose sword‑swing motion showed an extremely tiny error that should not have existed.

This error caused its blade to deviate from the intended trajectory by 0.01 millimeter.

Normally such a deviation could be ignored.

But for a warrior like Qin Wu, that 0.01 millimeter is the distance between life and death!

"Now!"

Qin Wu's fighting spirit was reignited at this moment.

Seizing this fleeting opportunity, the blade in his hand traced a cunning arc, bypassed the opponent's guard, and fiercely struck the Gray Mirror's neck.

"Crack!"

The Gray Mirror's head flew high.

The first perfect foe fell.

And this was only the beginning.

Qin Zheng discovered that the stability of the spatial walls of the solitary prisons that had divided his people suddenly showed a random fluctuation.

He immediately seized the opportunity, rebuilt the spatial matrix, and freed the trapped clansmen.

Qin Si's logic virus began to produce large amounts of garbled code and collapsed on itself.

Qin An's negative emotion field also began to fluctuate wildly, losing its stability.

One after another, variables that should not have appeared began to emerge across the battlefield in a chain reaction.

The decline of the Yanhuang Civilization was actually halted outright.

"Impossible!"

The Primordial cried out in shock, and on his eternally unchanging face finally appeared astonishment and bewilderment.