Chapter 350: Sacrificing to Heaven and Earth

"Can't change causality?" Mu Yi was shocked by Huo Qubing's words.

"You cannot use causal divine powers to change what has already happened! Especially the history of Jiuzhou!" Huo Qubing sighed.

"You too are considered an outstanding talent of the younger generation of the Military Strategist school, and you have visited the Military Strategist's hall—have you ever imagined what a splendid sight it would be if our Military Strategist had a leader?"

As he spoke, Huo Qubing couldn't help but show a hint of anticipation on his face.

"Our Military Strategist school has many factions, but fundamentally, the more people, the stronger; if we could unite all the war gods, even storming Spirit Mountain wouldn't be mere boast—if only..."

Huo Qubing shook his head; the war gods are all unruly and hard to tame—how difficult it would be to unite the Military Strategist school.

"Once, the Military Strategist school had a great sage who wanted to overturn Jiuzhou's history, to fish out the war leader Chi You from Jiuzhou's history and have him lead the school, but as soon as the causal divine power was unleashed, the retribution of causality struck, and in an instant he was reduced to ashes."

As Huo Qubing said this, his face was full of lament.

"Not only is the soul scattered, but even the person's entire existence and past are erased by the law of causality; only then did everyone realize that altering a witnessed causality invites the penalty of causality!"

"There is a rumor that the penalty of causality comes from the present consciousness of Jiuzhou, i. e., the so-called Heavenly Dao, and only those who mostly master causal abilities remember this; everyone else completely forgets that such a person ever existed."

"So you're saying history cannot be changed at all, but I..." Mu Yi frowned and said.

"If I recall correctly, Liu Bei once told him that they had secretly altered the fall of Shu within one or two small worlds, allowing the Han to thrive three times."

"It's not that it cannot be changed, but that you cannot change it through causal divine power; as long as you don't directly modify history using causal divine power, you won't be punished by the law of causality!"

"Remember, if you want to change the past, you must absolutely not use causal ability; solve it by other means!" Huo Qubing solemnly warned Mu Yi.

"I understand!" Mu Yi nodded, keeping Huo Qubing's warning in mind.

"As much as possible, direct your causal ability toward yourself, using causality to counter causality, until finally you are free of causality."

"It's like the victory-anchoring I just mentioned: let your going into battle be the cause, and splendid victory be the effect, thus ordering causality and strengthening the ability to warp reality!"

"However, directly anchoring victory is too hard for you; you can try first to incorporate causality into warping reality, namely observing a path to victory."

Huo Qubing imparted his understanding of using causal divine power, and Mu Yi gained much.

The ability of Uninterrupted also underwent great development.

Although still imperfect, Mu Yi can already manifest a desired future into reality; by following his envisioned future step by step, he can fully realize his expectations.

In other words, as long as there is a way to win, victory can be directly obtained.

During this period, Huo Qubing often came over to give Mu Yi related guidance, letting him avoid many detours and develop the Uninterrupted ability more quickly.

Unlike the stagnant development of abilities like the war lord's and mist's, Uninterrupted is the integration of Mu Yi's own abilities, progressing rapidly.

However, as soon as this was developed, Huo Qubing immediately gave him a lesson.

When Mu Yi used Huo Qubing's Uninterrupted ability to preemptively take the future, but during execution, Huo Qubing, whose level had been suppressed to match Mu Yi's, suddenly used an ability Mu Yi had never seen before.

The future that had been read instantly became illusory; the future of seizing victory shattered, and everything before needed to be overturned and started over.

"Reading the future is always just a hypothesis; if the opponent hides more than you estimated, then the future you read becomes a false future."

Huo Qubing found the loophole in Uninterrupted by the simplest means and fully revealed it to Mu Yi.

"I understand! The foundation is the root; this divine ability is merely a tool in hand, not to be relied upon for a living!"

Mu Yi nodded; he would not treat this ability as his foundation for existence, but as a means of utilization.

"Even a child can be taught!"

Huo Qubing was very pleased with Mu Yi's performance; he himself is a heaven‑gifted genius, and making him teach those talent‑less officers is also a torment for him.

However, what Mu Yi has currently shown actually pleases him.

"How has the cycle of reincarnation been lately?"

Usually after teaching Mu Yi, Huo Qubing would leave directly, but this time he posed a question.

"Everything is normal! No abnormal circumstances!" Mu Yi, not understanding Huo Qubing's meaning, spoke honestly.

"Get ready; in the coming period you might be very busy!" Huo Qubing, upon hearing this, nodded and said to Mu Yi.

"Are you preparing to end the age of chaos?"

Mu Yi also knew the process of establishing a new world, but he didn't expect it to happen so quickly.

"We plan to project the Candle Dragon, accelerate the surface's time flow, then send avatars down to the lower realm to accomplish unification!"

Huo Qubing also didn't hide it from Mu Yi, laying out the plan that Wei Qing had prepared.

Actually it's simple: basically send some officer avatars down to the mortal realm to assist Wei Qing and Huo Qubing's avatars in sweeping all current forces, then establish a great unified dynasty.

Then sacrifice to the Heavenly Emperor and Earth Mother, build temples to worship Huo Qubing, Wei Qing, and all the officers, and summon the heroic spirits from the war into the great army.

At that point, this world will become a transit logistics base, making preliminary preparations for the later great army's invasion of the greater world.

"What about those monks? How do you plan to deal with them?" Mu Yi asked a question.

"In an age of chaos, there are no immortals!" Huo Qubing said with deep meaning.

"After sacrificing to the Yellow Heaven and Earth Mother, the Heavenly Court and the Underworld will officially take residence, and it's time for them to depart!"

Mu Yi understood; this is a plan to find an excuse to directly kick the Buddhist Sect out of this world, which amounts to killing the donkey after grinding the mill.

Although these monks engage in proselytizing, their primary duty of salvating souls is still performed quite well.

But ultimately they came to share the cake; the original force of a few hundred has now grown to hundreds of thousands, and in just three months they have built over a hundred temples in succession.

Not only are they gathering incense, they even vaguely aim to establish an independent Buddhist state, playing the game of state religion.

The Military Strategist school's push for speed is also probably annoyed by the development speed of these Buddhist disciples.

In scheming, these war gods of the Military Strategist school can't outmatch the Buddhist Sect, but the school has its own solution.

If the problem can't be solved, then eliminate the person who creates the problem.

And the Military Strategist school's forte is naturally killing people.

The Military Strategist school acts swiftly and decisively; almost the day after Huo Qubing finished speaking with Mu Yi, the cycle of reincarnation surged with a large batch of true spirits.

Mu Yi took a moment to glance at the surface situation; it was like watching a fast‑forwarded movie, a youth resembling Huo Qubing somewhat leading cavalry east and west on campaign.

Numerous temples were razed, the golden bodies of Buddha images were looted clean, and the monastic monks were all burned to ashes.

However, what puzzled Mu Yi was that Guangjin did not appear in the cycle of reincarnation, nor did even the earliest Buddhist disciples show up in numbers.

I casually captured the souls of two monks to investigate, and then discovered that the guys like Guang Jin had already voluntarily entered nirvanic death one by one before the Military Strategist acted.

They say it was a passing into nirvana, but Mu Yi never actually saw these guys' souls; it was probably a feigned death allowing them to slip away from this world.

"They ran away really fast!" Mu Yi clicked his tongue.

The Buddhist Sect folks are truly skilled at seeking fortune and avoiding disaster; as soon as they sensed the flow of time was off, they chose to pass into nirvana and escape.

Although the painstakingly built foundation was completely destroyed, the thing called faith incense is still a cut‑and‑reap operation; regardless of the final outcome, those guys actually harvested a batch.

Not only Guang Jin, even the few senior brothers of Guang Jin achieved Legend status; for an ordinary faith‑incense deity, a destroyed temple would surely cause trouble, but backed by the great power of Ling Mountain, there is no worry of incense drying up.

As long as the chance is seized, spreading Buddhist teachings and faith to amass massive incense, with Ling Mountain's help, power can instantly ascend.

Not even a Legend—one can directly surpass demigods and become a true god‑Buddha.

After the Buddhist Sect was purged, the Military Strategist used a formation to create a similar transcendence method, warming weapons and equipment to separate the dead souls' resentments from their true spirits.

Although not as professional as the Buddhist Sect and with some setbacks, the advantage is that it's the Military Strategist's own technique and can also strengthen soldiers, a win‑win.

At first, Mu Yi was so busy his feet never touched the ground, nearly twenty‑four hours a day running the reincarnation knot to transcend the dead souls.

After the Military Strategist fashioned the formation called the Transcendence Array, Mu Yi's workload dropped dramatically.

This method of the Military Strategist is indeed less efficient than the Buddhist Sect, but it has far more manpower.

Mu Yi finally had some leisure and saw that the ground had gotten back on track; a massive host of celestial soldiers and generals descended to the mortal realm, and the reborn remnants of defeated souls were no match for these people.

In less than seven years, the great unification was completed and a new dynasty was founded, named Great Summer.

The first act of founding the nation, of course, was to sacrifice to Heaven and Earth.

A grand celestial‑sacrifice ceremony unfolded on earth, and officials of the Ministry of Rites oversaw its proceedings according to protocol.

While Mu Yi watched the spectacle, Emperor Wei Qing, in his incarnation, began reciting the sacrificial script before a massive cauldron resembling the Jiuzhou Cauldron, and a rainbow beam shot skyward, piercing the clouds.

The next moment, a magnificent scene appeared in the clouds.

Above the clouds, countless figures stood; at the very front center stood two indistinct silhouettes, surrounded by a myriad of strange phenomena descending.

Although blurry, a single glance was enough for Mu Yi to grasp the two figures' identities.

Heavenly Sovereign, Great Celestial Venerable and Earth Sovereign, Imperial Earth Deity.

Just by staring at the vague figures, Mu Yi felt like gazing up at a towering mountain, and immediately averted his eyes elsewhere.

Yet beside those two, the standing figures were also somewhat indistinct, and when Mu Yi looked around, every silhouette filled him with an overwhelming sense of oppression.

Although not very clear, one could roughly discern which divine beings these silhouettes represented.

Yu Qing Primordial Celestial Venerable, Shang Qing Spiritual Treasure Celestial Venerable, Tai Qing Daoist Virtue Celestial Venerable, Western Tai Chi Heavenly Emperor, Central Purple Star Northern Pole Grand Emperor, Eastern Azure Splendor Great Emperor, Southern Longevity Great Emperor…

Even the Buddha and Guanyin Bodhisattva stood among them.

Mu Yi tried hard not to look at these big figures, but with them standing there, they could not be ignored.

Just as Mu Yi was numb, the world spun in an instant; he found himself pulled from the Underworld up to the heavens, standing with the gods, though almost in the very back row.

Mu Yi may not know what happened, but he still stood earnestly on the clouds.

"Sacrificing to Heaven and Earth, praising all celestial deities…"

As the emperor below finished reciting the sacrificial script and tossed the ignited parchment into the great cauldron, a pillar of light shot from the cauldron straight into the sky, and the previously vague figures began to appear.

Starting with the Heavenly and Earth Sovereigns, countless figures standing in the heavens erupted with intense radiance, strands of light being fed into the pillar.

Mu Yi, with a blessed heart, later realized his divine seat and transformed his own aura into a beam of light, pouring it into the pillar.

Finally, the sky‑piercing light pillar became a canopy that covered the entire empire's realm; for the empire's people, beneath the canopy they felt refreshed and free of calamities and illness.

For those divine remnants, the canopy exuded an overbearing aura that swept over them.

Supreme dignity and weight.

Many divine remnants immediately prostrated on the ground, pleading for heavenly mercy, their courage of resistance completely extinguished.

Dozens of great deities stronger than the former Beast Gods descended, instantly crushing all defenses in their hearts.

The prostrate deities were granted pardon; the heavenly might was merely dignified, not murderous.

And the already maddened deities, unwilling to remain still, had their bodies crushed inch by inch under ten thousand times the pressure, with spontaneously generated flames branding a mark upon them.

This is the ceremony; the gods will not act to slay demons.

But after the ceremony, the Heavenly Court will send agents to purge these marked deities and ferocious beasts, which is part of the Heavenly Court gods' maintenance of cosmic order.

Immediately after, the canopy turned into a rain of light that fell from the firmament, silently merging into mountains, rivers, lands, and all living things.

The entire empire displayed a vibrant, flourishing scene.

"Praise Heaven and Earth, praise all celestial deities!"

The empire's citizens prayed en masse, each personally feeling the blessings of this celestial ceremony, their devotion to the empire and the deities intensifying immensely.

After the canopy fell, the emperor began enfeoffing meritorious officials; besides the generals who emerged in war, some deities were also granted titles, all of whom were mountain‑water spirits that had aided the empire during the war.

And Mu Yi was, surprisingly, present in both.