Chapter 526

When the nine-colored light gradually faded, new changes occurred between heaven and earth.

Time seemed to flow backward, and the damaged Heavenly Dao no longer had any cracks.

The collapsed Three Realms, including the beings who died within them, were all coming back to life in a reverse flow.

The Purifying World Green Lotus descended from the sky and appeared before Sun Wukong and Yang Jian. As the green lotus bloomed, Nezha's physical body was suspended in the air.

And Nezha, whose Primordial Spirit had completely vanished, had a body flickering with fiery red light. A golden Primordial Spirit condensed between his brows and merged into his body.

Until all the light faded, Nezha's fingers moved.

"Third Brother?"

"Brother Nezha?"

Nezha heard their calls and opened his eyes.

His brows were filled with confusion; he had clearly died, so how was he alive again?

He examined his own body, and it was indeed his physical body.

No...

"Where is she?"

Sun Wukong and Yang Jian lowered their heads in guilt, saying nothing more.

Nezha immediately realized something and rushed forward to grab Yang Jian's arms. "Where is she? What happened to her?"

Seeing that Yang Jian did not speak, he hurriedly expanded his divine sense to search the Three Realms for Tang An's aura.

But no matter how he searched, not a trace of her aura appeared in the Three Realms.

"What happened to her? What happened? Speak!" Nezha was nearly driven mad with anxiety.

"Nezha."

Tang An's voice appeared behind him.

When Nezha looked, Tang An, with hair as white as snow and a red dress, was standing quietly behind him.

At this moment, Nezha felt a panic he had never experienced before.

He rushed over to hug Tang An, but just like when Tang An had rushed to hug him earlier, he grabbed at empty air.

When Nezha anxiously turned his head to look for Tang An again, she was still facing him with a faint smile.

"Your hair..."

"And your Primordial Spirit..."

Tang An looked at her white hair, "It's quite good. In TV shows, white-haired immortals are always very powerful big shots."

Nezha walked toward Tang An step by step; he did not know what had happened during this time. But he knew he might lose Tang An forever.

"A real man, don't cry." Tang An smiled and punched his chest.

This time, Nezha could not feel how hard she had hit.

"And you guys, why are you so guilty? I am the Heavenly Dao now, the most powerful existence in heaven and earth."

Tang An spoke with a smile, but her eyes were filled with tears and deep reluctance.

Yang Jian hurriedly said: "Master, becoming the Heavenly Dao is not necessarily the end."

"As long as you are alive, we can wait for a new opportunity. If a thousand or ten thousand years later, a new Heavenly Dao is born, you might still be able to detach from the Heavenly Dao."

"Only by living is there hope for everything."

"Living, you say?" Tang An sighed, "I also want to live well, happily, joyfully, and peacefully."

"And I really, really tried very hard to live."

"It's just... I seem to be unable to survive in this man-eating world after all."

The moment she became the Heavenly Dao, she permanently lost her physical body, leaving only her Primordial Spirit.

As time slowly passed, her Primordial Spirit would eventually be eroded by the Great Dao, becoming a cold machine without emotion or desire. She would completely lose the personality of Tang An, leaving only the words "Heavenly Dao."

"The Great Dao is heartless, making me watch the vast Huaxia endure hardships without taking action."

"Making me watch foreign invaders kill my countrymen, steal my treasures, and still have to comply with the constancy of the Heavenly Dao."

"Making me watch my loved ones pass away without being able to stop or change it. Making this world gradually have no trace of my existence left."

"Making me supreme, yet endlessly lonely and desolate."

"I don't want this fate."

Her original intention had never changed; she had never wanted to be some cold, icy Heavenly Dao.

"Since the Great Dao is heartless and the Heavenly Dao is unjust, and neither can accommodate me, then I will be the one to change my own fate one last time."

Tang An's eyes were full of determination; she did not want to struggle and survive in this world anymore. Nor did she want to be swallowed, assimilated, or lose herself in this world.

"How do you want to change it?" Nezha's gaze had always been on Tang An.

"They want to impose the maximum amount of restriction on me, but I am determined to detach my Primordial Spirit and consciousness to gain endless freedom."

"I want to completely end all causal risks; rather than letting my Primordial Spirit be assimilated by the Great Dao in the end, it is better to merge my Primordial Spirit into the New Heavenly Law."

"This way, whether it is Chenxiang, Sanshengmu, or Yang Jian, they will never be implicated by the Heavenly Law tribulation again."

"And I... will leave myself a few final days of consciousness to gain unprecedented freedom and do everything I want to do."

Nezha looked directly into Tang An's eyes, his own eyes hurting so much that even the tears in them shattered.

"And after that?"

"After that... I will completely dissipate forever, I suppose."

"So you saved me, only to let me watch you disappear forever?"

To him, how cruel this was.

"I'm sorry, just let me be selfish for once, and make a willful yet firm choice."

"At the very least, by doing this, I won't be bound by them forever, right?"

"This is the only way I can freely remove my own fate."

Although she was not the winner in this game, at the very least, she was not a loser either.

Until death, she at least had a few days of freedom without being bound.

"I have circled with myself for a long time; I would rather be myself."

No matter how many things happened after she arrived here, no matter how many twists and turns occurred in between, she, Tang An, had never abandoned her original belief from beginning to end.

Nezha was so powerless that his voice went hoarse, "Is this the only choice? Is there no other room for maneuver?"

Tang An smiled bitterly. "In this life, it seems I have choices everywhere, but in reality, I have never had a choice."

"Right now, I still have the choice of final freedom, and I am already very happy."

"Don't forget, we are the Four Great Rebels. If we just accept our fate like this, what kind of rebels are we?"

Nezha dropped his hands; Tang An had blocked all his attempts to make her stay. It made even begging her to stay feel like depriving her of her final freedom.

He never wanted to lose her, but he was destined to lose her.

"Where do you want to go last?"

"Before my consciousness dissipates, I want to walk the Journey to the West path one more time." When Tang An said this, she was genuinely happy.

Because that Journey to the West path was the only part of her dark life that was full of warmth and light.

"When I was a child, I didn't understand the story of 'marking the boat to find the sword,' and I thought that person was so silly."

"Only now do I understand that in a person's life, it turns out that many times we are obsessed with marking the boat to find the sword."

She looked at Sun Wukong, Yang Jian, and Nezha, took out her Wealth Gathering Ring and all her magic treasures, and distributed them to them.

"These can be considered a memento I leave for you."

The Purifying World Green Lotus was fused with her life, so it could not be taken out.

Forget it, when I leave, at least I have that chatterbox Jinbao to keep me company, so it won't be lonely.

The three of them took Tang An's things and broke down, sobbing uncontrollably.

They could clearly still try to persuade Tang An, but they all understood her. They knew that doing this was indeed a good ending for her.

It was just that from now on...

From now on, they would have no Master.