Chapter 1206: Holding One and Acting, Following Everything; Opening Realms, Achieving Heavenly Principles

"Seeking non-action through action..."

The Immortal Path that Lü Buwei spoke of was vastly different from the world's impression of Daoist non-action, but it was extremely consistent with the Immortal Path civilization of the cosmic realms that Qian Chen had seen, and it had very strong traces of the Legalist school.

If it were someone else, they would definitely think that Lü Buwei was a Daoist skin with Legalist bones, wearing the skin of the Immortal Path, but actually walking the path of human Dao bones.

But Qian Chen could understand Lü Buwei. He pondered slightly, looked up, and said: "Holding One, non-action?"

Lü Buwei smiled: "That's right! Dao gives birth to One, One gives birth to Two, Two gives birth to Three, Three gives birth to all things! Even the Great Dao must give birth to One, give birth to Two, before it can transform and give birth to all things. Many corrupt Daoists think that quiet non-action can rule the world with Dao, and that lying there can make everything go as one wishes. This is not non-action; this is dreaming!"

"Non-action is going with the flow, is following heaven and responding to Dao, is acting in accordance with Dao. It is the sage seeing water and saying it moistens downwards, guiding the people to dig canals for irrigation, acting in accordance with the water's path."

"It is not a lazy person lying by the river, dreaming of heaven sending heavy rain to irrigate his fields."

"It is the sage regulating the four seasons, plowing in spring, irrigating in summer, harvesting in autumn, and storing in winter, making the nature of grass and trees fit the solar terms, not a lazy person digging roots in spring, picking stems and leaves in summer, searching for fruits in autumn, and starving to death in winter!"

"Those who understand non-action as not acting are merely beasts. Beasts are more in accordance with the Great Dao and more non-acting. Could the sage mean that humans are not as good as beasts?"

"The so-called non-action refers to following the Great Dao, not getting lost in the complexity of all things, and grasping the crucial One of the Great Dao's operation."

"Holding One gives birth to Two, Two gives birth to Three, Three gives birth to all things. Therefore, holding One and acting, all things follow; holding One and non-action, it is even more like Supreme ruling the world with Dao!"

Qian Chen thought for a while, then suddenly smiled: "Then the 'One' that Master Lü obtained is the 'One' of that Heavenly Emperor of the Old Heaven!"

Lü Buwei nodded and said: "Yes, I ultimately failed to hold One, but only held 'Two,' only grasped the step of the Old Heaven's One giving birth to Two. Taking One from Two, what I obtained ultimately was not the Great Dao, but only the Immortal Path."

Qian Chen said: "The Old Heaven's Dao gives birth to One, One gives birth to Two, Two gives birth to Three. It is the Great Dao giving birth to Vast Heaven. Vast Heaven holds power and virtue, releases His own power and virtue, and gives birth to innate gods."

"The One that Master Lü holds is Vast Heaven's power!"

"The so-called One giving birth to Two, Taiji giving birth to Yin and Yang, refers to this Two, which must be interdependent and indispensable. Two is not two Ones, but two sides of One."

"Therefore, Vast Heaven's power is not just omnipotent power, not just the magic power and supernatural powers represented by the Immortal Path, but power acted upon in accordance with Vast Heaven's virtue. Holding One and non-action, Vast Heaven's power is holding One, Vast Heaven's virtue is non-action; virtue and power are also Yin and Yang. Power does not lose its virtue, virtue does not lose its power. Master Lü is afraid that he only saw the power, but did not see the virtue..."

Qian Chen suddenly realized when he said this.

"No, Master Lü also saw 'Virtue'!"

"Because the Virtue of the Old Heaven only has four words: 'The strong are respected,' because the power of the Old Heaven has no limits, and the strong are omnipotent."

"Therefore, Master Lü established cultivation realms, discarded all hypocrisy, all morality, etiquette, laws, and words, and gave way to the most naked violence, casting classes with violence, making the Immortal Path's classes distinct. In Master Lü's view, all morality, etiquette, laws, and various 'external objects' are merely all things born from Three. Only 'power' is the only One. Holding the only One, external objects naturally attach. All morality, etiquette, laws, and external objects will operate attached to 'violence'."

Qian Chen sighed: "It should be said that Master Lü succeeded for the most part."

"In today's Immortal Path, if one has a high realm, one can do whatever one wants. Realms naturally form laws, classes are distinct, and honor and inferiority are naturally formed."

"Before Master Lü opened the Immortal Path, cultivators did not know etiquette or laws, did not understand honor and inferiority. A small witch disciple dared to clamor at a witch master. A witch method, a supernatural power, could kill a strong person thousands of times stronger than himself. Many people could not understand their own strength at all, measured it with past benchmarks, and the external objects distributed based on strength were not balanced. People often had to re-measure strength and distribute external objects through fighting. It was truly a chaotic world!"

"Unlike today, where Penetrating Law, Qi Refining, Jin Dan, Yin Spirit, Yang Spirit, and Primordial Spirit classes are distinct. Below me are all ants; those of the same rank are fellow Daoists, and those one rank higher are seniors."

"Every time one achieves a class, one is naturally assigned the corresponding status by everyone."

"Even with the highest family background, the most recognized morality, the most stringent etiquette, and the most severe laws, no Penetrating Law cultivator dares to clamor at a Jin Dan, and let the Jin Dan despise the Primordial Spirit True Immortal."

"Setting realms, clarifying honor and inferiority, guarding strength and weakness, and raising classes—Master Lü is the ancestor of the Immortal Path, and it is well-deserved!"

Lü Buwei smiled bitterly: "What you said is really mean..."

"Vast Heaven's power is omnipotent, added to all things, and everything follows."

Lü Buwei sighed: "The reason why Immortal Qin fell lies in the fact that I, this holder of One, failed to grasp that One, but mistakenly thought I had attained the Dao, and forcibly went to grasp one of the Two. Holding One and non-action, I could neither be non-acting nor hold One, so Immortal Qin's fall was caused by my own hands."

"Seeking power and losing virtue, acting violently and forgetting the law."

"The One I held only had Vast Heaven's power. Ying Zheng is my disciple, and he later surpassed me, far exceeding me in violence, holding that One for me, but violent and unreasonable, ultimately walked the wrong path!"

"This path was extremely biased even in the Old Heaven. Innate gods seemed to hold violence and be omnipotent, but the Divine Dao had its own order. Blindly pursuing the 'power' of the Immortal Path, while ignoring the order that the Divine Dao originally represented, represented Vast Heaven's virtue."

"Ultimately, it naturally led to self-destruction!"

"This is the reason why the Divine Dao can seek power, but the Immortal Path cannot."

"The Divine Dao holds Vast Heaven's power because they are gods, and their foundation is a kind of order and 'Virtue.' And the Immortal Path holds Vast Heaven's power, but immortals are originally people. Although the human Dao also has a kind of innate order, that kind of order is changing, developing, and does not approach 'eternity'."

"Therefore, once Immortal Qin's development stagnated, its internal philosophy of worshiping power would inevitably lead to its internal collapse, even worse than the Heavenly Court."

"This is the truth I reflected on after Immortal Qin's destruction."

Lü Buwei sighed: "What's more, Vast Heaven, who was most perfect in both Virtue and power, was also killed by Supreme, which shows that the Dao of the Old Heaven also had to change at the right time. I held Vast Heaven's power as One, and used it to operate the Dao of the New Heaven. How... how arrogant and ignorant!"

"Only then did I know that the power of the New Heaven is no longer omnipotent."

"Even the Primordial Dao Ancestor has things that power cannot reach... The Immortal Path's pursuit of power is ultimately just a dream bubble!"

Hearing this ancestor of the Immortal Path, the great Fangshi of Immortal Qin, personally admit that Immortal Qin's destruction was inevitable, Qian Chen was also silent.

Nowadays, people cultivate immortals and seek the Dao, mostly seeking power.

No wonder the Immortal Path has always failed to open the realm above the Primordial Spirit. I am afraid it is because Lü Buwei's philosophy of holding the Immortal Path's bull ear was biased, and he could not open the subsequent realms.

Lü Buwei smiled: "Fortunately, although the Immortal Path seeks power, when I founded the Immortal Path, I ultimately used the human Dao as the foundation."

"The word 'Immortal' relies on 'person'!"

"The Immortal Path has no Virtue, but the human Dao has Virtue. After Immortal Qin's fall, although the Immortal Path's violence was chaotic for a while, it was ultimately introduced into the human Dao's ditch. Of course, it was also partially snatched by the Divine Dao. The power obtained by the Immortal Path was ultimately not used to satisfy our extremely indulgent desires, but a larger part was guided towards the path of pursuing the Great Dao and kindness."

"It is also the merit of Supreme Dao Ancestor opening the Primordial Spirit, the masters of the hundred schools seeking the Great Dao with Dao Fruits, and many sects returning to 'kindness'!"

Lü Buwei said: "If it weren't for this, I would be truly guilty. Without guidance, the destination is ultimately destruction!"

"Since then, I have given up on opening the realm above the Primordial Spirit."

"Because the realm above the Primordial Spirit, no matter how it is opened, is just stronger power! It is better to seek the Dao from now on, and no longer measure merit with power."

Qian Chen nodded and asked: "Master Lü opened the Immortal Path, and I also cultivated step by step. Although Master Lü said that what is sought is power, these steps of cultivation ultimately lead to the Primordial Spirit. Master Lü sought power, but Supreme did not. The Primordial Spirit realm has its own Dao. Master Lü opened realms to seek the Primordial Spirit, and must have had some feelings. I wonder what you can teach me?"

"In the past, when I set the realms, I did indeed rack my brains."

Lü Buwei did not answer directly, but recalled the various things when the Immortal Path was ignorant.

"The Penetrating Law realm was the legacy of the ancient Dharma Dao that I painstakingly sought. I searched for all the witch methods in the world, went to seek the Primordial Great Heavenly Venerable, and requested the Talisman Dao Fruit, only then did I set the context of the magic cultivation of the cosmic realms. I even spared no effort to search for the remnants of the demon race in the world, offended the blood descendants of the Five Emperors, and only then gathered the Divine Treasury of the Goddess, the bloodline Great Dao of the demon race, and the bloodlines of the Five-Colored Divine Race, and combed out the Dao of supernatural powers."

"Only then was the power of the Immortal Path, the path of supernatural powers and magic, determined."

Lü Buwei said: "Finally, I knelt and requested the Primordial Dao Ancestor under the Investiture of the Gods list, and set the threshold and path for the Penetrating Law realm to sense the Talisman Dao Fruit."

"Only then can the Penetrating Law realm condense magic power talismans, cultivate various magic arts, and possess power far superior to those below it."

"Penetrating Law can cultivate magic arts, but if one does not penetrate the law, one cannot cultivate. Only then is the strength of this realm distinct."

"Sensing, Qi Refining, Penetrating Law, Jin Dan, Yin Spirit, Yang Spirit—these layer-by-layer realms were painstakingly divided by me after searching for many ancient orthodoxies. The so-called Dao of Sensing was the method of the ancient Witch Dao sensing gods and concurrently cultivating the Divine Dao. There are also sensing witch methods, using various connections of heaven, earth, and all things to sense and cast spells. There are also methods for sensing Dao Fruits and cultivating fruit positions after the Primordial Spirit."

"With the roughness of the Witch Dao, the complexity can be imagined."

"I first integrated the method of sensing Dao Fruits into all cultivation realms, sought the method of sensing those perfect innate Dao Fruits between heaven and earth, and integrated it into the path of cultivation, making it step by step, and sensing naturally formed."

"Truth and Illusion, Primordial Chaos, Jin Dan, Talisman, Rules, Creation, Time and Space..."

"The various perfect Dao Fruits between heaven and earth are like pillars supporting heaven, supporting the cosmic realms, but I had to find the corners on them and hang up the realms I set, supporting them."

"For example, the Sensing pass. In the past, I searched all over the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit but could not find it. Without the Truth and Illusion Great Dao, it is difficult to visualize, sense, borrow the false to cultivate the true, and borrow the law. Just this pass gave me countless hardships. Finally, I sought the 'Supreme Sensing Chapter' of the Supreme Dao, only then did I integrate the Truth and Illusion Great Dao into this realm, and by borrowing the power of the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit, I was able to establish the foundation of the 'Sensing' pass."

"Only then could I sense the Primordial Chaos Dao Fruit in the Qi Refining pass later."

"Gathering the Qi of many Dao Fruits manifested by the Primordial Chaos Dao Fruit to refine into true qi."

"And only after passing these two passes—sensing many Dao Fruits and gathering Primordial Qi to refine into true qi—could I borrow the Talisman Dao Fruit in the Penetrating Law realm, write virtual talismans with true qi, trigger the Dharma Dao, and refine into magic power."

"With magic power, I could go further, borrow sensing to pry into the Heavenly Great Dao of many Dao Fruits, borrow the Primordial Chaos Dao Fruit, gather more essence of heaven and earth, and borrow rituals, Dharma altars, and external objects to cultivate one 'magic art' after another!"

"These magic arts must further borrow the Talisman Dao Fruit and engrave them into 'True Talismans' with magic power."

"In this way, one 'Tianfu Tianfu Zhenfu' after another returns various complex magic arts to their origin, engraves the traces of the Great Dao into the cultivator's life in reverse, forms 'seals,' and condenses 'Dharma seeds.' In this way, by borrowing the immortality of the Jin Dan Great Dao, the creation ability of the Creation Dao Fruit, and the Primordial Qi origin of the Primordial Chaos Dao Fruit, in the Jin Dan realm, the Dharma seeds are integrated into our lives, making them 'supernatural powers' that no longer rely on external conditions and are cast like instincts!"

Qian Chen listened and felt heartfelt admiration.

Lü Buwei opened these cultivation realms, not only to collect and find countless ancient and complex orthodoxies, and comb through those cultivation paths bit by bit, but also to grasp the essence and integrate the essence into those cultivation realms.

He also had to grasp the essence of various Dao Fruits behind the Heavenly Great Dao and point directly to the origin of those paths.

Only by investigating the root.

Knowing the 'what,' and even more knowing the 'why.'

Only then would he not mix some useless complex steps into the Immortal Path, making the Immortal Path realms become shit-mountain code when deduced by later generations.

This is simply a merit that will last for ages.

If the Immortal Path and those cultivation realms are programming languages and open-source protocols, then the countless cultivation methods, magic arts, and supernatural powers behind them are programs built upon them.

Then Lü Buwei can simply be called a Heavenly Dao-level programmer.

Just like the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit that Qian Chen mastered.

The Sensing pass, which has the deepest connection with the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit, is simply that the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit makes borrowing the false to cultivate the true possible.

Therefore, one must enter the true from the illusion.

In the world in Supreme's memory, the boundary between truth and illusion was incomparably strict.

There was fundamentally no possibility that imagining something in one's mind could change the material foundation.

But in the cosmic realms, there is the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit, and by borrowing the power of the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit, one can borrow the false to cultivate the true.

In the universe with the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit, imagining a steam engine in one's mind will not allow one to punch out a bang-bang steam with one punch and one kick, let alone have additional work done.

But in this universe with the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit, imagining a steam engine in one's mind, the closer it is to reality, the more one can really borrow the power of the steam engine's operation.

This is 'Sensing'!

Before Lü Buwei opened the Immortal Path, cultivators discovered the wonderful use of the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit and began to borrow the Truth and Illusion Dao Fruit to cultivate.

Such as visualizing gods, visualizing the sun, moon, and stars, and all natural phenomena in the mind.

The more real it is, the more one can borrow the power of the body they imagine.

Like the sun, moon, and stars, and even terrifying existences like gods and demons, borrowing a trace of their power and following their path can allow one to approach them. This is also a cultivation path.

But sensing is not just truth and illusion.

The essence of sensing is connection, and truth and illusion are just one kind of connection.

Truth and illusion cause connection, and the whole and the part also cause connection. Even fate and the entanglement of breath will cause 'connection.'

The so-called sensing, in essence, is establishing a connection!

Many magic arts of the ancient Witch Dao have to borrow this kind of connection, such as using a person's claws, teeth, essence, blood, and hair to cast curses, and using the birth date to locate and cast spells.

All use the Dao of 'Sensing.'

A person's claws, teeth, essence, blood, and hair can be regarded as a part of them, so by borrowing this 'connection,' the 'change' of the part can be applied to the body. Birth dates and names also have a certain connection with the body, and by borrowing these connections, one can sense and cast spells.

These are all 'Sensing'!

But if one does not understand the fundamental truth of these 'connections' and cannot point directly to the origin of the Dao of Sensing.

Then the Immortal Path, by incorporating 'Sensing,' would have to retain the various complexities of the Witch Dao.

For example, casting different magic arts requires different sensing methods.

Such as visualization, difference, whole and part, fate and breath, etc.

Then cultivating a certain magic art and seeking a certain Dao Fruit would require those original paths of the Witch Dao.

One might even be monopolized by the object of sensing.

All cultivators who cultivate the Sun method need to worship the Sun Star Lord, and all those who cultivate Demonic Path magic arts need to worship the Nine Heavens Demon God.

Because one cannot reach the root directly and needs to borrow the reverse sensing of great powers to 'Penetrate the Law.'

This became shit-mountain code...

The Immortal Path also lost its potential for development.

And in Lü Buwei's hands, 'Sensing' pointed directly to the root.

The fundamental scale of all connections is 'strength and weakness,' and there can be many scales to measure the 'strength and weakness' of connections.

Such as the 'power' of the object of sensing, which is the foundation of the Divine Dao. If one chooses this path, then the cultivator's sensing will inevitably be controlled by gods and demons!

But Lü Buwei pointed directly to the root and attributed the key to sensing connections to 'distance.'

And the scale to measure 'distance' is 'truth and illusion.'

That is, the closer the sensing is to 'truth,' the more powerful it is...

It was Lü Buwei who chose the foundation of the Immortal Path in the Sensing pass, using the Dao of Truth and Illusion to decide sensing, rather than the opposite, thereby creating the two underlying laws of Immortal Path cultivation.

Dao gives birth to One, One gives birth to Two, Two gives birth to Three, Three gives birth to all things.

Therefore, all things in the world originate from Dao and can be metaphysical.

This is the gradual sensing of the Great Dao origin and Dao, Law, Name, and Form.

That is, all existing sensing has an ultimate root—the Great Dao. All 'sensing' proceeds from perceiving 'external form,' visualizing 'naming,' abstracting 'into law,' and finally tracing the origin to 'attain the Dao.'

All gods and demons are not the end of sensing; they are just a part of Dao.

Thereby incorporating all sensing into the Immortal Path, into the path of seeking and attaining the Dao...

This is the 'Return to Origin' law of sensing.

But the Great Dao is formless and nameless. How to return to the origin and seek the Dao? It still has to fall on 'truth and illusion,' that is, true reason is close to Dao, and false reason is against Dao.

This determined the fundamental difference between the Immortal Path and the Witch Dao.

The Witch Dao borrows the law through gods, while the Immortal Path borrows the false to cultivate the true.

As for the other underlying law of sensing, it is 'Primordial Qi.' The power borrowed by sensing must be operated through the Primordial Chaos Dao Fruit and the Dao of 'Primordial Qi,' so the next pass of sensing is Qi Refining.

The change of sensing is 'opportunity'!

Moving but not firing.

Once sensing is triggered, it is the change of qi opportunity, thereby refining qi, and ultimately attributing everything sensed from the Great Dao to 'Primordial Qi.'

This makes the Immortal Path's path complex, but the foundation is pure and pure...

Qian Chen had already grasped the key that Lü Buwei wanted to say. Although he kept saying that the Immortal Path seeks power and did not hide his purpose in opening the Immortal Path, which was to pursue power and create a natural and heavenly principle order based on power, Lü Buwei was ultimately a seeker of the Dao.

The truth of his pursuit of power is also the 'Great Dao'!

Therefore, the Immortal Path is superficially pursuing power, but its essence still fits the 'Morality' that Supreme operates in the dark!

"Is the end of pursuing power the Great Dao?"

"Holding Dao with power often has deviations, but holding power with Dao is not necessarily impossible! Therefore, this path of the Immortal Path can continue to develop after escaping Lü Buwei's control and escaping Immortal Qin's guidance!"

Thinking of this, Qian Chen suddenly saw clearly the Dao Fruit beside Lü Buwei that looked like a palace, with distinct pillars, supporting countless orderly arranged bricks and tiles.

Zhao Zhao Tianli Dao Fruit.

Holding Dao with power, following the Great Dao...

It is casting Heavenly Principles!

In this world with supernatural powers and magic, "the strong are respected" is the Zhao Zhao Tianli.

Lü Buwei grasped this Zhao Zhao Tianli, held One and acted, operated the Zhao Zhao Tianli by creating the "realms" of cultivation, and created the order he wanted.

He molded his own values and choices into those cultivation realms.

Making those who follow his path strong, guiding power in the direction he wanted, thereby casting the Zhao Zhao Tianli Dao Fruit.

Thus, millions of years after Immortal Qin's destruction, the order he cast is still solid.

Worthy of being a great Fangshi of the Creation Dao! ===== CHAPTER 1207 =====

Thus, ten million years after the collapse of the Immortal Qin, the order he forged remained firm.

He is truly worthy of being a Great Fangshi of the Dao of Creation!