Ten days and ten nights later!
The Heavenly Dao trembled, the Great Dao of Time appeared, and Wu Tao roared to the sky. With every movement, he caused the heavens and earth to shake. His aura was world-shattering, unstoppable.
At this moment, Wu Tao, who had advanced to the Nascent Soul stage, was perhaps the most powerful person in this world.
"Alas!"
Dozens of days later, Wu Tao, having adjusted to his optimal state, looked at You Meng, who was clad in purple armor, and let out a long sigh.
With a slight movement of his arm, Wu Tao, relying on the power of the Great Dao of Time, forcibly severed a contract of life and death he had made with the Nightmare clan in the past.
From this moment on, Wu Tao and You Meng were no longer bound by the oath of sharing life and death.
Gently wiping away the tears from You Meng's eyes, Wu Tao whispered, "Don't cry, or you'll really turn into a little calico cat."
"Rest assured, there's nothing I set out to do that I haven't accomplished. Believe me..."
After whispering a few soft words, Wu Tao stroked You Meng's hair, a trace of reluctance flashing in his eyes.
However, he resolutely used the Great Dao of Time as a fulcrum and entered the unobservable, undiscoverable Sea of Time.
Pausing in the temporal stratum of the Sea of Time, Wu Tao looked back. Standing against the flow of time, all his experiences over the past millennium flashed before him like a revolving lantern. You Meng, standing in the present, saw his backward glance.
At this moment, time stood still. Standing at a corner of the spinning wheel of time, they looked back at each other, smiled, and understood everything without words.
From the perspective of time, life and death were essentially the same, with no other distinction.
Yet, in human eyes, life was like traversing countless worlds at will, while death was like embarking on a solitary journey with no return.
Fates are intertwined and eventually unravel, yet a single thread of true affection can never be extinguished!
After nearly a thousand years together, the bond between Wu Tao and You Meng was beyond ordinary understanding; they were more than lovers, more than kin.
Wu Tao knew that entering the Sea of Time might be a path to certain doom, but without even trying, one could never be at peace, even in death.
...
Stepping into the Sea of Time, Wu Tao felt as if he had become formless. All his previous perceptions and logic vanished, as if he had leaped from a three-dimensional to a four-dimensional plane.
The Sea of Time was composed of an endless expanse of warp threads, formed by the past, present, future, and more.
Each time a temporal tide emerged, it was equivalent to the renewal of a warp thread, meaning a shift in the timeline.
Wu Tao followed the temporal tide, moving in the opposite direction. He intended to return to the past, and to do so, he had to break the equilibrium of time.
To achieve this, Wu Tao had to constantly and with all his might maintain the stability of the Great Dao of Time.
Using the Great Dao of Time as his anchor and himself as the driving force, Wu Tao traversed the temporal tides step by step, arriving at a quiescent layer akin to a sandy beach.
The Sea of Time was the birthplace and origin of all life's perceptions, and it held the determinants of life and death as perceived by beings.
The reason for this was that behind the constantly flowing temporal tides lay a silent, soundless, and colorless graveyard of time.
This was time's gift to the departed, and the place that the living feared the most.
Upon reaching this point, Wu Tao became even more cautious. This was a paradise for the deceased, but by no means a haven for the living.
Countless perils brushed past Wu Tao as he followed the pulse of the Sea of Time, flowing upstream. After an indeterminate duration, he arrived at a realm called the Memory of Time.
Countless fragments of time, imbued with memory, emanated a rainbow-colored radiance. It was a dreamlike place where the memories of the deceased shattered and reassembled, forming a brilliant dreamscape of time!
Time fragments and temporal wrinkles were everywhere. The measures and surfaces of time were vividly displayed in this place!
If anyone were to stand here, they would see a faint shadow struggling through the sands of the Sea of Time amidst the flow of temporal currents.
Behind him lay a myriad of twists and turns. In walking through the Sea of Time, he was, in essence, traversing his own timeline.
The unique temporal tides slowly eroded his lifespan. His ten thousand years of life did not last long before it was nearly depleted.
This was even with Wu Tao's augmentation and protection from the Great Dao of Time; otherwise, he would have long since been buried on this temporal beach.
His long white hair cascaded behind him, his steps were faltering, and his skin, like tree bark, was clearly visible. The aura of death emanating from him far surpassed that of ordinary elders...
Grasping the脉络 of time and walking along its line, Wu Tao felt some indescribable insights. He seemed to have gained something, yet also lost something.
His physical body grew increasingly aged and weary, but his Great Dao of Time became even more potent, even surpassing the limits of the Nascent Soul stage and reaching a new realm.
Eventually, Wu Tao's physical body dispersed like dust in the wind, blown away by the force of time, vanishing completely from this world.
However, enveloped by the Great Dao of Time, Wu Tao's divine soul continued to move forward.
In the grand scheme of the Sea of Time, even someone at Wu Tao's elevated state was merely an "ant" that could perceive and touch it.
When Wu Tao found his own temporal line node, the Great Dao of Time, which had been protecting him, began to crumble layer by layer.
Now, with only his divine soul remaining, Wu Tao was like a candle in a gale, liable to be extinguished at any moment.
Yet, Wu Tao pressed onward, his heart devoid of any regret.
If you could return to the past, what would you be willing to sacrifice?
Everyone's answer would differ, and Wu Tao's answer was that he was willing to sacrifice everything, including his life!
Walking against the flow of time, Wu Tao witnessed all that had transpired. He saw Xu Sheng and Lü Yuehua, he saw joy, pain, sorrow, bitterness, delight, and all the unique experiences of his life.
When Wu Tao reached the origin of it all, the young man who had practiced martial arts day and night on the mountain peak...
The moment he saw that youthful boy, Wu Tao's eyes became distant. He murmured to himself, "I have now reached the original starting point. My future should also change, shouldn't it!"
After speaking, Wu Tao extended his right hand towards the young man on the mountain peak. An invisible force flowed into the young man's body.
Deprived of his last vestige of strength, Wu Tao could not even preserve his own divine soul. In the tumultuous waves of the temporal tides, he dissolved into countless fragments, disappearing completely. His life had ended.
The young man on the mountain peak looked up thoughtfully, only to see a sky ablaze with rosy clouds, emitting a seven-colored glow under the sunlight...
(End)