Chapter 82

Chapter 81

The phenomenon of sunlight shining at noon is the order of all things, which has continued since the beginning of time.

The absence of sunlight at noon, unless during a solar eclipse, is unprecedented in the long history of the Central Plains.

The problem was that this tremendous event, which might be considered a natural disaster, was orchestrated by Xiaojianxin, who was merely a martial artist.

All the sect leaders cowered in the darkness, trembling in fear.

Could such divine power truly be categorized by the levels of martial arts?

Martial arts, after all, are measured by human standards.

However, the inexplicable phenomenon of the sun disappearing at noon was not something that could be explained from a human perspective.

The celestial bodies of the sun, moon, stars, and planets, which control the fortunes and destinies of people, are objects of reverence.

A martial artist who could control these celestial bodies at will?

Such a display of divine power had never existed in the history of the martial world since its inception.

Even the three great martial artists, the most extraordinary in the world, had never reached this level.

"Call the general in."

"Wh-where to...?"

How could one determine a direction when the four directions were indistinguishable?

Soon, Zhaohui calmly observed Ha Long, the chief of the Heavenly Protection Force, and then lightly manifested his will.

At that moment,

Flash—

A faint sound, like something flickering, occurred, and only around Ha Long did the light return.

It was as if the scorching sunlight only shone upon him, making his surroundings "daytime."

All the sect leaders, their eyes filled with shock, turned to Ha Long.

This was an even greater shock than when the four directions turned dark.

It proved that the current phenomena were not coincidental.

This confirmed that Xiaojianxin had the power to control the movements of the sun, moon, stars, and planets.

"Ah, I need to check my side as well."

Flash—

The area around Xiaojianxin also became bright daytime.

"Ugh..."

Ha Long bit his lip until it bled, groaned, and soon left the scene.

All the sect leaders of the martial alliance looked at Xiaojianxin with a sense of despair.

The opponent was one who could control the great celestial bodies by will.

The mere thought of drawing a sword was impossible.

The one who could shine alone under the darkened sky.

Perhaps they were witnessing a legend that would never be seen again in the world.

Zhaohui observed the sect leaders indifferently.

Indeed, everything was as he had expected.

Actually, he did have the power to overwhelm all the sect leaders at once.

But controlling his strength to avoid killing while facing tens of thousands of troops? That was impossible.

Many people would undoubtedly die, and this would be tantamount to undermining his righteous cause of saving the martial world, or even the world itself.

The wishes of the revered elders, whose souls had been shattered and extinguished, and the nobility of Master Zhang Sanfeng, meant that every action he took had to represent their will.

This was his destiny.

The weight of the missions of many people.

Zhaohui knew better than anyone how the people of the Central Plains perceived situations differently from modern people and what they feared.

The greatest fear of the people of the Central Plains, who did not understand science, was natural disasters.

A single season of drought could cause millions to suffer from famine, and a slightly harsh winter could result in countless cases of frostbite.

A terrible epidemic could decimate a village or even an entire region, and a swarm of locusts could ruin an entire year's harvest, causing tears to be shed.

To the people of the Central Plains, a solar eclipse was a harbinger of all ominous events.

Now, Xiaojianxin would undoubtedly be seen as the embodiment of all human disasters.

He didn't need to use force or kill anyone.

He could control them with darkness alone.

This alone would make Xiaojianxin appear to them as a being of true divinity.

However, the problem was that his companions, Nangong Zhanghuo and Sima Zhong, also shared the same common sense as the people of the Central Plains.

"How can this be...?"

Sima Zhong, who had just collapsed and stared blankly at Zhaohui.

Until just a moment ago, he had considered Zhaohui's arrogant claim of superiority over the divine to be mere boasting.

But this...

Was it even possible for a human, let alone a martial artist, to achieve such feats?

He had known that Zhaohui had transcended the realm of later-generation disciples, but this was simply too much. His sense of competition had completely vanished.

All that remained was a growing doubt about how a mere human could possess such abilities.

At that moment, Nangong Zhanghuo's usual deep voice was heard.

"Zhaofenggong."

Zhaohui's eyes sparkled, and he revealed a faint smile.

"Speak, Xiaojianzhu."

Nangong Zhanghuo chuckled.

"Yes, that's fine. Even if you become a god unparalleled in ancient and modern times, or even a celestial deity, as long as you remain the same person I remember, I'm fine with it."

Nangong Zhanghuo was Zhaohui's oldest friend among his companions.

Recognizing his own position as a secondary figure more than anyone else, Zhaohui found Nangong Zhanghuo's support deeply meaningful.

"Thank you."

Still, Nangong Zhanghuo was not without shock.

He soon shook his head in a defeated manner.

"Still, this is... It's just too much. What kind of power have you wielded?"

Zhaohui looked around silently and then spoke nonchalantly.

"By cultivating willpower for thousands of years, one reaches a stage where the total amount of willpower neither increases nor decreases. I call this the Ultimate Willpower Realm. I thought there was no higher stage beyond this."

The idea of cultivating willpower for thousands of years was already unrealistic, and the concept of reaching a stage where willpower neither increases nor decreases sounded even more absurd.

Willpower, being an abstract concept, was something Nangong Zhanghuo, who had not yet reached the ultimate realm, could not understand in terms of quantity.

"How can human thoughts or will be measured in quantity?"

Zhaohui thought for a moment about how to explain it and then spoke again.

"Let's use memory as an example. Does the total amount of what a human can remember have a limit, or is it limitless?"

"Hmm..."

Zhaohui tapped his head with his fingers.

"Then why do we keep forgetting things?"

"That's...!"

Nangong Zhanghuo tried to argue but ultimately closed his mouth.

"To absorb new memories, we must erase old ones. The human act of forgetting perfectly proves that there is a limit to the total amount of memory."

Zhaohui looked at Nangong Zhanghuo again.

"Willpower is the same. Thoughts are essentially a form of human computation. While not all aspects of willpower can be explained by brain computation alone, it can be generally said that 'willpower is computation.'"

Zhaohui's point was that willpower, like memory, has a total limit because it is a part of human computation.

However, to Nangong Zhanghuo, Zhaohui's argument still sounded vague and abstract.

The idea that human thinking power has a total limit.

This implied using the full capacity of the brain, something no human had achieved in history.

Even in the cutting-edge field of modern neuroscience, there was still much to explore.

To modern people, using the full capacity of the human brain would be akin to reaching the realm of a deity.

For Nangong Zhanghuo, a person from the Central Plains, this would sound even more bizarre.

"Truly... It's unimaginable. So, this darkness is within the realm of the Ultimate Willpower Realm?"

"No."

Zhaohui smiled wryly.

"Something within me blossomed after I inscribed a strange name on that cursed stone tablet. It's a power I can perceive but can't explain. Should I call it some kind of extrasensory perception... or literally...?"

The words "Is this really the power of a deity?" never left Zhaohui's lips.

Accepting such a reality would mean acknowledging his own position as a secondary figure.

"Do you mean you've achieved a realm beyond the Ultimate Willpower Realm but can't describe it in words?"

"That's it."

All martial arts in the history of the martial world had their own incantations.

Zhaohui needed to be able to explain this subtle feeling.

"Then it's not martial arts."

"Why?"

Nangong Zhanghuo's firm voice.

"After a long time of practicing martial arts, a cultivator's realm always has a self. If you can't explain it, it means your realm lacks your own self."

If you can't explain the power you possess, it means it's not truly yours.

Zhaohui's face contorted.

"If this isn't my power, are you saying it's someone else's?"

"There are people in the martial world who can't explain their own realms, like you. They are the demonic beings. Captivated by the power of demonic arts, they lose their self. Your explanation is similar to theirs."

"Ha..."

Nangong Zhanghuo, looking at the pitch-black darkness Zhaohui had created, was filled with fear.

He believed Zhaohui was captivated by a dangerous demonic nature.

Zhaohui sighed.

"This isn't demonic power."

Sima Zhong glared at Zhaohui.

His gaze was no different from Nangong Zhanghuo's.

"Prove it."

Proving that Zhaohui's divine power was not demonic was crucial for those who had decided to follow his righteous cause.

Rip—

Zhaohui silently tore his collar and made it into a blindfold, then handed it to Nangong Zhanghuo and Sima Zhong.

"It's better to cover your eyes."

Sima Zhong, holding the torn collar, looked awkward.

"Why?"

Zhaohui chuckled.

"You asked to see, didn't you?"

Sensing something unusual about to happen, Nangong Zhanghuo and Sima Zhong quickly covered their eyes with the collar.

At that moment,

Zhaohui suddenly opened his mouth wide.

Something he spat out was slightly visible at the back of his throat.

"Aaaaah!"

"Kraaaah! My eyes!"

The sect leaders who had been looking at Zhaohui screamed and fell, clutching their eyes.

Whoosh—

What Zhaohui spat out was a ball of blinding light.

As the rough screams of the sect leaders echoed from all directions, Nangong Zhanghuo shouted in confusion.

"Wh-What is that...!"

Even with their eyes covered, the brightness was so intense that it was impossible to block.

Then, Zhaohui's usual stern voice was heard.

"I gathered all the light sources in the Taiyuan Province and stored them in my body."

"No, no...!"

"Crazy! Impossible!"

Zhaohui smiled.

"See? It's not demonic power."

Sima Zhong, feeling defeated, collapsed again.

Yes, it's not demonic power.

But isn't it the divine power of a deity, the divine power of a secondary figure?

* * *

Zhang Zhanchui, the general of the martial alliance, and Xue Jianghou, the inner circle master, were so stunned that they forgot about the proceedings of the Nine Dragons Grand Assembly and just stared blankly out the window.

The same was true for the nine elders representing the major sects.

The room was pitch black, as if no candle had been lit.

"Why this sudden darkness..."

"Ugh..."

This wasn't a solar eclipse.

If it were, the outline of the sun would have been faintly visible in the sky.

Clearly, there was no sign of a solar eclipse, no matter how carefully they looked at the sky.

"Xiaojianxin...?"

At the inner circle master's strange question, the general Zhang Zhanchui shook his head roughly.

"How could a mere human possess such power!"

The Central Plains had legends of divine beings who appeared by blocking the sun.

But they were ancient legends.

For a mere martial artist like Xiaojianxin to be on par with those legendary deities!

In the long history of the martial world, such a powerful figure had never existed.

"At the moment when all the sect leaders are surrounding him, for such a strange disaster to occur, isn't it too coincidental?"

"Hmm...!"

Xue Jianghou had the sharpest eyes and the most composed demeanor in the martial alliance.

His ability to read situations and the overall situation was unparalleled. Naturally, all the attention of the officials in the meeting room was on him.

"If this darkness is a manifestation of his will, all our plans must be completely revised."

Wu Fangyun, the chief of the Nine Dragons, raised a question.

"If Xiaojianxin has become such a mythological being, can we really achieve our goals in Jiangxi with our own strength?"

Xue Jianghou answered with a tone of certainty.

"No matter what, how can one person handle a million martial artists? Moreover, our strength has been rising daily due to the Dharma Sutra. The troops of the Zhao Family Trading Company are far inferior to even the Sichuan Association, according to the consensus of all intelligence organizations."

Thus, the martial alliance had already regarded the Zhao Family Trading Company as an enemy to be punished.

If the general had not obtained the Dharma Sutra from Shaolin, the title of the First Power in the World would have had to be ceded to the Zhao Family Trading Company.

Everything that came from the Zhao Family Trading Company, including their systems and artifacts, had spread throughout the Central Plains.

Most of the martial alliance members treasured the leather clothes from the Zhao Family Trading Company as precious items.

The business model of combining food delivery with cargo transportation had almost driven the courier industry to extinction, and inns that did not offer delivery services were struggling to survive.

The Zhao Family Trading Company had a monopoly on the production of the mysterious artifact, the bicycle, and did not even sell it to outsiders, making it impossible for other inns to compete.

The impact of their invention, the cloud cart, was equally significant.

Almost all the workshops producing carriages were facing business crises.

Unlike carriages, which transmitted the friction of the road directly, the cloud cart was nothing short of a revolution.

However, the unique wheel structure of the Zhao Family Trading Company was a technology they exclusively controlled.

Despite repeated efforts by other workshops to disassemble and reassemble the cloud cart to uncover its secrets, they failed to grasp the unique connection structure and the method of refining the steel plates to the appropriate strength.

In the food industry, it was even more evident.

How they procured such a large amount of ice and where they sourced the expensive honeycomb in such large quantities were all kept strictly confidential.

As a result, people in the north were going crazy over Hanbing Wine and Heiqingshui.

Moreover, as the representative of the Zhao Family Trading Company, Xiaojianxin, who carried the legendary titles of Sword God and Martial God, his influence was only growing.

Thus, the Zhao Family Trading Company had transformed from a simple merchant guild into a powerful group that dominated the entire culture of the Central Plains.

The severity of the threat was so serious that even the imperial court was closely monitoring the Zhao Family Trading Company.

For the martial alliance, punishing the Zhao Family Trading Company was no longer just a matter of power struggle but a matter of survival.

"What about accepting the proposal of the Three Great Elders?"

At the elder's question, the hand movements of Zhang Zhanchui, who was serving tea, paused.

"The principle of neither being too close nor too distant between the imperial court and the martial world has been maintained for a long time. If we accept the support of the imperial court, this will no longer be a matter of the martial world but of the Central Plains. Even if the Zhao Family Trading Company is resolved with their support, the interference of the imperial court will inevitably begin. We cannot set a precedent."

Zhang Zhanchui closed his eyes meaningfully.

"As long as we have the Dharma Sutra, the strongest card, the number of sect leaders will continue to grow. One million, two million, three million... Eventually, all the people in the north will be under the alliance, and this general will..."

He opened his eyes again, emitting a fierce gaze.

"I want to seek the opinions of all the elders here regarding the admission of the people from the south."

It was a sudden and significant proposal from the general.

However, the elders could not accept his proposal.

"Impossible!"

"That's out of the question!"

Amid the strong opposition from the elders, Xue Jianghou also expressed his disagreement.

"Does this mean