Jiejiao was in utter chaos because of the enforcement team, yet none of this affected Tongtian. Wuyunxian guarded the entrance of Biyou Palace, refusing to grant an audience to anyone, regardless of who they were. With no other options, and unable to defeat him in combat, the crowd had no choice but to retreat. This only emboldened both sides, as it was now obvious that their Master was not going to intervene. Consequently, they all headed back to prepare for a confrontation with each other.
Meanwhile, Tongtian spent his time continuously organizing his state of being, combining his insights with the memories of Tongtian, and pondering his future. From the looks of it, he would have to face four Sages; even with the Immortal-Slaying Sword Array, he stood no chance of winning. Had Laozi not been concealing his true strength, he probably could have broken the formation all by himself, let alone Yuanshi, whose power was on par with his own. Then there was the meddling duo from the West. Most importantly, there was the Dao Ancestor, who was blatantly showing favoritism—though what the Dao Ancestor was actually thinking remained a mystery.
Tongtian knew that everything ultimately depended on strength. As long as his own power was formidable enough, he would have nothing to fear from them. However, as long as he remained within the Xuanmen cultivation system, surpassing the Dao Ancestor was an impossibility. Saints of the Heavenly Dao like himself, though immortal and indestructible under the shroud of the Heavenly Dao, were inevitably restricted by it. The Grand Purple Qi was a blessing and a curse alike. Now that the Grand Purple Qi had intertwined with his primordial spirit and anchored itself in the Heavenly Dao, even if he wanted to sever it, the attempt would immediately be detected. What a headache.
Tongtian pondered his paths: the Dao of Interception, the Dao of Formations, the Sword Dao...
The Dao of Interception meant intercepting the Dao of Heaven, seizing a sliver of vitality from the jaws of fate. If he were simply to conform to nature, his Dao heart would likely collapse, and falling from his realm would be the least of his worries. If he lacked even the confidence in his own Dao, he might as well obediently wait for the God-Conferring Tribulation and take up permanent residence in Zixiao Palace. The essence of the Dao of Interception lay in resistance, in striving—striving for that single chance of survival. It was also his fundamental Dao.
The Dao of Formations had not flourished well in the Primordial World, largely because most innate formations required virtually no arrangement to possess formidable power. Furthermore, most innate formations were immovable, relying on the momentum of mountains and rivers to protect a region. The most famous among them were the Demon race's Zhou Tian Star Dou Array and the Witch Clan's Twelve Capital Gods-Slaying Formation. Both possessed the power to contend with Saints, but after the great war, both had been lost to history and become echoes of the past. Then came his own Immortal-Slaying Sword Array and later the Myriad Immortals Formation—both formations upon which he had pinned high hopes, yet neither had managed to turn the tide of heaven and earth.
As for the Sword Dao, he had used it to roam freely across the Primordial World before achieving Sagehood, but after attaining that state, he had cast it aside because there had simply been no occasion left for him to draw his sword. He needed to pick this up again; it would be tested in the future.
In terms of cultivation, he was at the peak of the Second Heaven of Sagehood. The Sage realm was divided into twelve layers: the first six layers constituted the Heavenly Dao Realm, and the latter six layers the Dao Realm. The Dao Ancestor was at the Sixth Layer of Sagehood, but after merging with the Dao, and with the assistance of the Primordial World's Heavenly Dao, his great Dao power reached the Eighth Heaven of Sagehood, though the price was steep—one misstep and he would be assimilated by the Heavenly Dao. Assimilation? Tongtian seemed to realize something. When Pangu split open the chaos, he was at the eleventh tier; had the creation of the world succeeded, he could have stepped directly into the twelfth tier and become the Overlord of Chaos. Yet who could have foreseen that he would fall just short of success?
He had to resolve the influence of the Grand Purple Qi on himself before breaking through to the Third Heaven of Sagehood. As his cultivation deepened, his entanglement with the Grand Purple Qi grew ever tighter, as did his connection with the Heavenly Dao. Yet if he were to perform a self-slashing within the Primordial World, it would quickly be discovered by the other Saints, and more importantly, by the Dao Ancestor—with consequences too horrific to contemplate. Perhaps a trip into the chaos was in order.
As for spiritual treasures, he was left with only the four Immortal-Slaying Swords, the Immortal-Slaying Formation Diagram, and the Qingping Sword; everything else had been bestowed upon his disciples. This was still enough for him to roam the Primordial World unhindered. Once the Immortal-Slaying Sword Array was deployed, it could not be broken by anything less than four Saints. As for what the Dao Ancestor truly thought of him, Tongtian could not fathom it. Logically speaking, he should have been the Dao Ancestor's most cherished disciple, yet later on, during the God-Conferring Tribulation, when he ultimately re-forged earth, fire, water, and wind to recreate the Primordial World, he was merely taken to Zixiao Palace and placed under house arrest. It made no sense; it truly made no sense. But since he could not figure it out, he stopped thinking about it. Strength was paramount. As long as his strength surpassed that of the Dao Ancestor, he would have nothing to fear.
Summing up his reflections, he needed to self-shout a cut, falling from the realm of Sagehood to sever the connection between the Grand Purple Qi and himself, and then re-proove his Dao to become a Sage. But in the current Primordial World, could such an endeavor truly succeed? Relying on Xuanmen's method of the Three Corpses, achieving complete integration was simply impossible; back then, he hadn't even severed his corpses, but had directly established his teaching and attained Sagehood. Perhaps he could find a way through the Sword Dao.
Regarding spiritual treasures, he needed to find a defensive magical treasure, otherwise he would be at a great disadvantage. In his past life, it was precisely the lack of a defensive treasure that caused him to lose face in combat. The best choice would be the Chaos Clock, after all, the three treasures of creation were a better match for the Three Pure Ones, weren't they? However, the Chaos Clock had vanished without a trace following the fall of Donghuang Taiyi. Even after searching the battlefield for ten thousand years, he found no sign of it, leaving him to suspect it had been collected by the Dao Ancestor. He would have to think of another way. Jiejiao also required an innate supreme treasure to suppress its Qi fortune, otherwise, like a blazing fire under a boiling cauldron, the Qi fortune of Jiejiao would eventually drain away completely. His vast recruitment of disciples had not been without the intention of winning through sheer numbers, but the ultimate outcome seemed less than ideal.
Tongtian took out a fragment and slowly began to refine it. This fragment was what had returned together with Tongtian, and it was also the secret that had allowed Tongtian to attain the Golden Core realm even in the Age of Dharma Decline. As the refinement proceeded, its mysterious veil was gradually lifted.
A scene unfolded in Tongtian's mind: in the midst of chaos, a stern-faced, resolute giant was swinging an axe to hack and cleave. A blow to the left, a blow to the right; along the way, whatever stood in his path was reduced to dust by the gleam of the axe.
Was this Father God? Indeed, it was the scene of Pangu splitting open the chaos. Tongtian stared fixedly at the vision. Pangu seemed to sense something and glanced at Tongtian. With just that single look, something beneath the axe gave a sharp crunch and vanished. Pangu did not pursue the matter, but changed direction and continued hacking, and the vision ended.
As it turned out, this was a fragment of the Chaos Bead, a Chaos Supreme Treasure. It should have been destroyed during the creation tribulation, but because of that glance from Tongtian, it found a sliver of vitality. To repay this kindness, the fragment had followed Tongtian, eventually ending up in the hands of Tongtian, while its main body remained hidden in the chaos, recovering from its injuries. Every cause and effect has its predestined outcome. Perhaps Pangu had sensed Tongtian and thus left a treasure for his descendants.
Tongtian paid no heed to this, instead becoming entirely immersed in those few axe strokes swung by Pangu. That must have been when Pangu had just begun splitting the chaos and had not yet encountered the Chaos Demon Gods, yet those strokes were precisely the most suitable for Tongtian to comprehend. Otherwise, as the creation of the world progressed, ordinary Saints would simply have been unable to watch; after all, those Chaos Demon Gods at the Tenth Heaven of Sagehood were dispatched with a single axe stroke each, while those at the eleventh tier either fled heavily injured if they were quick-witted, or were crippled if they weren't, reduced to reincarnating and re-cultivating in the Primordial World. Anything below the tenth heaven was entirely turned into nourishment.
If he could transform these few axe strokes into his own Sword Dao, then achieving Sagehood through the Sword Dao was not entirely impossible. However, this would take time.
The fragment—right, this fragment was a piece of the Chaos Bead, which could also be said to be a coordinate actively separated by the Chaos Bead. As Tongtian refined it, it gradually established a connection with the chaos.