69novels Chapter 998 Meeting Tianxing, Speculating on the Truth!
Chapter 998 Meeting Tianxing, Speculating on the Truth!
With the wisdom, resources, and connections he had accumulated over his long life, he could easily have abandoned the high-risk act of maintaining balance in the court. He could have simply focused on secretly developing a loyal hidden force to protect Qin Shi Huang's mausoleum and ensure the celestial sphere remained undisturbed—a feat he was well capable of accomplishing. After all, even without his direct intervention, with Hu Hai dead and Zhao Gao no longer a figurehead, the Qin court could have chosen to welcome back Prince Fusu or appoint a wise and virtuous prince.
In any case, the Meng family army, to which Meng Tian and Meng Yi belonged, as loyal subjects of the empire, would never abandon the precarious state of Xianyang and devote all their strength to attacking a country like mine that was content with its isolated corner! This simply does not conform to basic political and military logic!
Gao Yao's rise from a modern society to his current position of immense power and influence is not only due to the mysterious system that helped him, but also largely due to the precise insight and shrewd calculation he honed in the harsh environment of this world, which honed his understanding of human nature, power, and the entanglements of interests.
He completely shifted his mindset, attempting to adopt the perspective of the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan.
If I were him, and if he truly considered me a destabilizing factor that had to be eliminated, the best strategy would not be to prematurely reveal his presence, much less to lay bare his forces and attempt to defeat me on the battlefield. Doing so would be too costly and involve too many variables.
The most effective way would be to continue hiding behind the scenes, perhaps even using the identity of an immortal to disguise oneself as a reclusive master, actively approaching me, bewitching me, or cultivating my enemies to undermine me from within using more covert and insidious methods. This would be far more efficient and safer than launching a national war.
Gao Yao absolutely did not believe that the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan, who could devise such a far-reaching plan and force him to be on guard at every turn, was a fool.
Therefore, there's only one explanation for his choice of this seemingly thankless and arduous method—he 'had no choice' to do it! His attack on me wasn't purely out of fear or hatred, but because he 'had to' ensure something happened, or prevent something from happening. In other words, what he needed to protect wasn't just the Tianxing stone itself, but also the main thread of history, preventing it from deviating too much!
This was the point that had long puzzled Gao Yao the most. How could someone who treated human life like dirt, disregarded the common people, and could even exploit foreign races at will—someone who seemed to have transcended the constraints of worldly morality—suddenly become so respectful of history and committed to upholding the historical process? This was simply a huge joke, completely defying any normal logic!
But now, standing before this celestial star that exudes boundless magic and mystery, feeling its magnetic field that distorts reality, all the things Gao Yao couldn't understand before suddenly clicked open by an invisible key!
A daring conjecture, so audacious it sent shivers down his spine, surfaced in his mind—
Perhaps... from a certain perspective, what the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan thought and did wasn't wrong! The mythical world we live in now is actually a huge, constantly repeating... closed loop of spacetime!
This magnificent and terrifying closed loop needs a starting point, and it also needs an end point.
"The starting point might be the moment when this mysterious Yi Xiaochuan himself first traveled back to the Qin Dynasty. This time was likely shortly after Qin Shi Huang ascended the throne, or, to be more precise, around the thirty-sixth year of Qin Shi Huang's reign, which is shortly before the historical record of Mars guarding the heart of the sky and the celestial star descending to earth. He experienced the glory and collapse of the Qin Empire, took an elixir of immortality made from celestial powder, and lived for a very long time."
And the end of the cycle... Gao Yao's gaze once again fell upon that suspended celestial body, at the moment when, for some reason, the celestial body's energy went out of control, and it shattered and was completely destroyed. At that time, all those who relied on the power of the celestial body to gain immortality—including the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan, Princess Yu Shu, and even... the original Yi Xiaochuan and Gao Yao who took the elixir in history—would all die together because the source of the power of immortality would disappear.
So, how is this closed loop connected?
The inner cycle is a series of new Yi Xiaochuans and new Gao Yaos who travel from the modern era back to the Qin Dynasty, experiencing love, hate, and grudges, ultimately either taking elixirs to achieve immortality or facing death, then returning to the modern era, only to watch helplessly as their 'next selves' travel back to ancient times. It is a vicious cycle of constant repetition and entangled cause and effect.
The outer cycle begins with the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan's first time travel and the arrival of Tianxing, and ends with the final destruction of Tianxing and the annihilation of all the immortals associated with it.
These two are not isolated from each other, but are cleverly and cruelly intertwined, forming a holistic structure that is interdependent and mutually causal!
In other words, Gao Yao felt a chill rise up his spine. Now, this mysterious Yi Xiaochuan and this Tianxing, after countless cycles and energy interactions, may have formed a mysterious, semi-symbiotic connection! He is both the guardian and representative of Tianxing in this spacetime loop, and Tianxing is also the foundation and shackle that allows him to exist and 'live forever'!
At this point, Gao Yao finally glimpsed the true motive behind the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan's obsessive insistence on preserving the original historical record—it was not out of respect for history, but rather out of sheer desperation!
Who would want to be trapped forever in a fixed river of time, like a donkey pulling a millstone, endlessly repeating the cycle with no end in sight? Gao Yao knew in his heart that once Tianxing was destroyed, he would surely die. And Tianxing, perhaps because of some cosmic law or causality that we do not yet know, was already completely bound to this ever-repeating history, forming a stable system.
Therefore, if the historical process is significantly disrupted and deviates from its predetermined 'track' by variables like myself, it could very likely trigger a chain reaction, affecting the stability of the celestial body as the core of the cycle and energy source. At best, it could cause its energy to decay; at worst, it could lead to its premature collapse!
This was an ending that the mysterious Yi Xiaochuan absolutely could not accept! All his actions were not fundamentally aimed at preserving history itself, but rather… at saving himself! To prevent the closed loop of time and space that allowed him to continue 'existing' from being broken!
Having figured everything out, Gao Yao let out a long sigh of relief, but his chest felt as if it were filled with something even heavier. The pale yellow light before him was still warm and mysterious, but he felt an endless coldness and confinement emanating from it.
The truth of history is often more bizarre and cruel than any legend.
He raised his head, his gaze piercing through the vast distance, locking firmly on the suspended celestial star, and murmured to himself, as if declaring to his opponent hidden on the other side: So that's how it is... This is your destiny, and your prison. Therefore, my appearance, for you, is the mistake that must be erased.