The wish still did not come true.
But from the feedback when the secret art of that little girl of the Hundred Flowers line failed, everyone finally understood one fact. Whether it was a law, or some kind of prohibition, or perhaps a curse laid by some divine-level power, the Divine Wish Flower Tree could no longer bring forth a baby boy. In other words, no matter how hard those who came after tried, there would never again be a male heir who could inherit and rule the whole Sky Stairway.
Mother… When she learned this, her heart sank.
But the blow did not break her will. With her Sovereign Intent, she worked even harder, because she had decided to take on her own shoulders the share of responsibility that belonged to the little brother who could never come — the hopes of her mother, her little auntie and the rest of her family, and the inheritance of every life on the Sky Stairway.
To become a Supreme — a Supreme unique above heaven and below earth, without equal in the world — to restore the Sky Stairway, and to revive the Sky Tower. That was her new goal.
For several hundred years, she walked beneath the starry skies of every self-contained world and every dimensional world, observing and coming to know every kind of life. By every sort of means, and with the Divine Sight that saw through to the truth of everything, she explored the secrets of every kind of living thing and the truth of how the world was made, and used it all to enrich her own wisdom, her view of the world and her understanding of life. Sometimes a lonely little flower, a thriving clump of wild grass or a little bug crawling every which way could teach her a great deal.
It was not only the tempering of battle that made her grow. Every kind of experience was a way of rising higher, and that kind of rising was a growth that happened quietly, without her noticing.
Then one day, looking back, she was astonished to find that without realizing it she had crossed one new realm after another… She had slain the Evil-Curse Witch King in the Abyss of Agony, listened to the songs of the elves in the Moonlight Forest, walked across ten thousand li of yellow sand under a blazing summer sun, and gazed up at a sky full of stars on lonely, freezing nights.
Time flowed like water and was gone, leaving no trace.
She had fought an ancient power who broke his seal and burst free on the summit of ten thousand mountains, for three days and three nights without rest, until everything within a hundred li was leveled flat. She had fought for nearly a month against thousands and hundreds of her own selves in the Life Gate, her exhausted eyes reflecting a stubborn fighting spirit that would never waver. She had stood in the Hall of the Innate, overawed all the heroes of the world, and set down by her own will Sky Tower Decrees that no one dared to defy. And she had stood beneath the World Tree of the Sky Stairway, climbing step by step, taking in the inheritances of those who had come before while growing her own wisdom.
She had never known on what day this cultivation of hers, heedless of day and night, would end. She knew only that the divine tier was still impossibly far away.
The divine realm seemed within arm’s reach, and yet the closer she came, the deeper and more mysterious it seemed.
Then one day she returned to the Valley of Life, where she was used to living, and beneath the Tree of Life a very well-behaved little girl was quietly waiting. Though she looked very small, she had a presence all her own, unlike anyone else’s, and her quick-witted, luminous beauty astonished and delighted even her, who had looked over millions of geniuses with her Divine Sight.
“Are you that little girl of the Hundred Flowers line?” She could see that the little girl before her, though young, was truly no less gifted than herself.
“Supreme, the one you mean must be my big sister!” The little girl — bright-eyed, lovely, with a winsome smile — called herself Huaxian, and said her big sister had sent her to bring the Supreme good news.
“What good news?” She was puzzled. In all these years, she hadn’t heard of any great happiness on the Sky Stairway.
Suddenly her heart stirred. Inspiration flashed through her, and the words burst out of her: “Your sister succeeded? A baby boy was born from the wish?”
The little girl called Huaxian smiled faintly and nodded obediently. “Mm. He wasn’t born from the Divine Wish Flower Tree, but Big Sister placed her inheritance and her wish for life in a baby of the Eastern True Dragon clan. With the primal spirits of the Eastern Immortal Clan watching over him, the little treasure is sure to grow up safely.”
“And the curse?” She did not quite understand how this Huaxian’s sister had done it — fusing her inheritance and her wish for life with a baby of the Eastern True Dragon clan. The Eastern Immortal Clan, like dragons whose heads are seen but never their tails — would they ever agree to that? And even if they did, how had Huaxian’s big sister found them? Never mind the Sky Tower — there’s no trace of the Eastern Immortal Clan even in the Sky Realm. How did she bring off such a feat? The Eastern Immortal Clan has always shut out outsiders and never looks after anyone who isn’t of their own bloodline. How could they agree to an inheritance of blood like this? And even so — that divine curse, barely detectable and in force for ten thousand years — how could it be lifted?
“Big Sister has a guard who is loyal to the very end, and he was willing to let his own son take the place of that ancient curse. And the little treasure will be raised by the Eastern Immortal Clan, and only when he’s fully grown will he be summoned here…” The little girl called Huaxian explained it all, point by point.
“Will it really work?” She was overjoyed. It wasn’t her own little brother but the inheritance of the Hundred Flowers Clan — and yet with a boy like this, the heavy burden on her shoulders ought to be something she could set down at last. Perhaps one day she might stand again before her mother and her little auntie as she had long ago, with her little sister laughing and playing as before, running along behind her with her little legs flying.
“Mm!” The little girl called Huaxian nodded firmly.
“What do you need me to do?” She felt this little Huaxian must have come for some other purpose too — that it was not simply to bring good news.
“Big Sister says she wants to ask you, Supreme, to be his guide and teacher — to watch over the little treasure as he grows and show him the way!”
“Why won’t she watch over him herself?”
“Well, Big Sister says she isn’t a fighting-type power like you, Supreme, so she couldn’t teach the little treasure’s cultivation properly. And she promised the Eastern Immortal Clan one condition: that she can’t watch over or guide the little treasure directly as he grows, and can only be his mother in name. Most important of all, Big Sister has already inherited the ancient mysteries of wisdom, and she’s going to enter the Ruins of the Gods to comprehend them… After that, she may never come back. She may pass right over the Heavenly Realm and the Sky Realm and ascend straight to the world of the Eastern clan… If you don’t agree, Supreme, then with only me, Huaxian, I’d be so lost — I wouldn’t know what to do at all!” The little girl called Huaxian asked timidly.
“She’s already comprehended the divine tier? She can even enter the Ruins of the Gods to comprehend!” She was startled to hear it. That little big sister of the Hundred Flowers Clan is an even greater genius than me, the Supreme?
“Big Sister left her Divine Codex behind, but I can’t accept it, because it’s everything she poured herself into…” Little Huaxian mentioned the Divine Codex.
“So there really is someone more remarkable than I am?” She smiled.
The heavy, invisible pressure in her heart vanished at once. So in this world there was a little big sister of the Hundred Flowers Clan who was more outstanding than she was, more gifted, wiser and quicker to understand… Neither the Sky Stairway nor the Sky Tower needed her to hold it up alone, or to strive alone. Besides this Huaxian’s big sister, there was him too — already born and growing up — the one who had carried her mother’s and her little auntie’s wish all along without being able to come, the one like a little brother, the little man who, once he grew up, could take charge of the Sky Stairway and stand tall atop the Sky Tower, holding up heaven and earth… The Night Clan line, the Hundred Flowers line, the Butterfly line and her own Bright Moon line — everyone had been working toward this the whole time!
It isn’t just me fighting alone!
Maybe it used to be. But from now on, it certainly won’t be.
Because there are all of them — and there’s him, the one who’s become my little brother, and who may become my disciple!
“All right, I agree. I promised her long ago — the one who sleeps in her dream — that we would work at it together. Go back and tell your sister, and thank her for bringing me such good news!” She smiled. Suddenly there was not a trace of pressure left on her shoulders, and the whole world seemed to grow lighter and livelier. Her cultivation, which had been stuck at a bottleneck for so long, broke through in an instant, and like a spiritual spring gushing up, she entered an entirely new realm.
“Thank you, Supreme. I have to work hard too. When the little treasure grows up, if he’s all by himself, he’s sure to be very lonely. So I’ll think of a way to give him a few little sisters. I’m sure that with little sisters beside him, he’ll never feel lonely.”
The little girl called Huaxian laughed happily, her small mouth ringing as clear as a wind chime.
As she left, she kept murmuring to herself, and every now and then she laughed softly out loud, as if that adorable little head of hers had come up with some wonderful idea…
“Mother, Little Auntie — did you hear that? It isn’t only me. Everyone is working at it! Please keep watching over us. Only beneath the starry sky, under your gaze, can we keep from being lonely, and grow up with our hearts at peace!”
Yue Yang, for his part, living through it all as if it were his own, now understood everything. He understood it all.
He had never once laid eyes on that mother. Even now, he did not know her face or her voice or her smile. He did not know how she had made her wish, or how she had summoned him over from his original world, or what that old Daoist had to do with him… But he did know one thing: that he, who had been an orphan, had a mother after all! Someone had loved him, and had watched over him and cared for him all along!
There was no need to think about blood or birth, and no need to think about the kind of mother-and-son relationship the world recognized. Never mind wishes, and never mind who had raised him.
Only one thing mattered.
She was the one who had created him… and in his soul he carried everything of her life!
And in truth she was not the only “mother.” There were many, many others — the Supreme’s own mother, her little auntie, the one who slept in her dream, the quick, luminous little girl who had grown into gentle Fourth Mother, and a great many guardians he knew of or had never known… All of them counted as his “mothers”! It was they who, together, had made the wish and created his existence.
Through another form of life, built on the bloodline of the Eastern clan and guided by endless inheritances and endless wisdom, he had been made — all the way to eternity at the end.
That was the course of his life, and the direction of his future.
“I understand. I finally understand…” Yue Yang slowly opened his eyes and found that all the scenes had vanished. He was back beside the bright lake on the millionth step of the Sky Stairway, back before the Supreme, who had used her divine mind to guide him into merging with her whole life and all her wisdom!
Without being able to stop himself, he turned and held tight this lonely, strong Supreme — this beautiful master of his whom he had always wanted to hold and never dared!
And he did not only hold her.
Lost to everything, he kissed her. He kissed her clear, jade-smooth little forehead, her long, slender brows, her curling lashes, her cheeks flushed redder than fire, and those soft, cherry-pink lips that trembled in shock and could not speak… Into the realm of her awareness, guarded by her Sovereign Intent, he broke in like a stone shattering a mirror-still lake. For the first time since she was born, someone so rude and so bold had broken through everything, burst into her heart, and quite naturally become one with her soul… Perhaps from the day he was born — perhaps even before he was born — he had been destined for this day, when their souls would meet and their lives would be joined.
The Way of Heaven is vast and boundless and without end; heaven and earth held in a palm, worlds as many as grains of sand — who can know the truth within?
(End of Chapter 1277)