The reason for the fifth trial of the God trials was to test one's potential as an immortal. Those of the transcendent plane didn't have set life spans… Rather, the solidity of the dao heart decided how long they could live. Theoretically, a transcendent really could live forever.
The problem was that no one's dao heart, no matter how talented you were, could last forever.
Even Dyon's grand teacher's dao heart was on the verge of collapse, which was exactly why his appearance and demeanor were so old and sickly.
Thus, the connection between life force and the dao heart was clear… It was just that Dyon's dao heart consolidated a level of comprehension it wasn't prepared for… It was the equivalent of integrating celestial level meridians into the body of an essence gatherer… Dyon was lucky that he didn't die.
"… These flames…" For the first time, the entity's tone slightly changed as he finally found the root cause of Dyon's fall.
He had seen these flames before. When he first met Dyon, it was obvious that this young boy was angered beyond belief.
Whenever Dyon was angered beyond a certain limit, back when his wills were unsealed, of course, his eyes would flicker with black flames. With his senses, how could the entity have missed it?
The problem was that the flames were truly too weak when he last saw them. Plus, The Seal was interfering heavily, in fact, it was interfering now. Its passive ability was to hide its owner from sensory inspections and attacks of the mind. If Dyon wasn't allowing the entity to see what he wanted to see, in his current state, the entity wouldn't have been able to sense a thing.
"Interesting!" The entity chuckled slightly. "It seems I was wrong about you. Your talent is quite good! It's no wonder your dao heart is in such a state."
Those who knew the entity personally would be shocked by his words.
When last he spoke to Dyon, he mentioned that there were only four people to have ever existed that he acknowledged the talent of. For him to say that Dyon's talent was quite good when he at first dismissed him, even knowing that Dyon had absorbed the cumulative talent of billions of individuals… It spoke for itself!
"Ai… It's a shame that you're technically a junior brother of mine, although I have to admit that I disdained to admit it before. Too many generations have passed for me to have seriously considered you so, but this changes everything! If you weren't, I would have liked to take you as an in-name disciple."
Dyon didn't have much of a reaction to the entity's words. Maybe someone else might have been excited at the acknowledgement of a transcendent, but not only was he not in the state to care, even if he was in his normal state, he would have only seen this entity as an enemy.
Clearly, though, his flames were something even someone at that level couldn't ignore…
"So, what did my precious Junior Brother come here for?"
Dyon scanned the surroundings. He could still see the craters and residue from his battle 14 years ago… Even the death abyssal core hadn't faded away yet, but at this point, it was far too weak to be of any use to Dyon. After all, it was at the level of a mere essence gate when Dyon harvested it which meant it could only help him reach the 3rd intent level at best. Considering he was now at that 9th intent level, he even found it quite lacking…
"What's your goal?" Dyon suddenly asked.
"My goal?" The entity questioned. "Isn't it obvious? The heavens control our fate like a puppet master, pulling upon the strings of our life without care or consequence. Even worse, no matter how shiny or entertaining we might be, this puppet master will eventually get bored of us one day and never lift us up to play again.
"Is it not the nature of the living to want to break free of this control? I'm just closer to most others at accomplishing my goal."
"So the only puppet you care for is yourself?"
The entity laughed. "Do you believe that I am cold and heartless? Let me tell you something.
"My Master and your grand teacher has five world defying abilities. Cycle of Reincarnation. Ethereal Permeation. Temporal Lock. The Aurora. And True Empathy.
"Each one of these abilities has reached an unprecedented level, while three of them have reached a level of absolute perfection, allowing them to fuse with the will of the universe and be passed on to later generations.
"These three were Ethereal Permeation, a supreme law among the very best. The aurora, the absolute central staple of secondary professions. And, finally, True Empathy.
"However, what many don't know is that of my Master's five abilities, only two of them are self-created. The other three were abilities that he formed with the help of my Senior Brother, me and my Junior Sister. In fact, the three that transcended to the realms of perfection were the ones we worked on together.
"Cycle of Reincarnation and Temporal Lock are the two that my master forged on his own before he ever took a single disciple and are the central legendary abilities of his Jafari family.
"Cycle of Reincarnation falls under the category of a cultivation technique. It puts its users through a cycle of Samsara that helps them experience the vicissitudes of life. It's this technique that is the secret of tempering one of the legendary nine Dao Hearts, the Samsara Heart. Truth be told, it's because of this heart that my Master has lived for so long. Believe it or not, he was already trillions of years old before he decided to take on the three of us as disciples.
"Temporal Lock is a seemingly simple ability on its surface, but endlessly complex. Trying to explain it to you now would do no good. I can tell that you haven't re-established your time will… It seems that you know that even in this state, you don't have enough life span to exchange for true time will. That's good, I don't want such a talented junior brother of mine to die so early on. Although, I'd really like to know how you have so much life span left even now… It seems you had quite a lucky encounter.
"Anyway, I'm getting distracted. Simply put, it is one of the few time legacies that allow the freezing of living beings while keeping the cost at a minimum.
"Ethereal Permeation is an ability my Master worked with my Junior Sister to create. As you know, our connection as fellow disciples is through my Junior Sister, or the 1st White Mother.
"However, even back then, the celestial bloodline was in decline. Despite being the creator of the legendary White Mother title, Junior Sister still wanted to do something more to help her fellow clansman. She believed that the key to bringing the celestial bloodline back to its origin was Primordial Energy.
"Still, once again, problems arose because Primordial Energy was also in decline. Ethereal Permeation was meant to be a replacement. Unfortunately, while it became a mighty supreme law, it was extremely difficult to practice. That said, it should only be a bit more than a few millennia until Junior Sister succeeds in bringing her bloodline back to perfection. It can be considered a success.
"Next would be the Aurora. As you know, my Senior Brother is truly a legendary figure who definitely had the most impact of the three of us. While the basic idea of the Aurora was created by Master, without array alchemy, it would be practically useless except for some minor healing abilities. The two went hand in hand… If it wasn't for array alchemy, the aurora wouldn't have been acknowledged by the heavens.
"Now that I've gotten this far, you're smart enough to understand why I've said all of this right? I mentioned four abilities, two of which were created with the help of my fellow senior brother and junior sister. However, there's still me. No?
"As the first True Empath, how could there be anyone in existence more sympathetic to the plights of others than me? More in tune with their sufferings?
"My perspective of the world is different from others."
