Chapter 58: Taoist Sutra 100
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Reading the contents on the page, Zhou Bai suddenly felt himself getting warm. Countless scenes flashed in his memory. His primordial spirit intuitively started operating.
He quickly set the page down on the table. Only then did he feel like he regained control over his primordial spirit and calmed down.
Zhou Bai stared at Qian Wangsun with wide eyes. “What is this thing?”
Qian Wangsun grinned. “I’m not sure, but it’s not just some ordinary item. The moment I read this line, I felt myself get heated and my primordial spirit shake. But when this line is written elsewhere, it has no effect. Although this isn’t as scary as Taoist Sutras, where they can induce supernatural phenomena anywhere they’re written, it’s still pretty amazing.
“I found this thing in a special place. I suspect that this could very likely be something left behind by independent Taoist Qingjing.”
“Independent Taoist Qingjing?” Zhou Bai looked expressionless, but he was secretly shocked.
If he had to write Tao Te Ching from memory, he probably wouldn’t be able to write a lot. But seeing these lines in front of him, he suddenly remembered this was from Tao Te Ching.
Especially the beginning line—”The highest goodness resembles water; water greatly benefits myriad things without contention”— this line is way too well known.
Qian Wangsun continued, “More than a hundred years ago, after independent Taoist Qingjing from Donghua Tao Academy brought up the three main codes of Tao practice, she participated in the compilation of Taoist Sutras.
“Although independent Taoist Qingjing wasn’t the one with the highest level of practice and combat capacity at the time, she was the one who had the most thorough understanding of Tao practice theories, so she led the compilation of Taoist Sutras at the time.”
Zhou Bai’s eyes glimmered. “Compilation of Taoist Sutras?” Zhou Bai had read a Taoist Sutra. Just by reading and increasing Degree of Taoification, he experienced so many obstacles. To compile the Taoist Sutras from nothing into something, he could only imagine how hard that must have been.
Qian Wangsun looked at Zhou Bai and said, “Of course, one hundred years ago, the four big Tao academies were established. Too many people died from practicing under the distorted Heavenly Tao. To lower the occurrence of this situation, they invented one by one formations for purifying Spark, primordial spirit adjustment, and rune vaccines.
“But the most important invention was the Taoist Sutras.
“From Taoist Sutra 00 to Taoist Sutra 99, it took a total of more than forty years by the vast deities of Paradise and the top practitioners. Tens of thousands of practitioners and deities died in the process of compiling them.” At this, Qian Wangsun sighed faintly. “Unfortunately, after forty years of compiling the Taoist Sutras, independent Taoist Qingjing went missing. Taoist Sutra 100 still hasn’t been compiled as of today.”
Zhou Bai knew about this from some Tao practice history books he’d read while studying basic textbook materials.
The process of increasing Degree of Taoification from 0% to 99% is the process of increasing synchronization with the Heavenly Tao. It was said that when Degree of Taoification reached 100%, life would go through a metamorphosis of its essence, and humans would rise to godhood, enter Paradise, and become deities.
But Taoist Sutra 99 could only increase Degree of Taoification to 99.9% at most.
And ever since the compilation of Taoist Sutras, writing Taoist Sutra 100 had never succeeded. Plus, the higher your Degree of Taoification, the greater risk you’re in when you increase it. This led to the phenomenon that 100 years after the Heavenly Tao distorted, there hasn’t been another practitioner who successfully increased Degree of Taoification to 100%, ascended to heaven and became immortal, and became one of the deities.
Given that Mara never die and are immortal, it has made the human predicament more and more difficult.
Qian Wangsun said to Zhou Bai in a low voice, “There are many rumors surrounding the disappearance of independent Taoist Qingjing. Some say that the Mara assassinated her in order to prevent the creation of Taoist Sutra 100.
“Others say it’s because her research failed. She went through a mutation one time while writing Taoist Sutra 100 and turned into a goblin.
“Others say Taoist Sutra 100 has already been written, but independent Taoist Qingjing took it with her.”
“There’s no way these kinds of rumors are true.” Zhou Bai looked at Qian Wangsun with discontent and said, “Stop making me guess. What do you want to say?”
Qian Wangsun chuckled. “Independent Taoist Qingjing was a peerless erudite who led the compilation of Taoist Sutra 00 to Taoist Sutra 99. Anything she left behind, even if they’re just a few isolated words and phrases, must have special qualities. Perhaps they have some practice learning hidden in them. Even if we have no use for it, if we hand it in to the school, they must reward us with some points.”
Zhou Bai looked at the page he held on the table, and said casually, “If they could be found, they would have been found long ago. There wouldn’t be anything left for us to find.”
Qian Wangsun said, “That’s not necessarily true. Independent Taoist Qingjing left many notes of her learnings and comprehension of the Heavenly Tao over the course of her life. Maybe there are some that haven’t been found, for example, this…”
Looking at the page Qian Wangsun held up, Zhou Bai had many conflicting thoughts.
If this was just content from Tao Te Ching, why would people from this world know it? Did other people travel to this world before him?
If Tao Te Ching already existed here, then how did Zhou Bai get first place when he wrote Tao Te Ching during the exam?
All sorts of questions arose in his mind.
Zhou Bai looked at Qian Wangsun and asked, “What are you planning to do?”
Qian Wangsun said, “This page is clearly just the first page from a certain notebook. If we can find the entire notebook by independent Taoist Qingjing, then we would be rich. When we hand it in to the school, they’d give us at least a couple thousand points.”
Hearing about a couple of thousand points, Zhou Bai’s eyes instantly lit up. But the next moment, his cautious instinct took over again. He looked at Qian Wangsun and said, “Why did you show it to me? Why don’t you go look for it yourself?”
Qian Wangsun laughed. “I already asked the teacher. If I hand in this page of notes, they can reward me with ten points. After all, this thing is kind of strange, but you can’t tell what uses it has yet. So I plan on finding a couple more pages …”
Qian Wangsun sighed and said, “I’m not afraid to tell you. I found this in the abandoned dorm building on the north side. Now that I’ve mentioned it to the teacher, they’ll probably send in workers tomorrow to search it inch-by-inch. Then we won’t get a share.
“But that place is too big, and we only have one night, I can’t manage it on my own. That’s why I remembered my good classmate.”
Qian Wangsun thought to himself, Tch, if it weren’t for the fact that Du Bing, Shirley, and Jing Xiu all have no interest and only care about spending all their time on practicing, why would I seek you out? It’s just looking for things. Strength and level of practice don’t matter. Zhou Bai should be fine.
Qian Wangsun looked at Zhou Bai with a smile, “How about it? Do you want to come with me?”
“It’s just picking out trash. It shouldn’t be too dangerous. And this Tao Te Ching…” Zhou Bai had many doubts. This Tao Te Ching was quite important to him; it had to do with his definition and ideas of this world.
So after some consideration, Zhou Bai said, “All right, when are we going? I have to go back to my dorm first.”
Zhou Bai naturally planned on taking Christina along.
Although an abandoned dorm building should theoretically not be dangerous, if he brought Christina along, it’d definitely be much safer when man and cat worked together.
Thus, half an hour later, in the already somewhat dim campus, Christina rolled around in Zhou Bai’s cognitive sea unwillingly. She complained, “I don’t want to go out. I just want to practice. I feel like I’m about to finish practicing the fourth star point!”
Zhou Bai said, “As a cat, you can’t just stay home and practice every day. What’s most important is to walk around like I do every day. You have to alternate the tension, strike a proper balance between work and leisure; that’s how you can practice more quickly.”
Christina said with jealousy and disdain, “Cheater.”
“What are you saying? Who said I was cheating? I’m not cheating!” Zhou Bai said, unconvinced. “Is using the auxiliary practice system cheating?”
Two weeks passed, Zhou Bai was not the only one improving. Christina also finished practicing the second star point, Tai White, and the third star point, Luster. The speed, sharpness, and lethality of her sword aura had all improved immensely.
Now, she had already begun practicing the fourth star point of the Sword Map, Sword Nurture. It was a star point that improved the flexibility and recovery speed of her sword aura.
Qian Wangsun looked back at Zhou Bai. “Hey, come up. We’re here.”