Chapter 961: Hope in Despair
“What?”
Zhang Yu looked at Demon Supreme Truth in the encrypted message, watching her gaze directed at him. He felt as if he were crossing time and space, listening to her narration.
Demon Supreme Truth continued, “I succeeded. I successfully broke through to the Immortal Emperor Realm and completed the Supreme Dao Lineage.”
Zhang Yu frowned slightly, his heart trembling.
Demon Supreme Truth added, “Unfortunately, I also failed.”
In the encrypted message’s projection, the constantly repairing and restoring heaven and earth rapidly spread to Demon Supreme Truth, surrounding her like layers of whirlpools, inching closer to her body.
At this moment, Zhang Yu finally noticed that Demon Supreme Truth seemed to have been resisting this repairing force all along.
Demon Supreme Truth said, “Only now do I understand that the Ten Immortal Emperors… have surpassed past seniors, pushing Immortal Dao Technology into an unknown domain.”
“The moment of my success is the moment of my failure.”
“Or rather… in this world, for any 11th Immortal Emperor, the moment of success is the moment of failure.”
“The instant our Supreme Dao Lineage is pushed to 100%, the true future is already set in stone…”
Staring dead on at the scene in the encrypted message, a look of shock gradually revealed itself in Zhang Yu’s eyes.
He saw that the heaven and earth, having been repaired, restored, and recovered, still did not stop even after everything had been fixed.
The flowing clouds rolled backward, and the sunlight retreated; everything in the world seemed to be retracting into the past.
At the same time, Demon Supreme Truth, who was struggling to resist, was also undergoing a drastic change.
The infant was regressing inch by inch back to the state of a Saint Fetus.
And Demon Supreme Truth herself was slowly fading away, as if she was going to disappear from this space.
Demon Supreme Truth said, “When an 11th Immortal Emperor is born, the Ten Immortal Emperors will join forces… to completely devour them, turning them into resources for their ascent on the Immortal Path.”
“And if the 11th Immortal Emperor is a rogue Immortal Emperor, they will join forces to activate a Supreme Immortal Artifact, causing the entire world to begin rolling back.”
“This is intel I only perceived through my spacetime connection in my bloodline after stepping into the Immortal Emperor Realm.”
Demon Supreme Truth said solemnly, “Originally, in the intel I possessed, as long as the Ten Immortal Emperors agreed, they could join forces to activate the Supreme Immortal Artifact. Although it could correct the world, it absolutely lacked the ability to roll back the world.”
“I don’t know when they mastered this Immortal Dao technology, nor do I know the conditions, limitations, or prices of doing so.”
“Nor do I know how many times they have already rolled back this world.”
“But one thing is beyond doubt… the current Ten Immortal Emperors have completely accomplished some kind of transformation in Immortal Dao Technology, mastering an Immortal Dao Technology that stands above the entirety of Kunxu.”
“They have opened up a qualitative gap between themselves and the existences below the Immortal Emperor.”
“It is conceivable that whether it is a rogue 11th Immortal Emperor, or the consecutive births of the 11th, 12th, and 13th Immortal Emperors… it is all meaningless. The moment their breakthroughs are completed, it will trigger the Ten Immortal Emperors to roll back the world, resulting in suppression.”
“The Ten Immortal Emperors are already unstoppable.”
“The Ultimate Doomsday can no longer be prevented either.”
Demon Supreme Truth sighed and said, “Or rather, among the Ten Immortal Emperors, an existence will inevitably be born that truly steps into the Apex of the Immortal Dao, viewing the entire world as a useless class. The entire Kunxu… is in fact already in the midst of the Ultimate Doomsday, it’s just that we in the past had yet to realize this.”
Listening to Demon Supreme Truth’s account and watching the still continuously regressing world in the encrypted message, Zhang Yu’s heart was shaken like never before.
“Rolling back the world? Reversing time and space?”
“Are you kidding me? The Ten Immortal Emperors can actually go to such lengths?!”
At this moment, a deep sense of powerlessness rose in Zhang Yu’s heart, a feeling that the Ten Immortal Emperors were truly invincible and unstoppable.
The Sect Examination Clone, however, laughed heartily in excitement: “The technical prowess of my Myriad Laws Immortal Emperor is indeed unparalleled in the world!”
Meanwhile, Demon Supreme Truth continued: “People of the past, if you have received this message, it means that… I, who have already stepped into the Immortal Emperor Realm at this moment, have indeed relied on the connection of bloodlines between the past and the future to transmit this future message back to the past.”
“At the same time, this also shows that the Ten Immortal Emperors failed to intercept or even detect it, which means their technology is not completely flawless.”
Hearing these words, Zhang Yu’s heart trembled as a thought crossed his mind: “Transmitting a message from the future to the past through bloodlines?”
“However, this must have also leveraged the momentum of the World Rollback, otherwise… if one could casually transmit messages to the past at will, the present wouldn’t be like this.”
Zhang Yu thought of the “Ying Xintian” who had given him this encrypted message; the other party was the Ying Xintian clone created by Supreme Truth.
“So Yun Taizhen of this moment has also received the message sent… from the future Demon Supreme Truth, and she already knows that a World Rollback has occurred once?”
The Demon Supreme Truth in the projection continued: “No matter which Yun Taizhen you are, or which person from the past, after you receive this message, you must keep it a secret. Do not tell all the other versions of me.”
“My defeat is already a foregone conclusion; no one can stop it.”
“Transmitting the intelligence of the World Rollback to the past is my greatest value in this battle.”
“Do not try to change my fate. Let everything happen as before without the slightest anomaly, and do not attract the attention of the Ten Immortal Emperors.”
“Once you arouse the suspicion of the Ten Immortal Emperors, if they initiate another World Rollback, this intelligence may disappear completely.”
“Pass the intelligence down and continue to figure out the mechanism of the World Rollback. Only then can we find a way to defeat the Ten Immortal Emperors…”
“There is no perfect Immortal Dao Technology in this world.”
“The conflicts among the Ten Immortal Emperors will only be greater than their conflicts with any non-Immortal Emperor.”
“Understanding the intelligence of the World Rollback means that we are one step closer to defeating them.”
“Knowing the existence of the World Rollback means that even if we are already in the Ultimate Doomsday, there is still a chance to reverse it…”
Demon Supreme Truth seemed to want to say something more, but before she could finish her words, her body completely dissipated.
The images in the encrypted message seemed to come to an end here.
Hearing Demon Supreme Truth’s last words, Zhang Yu’s heart skipped a beat: “She… is encouraging us?”
Immortal Slayer said with a complicated tone: “Yes, perhaps she was worried that whoever learned this information would lose faith. She… is indeed encouraging us.”
When Zhang Yu read the encrypted message to this point, he thought he had seen all the contents.
But the next moment, after Demon Supreme Truth disappeared, another figure emerged.
“Patriarch Ying?”
“Senior Ying?”
The person who appeared in front of Zhang Yu at this moment was none other than Ying Xintian.
Ying Xintian was heard speaking rapidly: “The memory that Supreme Truth transmitted to the past was passed down through the bloodline… and received by a clone she created.”
“This should also be her deliberate arrangement. This clone possesses the bloodlines of both Yun Taizhen and Ying Xintian, and is precisely the clone arranged to head to the Myriad Gold Mystic Realm to search for the ancestor’s corpse.”
Zhang Yu’s gaze shifted as he recalled liberating the ancestor’s corpse in the Myriad Gold Mystic Realm, where he encountered that Ying Xintian clone created by Supreme Truth.
At the same time, Ying Xintian in the encrypted message continued, “It was also this clone that triggered the ancestor’s corpse I left behind in the Myriad Gold Mystic Realm, summoning a wisp of my consciousness from the distant outside world…”
At this point, Ying Xintian’s tone was filled with emotion, “When the future memories were transmitted over, Yun Taizhen was holding a closed-door meeting with two Immortal Emperors. Daring to pass any information to her could have been detected by the two Immortal Emperors.”
“Furthermore, in Yun Taizhen’s own view, she was already doomed to fail and had no value in being saved. On the contrary, actively contacting her would likely cause her to act differently than before this rollback, which would in turn arouse the suspicions of the Immortal Emperors.”
“For her future self, breaking through to the Immortal Emperor Realm and successfully sending intelligence back from the future was something she could never accomplish a second time. Sending this intelligence out… this was her only chance.”
“So she found me.”
“Ying Xintian, although I am very reluctant to say this, at this very moment, the first person I can think of, and the only person I can trust, is you.”
Ying Xintian sighed and said, “She cut off her last possibility of success, and handed the hope of defeating the Ten Immortal Emperors into my hands.”
As these contents from the encrypted message quickly flashed through his mind, Zhang Yu thought to himself, “So that’s how it is. Yun Taizhen actually summoned Senior Ying through the ancestor’s corpse left behind by Senior Ying Xintian?”
He then heard Ying Xintian continue, “After I sent down a sliver of my consciousness, I entered the clone that Yun Taizhen had prepared for me…”
Zhang Yu thought to himself, “It was actually like this?”
He thought of the “Ying Xintian” that he and Tai Yuebai had faced together at that time.
Tai Yuebai and he had originally thought the other party was a clone created by Supreme Truth, but they hadn’t expected that inside this clone’s body, there was actually a trace of Ying Xintian’s will. It could be said that they were facing Ying Xintian himself at that time.
Ying Xintian continued, “But as I repeatedly studied this future memory, I noticed something: the contents of these future memories are rapidly disappearing, constantly being forgotten.”
Hearing Ying Xintian’s words, Zhang Yu’s heart jumped, and he quickly recalled the future memories he had just obtained.
In an instant, Zhang Yu finished recollecting, but he didn’t find that he had forgotten anything.
At this moment, two guesses arose in his heart: “Either… I can no longer remember what I have forgotten. Or, I haven’t forgotten? But why? Why wouldn’t I forget?”
Thinking of this, another idea emerged in his mind: “I’m afraid… when Senior Ying Xintian discovered that some of the future memories had been forgotten, the future memory he passed on to us was already lacking and had lost some information.”
Zhang Yu suddenly thought of something. In the encrypted message, despite various future memories, there was no part about him and Tai Yuebai exploring the ancestor’s corpse.
“Was this part lost? Before the rollback, did the previous versions of Tai Yuebai and I not encounter the real Senior Ying Xintian? What happened back then?”
Zhang Yu knew this was something he couldn’t possibly know, so he could only continue reading.
Ying Xintian: “After some simple testing back then, I found that future memories, or the information in future memories, would start to disappear as soon as they interacted with living beings.”
“The future memories I kept in my mind would quickly be forgotten.”
“Future information directly recorded on any medium would continue to exist if I didn’t read it. But once I read its contents, not only would I gradually forget what I read, but even the future information recorded on the medium would gradually disappear, as if it had never existed…”
“I estimate… it’s just that this future information can exist independently, but if the future information interacts with any living being in the present, the related memories will be forgotten, and the future information will gradually disappear.”
Ying Xintian sighed with emotion, “It’s as if there is a force in the unseen world erasing the interference and influence of the future on the past.”
“Unfortunately, the conditions at the time were too crude, and the future information disappeared very quickly. I didn’t have the ability or time to conduct further tests, and the testing process also consumed some of the future information.”
“But the good news is… during this simple testing process, none of the Ten Immortal Emperors’ powers ever came to deal with me, nor did they notice the future information I possessed.”
Speaking of this, Ying Xintian’s tone became more solemn, “This shows that this interference force that erases future information… is very likely not directly related to the Ten Immortal Emperors who initiated the rollback… at least, they are not directly controlling this force to erase future information.”
“Just like an apple falling to the ground or sunlight raising the temperature… it’s a heavenly principle like that. For information to be passed from the future to the past and undergo such changes might also be a heavenly principle…”
“Of course, we cannot rule out the possibility that this heavenly principle belongs to a Dao Lineage, and this Dao Lineage is collectively controlled by the Ten Immortal Emperors. They keep each other in check, so their individual control over this Dao Lineage is somewhat lacking. Only when they reach a unanimous agreement can they truly unleash the power of this Dao Lineage.”
Ying Xintian said solemnly, “But no matter which possibility it is, it at least shows that the Ten Immortal Emperors still have flaws in their Immortal Dao Technology regarding the World Rollback, rendering them unable to prevent or detect the future memories transmitted by Supreme Truth.”
“To prevent this future memory from continuing to dissipate, I have made a few preparations. One of them was to encrypt it, send it to you and Tai Yuebai, and set a time for it to automatically decrypt.”
“Because no one has seen the encrypted future information, this information shouldn’t disappear before the time arrives.”
“And when this encrypted message is completely released, it will be exactly the time point of the Ten Immortal Emperors’ last rollback.”
In the encrypted footage, Ying Xintian held up two fingers: “Regarding the characteristics of future information, I have two speculations that need to be verified.”
“The first speculation is that the reason future information is erased is perhaps… because it would alter the original history.”
“Therefore, when future information is no longer future information and can no longer change history, it will no longer be erased.”
“For example, right at this moment, when Supreme Truth is suppressed, the future information you obtained no longer possesses the possibility of changing history. The events that occurred over the past two months contained within it are no longer ‘future information’ to you, and thus will not be erased.”
Upon reading this, Zhang Yu’s heart stirred. “Senior Ying Xintian’s first guess is probably correct.”
“The reason the encrypted message I hold right now hasn’t been erased is because this future information is no longer future information. It has lost the possibility of changing history?”
Zhang Yu continued reading the contents of the encrypted message.
Ying Xintian went on to say, “The second guess is that the Ten Immortal Emperors are also restricted by the rules of time and space.”
“The worst-case scenario is that although they are also subject to this restriction, the degree to which they are restricted is much less than ours.”
“The best-case scenario is that it’s about the same as ours. You can make a judgment by comparing the future information with the changes in the situation you encounter.”
Hearing this, Zhang Yu’s heart stirred. A massive amount of images and content from the encrypted message flashed rapidly through his mind, along with the events he had experienced over the past two months and information regarding the changing situation.
“After the Ten Immortal Emperors initiated the rollback, they did not drastically change the world or the situation. During the period when the number increased from 0% to 100%, various events still occurred just as they appeared in the encrypted message, aside from a few minor differences…
“Senior Ying Xintian and Supreme Truth did not do so to avoid being discovered by the Immortal Emperors.
“But why would the Immortal Emperors do this? Is it simply because they do not want to make changes, wanting the world to develop along its original path so they can accurately grasp Supreme Truth’s movements? To prepare for their suppression of Supreme Truth?
“Or is it… as Senior Ying Xintian said, the Ten Immortal Emperors are equally restricted by the rules of time and space, and cannot limitlessly grasp future information at all times?”
Zhang Yu could not determine the exact situation of the Ten Immortal Emperors, but after following Supreme Truth and Ying Xintian’s line of thought, he suddenly realized that even if the Ten Immortal Emperors had mastered such terrifying Immortal Dao Technology as the World Rollback, they were not necessarily truly unbeatable.
“If I could grasp more intelligence, I could understand exactly how the Ten Immortal Emperors initiate a World Rollback, what the price entails, and what the side effects are.”
“Simply put, what if I could figure out how far back the Ten Immortal Emperors can roll back, how many times they can do it, and whether there are any rules governing each rollback?”
“Only by figuring out as many of the Immortal Emperors’ methods as possible will there be a greater chance of breaking through their obstruction to become a new Immortal Emperor.”
At this moment, a flash of realization crossed Zhang Yu’s mind: “Perhaps there has been more than one 11th Immortal Emperor who successfully broke through in the past, but after the World Rollback, they were subjected to complete suppression and harvested by the Ten Immortal Emperors. This was entirely due to a lack of intelligence.”
“But at least this time, Immortal Emperor Supreme Truth has transmitted intelligence back.”
Just then, Zhang Yu read the final part of the encrypted message, and his heart jolted once more.
Ying Xintian’s voice echoed: “Zhang Yu, you now possess my daughter’s bloodline power and have mastered the true Primordial Supreme Truth Bloodline.”
“Originally, I thought that sooner or later, you would be able to rely on this trump card… to stand against Supreme Truth.”
“But now, possessing this trump card, you are the best vessel for Supreme Truth’s inheritance, allowing her to pass things on to you through the bloodline before she is completely suppressed.”
Looking at this content, Zhang Yu was taken aback.
Although Zhang Yu had reviewed a vast amount of content in the encrypted message, the time consumed was merely a few instants.
When he looked up at the sky, he could still see the scene of Supreme Truth being forcibly suppressed by the Ten Immortal Emperors, her body continuously bursting with more and more cracks.
Ying Xintian: “The Ten Immortal Emperors, capable of rolling back the entire world, possess near-infinite space for error.”
“However, precisely because of this, they allowed and tolerated Yun Taizhen’s breakthrough, and even tolerated my departure.”
“Therefore, they will also tolerate your continuous growth.”
“Because they possess the absolute confidence to suppress all latecomers.”
“And this is exactly the hope amidst despair… Only such Ten Immortal Emperors would not firmly suppress you below the level of an Immortal, thus giving us the opportunity to defeat them.”
“Their success lies in the rollback, and their downfall will also lie in the rollback. Zhang Yu… from the moment we obtained the intelligence regarding the rollback, the Ten Immortal Emperors were no longer flawless to us.”