Planet Pulverizer: A Mortal's Ascent-Chapter 976: The Road Ahead

Li Pin's mind was fully immersed in the river of time

"No matter which timeline it is, no matter who it belongs to, when the Eternal's gaze focuses on it, this timeline will be consolidated and bound by Eternity."

His entire being merged with the timeline, as if he had become time itself, yet also seemed to transcend above it.

"However, though an Eternal's gaze, even indirectly, could consolidate all perceivable time, that did not mean there was only one eternal timeline."

Li Pin raised his head to gaze upward. His gaze seemed to pierce through the timeline he represented and see things beyond it. Whenever his gaze swept across this timeline, it was naturally consolidated by him, yet the number of timelines he saw was far, far too many.

It was like someone possessing the power to subdue anything they saw, yet still unable to subdue all the living beings on an entire planet.

How large was the scope of his life? How many beings could he encounter in a single day? How many beings lived on a planet? And how many planets existed across the starry universe? They were countless and incalculable.

When Li Pin truly cast his gaze in that direction, he could clearly feel his own insignificance. It was like a human with extraordinary powers gazing at the vast, boundless universe, beholding countless planets whose numbers could not be calculated even in a lifetime. Even if he had already become the overlord of one planet, ruling all its resources and wealth, in that moment, he would still feel an innate, heartfelt insignificance.

The true number of timelines was far greater than the stars in the universe. Even though he could consolidate billions upon billions of timelines within his gaze, almost every moment, countless more timelines were branching forth. These countless timelines, due to new variables, geometrically gave birth to even more.

A being could never truly know how many thoughts might be born in an instant. The number of timelines was as numerous as the endless thoughts born from the collisions of human minds.

How many such thoughts were there exactly? Even the human brain itself could not calculate it clearly. It could be one, or it could be infinite. Once imagination began to flow, the arising thoughts would never cease.

"Eternity," muttered Li Pin softly. "So... all time will eventually have a source, a core... and that source, that core..."

He suddenly rose with the river of time, directly tracing upstream along the directions from which all timelines branched.

"Is the origin! And also... the destiny that governs all!"

Transcend Origin! Break Destiny!

As he began tracing upstream, things he had never previously noticed appeared before his eyes.

The first thing he saw—what he most wanted to know—was himself.

Why had he arrived here?

Where did his Clairvoyance gift originate from?

"Could it be?"

It was not Li Qiuxian!

Whether it was his Clairvoyance gift or the act of transmigration itself, unexpectedly, none of it came from the Li Qiuxian who had touched upon destiny, as he had thought. Instead, it was...

"Void."

Li Pin's gaze followed in a certain direction. A majestic existence floated silently in a part of the Frostbound Star Abyss. It seemed dead, yet also seemed alive. But on closer inspection, the existence was indeed dead. This outcome truly came as a surprise to Li Pin.

"Why..."

Although one of the mysteries weighing on his mind had been solved, many more arose.

His Clairvoyance was indeed quite similar to Innate True Spirit.

As for his origins, as well as Void's....

Li Pin's gaze shifted. He could easily glimpse the timeline of the Void Emperor, but if he peered too deeply into his future, that timeline would be consolidated and fixed by himself.

Thus, he turned his gaze toward the Void Divine Treasure World that had long since been broken, arriving at a moment when it still existed.

Through that world, he directly found Baili Zhu, and from Baili Zhu's timeline, he traced further and further back, through billions of years, to the time before the destruction of the Ancient Astral World era.

It was an era when Eternal Zhan Yuan had not yet severed his Eternal Path, and the Void Emperor had not yet become the Void Emperor.

"Baili Qingfeng, Li Wuzhi..."

Li Pin slowly looked back.

When the truth was finally revealed before him, even though he had already become an Eternal, his thoughts momentarily froze. After a long while, he sighed. "So, in truth, I was not Li Qiuxian's first choice?"

Li Qiuxian's first choice was the Void Emperor.

"So, we really did come from the same place..." Li Pin murmured.

Back then, through the Void Divine Treasure world, he had returned to the Earth from which the Void Emperor had transmigrated. That place was very similar, yet slightly different.

But now it seemed that the two worlds, and the two people, were like two different possibilities, heading toward two different outcomes.

Li Pin suddenly thought of something. His gaze shifted, falling upon the true Void Emperor he had first seen when he entered the Void Divine Treasure World. At that time, the Void Great Emperor's gaze upon him was profound and melancholy.

"If only... he had your unwavering resilience. If only... he shared your love for life. If only he, too, could move forward without fear or hesitation... Perhaps the brilliance of his life and existence would shine just as brightly as yours..."

At that moment, Li Pin fully understood. He looked at the Void Emperor and let out a sigh.

"To be honest... I do not hate you..."

Profound, hollow, and void.

"But... fate..."

Who was this "you"?

Li Pin traced the timeline upward until he finally saw that person.

"Li Qiuxian."

He organized these timelines, and the truth revealed itself clearly.

"You chose him... but he did not accept your choice, or perhaps... destiny interfered, preventing him from carrying out your will... Thus, he failed, falling into eternal emptiness and nothingness, almost the same as you."

Li Pin spoke, then paused. "So, you chose me instead."

That's why his Clairvoyance gift was similar to the Innate True Spirit, yet fell short of it. And before he had come into contact with the Void Emperor, he had never even touched upon Li Qiuxian's concept. That was because Li Qiuxian probably had not placed much hope upon him.

After all, Li Qiuxian had painstakingly nurtured Baili Qingfeng and endowed him with a body containing spacetime traits, even an Innate True Spirit—yet he had still failed. How could Li Pin, who possessed only a single Clairvoyance gift, succeed?

But the result was that Li Pin's performance had exceeded everyone's expectations.

"Although the process was a bit twisted, no matter what, it wouldn't be wrong to say I am your successor," Li Pin said softly.

He withdrew his focus from these truths. Following all their roots, he looked toward Li Qiuxian.

Then he thought of something else, and his gaze went past him, toward another distant Eternal.

He saw that Eternal tracing back through the river of time.

He saw that Eternal trying to kill Li Qiuxian at one moment, yet saving him in another.

He also saw that Eternal standing before the origin, filled with despair and helplessness, and in the end... leaving hope to those who came later.

That hope was...

Me.

"What truly changed the Eternal's thoughts was destiny... but... not the destiny as I understood it."

Li Pin looked at that figure who, despite exhausting even the concept of his own time, still rushed toward that origin.

"In the end, all results were the Eternal's fall, but the nature was utterly different. In one case, destiny interfered with the Eternal, driving him to death. In the other, the Eternal comprehended destiny, igniting unyielding conviction with resolute will, and charged toward Eternity in an inevitable yet defiant downfall..."

Li Pin's figure continued forward. As he comprehended all truth, two figures gradually merged with him.

One of them was Li Qiuxian, the one whose path was severed by Eternal Zhan Yuan—in a highly illogical process.

After all, He had already completed the fusion of past, present, and future, yet was cut off by Zhan Yuan, who suddenly emerged and achieved Eternity before him, severing his path to Eternity.

Thus, unwilling to give up, unwilling to fail, he desperately searched and explored until he eventually discovered the existence of destiny.

He tried to prove to Eternal Zhan Yuan the existence of destiny, but Zhan Yuan paid it no heed at all.

At a certain moment, when Li Pin sent Null back to the future to become One, Zhan Yuan sensed the power of destiny.

Thus, he stepped out from the "ultimate" realm he understood and launched an assault on destiny, an attempt to transcend the ultimate.

Li Pin continued forward, following the path someone had opened and led. Finally, he once again saw Eternal Zhan Yuan, who in theory should have already vanished from the spacetime plane. Li Pin caught up to him, or rather, Zhan Yuan had brought Li Pin here.

Thus, when he saw Eternal Zhan Yuan, Zhan Yuan's gaze also turned to him. Zhan Yuan's gaze seemed to look back upon the past, and also seemed to convey a message to him.

"I can only help you... up to this point."

This was the message.

Zhan Yuan did not speak, but when Li Pin looked at him, he naturally understood his meaning. This Eternal was sighing, lamenting, and even... mocking himself, mocking his own shortsightedness of the past.

A long time later, Zhan Yuan murmured with a sigh. "Eternity... destiny..."

The next moment, his timeline suddenly fractured, and the traits belonging to him as an Eternal were eroded and extinguished by the river of time, changing from fixed to countless possibilities, flowing along his own timeline into the current of time.

"The future... will depend on you..."