Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 309 - 308 - Divine Memory vs Reality

"Please stop, senior!"  Lind was actually getting a bit dizzy and also he did not want to feel the touch of death from across the world again.

As if suddenly realizing all she had done, Lind was dropped as if he was on fire.  His instincts took over to save himself from the toss and he landed on his feet.

His host had her beautiful back to him but he was very firmly thinking of her as a roc and the mother of his recent charge.  Very firmly he was thinking of that.

"I apologize as I assumed you simply removed the block.  I did not know you integrated it.  Please, enlighten me."  Lind was floored at the humility this powerful roc now showed him.  Why?

From what Skinwalker had told him, nothing inside the Inheritance could come out.  He had not explained why, only that it was so.  A separate reality but real as the outer world.  Only Lind could leave it eventually.

It made him sad as he glanced at Tal.  He had come to like having it around very much.  Sighing, he resumed his seat and began with his experience with the 6 Primordial Immortals.

It took several days but it was very relaxing after wandering the jungle for months.

After he was done, his host seemed to be carefully considering all she had heard from him.  Her gaze also gained respect for him which he did not understand.  He was an Iron Tier, less than an ant to her.

"I do not think you appreciate what you have done.  While I do not associate with human powers, it is wise to keep an ear to the winds.  While they rarely care about the mortal realms at that stage, some still talk about it."  She sipped at her tea as if contemplating how to tell him something.

"In the billions of years I lived until my original body died, all humans, aether children, demons, and so forth agreed that 6 elementals were an enigma that could never be solved.  While we add secondary elements later in our lives, it is a grueling and risky process.  Many die or waste their potential doing it."  It was the first Lind had heard of it.

He had assumed the Heaven Realm cultivators had some process he had yet to hear about to add the missing elements to their dantian.  He now learned it was not so straightforward of a process.  He was unclear how they would even start but had assumed it would become clear later.

"Are you telling me, there was never mention of someone succeeding like me?"  Lind found that hard to believe.  So many Immorals seemed focused on digging into the problem yet he saw her nod.

"There has never been a cultivator with 6 primary elements.  If such a being existed, they would be unrivaled or at least a big enough news to spread far and wide even to me."  He contemplated the possibility such a person would not advertise when he recalled he could not block the senses of Sky Realms let alone a Divine Realm cultivator.

They would never be able to hide completely.

"How is that possible?  The sheer number of cultivators–"  Lind was in denial.  The odds against it were high but like the lottery, there was a winner eventually.  The long lives of cultivators should have even increased the odds!

"They had higher issues!  The war with the Fiends is a large issue but not the only one.  Cultivators are more obsessed with progressing on their own path than the lucky few you encountered."  She interrupted him and it deflated his rising emotions.

"So…they just let them die?"  Lind felt hollow realizing the enormity of it.  The worlds of cultivation measured their existence in the billions of years at least.  He did not know how old the Divine Realm world was but he could suspect it was much older.

In all of that, how many frustrated and abandoned 6 elemental had been left to die?  How many pleaded for help or may have had a true breakthrough and were dismissed?  How many were just reviled trying to overturn the cultivation world to help them?

He had been lucky, made good connections, but if not for his professions, what would his fate have been?  The resources and opportunities would not have been possible, of that he was certain.

"I am sorry, it is the truth but it is not an easy one."  Her gentle words surprised him as he suddenly understood.

"For aether beasts, a disparate element is more serious, isn't it?"  A solemn nod confirmed it.  Aether beasts had an advantage in their methods of cultivation but he suddenly realized there was a trade off.

A simple beast would not know how to integrate opposing elements.  The repulsion would literally lead to severe Qi deviation and death.  Only if a beast had a more sentient parent or elder to protect it, would it survive.

"It would seem I owe you an apology, senior."  She smiled at his words but then a ward was put up around them.  It was too profound for even his Eyes to figure it out nor did he see a formation plate.  He wondered about it but Tal was outside of it somehow and trying to get in without any success.

"You have found a path that maybe a few have walked but never succeeded.  The fact you have come this far shows promise I never heard of.  My daughter is stable and thriving when by now she was dead before."  Lind was now confused.  Had they changed the past?

His confusion was clear and she patted his head like he was a small child.

"Divine Memory is reality but it does not affect history.  A Divine Inheritance can take many forms but Lord Skinwalker simply separated this place from his mind and enclosed it here.  For a human, he had a lot of respect from the Patriarchs and Matriarchs of the clans.  However, his memory cannot include any Divine Realm cultivator that did not wish to be here."  Lind was stunned.

How did that work?

"You mean a Divine Realm can only be remembered if they allow it?" Laughter filled the small dome as she was caught off guard by his question.

"Your memory will be intact, never worry, but only what you can comprehend.  What I mean is this place.  I am here because my old self allowed it.  It is a rare opportunity but there was a dragon clan not far from my nest back then.  They are not here now."  Lind began to grasp something.

Divine memory was real, but it was not reality.  It was a simple memory within a cultivator but manifested like it was for an Inheritance must fulfill some conditions.  It also sounded like other cultivators were aware when it happened and could allow it or deny it.

"A new world."  Lind suddenly had words escape him as a smile crossed his host's face.

"Correct.  Divine cultivators have come as close to Heaven and Earth as any cultivator can become.  The process is beyond you at the moment, but we control our existence in a more literal way than ever before.  By allowing Lord Skinwalker to include me in his manifest memory, I can exist even after my death."  Lind could see some advantage in that but why?  Why would it matter since nothing could exist outside the Inheritance, right?

Lind was about to ask when he froze.  A new world, he had said.  An Inheritance collapsed into a Ruin and eventually a Relic if possible.  That process was what he had lived with as a fact but what happened when a Divine Inheritance collapsed?

His head began to throb as a possibility tried to take shape until suddenly he understood.  The pain faded as he stared at his host.

"H-how long does this memory last?"  A grin appeared on her face as she nodded at him.

"It starts from wherever a Divine Cultivator wishes, and it will be identical down to the smallest detail as it was back then in the greater world, but after it starts, there is no certainty.  The greater the variance, the more strain on the housing holding it."  She sipped at her tea as she looked at him deeply.

The reason she isolated them was coming.

"My daughter died from Qi deviation, I remember it clearly despite never seeing it with my eyes.  I died well after Lord Skinwalker began to reach the end of his life.  Yet, I still live here in his memory as he had already been building his Inheritance even back then."  Lind found it hard to conceive.

Moebius Sect had been conceived and built in less than 5 years but he had not imagined it until his wives proposed the idea to him.

He had been teaching on the move for almost 10 years so now he would make them come to him, but the idea of planning something millions or billions of years before doing it awed him.

"So all the beings I have seen and died, a lot of it is repeating like before?"  She nodded.  "Yet, those like you, that are aware of what is going on, have begun to alter events."

She smiled wide and nodded firmly.

Lind began to understand.  Rather than breakdown due to a lack of resources or simply wear and tear, a Divine Inheritance only endured so long as the point of its creation was maintained.  If it deviated too much, the strain from reality would break the boundary.

The Inheritance would be destroyed but what was inside would become a seed.  A seed for a new world.

"A-are all mortal realms like that?"  She shrugged her shoulders.

"No one truly knows but enough documentation exists and my race memory includes such a possibility.  All I know is that the myriad mortal realms exist due to Divine Realm cultivators."  Lind was shocked and stunned.

The records he had read referred to beings he thought was related via the Floating Isles or descending cultivators, but what if it was survivors from the broken Inheritance?!  Some could have lived long enough to leave records behind or had to leave in a hurry while the weaker cultivators started up the new world!

There was no way to prove it unless an Immortal or Divine Realm cultivator came forth and maybe they had as she indicated but what did that make reality?

Was it all a memory?