Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

BOOM! BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM!

A volcano eruption was taking place in the distance. Lightning and thunder were rumbling in the sky. Two giants weighing six to seven tons crashed into each other brutally like two mountains of meat. Every collision

and stomp was equal to a minor earthquake. The insects and reptiles in the mud craned their heads out and stared at the two primordial beasts in bewilderment.

This was the time when flowers bloomed in the warmth of spring, when all things were revived and life bloomed to their heart’s content.

Even the air was rippling with the intense scent of endless life. Tyrannosaurs, velociraptors, diplodocuses, thunder dragons, and all kinds of amphibians, reptiles, and insects were trying their best to pass on their

precious genes so that the wonderful life could be expanded to the entire planet.

Suddenly, deafening noises that were even louder than the collision of two tyrannosaurs echoed in the sky.

A burning meteor tore apart the atmosphere and crashed to the ground with a long exhaust flame.

This was only the first shooting star.

Very soon, it was the second, the third… and the 101,000th. An incomparably brilliant meteor shower assaulted the newborn heaven and earth. It was about to bring forth tens of millions of years of coldness and

deathly stillness, a great extinction of creatures that swept across the entire planet.

“This is—”

Flames that looked like shooting stars were beaming out of Ding Lingdang’s eyes.

“Yes. The world is about to be destroyed.

Li Yao said in a low voice, “Even if they are not destroyed by the unprecedented meteor shower and the dark winter that follows, they will be destroyed by natural disasters and man-made disasters in countless years

to come. This is the outcome of most virtual worlds. Maybe destruction is the norm in the universe. Every star and planet will eventually die, not to mention the tiny life that lives on the planets and depends on the

radiation of the stars.

“Life, fragile life, is really like dust and bacteria.

“But…

“Even if we are going to be destroyed in the next second, we will still try our best to continue our genes so that our genes will be tangled together and mutate mysteriously. We will explore the endless possibilities and

fight for one billionth hope.

“Even if our endeavors fail, somebody, somewhere, will succeed someday. Am I right, honey?”

“…That’s right.”

Ding Lingdang closed her eyes. Her bloody mouth bit Li Yao’s rough skin softly. “We can be destroyed, but ‘hope’ will not. Never.”

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

More and more shooting stars appeared between heaven and earth. The fastest ones had already hit the ocean and the earth brutally, raising tides hundreds of meters high, dust hundreds of meters high, and blast

hundreds of kilometers away.

Countless birds and animals had been killed by the flames and the blast. But the remaining creatures, including Li Yao and Ding Lingdang, the two tyrannosaurs, seemed to have been stimulated by destruction and

embraced each other more and more passionately, echoing each other to their heart’s content. The cells all over their body, especially the life seeds, had etched the meteor shower into the deepest part of their gene

strands and were undergoing the crazy mutations on a microscopic level, hoping to create a new life form that could survive the coldness and the extinction of creatures.

Maybe, this was evolution.

With the meteoroids falling from the sky, the earth shaking, the volcano erupting, and the dark sky as the background, Li Yao and Ding Lingdang, the two tyrannosaurs, threw themselves into it without a care in the

world. They held their heads high, swallowed, blended, collided, and continued to pass on their knowledge until the end of the world.

When Ding Lingdang regained consciousness, she seemed to be able to smell the strong scent of sulfur and the dust raised by the meteoroids.

However, she was clearly no longer a tyrannosaurus rex, and she was no longer in the ancient era when meteorites assaulted her.

This was also a desolate continent without a civilization. It was surrounded by endless primitive forests. However, she was not a bird or a beast, but a tree.

It was not accurate to call it a tree. More precisely, it was a rarely-seen super-large plant between a tree and a flower, similar to the ancestors of the Kuafu Clan.

Her roots were hundreds of meters below the ground and could extend to several kilometers away. All the trees, flowers, and bushes that seemed to be independent were actually part of her body.

She could clearly feel that her ‘roots’ were absorbing water and nutrition from the depths of the earth, and she could also feel the subtle changes of sunlight, humidity, and wind. She was adjusting every leaf of hers

precisely, either curling, relaxing, or shivering, in order to maximize the radiation of the star.

All kinds of ancient information had been recorded in her cells in a mysterious way. She seemed to have grown in this world for thousands of years, or even hundreds of thousands of years!

“Honey! Honey!”

Then, she heard Li Yao’s excited cry.

She had thought that Li Yao would become another tree next to her.

But she had underestimated Li Yao.

Li Yao turned into a swarm of bees, or rather, what seemed to be a combination of bees and butterflies that had gone through excessive radiation.

“Although the flesh and blood of human beings are the most perfect forms of carbon-based intelligent life, it does not mean that other life forms are not worth learning.

Li Yao danced around Ding Lingdang like a swarm of deformed bees. “Let’s say that plants are the first to walk on the path of evolution in a certain world instead of animals. What kind of interesting things are going to

happen? Come on. Experience the path of harmony between a giant tree and everything in the universe!”

n the long time that followed, Ding Lingdang indeed experienced a brand-new… mode of genetic inheritance and mutation.

The tree that she had turned into was not an ordinary plant. It was more like a brand-new life form that boasted both the characteristics of plants and animals. Her own bees and Li Yao’s were enough to form a

complete, self-sustaining ecosystem.

Li Yao picked food from her body and brought her food from afar. She shielded Li Yao from the sunlight and the storm and provided tree hollows as nests for the bees. They exchanged materials, energy, genes, and

feelings in a way that nobody had ever heard of. A long, long time later, Ding Lingdang, the giant tree, had expanded to the entire continent and even extended countless roots as thick as tentacles into the ocean. Li

Yao’s bees gradually grew into a quasi-intelligent life form that was highly social.

Maybe, it meant that a ‘civilization’ was about to be born.

In the following days, they also experienced the melding and harmony of countless forms of life in countless illusionary spaces.

They had once been two pieces of ore. Under the high temperature and pressure deep below the ground, they had pressed each other and absorbed the tens of thousands of elements stored inside each other’s body,

gradually melding into one.

They had turned into the nautilus and trilobites in the primitive ocean and even the archaea in the undersea craters.

Of course, it was not without the forms of human beings. In the different stages of history, human beings experienced love and hate in different identities.

After seven days and seven nights of reincarnation, their souls had received the deepest resonance and the purest harmony. Under Li Yao’s billions of strikes, Ding Lingdang’s soul had been tempered and consolidated

to the highest point.

Finally—

Countless dreams were dancing like butterflies. After a hundred reincarnations, they dispersed like fireflies in the sky and returned to the shuttle at the edge of the Empyrean Terminus Sector in the real world.

The two of them were still sitting cross-legged with their heads facing the sky.

But something deep inside their eyes was completely different from seven days ago.

Lying in Li Yao’s arms, Ding Lingdang was no longer as angry as when she was the ‘Dragon of Fire’. She was more like a satisfied red cat that had just eaten and slept.

“The mysteries of life are indeed endless.

Ding Lingdang was somewhat lazy. She mumbled, “I suddenly feel that it’s too little to only have this life. I wish that the so-called ‘reincarnation’ did exist. I wish that I could experience ten thousand worlds and ten

thousand different kinds of brilliance. Am I being too greedy?”

“Not greedy. That’s what I thought, too. Maybe reincarnation does exist.”

Li Yao paused and hugged Ding Lingdang tighter. “And one day, we will find a way to ‘beyond reincarnation’!”

“Alright. I’ll believe whatever you say!”

Ding Lingdang raised her head and looked at Li Yao with her watery eyes. “Hubby…”

Li Yao had a bad feeling. “What—what happened?”

“Nothing. I just felt that the past seven days and seven nights were too wonderful and too hasty. I felt that I was swallowing the fruits of my labor. I didn’t have the opportunity to appreciate the wonders of life.

Ding Lingdang said shyly, “How about we continue for another seven days and seven nights?”

“Huh?”

Li Yao’s face changed color. He pretended to be calm and said, “Good… Of course, it’s very good. In fact, I, too, feel that I’m not done yet. To tell you the truth, I’ve only exerted thirty percent of my strength. There are

still—there are still a lot of killing moves that I haven’t performed yet. It’s—it’s really not enjoyable. But—but…”

He was trying to find the right words when their crystal processors started vibrating at the same time.

Li Yao raised his wrist to take a look. A hint of relief flashed in his eyes, but he slapped his thigh and frowned. “Look, look at these guys. They are annoying us with boring things such as saving the world and benefiting

the universe. Really. Can’t they hold on for half a month without us?

“Honey, it can’t be helped. I really wanted to fight another 300 rounds with you, but as you can see, everyone is waiting for us to go out and take charge of the situation. What can we do? We can only sacrifice ourselves

for everyone. How about we make another appointment?”.