Calamity of Tomorrow

If I really can’t practice it, then I’ll give it to Christina to practice, Zhou Bai thought. If I can practice it, then I like the developmental path of the Sword Map anyway.

It has great offensive power, he noted. If you can’t beat the opponent, you can run away. It suits me perfectly.

As the Sword Map was injected into Zhou Bai’s cognitive sea, his primordial spirit power instantly boiled. But it wasn’t accepting the Divine Map as Lu Chongyang described. Instead, it was showing great resistance, wanting to spit out the Divine Map.

Zhou Bai furrowed his brows. He thought, It really doesn’t work?

Christina cheered. She shot over to the Sword Map that entered Zhou Bai’s cognitive sea and said, “If you can’t do it, then give it to me. I’ve been wanting to be a sword god forever.”

He saw Christina merge with the Sword Map, turning into a small disc that hovered in Zhou Bai’s cognitive sea.

A moment later, Christina floated out of the disc. She puffed out her cheeks and said bitterly, “Ugh, my primordial spirit power is not high enough. I started the Taiyi Disc but I can’t practice at all. Zhou Bai, find me a good breathing method, I’m going to raise my primordial spirit power to ninety-nine points!”

Zhou Bai knew that Christina had primordial spirit power. Back when they were in the underground base, she showed him a dream with her primordial spirit power.

However, Christina’s primordial spirit power was weak. She couldn’t even defeat Zhou Bai when he had only 30 points.

But today was the first time Zhou Bai found out Christina could practice too.

If Christina already was able to form aTaiyi Disc from her Divine Map, where is my Taiyi Disc? he wondered. Isn’t my Divine Map Deva Nine Disasters?

Zhou Bai frowned. After using his primordial spirit power for so long, he’d never found a Divine Map or Taiyi Disc in his cognitive sea.

Suddenly, his eyes glowed. Could it be…

He looked at the Divine Map on his auxiliary system. Back when his Primordial Spirit Value was lower, he had tried to increase it with Laziness, but it never worked. He never tried increasing it again after that.

At this moment, Zhou Bai tried to put his Laziness on the Divine Map. His Laziness suddenly fell by 500 points, turning into 710 points.

His primordial spirit gathered together and turned into a minuscule dot, then suddenly blew up, turning into a giant disc that floated in Zhou Bai’s cognitive sea.

This Taiyi Disc was more than ten times the size of Christina’s Taiyi Disc. The moment it appeared, it took over the center of Zhou Bai’s cognitive sea. Christina’s Taiyi Disc could only spin around his.

“Is this the Deva Nine Disasters Divine Map?”

Zhou Bai’s eyes lit up, focusing his vision on the giant Taiyi Disc before him. He immediately sensed the condition of the entire disc.

He saw on the enormous disc that the outermost layer gave off a faint glow—nine dim star points scattered on this layer in a certain order.

Only one of the star points accepted Zhou Bai’s observation. Zhou Bai focused his attention on that one, and a message entered his brain.

Fragmentary: Accumulate Spark, enhance physique.

Method of Practice:

Internally, inject primordial spirit power into the star point. Externally, breathe Spark. Use it to densely cover your body and arrange it in the following formation…form an atmosphere, use water and fire to stimulate and refine…

Zhou Bai read the information that flowed out. It talked about the use of this star point and the method of practice. It was tens of thousands of characters long.

So that’s how it is, he thought. You inject primordial spirit power into the star point on the disc, then use a special method to assist in practice externally… Zhou Bai looked at the different formations and methods of refinement and stimulation. The more he read, the more worried he became.

But then he smiled because on the bottom of it all, he saw “Laziness (0/300).”

Does that mean that if I inject 300 points of Laziness, I can complete the practice of this ‘Fragmentary’ star point? He wondered. Zhou Bai was itching for a try, but he didn’t do it immediately. There were so many people around, it would be troublesome if he made too great of a commotion injecting Laziness.

But now he had a better understanding of the practice of Divine Maps.

“After the Divine Map is inserted, it combines with the primordial spirit to form the Taiyi Disc.

“The Taiyi Disc is also divided into eleven layers according to the eleven realms of practice. They correspond to the zeroth to tenth realms of Tao practice.

“There are many star points in each realm. Injecting your primordial spirit power and practicing according to the methods on there will illuminate your star points, allowing you to improve in different aspects.

“The star points are ordered. You can’t go on to the next star point before you finish practicing the current one.

“Depending on the Divine Map, the number and contents of star points are different too, so every practitioner has different fields of strength.”

Zhou Bai looked into the disk and saw ten layers of a dark area. He couldn’t see their contents at all.

He would have to inject a higher level of Divine Map into the Taiyi Disc to illuminate those layers of darkness.

He turned his gaze to the outermost layer of the Taiyi Disc, which was the zeroth layer that corresponded to the zeroth realm of Tao practice.

He counted a total of nine star points that hadn’t been illuminated on the zeroth layer. If he illuminated all of them, then he was done practicing this layer.

“Each time you light up a star point, it requires painstaking practice. As you gain strength, you also sublimate your will. That’s why after you practice Divine Maps, you can consider raising your Degree of Taoification.

“After raising the Degree of Taoification, you can increase the upper limit of your primordial spirit power.

“Practicing Divine Maps expends a lot of primordial spirit power. If you raise the upper limit of primordial spirit power, then you’ll increase the efficiency of practicing Divine Maps.

“Divine Map, Degree of Taoification, primordial spirit power—these three are closely linked, and none are dispensable.” A look of understanding appeared on Zhou Bai’s face.

Just as Zhou Bai was dreaming about his future practice, Lu Chongyang’s voice sounded again next to his ear.

“How is it? Zhou Bai? Did you succeed?”

Zhou Bai opened his eyes and exhaled, “The Taiyi Disc is complete. I was trying to absorb the knowledge within it. I got too captivated.”

“That’s normal.” Lu Chongyang smiled, then said to everyone, “The practice of Divine Maps is the guiding principle on the path of Tao practice. It condenses the experience of countless predecessors, allowing you to proceed quickly on the paths they’ve taken.

“However, Divine Maps are not omnipotent. If you want to go further on the path of Tao practice, you must not be satisfied by the contents of the Divine Map. These are the classes for tomorrow…

“Also, even the practice of Divine Maps isn’t one hundred percent safe. There are obstacles to the practice of every star point. If you encounter any difficulties or questions, you can always ask me. Don’t try to shut yourself up and do everything alone…”

The first class of Tao academy passed in Lu Chongyang’s instruction.

Although there were many things he didn’t understand, Zhou Bai summarized it to a few key points: Degree of Taoification is the rank limit, Primordial Spirit Value is a basic attribute, Divine Map can increase all sorts of passive and active techniques.

After Zhou Bai got out of class, he rushed back to his room impatiently, wanting to light the star point on the Taiyi Disc with Laziness.

He even ignored Jing Xiu’s shouting. Zhou Bai waved and ran back to his dorm in a hurry.

Once he returned, Elsa pounced on him. “I’m hungry!”

“Be good, Elsa. I’ll take you to get food later.” Zhou Bai licked his lips, held down Elsa’s head, and consoled her.

Then he sat down with his legs crossed, once again focusing on the enormous disc in his cognitive sea, on the first star of the zeroth layer, Fragmentary.