Tales of Herding Gods

Qi Jiuyi wanted to plunder some of these hexagon-shaped crystals, but he dispelled his intentions upon hearing Qin Mu’s words. He laughed. “Cult Master Qin, given your sufficiently strong consciousness, how powerful would the Earth Count created from this treasure be? Can it surpass you?”

Qin Mu shook his head. He picked up the tiny Earth Count that he had created and placed it in his palm. He said, “He doesn’t have much in terms of abilities or a soul and is just a confused lifeform. He looks fierce, that’s all.”

Qi Jiuyi reached out a finger and probed at the tiny Earth Count. He said, “In that case, these crystals are useless. The lifeforms created are so much weaker than you, and they aren’t even divine arts practitioners. Also, without a soul, they are unable to cultivate. What’s the use of these crystals?”

He pressed his finger upon the tiny Earth Count. This little creature was ferocious, it grabbed his finger and wanted to fling him away. However, it didn’t have the strength and could only howl in anger.

Qin Mu put the tiny Earth Count down and said, “If I am correct, these masters of creation from prehistory must have had consciousnesses that exceeded ordinary men. They must have had incomparably powerful consciousnesses, at a level where it would be terrifying. Look, everyone in the relief sculptures is able to use the crystals to create things out of nothing. I can only do it after cultivating the Three Primordial Spirit Undying God Consciousness. Based on this, every one of them had a consciousness not inferior to mine!”

Qi Jiuyi didn’t feel that anything was wrong, and the dragon qilin and Yan’er understood what he said.

Qin Mu’s Undying God Consciousness was already terribly powerful. Despite Yan Shaoqing being the celestial heavens’ top practitioner of Numinous Sky consciousness techniques, he managed to trap Yan Shaoqing using the dreams and illusions he created!

Qin Mu’s consciousness might not be as dense as that of Yan Shaoqing, but his quality was much better.

If these masters of creation from prehistory did have consciousnesses that were as strong as him, that would be frightening.

Qin Mu pointed at the relief sculptures’ masters of creation from prehistory and continued talking, saying, “What’s more strange is that their corporeal bodies grew bigger than before. I’m guessing they used their creation abilities to augment their corporeal bodies.”

The dragon qilin didn’t understand and asked, “Cult Master, how does one augment their body with that?”

“Utilizing this crystal, one could use their immensely strong consciousness to reconstruct their corporeal body. This is no more difficult than creating a tiny Earth Count.”

Qin Mu explained, “Earlier, in the Blood Rust Zone, we saw a skull that looked as big as a planet. The body must have been much bigger than the head. Who can grow to such a large size? They must have used the crystals to reconstruct their corporeal bodies, making them bigger.”

He paused for a moment and returned to the earlier sets of relief sculptures. “The first giant that received the crystal had a corporeal body bigger and stronger than the rest. It’s possible that he used the art of creation to augment his corporeal body. Also, there’s another crucial point—they were immortal and could be considered gods!”

Qi Jiuyi frowned greatly.

Qin Mu had a grim expression and said solemnly, “When the art of creation is cultivated to a certain realm, one can achieve immortality, their corporeal body becoming imperishable. Even if someone is just a small practitioner of the Spirit Embryo Realm, as long as they are proficient in the art of creation, they can also be immortal like a god, living forever! These masters of creation from prehistory were just a bunch of immortal gods!”

His words struck him deeply, as he was similar to them.

To a divine arts practitioner, gods were people whose primordial spirits had reached the Celestial Palace Realm—immortal with potent magic power and remarkable abilities.

To an existence like Qin Mu, the definition of a god from these ordinary divine arts practitioners was a joke.

First, the realms were created by the Seven Celestial Venerables, and Qin Mu had participated in the process of establishing them.

During the first year of the Dragon Han Era, on behalf of Celestial Venerable Yu, he imparted the way to become gods to the people. He and Celestial Venerable Hao established the seven god realms from the Southern Heavenly Gate to the celestial heavens, known as the seven realms of the celestial heavens.

After that, Qin Mu, Xu Shenghua, and the other talented people of Eternal Peace broke through the realm barrier over and over again, turning the seven realms in the divine treasure system into one realm.

Qin Mu also reopened his Spirit Embryo Divine Treasure to reconstruct his soul.

The ordinary held the realms in awe, cultivating within the constraints of the realms and following the crowd without initiative.

Geniuses, on the other hand, created realms, leaping out of the realms’ constraints.

They were the founders and creators of realms.

Qi Jiuyi observed the figures of the relief sculptures and shook his head. “So what if they were immortal? They were just big and knew nothing about the Great Dao divine arts. Also, this method of creation, apart from making one bigger and immortal, has no other real uses. The things it creates are too weak.”

Qin Mu said, “What if countless masters of creation from prehistory were executing their consciousnesses at the same time and thinking of the same thing?”

Qi Jiuyi was stunned. Suddenly, he thought of the sacrificial altar outside and the skeletons around it. He cried out, “What you mean is, the Heaven Duke that attacked us was a product of their creation abilities?”

Qin Mu walked forward to take a look at the other relief sculptures. “The skeletons around the sacrificial altar were actually priests of the masters of creation from prehistory. They gathered everyone’s consciousness, then magnified the strength through these crystals to create a Heaven Duke under their control.”

Qi Jiuyi shook his head, both astonished and shocked. If ten thousand of these masters of creation from prehistory thought of the same giant lifeform at the same time, the creature created by the amalgamation of their consciousnesses would be extremely strong?

What if there were even more masters of creation from prehistory working together?

Would the lifeform they created then be even stronger?

Was there a limit to such overwhelming strength?

Suddenly, Qi Jiuyi laughed loudly and shouted, “Even if they could create things out of nothing and produced a Heaven Duke, that cannot be compared to the real Heaven Duke! The real Heaven Duke is an embodiment of Heavenly Dao, Master of Xuandu, and the head of all gods under the sky!”

Qin Mu stood in front of another set of relief sculptures and said, “Take a look over here.”

Qi Jiuyi looked at those relief sculptures. The masters of creation from prehistory all had the crystal on their foreheads. They created lifeforms much bigger and stronger than them and used these lifeforms to fight and kill other groups of masters of creation from prehistory.

He saw another set of relief sculptures. A leader of the masters of creation from prehistory was standing in the center of the sacrificial altar. He spread his arms wide and raised his head towards the sky, a golden scepter in his hand.

Around the sacrificial altar, other masters of creation from prehistory were performing a sacrificial offering for their leader, making him bigger and stronger.

This leader had unimaginable abilities, even producing divine arts!

Qi Jiuyi’s heart thumped with fear as he said hoarsely, “Divine arts aren’t produced in this manner. Divine arts are produced by wielding the power of the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth after the ancient gods mastered it. And the divine arts of lifeforms after the beginning like us are a result of observing and imitating the ancient gods, unleashing the power of the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth that we learned from them!”

Qin Mu shook his head and continued walking forward.

This roofless hall seemed like a prehistoric chronicle, recording all sorts of deeds from prehistory.

They saw that the masters of creation from prehistory were creating strange creatures, like human bodies with cow heads and other strange humanoid lifeforms with the heads of birds, beasts, and snakes. There were also bizarre creatures like human-headed snakes.

Qi Jiuyi’s face went pale. He saw them creating phoenixes!

“Hehe…” He chuckled but didn’t say anything.

What these relief sculptures recorded was too terrifying. The organisms that these masters of creation from prehistory created were getting more bizarre. Some organisms even looked like the ancient gods!

“They were imitating the ancient gods!”

Qi Jiuyi laughed. “They were imitating the ancient gods in creating life. They could never surpass or match up to the ancient gods!”

Qin Mu said, “Are they imitating the ancient gods, or are they creating the ancient gods?”

Qi Jiuyi was stunned. He suddenly shouted, “Heresy! Do you know what you are saying?”

Qin Mu also felt that his conjecture was preposterous. He broke out into laughter and shook his head, continuing to browse the stone carvings.

Qi Jiuyi’s anger couldn’t be restrained. He shouted angrily, “You mean that these barbarians created Celestial Emperor, Heaven Duke, Earth Count, Mother Earth, and the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth? Do you know what you are saying?”

Qin Mu ignored him and continued walking forward. The content of the relief sculptures was getting more shocking.

These masters of creation from prehistory organized themselves into several large tribes. The more people they had, the greater the power of their sacrificial offerings.

They also developed grander scenes of sacrificial offerings. Countless three-eyed tribesmen performed sacrificial offerings day and night, creating stronger and bigger spirit bodies to destroy and subjugate their enemies.

However, there was a race who chose to perform sacrificial offerings for their leader, allowing their leader to become much bigger and stronger.

Their leader’s corporeal body was incomparably huge, as tall as the sky. Countless giants surrounded him, their crystals glowing. The light shone on the leader’s body, giving him a holy appearance.

There was also a crystal in the leader’s forehead. However, it was different from the rest. Its color was vermilion red, giving off a dazzling luster as it absorbed the light from the other crystals.

Qin Mu tried to examine the leader’s face. However, his face was covered by the brilliance of the light emitted by the other crystals and wasn’t portrayed on the carvings.

Qi Jiuyi continued to follow by his side and coldly said, “They were merely using consciousness to create things and could never create the real gods. The ancient gods cannot be created, they can only be born from the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth.”

Qin Mu looked at another set of relief sculptures, whose content seemed very interesting.

The relief sculptures showed a large tribe, as though all of the masters of creation from prehistory had congregated together. They gathered and focused their consciousnesses, planning to create a huge world and leave this place of troubles!

They wanted to create another world, relocating their people there to avoid the conflicts of the real world.

‘Creating a world from nothing! Could these masters of creation from prehistory succeed? Wait a moment, Carefree Village! Isn’t Founding Emperor’s Carefree Village a world created from nothing?’

Qin Mu became more excited as he thought about it. He continued to move forward and got a shock. There were no more relief sculptures on the stone walls ahead of him.

They were destroyed by a powerful force, leaving only a few fragmented stone slabs on the ground.

He bent over to inspect them. Most of these stone slabs didn’t have traces of carvings, meaning that someone must have erased the contents on the surface. As if that weren’t enough, the relief sculptures were destroyed as well.

He performed a careful examination, trying to see if there was anything that might have survived.

“Cult Master Qin, you forgot one crucial point! The ancient gods have souls, whereas the creations of these masters of creation from prehistory didn’t have them! The Heaven Duke from earlier didn’t have a soul, and neither did the tiny Earth Count you created!”

Qi Jiuyi said, “The masters of creation from prehistory blasphemed against the ancient gods, imitating them in creating life. They intruded upon the interests of the ancient gods and offended them, going as far as using the strange lifeforms they created to do battle, a sin deserving of a thousand deaths! They deserved to be destroyed!”

He seemed a little perturbed, and his Dao heart was unstable.

Qi Jiuyi used to be a man of few words. Now, he was rambling behind Qin Mu. On the surface, it seemed that he was trying to convince Qin Mu, but in fact, he was trying to convince himself.

Qin Mu’s earlier words had unsettled him, making him seem out of sorts.

However, he did make a crucial point. Be it the Heaven Duke who assaulted them earlier or the tiny Earth Count created by Qin Mu, they lacked both a soul and consciousness.

The dragon qilin said, “Third Brother, the Heaven Duke of this place was created by the residual consciousnesses of the masters of creation from prehistory, far from their peak condition. What if during the prehistoric period, they could indeed create a Heaven Duke with a soul and consciousness?”

Qi Jiuyi was stunned, and his voice trembled as he said, “Second Brother, this is heresy…”

Qin Mu raised his head, looking around and searching.

‘Found it!’

He cheered as he quickly rushed forward. Qi Jiuyi followed behind, still looking out of sorts. He continued to convince him, saying, “Cult Master Qin, your thoughts were blasphemy against the ancient gods, you should repent…”

Qin Mu came to the center of the hall, then raised his head to look up and laughed. “Brother Qi, raise your head and look at the sky. What can you see?”

Qi Jiuyi raised his head and looked up. Upon seeing many stars embedded in the dark starry sky, he said, “Stars in a starry sky, of course.”

The dragon qilin raised his head and observed. “There are some stars in the sky.”

Yan’er’s gaze was sharp. She laughed and said, “Those stars aren’t real. They look as though they are far away from us, but actually, they aren’t.”

Qi Jiuyi said doubtfully, “This starry sky isn’t different from a real starry sky, how can it be fake?” He paused for a moment before saying, “Yes, this is indeed fake! We are in the Blood Rust Zone. There are broken fragments of vast land and planets flying around us, as well as countless giant skeletons, so there’s no way we can see the starry sky outside!”

Qin Mu laughed. “This is the treasure that my big senior brother left behind for me.”