Divine Spirit World
He Fan possessed a unique Spiritual Imprint.
No one knew about it but himself.
His Spiritual Imprint was of the Soul Attribute — the rarest attribute in the entire Divine Spirit World.
There was no secret technique capable of killing the Soul! It was because no one possessed a Soul-type Spiritual Imprint.
As a result, even if someone's understanding of the Soul Attribute reached its peak, their secret techniques would never reach sufficient levels due to incompatibility with their Spiritual Imprint.
However, He Fan was different.
He possessed Absolute Perception.
As long as he wished, he could perceive anything. He could even sense the existence of Immortals and Supremes. Unfortunately, due to the existence of the Fourth Wall created by the Timeless Demon God, his perception was limited to the Divine Spirit World.
Even so, he could faintly feel the prying of transcendent entities and their subtle interference with the Divine Spirit World. He could even sense his own thoughts being read.
From the moment his Spiritual Imprint awakened, he could perceive them all. Because of this, he deliberately refrained from showing any kind of ambition.
He lacked the freedom to even think.
People praised him for his strength, but he disdained it — for it bound him.
Sometimes, ignorance is the most merciful form of wisdom. It would have been better if he had remained ignorant. At least then, he could have lived happily. But now that he knew, how could he live with this obstacle? How could he allow himself to be under someone else's control?
After reaching the Rank 7 stage, he mastered the Law of Perception.
The Law of Perception also existed in this world. It allowed mortals and warriors to have five senses and perceive their surroundings through them.
He Fan could manipulate this law. However, his understanding of it was still shallow. Even with complete comprehension, no one could have absolute control over it, since part of its power belonged to the Avenue controlled by Angels and Devils, while another part belonged to the Authority controlled by the Supremes.
He Fan began traveling around the world. He needed to find a breakthrough — something that could shatter the stalemate and give him initiative against the Immortals.
As he traveled, he realized the entire geography of the Divine Spirit World was peculiar.
It was something only he could perceive because of his Spiritual Imprint.
At a glance, the geography looked normal, but he could perceive strange lines formed from stones, leaves, or fallen fruits.
They did not exist in reality, for if they did, even Immortals would have perceived them. They were illusionary — yet they existed. They were composed of real-world objects, but only specific ones contributed to the clue. Those specific objects could only be perceived by He Fan through his Absolute Perception.
It was like throwing billions of small balls randomly. Seen from above, no pattern would emerge. But if some of those balls were painted differently, patterns would appear. Immortals could not see the paint; to them, it was random distribution. But He Fan could see the paint — and thus, the clue.
He was shocked. His gaze deepened as he traveled around the world, never showing any abnormality in his expression or thoughts. Even when he first discovered the anomaly, he deliberately avoided thinking about it.
He simply looked around — and left.
After traveling through the entire world, he returned.
His understanding of the Soul also deepened with time. He sighed. 'Traveling is indeed the best way to improve one's strength.'
In truth, those words were meant for the Immortals. To lie to gods, one must first deceive oneself.
He wanted them to believe it, so that in the future, whenever he traveled, no one would find it strange.
Because he could not consciously think about the anomaly he saw, he could not memorize the patterns within it. Thus, he was helpless to use them. He needed a way to remember without remembering — to let the memories live within instinct, not thought.
He devised another plan — the development of a structured calendar.
There were other calendars, but different regions used their own, creating great confusion. To resolve this, he conceived a unified one.
He began his journey again. This time, it was different. As he traveled, he counted — as if marking the passage of time, as if creating a new parameter to measure it. His journey was planned so that he moved in one direction and, after observing all the clues, returned from another, completing a full cycle. He made it appear that the number of counts he made would determine how months and years were divided.
After finishing the count, the number he obtained was 466,560,000.
There was already a division of one day into 24 hours, each hour having 60 seconds. The number 60 was chosen because it is divisible by the first six numbers, allowing easy subdivision.
Upon returning home, he divided 466,560,000 by the number of seconds in a day. The result was 5400.
He decided that each year would have 360 days and 15 months (5400 = 360 × 15). Thus, each month had 24 days. This became the origin of the first Global Calendar of the Divine Spirit World.
He spread this calendar across every continent.
At the same time, he created a massive grid — 466,560,000 × 466,560,000 in size.
Yes, this was the clue.
Some of the grids were filled with symbols — 466,560,000 symbols in total, scattered across the cells.
It took him fifty to sixty more years of travel to fill in all the hidden clues around the world. When he completed them, he found exactly 466,560,000 strange symbols spread across the grid.
There were 466,560,000 sub-grids within the main grid, and each sub-grid contained 466,560,000 cells.
Just by looking at the board, he understood it was a puzzle meant for him to solve. By intuition, he grasped its rules.
In modern terminology, it was a Sudoku — with 466,560,000 digits, each represented by a different symbol.
By studying the arrangement, He Fan concluded that each row, column, and sub-grid had to contain all the symbols without repetition. Because of the grid's immense size, he was able to discern patterns.
After confirming the rules, he sent the puzzle to the Ethereal Sect's Treasury.
He declared that from now on, every new Sect Leader must solve this puzzle before taking their position.
The reason was simple.
If he didn't, the Immortals would grow suspicious. Why would he spend so many years traveling and creating such a puzzle without purpose? There had to be something hidden.
That wasn't all — he also concealed various laws within it. Otherwise, using such a low-quality puzzle to select a Sect Leader would only lower the standard. He made it appear as though he was providing an opportunity to all future Sect Leaders of the Ethereal Sect.
There was one more thing. Why would he take fifty to sixty years to create such a simple puzzle? Wouldn't the Immortals be suspicious of that?
Unfortunately, they wouldn't.
The reason was simple.
He Fan added a few new symbols after each of his travels. During his journeys, he improved his comprehension of the laws and hid his insights within those clues. In this way, the Immortals were under the impression that he wished to provide the best possible opportunity to future generations — and thus, he took his time to create it.
After understanding the rule, solving it wasn't difficult for him. But to his surprise, the puzzle had too few clues to complete.
He discovered that four cells in the grid formed X-wings with one another and could not be resolved by any means. Each cell had two possible symbols.
This puzzle had two solutions.
He Fan had a sudden enlightenment. He realized it was never about solving the puzzle, but about unlocking a lock with an answer key. He remembered that those two symbols appeared eight times in the original unsolved puzzle.
He set out once more, visiting the places corresponding to the cells with those symbols, and collected them. He had long deduced that they could be gathered using Soul Essence.
After collecting those pieces, he returned to the locations of the unresolved cells.
He placed the two stones into each unresolved cell.
As soon as he finished, a flash erupted.
The sky, once empty, revealed three hanging moons and countless stars.
The entire world trembled for a moment — then He Fan disappeared.
When he opened his eyes in an unfamiliar world, he was stunned.
He had succeeded.
The puzzle itself wasn't hard — the difficulty lay in hiding it from the Immortals.
All he needed to do was solve it, for the four unsolved cells represented locations, and all the possible symbols valid within the solution were keys.
He had to collect keys from different cells, which otherwise held no purpose, and place them in the corresponding locations.
From each location, he obtained a token.
They were four Orders — Spatial Order, Temporal Order, Soul Order, and Elemental Order.
Initially, the tokens repelled one another. But the moment he gathered all four, they began to merge. The instant they united, the phenomenon occurred.
He was forcefully drawn into this strange world —
The Inheritance left behind by the Timeless Demon God.
The "Fake" Inheritance.
One of the shining moons in the vast sky!
From the remnants of the Timeless Demon God's Inheritance, destiny began to stir once more.
In that moment, the path of the First Emperor was set — one day, He Fan would walk it.
This was the beginning of the path of the First Emperor of the Divine Spirit World.