Two weeks later...
Heavenly Luo Sect
Inner Court.. District 50
The inner court was bustling with activity. Disciples moved to and fro, some sparring on constructed arenas, others cultivating and practicing calligraphy under trees. The entire court was serene and peaceful.
However, in one beautiful antique looking room in the lodgings, a crack in space shimmered with purplish blue web like tears in the air, a mutilated, naked figure dropped out of the tear in space, wheezing and coughing his lungs out. Gojo. Continuing the suicidal and maniacal training of the Voidforge Titan Physique finally left the training dimension after a whole week.
He looked unrecognisable, his flesh, if what that could be called was mutilated beyond repair, the only thing that had not been cut apart were the six eyes that shone with incredible power. He dragged his bloody up, and forced himself to sit despite the pain, and once he did, the healing factor of his physique activated. The sharp jagged cuts that ran across his entire body disappeared, healing almost instantly, as he let out pained groans. After about a minute, Gojo was back to full health and he sighed deeply. After breaking through to the third layer, the Voidforge Physique had stagnated. The reason why he had forced himself through this masochism for a whole week was to try and improve his physique but to no avail. There was not even the slightest increase in his strength even after days of getting torn apart by the spatial storms.
'Could it be that the next level would require an even more harsh training than I'm already undergoing?' He thought as he picked up a towel and wiped the blood. What could possibly be harsher and more gruesome than getting cut and torn apart by dimensional shards. Gojo couldn't help but facepalm. With this setback, his strength should stagnate for a while, but no, he had a backup.
It was time to study the Great Divination Scripture that he had put off for so long. He was still half naked, dressed in a pair of tattered pants. He sought deep into his consciousness, materializing a tattered, rolled up scroll in hand. Gojo's eyes shone for a moment. The scroll exuded a strange glow that made it look divine, as if it should not be touched or handled by mortal hands.
As he slowly unfolded it, his eyes shone, seeing the unraveling of a new world. One that he had never experienced. His consciousness was transported to a small temple, in the middle of the galaxy there, an otherworldly monk sat reciting sutras and holding karmic beads. In his right hand, he held golden runic Sanskrit like words that shimmered with an ephemeral glow. Reality seemed to bend around these writings, and from it, Gojo could see something he should not. It was as if time itself was subject to those runic letterings.
The next moment, Gojo was transported to a battlefield, where the same monk stood, garbed in reality itself. Above him a monstrous, planet sized golden eye raged at him. With one final stare, the monk seemed to sense Gojo's across multiple planes of reality and then he turned to him...
"To wield fate is to bear the wrath of Heaven, but to master it is to stand above even the gods." A thunderous voice resounded as the monk turned his gaze towards Gojo, and his consciousness was catapulted from the middle of the galaxy back into his body.
'Huff!' He sucked in air, as if his lungs weren't responding. It took a while for him to stabilise his mental. Cold sweat formed on his face which he wiped off and then proceeded to lay down for a moment.
"The fuck am I getting myself into..." He whispered, gasping, as his chest heaved up and down. After more than 20 minutes, he finally sat up, gathered all his resolve and then reopened the scroll. This time, he wasn't transported to any dimension, instead, he saw the golden runic wordings that the monk grasped flow through the runic letterings of the scroll.
Just reading through the first few lines of the scroll left Gojo unable to close his mouth. After a few seconds of registering what he had just read, he let out a boisterous laugh. The Great Divination Scripture was not a battle technique. Far from that,
The Great Divination Technique was an ancient and enigmatic art of foresight and past sight, said to predate even the oldest cultivation sects. Unlike ordinary divination methods that rely on astrology, omens, or spirit communication, this technique taps into the fabric of fate itself, allowing the practitioner to glimpse into time itself with unparalleled clarity.
He read through, with rapt attention. The technique was created by a mysterious sage who once peered into the destiny of the cosmos and saw a catastrophe so great that it would end all cultivation. In an attempt to alter fate, he devised this technique, but the act of creating it erased his existence from history, his name, deeds, and legacy forgotten, leaving only the technique behind.
Gojo gasped in shock. That mysterious sage must've been that monk whom he had seen on the battlefield against that massive golden eye of Heaven.
Mastering the Great Divination Scripture was no simple feat. According to the scroll, mastery was not purely based on Yuan power, but requires an alignment with the Dao of Fate, the power that governs all causality. He paused for a moment and frowned when he read the last part. The technique is forbidden because the burden of knowing too much about the future could lead to insanity, misfortune, or worse attracting the wrath of the Heavenly Will, which despises interference with destiny.
He paused again. Cultivating this forbidden scripture would put him at risk of getting killed or erased by the Heavenly Will, but did he care? No.
A cultivator practicing this technique must have...
1. An Unshackled Mind – The ability to endure cosmic truths without breaking.
2. A Fate-Sensitive Soul – A special spiritual constitution that resonates with karma and destiny... Gojo nodded. He had the six eyes that could process information like a supercomputer and the Voidforge Titan Physique and bloodline that was naturally attuned towards dimensions. Though he wasn't sure about the latter.
3. A Willing Sacrifice – Each use of the technique demands a price: lifespan, cultivation, memories, or even the destiny of loved ones.
Gojo thought for a moment and he understood. Gleaning information or discerning heavenly secrets came at a price. Hopefully these prices were reasonable for him otherwise, he wouldn't even bother...
He shrugged and continued thorough the scroll, and then for about a minute, he paused and then laughed. The original Great Divination Scripture was divided into nine levels, but this fragment of the technique only had four of it.
Heaven's Mirror Gaze – The cultivator's eyes reflect fate itself, allowing them to glimpse brief visions of the past. Threads of Causality – The ability to see karma lines between people, objects, and events, predicting cause-and-effect relationships. Divine Omen Manifestation – Summons a celestial revelation that directly imparts knowledge about a specific event, but at great cost. Fate Rewriting (Forbidden) – The most dangerous aspect of the technique. With immense sacrifice, a cultivator can alter fate itself, but doing so invites Heavenly Tribulation of unimaginable magnitude.
Gojo had to laugh at the absurdity of it all. The technique was literally going to turn him into a Time Sage. The technique was so overpowered it was scary. As he let his mind wander, he couldn't help but think about the applications and the abilities he would gain, it was mind blowing.
The first level was the Heaven's Mirror Gaze, which when cultivated would grant him eyes that can see brieflg into the past. This was tailor fit for him considering he already had overpowered eyes.
The second stage, causality would allow him to see karmic lines and predict probability. Now whether he could manipulate this probability was unknown, but that would be too overpowered wouldn't it? The stage stage, the Divine Omen Manifestation would allow him to summon celestial revelations and knowledge from Heaven's Will.
'I'm literally going to become one of those seers and prophets..This is insane..' He thought to himself. As for the final level, Gojo didn't even want to read the information listed there.
It is said that the complete Great Divination Technique had nine layers of mastery, but only fragments remain in various sects. Some forbidden texts hint at an ultimate form: "The Absolute Fate Transcendence", where one is no longer bound by destiny but instead becomes an entity beyond time itself. However, no known cultivator has ever reached this realm.
He nodded. And turned a page, to the first level, the Heaven's Mirror Gaze, he calmed himself and crossed his legs to focus. 'A divine level under the Great Divination Scripture, Heaven's Mirror Gaze allows the cultivator to peer into the reflected past, glimpsing truths lost in time, particularly events tied to locations, items, or individuals. It's an observational and truth seeking ability that does not alter the past but brings clarity to it.' He nodded calmly.
He read downwards seeing the cultivation mantra for the Heaven's Mirror Gaze, but things weren't as simple as he thought. The cultivate those eyes, he needed to align his mind, soul and spirit with the astral plane of Heaven. This was the most important step in the entire Scripture and it marked beginning the journey as a Sage.
The Astral Synchronization Ritual was to be done under a full moon, by reciting the mantra within the scroll along with two natural treasures of Heaven and Earth known as the Moonlight Silver Incense and the Heaven Divination Mirror. The only problem was, Gojo had absolutely no idea what those two were, and from the way the scroll was describing it, those treasures were absolutely essential in cultivating the technique as a whole. Without them, he could forget about cultivating the Great Divination Scripture and becoming a Sage.