Chapter 53: When Fortune Favours, Heaven and Earth Lend Their Strength

A trace of white fortune, slight as a drop in the ocean, fell upon Ye Chen—and yet it set off a profound upheaval within his sea of destiny.

The so-called sea of destiny was the place where the fortune of living beings manifested itself. There, destiny revealed its shape: some fortunes rose like canopies, with dragon and tiger interwoven; some stretched on like mountain ranges; some became jade pillars, towering into the heavens.

Yet within Ye Chen’s sea of destiny, there yawned a hollow void, bringing him an endless sense of emptiness. It was the mark of a missing core in his life, the sign of an inborn fate that was incomplete. Any sliver of fortune that gathered there would immediately leak away through that void, dispersing into the world as glimmering mist.

This turn of events had been entirely beyond Ye Chen’s expectations. Only after he gained some understanding of the way of fortune could he discern such things; otherwise, even in death, he might never have caught so much as the faintest trace.

Ye Chen fell into thought and lowered his gaze to the ice mirror.

Within the mirror rippled surging tides of scarlet, with billowing white radiance mixed into the crimson current, spreading in all directions.

Amid it all stood a single purple bamboo, upright and graceful.

“So there is no place for me in this world.”

“Even my fate is flawed. Those born with defective destiny never live long.”

“This is loathed by heaven and earth alike; it is a killing of vitality, with no road to life.”

“And yet, by some strange stroke of chance, I have actually found a thread of hope.”

Ye Chen felt the absurdity of fate, and upon thinking of it now, could not help but find it both laughable and tragic.

As his understanding of the Fortune-Reading Art deepened, more and more insights rose within him.

This brought him a wholly new perception. He was no longer as ignorant as before, but the more one knew, the less certain it was to be a blessing.

“Is this purple bamboo going to become my fate pattern, the pillar by which I stand in heaven and earth?”

Ye Chen watched as the purple bamboo had already melted away by more than half, strands of purple light entangling it. The tide-like fortune gathered into a torrent before him, forming a swift whirlpool.

As the whirlpool turned, energy accumulated within it, undergoing some incredible transformation.

He could also see a spirit butterfly entrenched in the sea of fortune. At first it seemed extremely frail; though it had landed on the bamboo branch, it looked as if it might dissipate at any moment.

The purple bamboo broke apart, and at the same time there condensed a fate pattern belonging solely to Ye Chen.

“I seized that purple bamboo. It seemed like a trivial matter, but it actually had such consequences.”

Ye Chen was not wholly ignorant. In his heart, he understood that the purple bamboo in this bamboo grove itself represented a certain measure of fortune.

It ought to have been the opportunity for the spirit bamboo totem—a chance for the spirit bamboo to transform and take another step forward.

Following the original course of destiny, it was easy to see that the Bamboo Tribe would receive a heaven-sent fortune. The one to gain the black flood dragon fate pattern might have been a shaman, or perhaps the tribe chief.

No, it could also have been someone else.

Ye Chen’s thoughts stirred, and he thought of Ya.

Ya possessed fortune of his own, and had already stepped into the realm of the extraordinary ahead of others. His own destiny exceeded that of most people in the Bamboo Tribe—so could it be that Ya had been born in response to destiny?

If Ya obtained that black flood dragon fate pattern, it would surely bring yet another series of changes, gradually guiding the Bamboo Tribe toward growth and prosperity.

“If everything had followed the original path, and I had not interfered, then Ya might have achieved great things.”

“The Bamboo Tribe would have suffered a severe blow. It looked like some kind of blood sacrifice, and the many changes in this dried-up well may have been caused only after the tribe endured such grave losses.”

“Seen this way, that blood sacrifice had already been anticipated by the upper ranks of the Bamboo Tribe. So all those deaths were merely to elevate one person?”

“Besides Ya, that spirit bamboo totem would also have to devour the purple bamboo, thereby completing its own fortune.”

“Hmm? It seems I overlooked something. The spirit bamboo totem might be able to swallow the purple bamboo with ease, but inheriting that fortune may not be so simple.”

The deeper Ye Chen delved into the Fortune-Reading Art, the more clearly he understood that the path of destiny was unfathomable and wondrous beyond belief. Fortune could not be shifted casually.

When a person died, they turned to ash; when fortune dispersed, decline followed in an instant.

Fortune was the prerogative of heaven.

When one’s time arrived, even heaven and earth would lend their strength; when fortune departed, heroes had no freedom. To seize control of the changes in fortune was to usurp heaven’s authority, and thus incur its dread.

“Unless the purple bamboo and the spirit bamboo totem share the same origin.”

“That is not impossible. If all of this was calculated by the ancestors of the Bamboo Tribe, then they could not have failed to consider that.”

Ye Chen did not intend to pursue the matter further. In any case, whether it was the purple bamboo or the spirit bamboo totem, both were already dead and thoroughly cold. What was the use of arguing with the dead?

Feeling the subtle marvel of his own changing fortune, Ye Chen watched as that spirit butterfly emerged from illusion and gradually became real.

It represented his fate pattern. Though it appeared to be merely a palm-sized butterfly, from time to time its entire body bathed in flowing radiance, transforming into a surging river.

Beside Ye Chen, it was as if a great river had begun to encircle him.

Within that river, ripples shone and waves burst into bloom one after another.

Then, with a crack, the entire purple bamboo fell into that river. It vanished without a trace, and in its place clusters of violet halos burst forth, exploding like multicolored clouds descending from heaven and earth.

The rainbow-tinted glow sank into the water and soaked into his destiny, giving rise to a transformation. The whole river channel seemed to be dyed a blazing red.

“The fate pattern is nearly formed.”

Ye Chen’s heart stirred.

This was the fate pattern born from the seized fortune of the purple bamboo. Though it was transformed from foreign fortune, it was completely under Ye Chen’s control, and thus very different from the black flood dragon fate pattern.

At the very least, with this fate pattern, Ye Chen need not fear backlash.

Of course, in that case, the gap between it and the black flood dragon fate pattern remained obvious.

Ye Chen could not simply let the black flood dragon fate pattern go. Compared with that, the fate pattern now taking shape within him seemed insignificant, almost meaningless.

But that was not so.

If Ye Chen himself lacked sufficient weight, then being constrained by the black flood dragon fate pattern would be only natural.

But if Ye Chen possessed deep foundations, extraordinary fortune, and a noble fate, then even if a black flood dragon entered his destiny, the suppression—and even the backlash—it produced would be much less severe.

Lowering his gaze, Ye Chen looked toward the void realm. There, the black flood dragon was still locked in a desperate struggle with Ning Peach Blossom.

Strangely enough, Ning Peach Blossom drew so much hatred that the black flood dragon seemed to regard him as a sworn enemy.

The black flood dragon’s scales were broken piece by piece, blood and flesh were mangled, and blood kept dripping down, making for a truly miserable sight.

Ning Peach Blossom also looked badly injured, yet Ye Chen did not dare to underestimate him in the slightest.

Good heavens, this Ning Peach Blossom was hiding his true strength very deeply. In the battle against the black flood dragon, it was the dragon that had fallen into the disadvantage.

If not for the faint connection between the black flood dragon and this underground world, which allowed its fortune to flow without end, and if that bond could not be severed, the dragon would probably have been defeated long ago—even if it did not die.

And even so, Ning Peach Blossom had already smashed the dragon’s head apart several times, leaving the black flood dragon with what was practically a psychological scar.

Yet the black flood dragon was truly stubborn, refusing to retreat at all. That left Ning Peach Blossom rather vexed.

This was exactly the kind of situation Ning Peach Blossom feared most. It was maddening: impossible to kill, impossible to drive back, so pigheaded that it insisted on fighting to the bitter end, steadily wearing him down until he could no longer hold on.

No good. No good at all. Ning Peach Blossom was starting to fail.