The Heavens: A Qing, the Yue Girl at the beginning

"Because 'variables' always exist." Shi Yiguang's voice was calm, as if stating a theorem that had already been verified.

"But I didn't notice the trace of that variable."

At the top of the Tower of Babel, the king in the blood pool slowly spoke: "Indeed, her performance in countering and breaking the enemy's moves was much stronger than expected, exceeding my initial expectations. However, she is still powerless against the supreme power of the Destiny level and cannot be shaken in the slightest."

"To be honest, I originally thought that since you had already glimpsed the warp and weft of the loom of fate and knew the final destination of the weapons, you must have also prepared a wedge to nail down 'despair'. Now it seems that the wedge may exist, but it may not be found within the time limit."

"Two hundred and fifty days is as short as the last tremor of a candle before it goes out in the face of the life and death of a civilization."

"Like the dew of late autumn, it vanishes in an instant."

“Wedge…” Shi Yiguang repeated the word: “What you are referring to is some kind of external ‘force’ or ‘tool’ that is sufficient to resist or even counteract ‘time-based formatting’. For example, a sharper spear, a stronger shield, a higher priority power?”

“Isn’t that right?” The king’s voice sounded somewhat muffled in the ripples of the blood pool. “All struggles are nothing more than a contest of strength and skill. When skill is exhausted, only strength can be relied upon. This is an ironclad rule and an eternal truth.”

“Ironclad…” Shi Yiguang gently shook her head, “So, your conclusion is: she has no chance of winning, and we are just struggling in vain?”

The waters were calm, and the king's gaze remained as sharp as ever.

There's no need to deny that.

He spoke softly, his eyes reflecting countless complex calculations and deductions: "'Time-sequence formatting' is an irreversible erasure, a complete deletion of data, which cannot be reset even with 'backtracking'—therefore, it is rational to stop the damage as early as possible and prevent that area from expanding further."

"It has nothing to do with courage or belief; it's just that the more complete the 'original sample' is, the more solid the foundation for reconstruction will be."

"Let's abandon this battle for now... I will sacrifice this 'kingdom' to buy you at least a few more years."

The repeated use of terms like "250 days" and "time-series formatting" is clearly derived from Zhao Qingfang's message, intended for ease of understanding.

But the ten-day agreement had come to an end, and He seemed to have lost the motivation to continue telling the third story, especially when there was only Zhao Qing's agent in front of him.

Ultimately, it's because I felt she lacked something essential, that she lacked the most crucial "bargaining chip" for an equal bargaining position.

"A gambler without chips is doomed to fail; he is nothing more than dust in the cycle of fate."

Shi Yiguang suddenly smiled, a hint of shrewdness appearing in her eyes: "But is your judgment on whether this 'bargain' exists still confined to the old paradigm of cognition? Using all the yardsticks you are familiar with regarding 'time' and 'fate' to measure a... unprecedented new path?"

"A new road?"

"The so-called 'right path' of forging a 'spark' and fabricating time has failed countless times in the grinding of reincarnation... When you specifically told those two stories, weren't you telling us that this path is blocked and we need to find another way?"

The words had barely left his mouth.

Silence, long silence.

"How can a beam of one-dimensional light be transformed into two-dimensional or even three-dimensional light?" Shi Yiguang continued, providing the starting point for the explanation.

Wave-particle duality?

It was easy to think of the famous double-slit experiment. The pure white king, who, though living in seclusion, still paid attention to scientific development, thought for a moment and said, "By changing the phase and amplitude distribution of the photon wavefront through optical elements, we can change the spatial probability distribution of the possible occurrence of photons?"

"Then, what if we change the spatial probability to the temporal probability amplitude?" Shi Yiguang nodded: "Can an event that was originally one-dimensional and linear be elevated to a higher dimension and attain a status on the same level as fate?"

"To forge three-dimensional weapons using one-dimensional materials?"

……

Almost at the same time.

Zhao Qing listened to the sound of time crumbling, her heart as still as water.

"Cheers, huh..."

She spoke softly, radiating a warm, restrained, and seemingly timeless luminous glow, like jade emitting smoke.

The illusory shadows of the sun and moon rise and fall, while the brilliance of the starry sea shines brilliantly, like strings and rings, quickly weaving together to form a hazy and sacred cocoon of light.

Upon closer inspection, every star, large and small, is rotating along an extremely complex trajectory—a trajectory that closes in three-dimensional space, yet projects an illusion that transcends three dimensions.

It's as if they are simultaneously depicting countless overlapping rings, which are nested and connected to each other.

The sword intent drifted and spread with the light, constantly weaving and differentiating.

Before disappearing into the star projection, it was still a wisp, but when it leaped out, it decoupled into two parts, yin and yang separated, yet they were connected and intertwined.

Microwaves cannot quench the thirst, cold soaking for a day's worth of stars.

Using this method to multiply continuously, their numbers quickly reached tens of millions, trillions, and almost immeasurable.

This operation is extremely complex, but Zhao Qing had already figured it out when he mastered the "Starfire Sword Scripture," grasping the essence of true essence and the quantum entanglement state derived from intention, making it easy to use.

"My past sword intent and sword energy, no matter how subtle and profound, are essentially still one-dimensional events. Their birth, progress, arrival, eruption, and annihilation all lie on the macroscopic timeline."

"No matter how sharp and powerful it is, tearing through space, it is still a low-dimensional, thin stroke that can be easily erased in the face of a time entity like 'fate' which has an internal structure."

She calmly analyzed: "To counter 'temporal formatting,' my 'attack' must also have a 'structure' in the micro-temporal dimension."

"Let it no longer be a line on the timeline, but a surface, or even a volume. Let it also have its own 'intrinsic time,' its own 'texture of destiny,' and 'story of time.'"

A sword with a "time profile" and even a "time volume".

Only then can we sever the solidified fate and pierce the barrier of despair.

"...understanding the changing nature of heaven and earth, and valuing the constant adherence to the mechanism of change."

With a slight thought, Zhao Qing applied a differentiated "time flow rate" to this entangled sea of ​​sword intent.

Simply put, each individual wisp of sword intent is endowed with different factors such as speed, space, and temperature.

From extreme speed to extreme slowness, from birth to decay, from explosion to introversion... countless evolutionary states coexist, utilizing the time dilation effect of relativistic speed, Lorentz contraction of coiled dimensions, changes in spatial curvature, and quantum oscillations under thermodynamic imaginary time.

Within a single sword intent, there are hundreds of variations in the speed of time, like rivers from different eras flowing through the veins of a leaf.

Each micro-element of sword intent is like a particle thrown into a time maze, evolving along its own predetermined historical trajectory.

Regardless of their respective intrinsic time states, entanglement ensures that the quantum correlations of these diverging paths never fade.

This creates a two-dimensional structure between the global time coordinates and the local physical evolution, which is interwoven and encompasses the myriad temporal states of sword intent from its birth to its demise.

The one-dimensional sword intent flow has been upgraded to the "historical spectrum of sword intent".

“However, that’s not enough,” Zhao Qing said calmly.

She picked up the cloud of sword intent that rose and fell unevenly, and turned her gaze to the vast world beyond the halo, a world yet to be affected by the "formatting".

There, countless beings still breathe, still think, and still stoop forward on the loom of fate.

Even if they know nothing about it, even if they are immersed in despair or confusion.

Countless glimmers of consciousness flickered under the polar night sky, like billions of stars suspended in the dark universe.

Each one represents an unfulfilled obsession.

Humanity's confusion and choices, the dragons' perseverance and acceptance, the raven's gaze, the reindeer's fear, the Arctic tern's unfinished flapping of its wings before its death... all of these, the threads of fate that had not yet been swallowed up, were all seen by her at this moment, revealed in every detail.

“Since fate can be viewed as a ‘living time structure,’ then every consciousness, every segment of fate that has not yet been fully formatted, is a natural ‘time lens.’”

"Each of them carries its own unique causal karma, and has different 'refractive indices,' different 'focal lengths,' and different 'aberrations.'"

"What I need is a 'diffraction grating'."

"A 'diffraction grating' woven from countless lenses of fate, stretching across the dimension of time." "Sword, come—"

Zhao Qing clenched her five fingers loosely, and the two-dimensional sword intent spectrum containing the "entanglement of historical paths" was suddenly thrown into the invisible yet vast "diffraction field" composed of the fates of billions of living beings, splashing and staining it wantonly in all directions.

Strands of tangled and diverging sword intent began to flow through, sweep past, and traverse fragments of the destinies of different beings.

Like the morning light passing through a prism, dispersing into a rainbow of colors;

Just as polarized light produces an interference pattern when it passes through a series of waveplates.

As it passed through the farewell embrace of an old general and his colleagues, the heavy responsibility and the calm farewell applied a phase modulation of "cohesion" and "delay" to it.

When it swept past Xia Mi's resolute yet reluctant glance as she boarded the plane, its stubbornness for survival and its complex emotions about giving up left an indelible mark of "sharpness" and "refraction" on its wavefront distortion.

When it gently caressed the gaze of the elders at the monitoring station as they witnessed the extinction, a gaze mixed with awe, despair, and a sense of destiny was given a filter of "attenuation" and "diffusion".

When it touches a raven sent by Odin, looking down at the golden eyes of the altar of doom, the indifference and insight of the pure observer are given a touch of "penetration" and "analysis".

The Destiny Diffraction Grating is officially activated.

……

“The ‘Yin Jing Refining Body’ project is not just about forced rescue, making all of humanity discard their physical bodies and evacuate from Earth.”

Shi Yiguang sighed softly: "Under normal circumstances, an individual's fate is stagnant and difficult to interfere with the time wave function of sword intent. There is a barrier of 'self-evidence' that maintains the subjugation and the enforcement of the law."

"If one's inner light is contained within, it can only illuminate one's own courtyard; how can it then become a lens that reflects the vast universe?"

"But once you cultivate to the point of 'corpse dissolution immortality,' your senses will be detached, your consciousness will be empty, and you will be deeply integrated with the true qi body cultivated by Sister Qing. You will then attain the state of 'spirit entering qi, qi enveloping spirit,' where you will be in a state of 'life and will traveling together.' You will be still and silent, yet able to sense and communicate, and you will be able to passively open the boundaries of your alaya consciousness."

"It is not that it actively climbs up, but that once the barrier is removed, it naturally becomes so, like ice melting into water, flowing into the sea."

"Is this the Mahayana Buddhist principle of universal salvation? Is the principle based on the 'unobstructed Dharma realm,' where the Buddha-land is purified according to the purity of one's mind?" someone asked.

“From the beginning, we were inseparable; we went straight to the path of enlightenment,” she replied.

One word reveals the mystery.

If Shi Yiguang had not personally experienced and witnessed those days, she felt she could never have imagined that there was such a profound realm of swordsmanship in the world, a mind that is clear and serene, containing the ultimate in emptiness and wonder.

They would never believe that someone could comprehend all these principles in just a few days, see through the subtle and profound, cut through the illusions, and overcome and integrate all the seemingly contradictory obstacles into a unified whole.

Taking into account the recent turmoil and the multiple shockwaves, landslides, tsunamis, and the normal rate of birth, aging, illness, and death, the number of people whose consciousness has been uploaded, transformed into "ghost immortals," and guided to space is approximately one million.

This number doesn't seem like much.

Compared to the global population, it is but a drop in the ocean.

Therefore, Zhao Qing simply transformed them into relays. As soon as the sword intent entered his body, it spread out along the lines of cause and effect, falling on those beings who had had karmic connections with these people. Moreover, because it had undergone preliminary modification, it became easier to break through barriers, penetrate the defenses of consciousness, and resonate.

Lights reflect each other, mirroring and interpenetrating one another.

Those who share the same voice respond to each other; those who share the same spirit seek each other out.

Like a pebble thrown into a still lake, ripples spread outwards, reaching the distant shore.

Each "ghost immortal" is the initial pebble, while their relatives, lovers, enemies, close friends, enemies, and even strangers they only met once become the ripples on the water.

This is the true meaning of "self-salvation and helping others, perfect and unobstructed".

"On my side, there are a few teams similar to 'Corpse Dissection Immortals' that could potentially become part of this plan."

The voice on the other end lowered, as if conducting some kind of communication and authorization across a vast distance: "They were already dead, and Odin has taken them in in another form in the temples of Valhalla."

"The 'fate' of these heroic spirits has already been set, but because it is set, it can be regarded as an extremely stable and pure 'time lens'."

Shih Yi-kuang nodded slightly: "For a pure and stable observer, the boundary of fate is clearer, the 'all-encompassing nature' naturally diminishes, and the modulation characteristics as a 'diffraction unit' are more predictable. Thank you for your assistance."

"No thanks needed."

"Investing in the future is always better than clinging to the past, which will eventually fade into oblivion."

"The dust has settled, so how about a single spark ignites a prairie fire?" The voice paused. "Now, I eagerly await the moment. All of history converges into a single sword strike; what earth-shattering spectacle will it unleash?"

……

The sword intent is subtle as light, and the river of fate is like a mirror.

Just as the "Indra's Net" realm is expounded in the Ten Profound Gates of the Avatamsaka Sutra: "One pearl reflects a thousand lights, and a thousand lights capture one pearl."

Billions of distinct "fate indices" and billions of unique "time lens parameters" belonging to the conscious subject are subjected to bizarre "phase delays" and "amplitude modulations".

These modulations are by no means random interference.

Under Zhao Qing's vast and star-like mind, and on the foundation of the underlying network of connections established by "entangled historical paths," they began to engage in wondrous cooperation and interference.

They absorb and gather all the colors, weights, and echoes of fate they "experience" along the way. Specific wavefronts are strengthened, and specific wavefronts are weakened, ultimately projecting a clear, three-dimensional interference pattern in the far field, containing a new order.

However, the light here is the intent of swordsmanship; the diffraction grating here represents the unfinished destiny of all living beings; the interference pattern here will form something that transcends two dimensions and enters three dimensions—

The sword of time structure, the weapon embodying destiny.

It is a complex and indescribable "synchronic structure" woven together by countless consciousnesses' perception of the "present," their expectations for the "future," and their recollections of the "past."

This forms a new, orthogonal parameter dimension.

Therefore, the "state" of the sword intent micro-element is no longer described solely by the two coordinates of "its position on the macroscopic time axis (T)" and "its own internal evolutionary stage (τ)".

It also possesses a third coordinate: "the fate phase information (Φ) that it has reflected and carried."

An abstract yet real three-dimensional time parameter space, spanned by T (macroscopic time), τ (intrinsic time), and Φ (fate phase), has finally quietly taken shape.

The two-dimensional sword intent spectrum, which was originally spread out like clouds, began to fold inward and stretch outward, entwining and twisting, just like a self-growing, crystal-clear time fractal crystal.

Its blade is the sharp edge of countless phases of fate; its spine is the rigid framework formed by the entanglement of historical paths; its "sword guard" is Zhao Qing's true and unique self.

Sword intent, from then on, possessed a closed temporal volume.

It is no longer just "striking a sword at a certain moment".

It is "a sword strike simultaneously across all possible histories," a manifestation of a non-causal order within a three-dimensional time structure, a reflection of destiny's radiance cast upon the path of the sword.

It is simultaneously in the stages of birth, peak, and extinction.

It reflects the past, present, and future simultaneously.

It simultaneously embodies hope, despair, and a tranquility that transcends despair.

Zhao Qing opened his palm.

The invisible and formless "Time Crystal Sword," whose full form can only be glimpsed from a higher-dimensional perspective, gently fell into her palm, naturally emitting a mysterious tremor that felt like time flowing through her fingers, both otherworldly and present.

"So this is... the shape of time."

She raised her head and looked at the pale halo that was still silently expanding and devouring everything, gazing at the solidified, lonely darkness: "With sword in hand, you and I are now on the same battlefield."

...(End of chapter)