Swallowing the Stars: Only in my later years did I come to the life-spending panel.

Just then, a holographic projection suddenly unfolded in front of Zhou Mu.

Babata appeared, her purple eyes wide open, her small mouth slightly agape, as if she had seen a ghost.

"Zhou Mu!"

Babata's voice changed completely, "Was that you just now? Your domain covers the entire globe?! Are you crazy?"

Zhou Mu laughed and said, "What's wrong? Did I scare you?"

"Did you scare me?"

Babata screamed, waving her slender hands wildly in the air, "Do you know what the Meteorite Star's detectors just showed?"

"Nine Levels of Domain!"

"The entire Earth is covered in a deep purple light! I thought a realm lord had descended upon Earth!"

She leaned closer to the holographic projection, staring intently at Zhou Mu, her eyes filled with disbelief.

"How long has it been since you broke through to the planetary level? A year? Two years?"

"A domain at the ninth level of perfection? And it can cover an entire planet?!"

Babata's voice grew increasingly shrill, "Do you know what this means? The domain of an ordinary peak level nine domain lord is barely ten thousand kilometers!"

"Your field of expertise is comparable to a global projection system?!"

Zhou Mu said calmly, "It's just good luck."

"Just lucky?"

Babata rolled his eyes, his long, silvery-white hair puffing up like a cat's fur. "You call this good luck? I've followed my master for so many years and seen countless geniuses, but I've never seen anyone at the planetary level cultivate their domain to the ninth level of perfection!"

"Never!"

She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down, but her eyes were still filled with shock.

"Zhou Mu, what kind of monster are you?"

Zhou Mu did not answer, but leaned back in his chair and looked out at the lights of thousands of homes.

The moonlight was like water, and the Milky Way was dazzling.

Babata stared at him for a long time, then suddenly sighed.

"Never mind, I won't ask anymore."

"Anyway, you've been acting strange from the very first time you showed up."

She paused, her tone becoming serious, "But I must remind you, there are still a few ruins on Earth that planetary-level beings cannot resolve."

Zhou Mu nodded: "I know."

Babata glanced at him again, and her figure began to become transparent.

"By the way, Luo Feng is about to break through. When you come back, please give him some pointers."

The holographic projection dissipates.

Zhou Mu leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and felt an unprecedented power.

He then focused his gaze on another line of characters on the panel.

[Insights into the Laws: An Introduction to the Laws of Lightning (10%)]

Zhou Mu's gaze gradually deepened.

"Continue the simulation!"

Without hesitation, he ordered, "Panel, consuming fifteen million lifespans, deduce the laws of lightning!"

The moment he finished speaking, a mysterious and terrifying force engulfed him.

Zhou Mu's consciousness was dragged into that sea of ​​lightning.

But unlike before, this time time has begun to distort.

A thousand years...

a thousand years......

One hundred thousand years...

Millions of years...

Every bolt of lightning that strikes the soul brings a long period of enlightenment.

That wasn't a momentary understanding, but a genuine immersion in it, spending year after year pondering, experiencing, and integrating it.

Zhou Mu felt as if he had transformed into that eternal thunderbolt, traversing the void for millions of years.

He watched stars being born and destroyed, civilizations rising and falling, and the river of time flowing slowly beneath his feet...

A million years passed, and his consciousness began to fade.

Those once clear memories—the smiles of family members, the words of friends—have begun to become distant and blurry, as if they happened in a past life.

He even began to doubt his own movement technique, wondering if he was Zhou Mu or the lightning bolt wandering in the void.

Five million years...

Eight million years...

Zhou Mu's consciousness drifted in the river of time, his memories like faded paintings, each one becoming blurry.

He remembered that his name was Zhou Mu, but with the passage of time, that name had become unfamiliar, like a symbol belonging to someone else.

He remembered that he had family and disciples, but he could no longer picture their faces in his mind.

Nine million years...

Ten million years...

Zhou Mu's soul trembled in the torrent of time.

He began to lose sight of reality and illusion, and of the past and the present.

The years spent in the sea of ​​lightning felt so real, while the decades spent on Earth felt like a fleeting dream.

who am I?

where am I?

How long have I existed?

These questions echoed in his empty mind, but there were no answers.

Fifteen million years...

As the final bolt of lightning struck the depths of his soul, Zhou Mu suddenly opened his eyes!

In that instant, the entire fighter jet was shaking violently!

Two deep purple bolts of lightning shot out from his eyes as if they were solid, piercing through the air in front of him and cutting through the bulkhead that could withstand the attack of a King-level monster as easily as a knife through butter, shooting into the boundless night sky.

The lightning around him surged wildly, no longer meandering gently, but roaring violently, as if trying to break free from his body and rush into the vast sky.

The fighter jet's alarm blared, and its intelligent silver-gray AI issued a warning: "An abnormal high-energy reaction has been detected inside the fighter jet. The energy intensity exceeds the safety threshold! The fighter jet is 5% damaged. Master, please remain calm!"

But Zhou Mu did not react at all.

He sat blankly in his chair, staring ahead with empty eyes, his mind a complete blank.

He forgot who he was.

Those ten million years were like a mountain, pressing down on his soul and crushing all his memories into fragments.

Those decades spent on Earth, within the span of ten million years, are as fleeting as a moment.

I don't know how much time has passed...

It might be a second, or it might be a century...

A blurry image suddenly surfaced from the depths of my memory.

It was a boy's smiling face. "Dad! Look, I've become a martial artist!"

That's... Po Jun?

One scene after another appeared...

"Amu, you've finally come to pick me up!"

The figure was so blurry, yet so clear; it was his long-deceased beloved, Ye Wan.

"Xiao Wan..."

Zhou Mu's eyes were no longer empty, and two streams of hot tears rolled down her cheeks.

More images flooded in like a tide, from blurry to clear, from fragments to complete.

All my memories have come back!

Zhou Mu closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled.

In that instant, he felt an unprecedented clarity.

At the same time, a strange feeling welled up from the depths of his soul.

In those millions of years of drifting through time, he was not only comprehending the laws of lightning, but also comprehending time itself.

Those long years allowed him to experience the essence of time for the first time: its passage, its weight, and its irreversibility.

So this is what time is.

Zhou Mu raised his right hand, a thought forming in his mind.

A nearly transparent ripple gently spreads across the fingertip.

The ripples were silent, yet they made the surrounding air seem to freeze, as if even the light slowed down.

[Consumes and plunders 1500 years of lifespan]

[Introduction to the Lightning Law (10%) → Mastery of the Lightning Law (80%)]

You have grasped the fundamental law of the higher realm: Time.

[Current level of understanding of the law: Introduction to the law of time (1%)]

[Remaining lifespan: 602,000 years]