Chapter 1238: Perfect World

Months later, Bai Yuqiong returned to the Celestial Heavens, concealing her appearance, and quietly entered the Spirit Energy Transfer Bridge in the Southern Heavens. While traveling from the Primordial Realm back to the Celestial Heavens was time-consuming, the journey from the Celestial Heavens to the Southern Heavens was much easier. Qin Mu had spread the Spirit Energy Transfer Bridge technology across various realms, making travel convenient. It didn't take Bai Yuqiong long to arrive at the Southern Heavens.

The Southern Heavens was nominally under the dominion of the Red Emperor Qi Xiayu, with many heavens established there.

Bai Yuqiong first arrived at the Southern Heaven Continent, where Qi Xiayu's Celestial Palace was located. She transformed into a young maiden and traveled widely. Having learned much from her cunning battles with the Ghost Emperor, she conducted herself with great caution.

“Fire Heavenly Venerate has managed the Southern Heavens very well.”

After an initial tour, Bai Yuqiong saw that the people lived in peace and contentment, like a pastoral idyll. The populace showed no competitive spirit, and everywhere was a scene of harmony and joy. She couldn't help but feel pleased, and was somewhat dismissive of Qin Mu's actions.

“Heavenly Venerate Mu is indeed wrong; Fire Heavenly Venerate is right. The people here can live peacefully and safely, and can also cultivate to become divine abilities practitioners, or even human gods. This is a pure land. Heavenly Venerate Mu is too radical!”

She shook her head, intending to leave, but suddenly, as if by a strange impulse, she stopped, and continued her travels to observe the lives of the people.

“After all, my time here has been short. A cursory glance cannot reveal the true life of this world. Heavenly Venerate Mu must have extraordinary qualities to have achieved what he has. I need to stay a few more days to understand why he is so hostile towards Fire Heavenly Venerate.”

She calmed her mind, and observed the human civilization of the Southern Heavens with an outsider's perspective.

A few days later, her expression gradually grew solemn.

She witnessed the funerals of the human race in the Southern Heavens, and found them absurd and incomprehensible.

“However, Fire Heavenly Venerate must have a reason for doing this. After all, the demigod race is powerful now. For humans to live to sixty is already a rarity.”

She consoled herself. Such good fortune didn't exist in other heavens. She had once visited other heavens in the Primordial Realm, where people lived only forty or fifty years due to harsh living conditions, oppression, and slavery.

In comparison, many people in the Southern Heavens could live to sixty, and being sacrificed to demigods after sixty was considered a long life.

Of course, Yankang was an exception. Ordinary people in Yankang lived longer now. Due to better living conditions and the widespread practice of martial arts in their youth, there were more than a dozen eighty-year-olds in every village.

“Yankang is precarious, constantly on the verge of collapse. Naturally, the Southern Heavens is better!”

Bai Yuqiong also observed the education in the Southern Heavens. While she felt that the "three obediences and four virtues" and "three cardinal guides and five constant virtues" were somewhat amiss, such teachings ensured the populace wouldn't rebel. Without rebellion, there would be less suffering, which she found understandable.

She then witnessed the funerals of divine abilities practitioners.

If a divine abilities practitioner failed to become a god by the age of seven hundred, they would voluntarily sacrifice themselves to a demigod.

“That's also understandable.”

Bai Yuqiong murmured to herself, “Compared to other places, this is already very good. After all, human divine abilities practitioners here have a high status, and can cultivate peacefully without worrying about worldly affairs. If they can't become gods, they volunteer as sacrifices. They only have a century of lifespan left anyway…”

She also saw human gods. Here, there were no wars between human gods and demigods. Instead, there was peace. Gods attended feasts together, with no racial disputes, which was truly rare and commendable.

This was unlike other heavens.

In other heavens, human gods would fight against demigod deities because their people suffered injustice and hardship, leading to bloodshed.

“Fire Heavenly Venerate hasn't done anything wrong,” Bai Yuqiong murmured.

She then left the gathering of gods, and went to the mortal realm of the Southern Heavens. Everything seemed fine there. She could understand Fire Heavenly Venerate's benevolent intentions, yet it all felt somewhat artificial to her.

However, she couldn't pinpoint exactly where the artificiality lay.

She entered a small town, planning to rest there briefly before leaving the Southern Heavens. However, she discovered a strange phenomenon in this town: there were tens of thousands of human residents, yet not a single one was a divine abilities practitioner!

This was almost impossible.

While becoming a divine abilities practitioner required aptitude, it wasn't difficult after so many years of development.

Bai Yuqiong inquired carefully. An old man, sitting on a field ridge, openly picking lice, told her: “Our ancestors weren't divine abilities practitioners, so naturally, neither are our descendants. Divine abilities practitioners all belong to powerful clans, families descended from the Dragon Han era a million years ago. Who among them would be willing to marry an ordinary person?”

Bai Yuqiong was stunned, then laughed. “Can't ordinary people become divine abilities practitioners? You can also open Divine Treasures and establish Celestial Palaces. Let alone divine abilities practitioners, it's even possible to cultivate to become gods!”

The old man hurriedly said, “You mustn't say such things! Young lady, are you from out of town? To speak like that is rebellious and blasphemous! The divine abilities practitioner lords are born with divine rights, they are constellations from the heavens, destined to be superior from birth!”

Bai Yuqiong was aghast.

The old man continued, “We who do manual labor are destined to be laborers for life, cultivating crops. Our ancestors, generation after generation, were destined to be farmers. How could we dare to hope to become divine abilities practitioner lords?”

“But…”

Bai Yuqiong opened her mouth, but no words came out.

In the early Dragon Han era, Heavenly Venerate Yu, Heavenly Venerate Hao, and the other Seven Heavenly Venerates developed the Divine Treasure cultivation system, allowing ordinary people to open their own Divine Treasures and become divine abilities practitioners.

Yet, somehow, divine abilities practitioners in the Southern Heavens had become established clans, passing down seven great Divine Treasures to their descendants. They were exalted, holding innate divine rights.

Families whose ancestors were not divine abilities practitioners, no matter how talented their descendants might be, could not become divine abilities practitioners, and were unable to escape a lifetime of being confined to the fields!

However, the Seven Heavenly Venerates developed Divine Treasures precisely to allow ordinary people to master power and become divine abilities practitioners!

Why were the destinies of the people here fixed for all generations?

Why was it that if an ancestor was an ordinary person, their descendants would never have a chance to rise?

“This Southern Heavens is a pool of stagnant water, so still that not a single ripple can be stirred!”

Fear arose in Bai Yuqiong's heart. Although she hadn't awakened her Vermilion Bird divine soul, she still remembered the Dragon Han era from over a hundred lifetimes ago, when ordinary people could open their own Divine Treasures and become divine abilities practitioners, and the descendants of ordinary people could also become gods!

Even if ancestors weren't capable, intelligent descendants had the potential to rise!

But Fire Heavenly Venerate's Southern Heavens offered no such possibility!

“Those divine abilities practitioner clans are no longer human! Those human gods are no longer human either! They and ordinary humans are completely two different species, because they live in completely different worlds!”

Bai Yuqiong's mind was in turmoil. What Fire Heavenly Venerate did was clearly right: not teaching the methods to open Divine Treasures and establish Celestial Palaces, allowing ordinary people to be content with their current state. They accepted the three cardinal guides, five constant virtues, three obediences, and four virtues. They had no power or desire to resist.

Letting divine abilities practitioners become powerful clans, controlling power, they, as those in power, wouldn't resist either.

The demigods had enough “food” and didn't want to change any of it!

Everything here was so perfect, appallingly perfect!

Bai Yuqiong cried out, and fled the Southern Heavens, frantically escaping back to the Celestial Heavens.

The Southern Heavens stifled her.

Although she knew she was the reincarnation of Southern Emperor Vermilion Bird, having been reborn as a human for nearly two hundred lifetimes, she had always regarded herself as human.

The current state of the Southern Heavens filled her, as a human, with some dread.

At this point, she decided to visit Yankang.

She arrived in Yankang.