novelsmap Chapter 1538 - 788: Who Is Righteous, Who Is Evil_3
Chapter 1538 - 788: Who Is Righteous, Who Is Evil_3
Other than the three Holy Fools, no one can ignore the shackles of the Lock.
What's more, if he jumps out now, he'll be facing Heavenly Furnace, the one closest to the Realm of General Control in the present world! That bastard is also the Lock's administrator, a permissions dog through and through, who loves nothing more than using the Lock to target people.
If he slips up and gets caught, never mind winning or losing—whether Elder Anvil will even still exist afterward is another question entirely!
Besides, he's not the one who should be anxious right now!
He's already seized the initiative!
"Say it straight, Old Deng."
Heavenly Furnace shook his head, glancing at the scene before him: "You went to all this trouble and scheming—what's the point? Don't tell me it's just to blow up a latrine so you You Sui lot can have something to drink to?"
"Hm? Isn't everything I've done laid out in the open?"
Elder Anvil feigned puzzlement, not hiding a thing, looking straight at Heavenly Furnace with a frank, mocking smile: "Of course it's for what you long to do yet cannot do…
Of course it's for that which you Embers cherish most—[Change]!
Shouldn't the Association be giving it full support?"
"Change? Where is this 'change'?"
Heavenly Furnace shot back: "Are you going to tell me that Mutants are also change, that deterioration also counts as transformation?"
"If Ascension is the starting point of Alchemy, how is descent not to be counted?"
Elder Anvil's hunched frame slowly straightened, standing tall, his joking gone, asking sternly: "Is today's mutation something I created?
This world has sunk to this state—its sin lies with Tian Yuan, with White Deer, with Ascension, with the Ruins, with the crimes of the Federation Empire… but the true culprits, are they not you good-for-nothing Embers!"
"Even when the Heavenly Origin Pillar collapsed, the world still had the possibility of change. And before the Association was founded, which Ember Chosen ever deigned to call themselves a craftsman?
You Grandmasters perched on high—why don't you dare tell those craftsmen that the way they are now is precisely what the Association deliberately shaped?
The hidden danger in the Association today was buried by your own hands!
And the original instigators—are they not you Heavenly Furnaces?"
Self-imprisoned in the Net, distorting Heavenly Destiny.
You turned the Ember-chosen into craftsmen, steeped in technique day and night, while the Ember's Transformation itself vanished without a trace.
So that ever since, every Ember in the world seeks craft more than change… causing the Realm of Decay to thrive and expand at high speed, dragging every craftsman in the Association into downfall without even realizing it!"
"You Sui still churns and renews itself, so why has the Association become a pool of dead water? Where is your Transformation? Where is your passing of the torch?"
Elder Anvil laughed loudly, mocking as he asked: "Set aside this so‑called difference between good and evil—between you and me right now, who is Zhi Fu, and who is Ember?"
"Set the physiological differences aside—how are you any different from a dog?"
Heavenly Furnace yawned, unmoved. "Nice patter. How long did you save that line up? Even your fart's on beat now?"
"I already said, stop playing word games. The Association's existence follows its own Way—what right and wrong is there to split hairs over?
You Sui renews itself?
You sound like you're trying to make me laugh!
Save that line for when you yourself get replaced!
The ones below keep tearing each other apart, using themselves as fertilizer to feed you old fossils up top, who never change for ten thousand years. After you eat until oil drips from your mouths, you still have the nerve to bark.
Even if the Association does nothing, what achievements are there in that rotten quagmire you lot made?"
"And how do you know high-rises can't be raised on rotten soil? In the mire, trash will naturally sink, but true talent—how can that be erased?"
Elder Anvil raised his head in pride: "Since All Things Self-transform, let's see what this world will make of itself!"
As he spoke, the Flame of Decay roared higher.
Right before Heavenly Furnace's eyes, the colossal pillar made of countless mutant constructs solidified once more, like a seed, taking root in the present world.
He no longer hid his intentions: using the collected decline of the entire present world as a foundation, he began to refine the Transformation of Good and Evil…
By this, the essence of Zhi Fu would seep into Ember, turning part of the Embers in this world into Zhi Fu as well; when that time comes, the Abyss Well of You Sui will naturally Anchor itself onto the present world!
What he sought wasn't even the achievement before him.
He wanted to pour the essence of Zhi Fu, the gift of Great Evil, back along the Ember and spill it over every craftsman!
And even more, on that basis, to gradually replace the Association with You Sui, and Ember with Zhi Fu… until finally, he fully overturns and reverses Great Evil and the Superior.
However long it's destined to take, however hard it's destined to be, there's no denying that under Elder Anvil's lead, You Sui has once again taken this step.
After a long dormancy, they're finally baring their fangs at that lofty Association!
And so, the faintly mocking, drifting smile on Heavenly Furnace's face slowly disappeared.
His face went blank.
You really dare, you motherless sons of bitches.
"No room to talk?"
"No room to talk."
Elder Anvil answered without hesitation: "If good and evil are one, how is Ember any greater than Zhi Fu? If they spring from the same source, why must the Association be superior to You Sui?
I'd very much like to ask—why can't You Sui be the orthodoxy?"
"Fine, then we fight."
Heavenly Furnace nodded: "Once four hundred years ago, once two hundred years ago. If you still won't give up, after all these years, it's about time we fought again…"
He asked solicitously, "Got enough arms and wings? Need me to give you more time to prepare?"
"No need. Since this is You Sui's work, it will naturally be achieved by You Sui alone. Why let others get in the way?"
Elder Anvil sneered. "Taiyi Ring can call in friends if it likes. I wouldn't mind things getting even livelier."
"Good!"
Heavenly Furnace clapped, itching for action: "Then please wait a bit while I go drag those old coots—Heavenly Governor Earth Emperor's Remnant Book Mirage Holy Blessing and the rest—over here!"
In the brief pause, he glanced at Elder Anvil's utterly unchanged face and gave a scornful smile: "What are you acting for?
If I really said that, you think you could still sit here, old man?"
"I wouldn't mind."
Elder Anvil also smiled, as if he truly didn't care.
Or rather, as if he had nothing to fear.
A craftsman's mouth never speaks the truth—just like Power Armor doesn't come with a rear-view mirror.
Since when did saying 'there isn't' really make it so?
But by the same token, no matter what you say, sometimes when there isn't, there just isn't!
Heavenly Furnace understood, and Elder Anvil understood, and every craftsman understood—once you come out as a craftsman, you can throw away your face, flip the table, and ignore the rules!
But before that, the first thing you must cut away is the arrogance in your own heart!
Faced with this challenge that will decide who is orthodox, no craftsman will ever choose a second option.
Who the fuck do you think you are?!
——I need to call people to beat you?
Never mind calling people—even if others want to butt in, you tell them to get lost, stay out of the way!
Call it wild arrogance or call it self-confidence and composure; there's never been a difference between the two. Whether it's essence or dregs, it's just two faces of the same thing. This is the original sin and the virtue rooted deepest in a craftsman's soul.
And any who reach great heights—who among them isn't like this? Without absolute confidence in your own talent, how could you ever achieve anything?
Ember is like this; so is Zhi Fu. The Association is like this; so is You Sui.
The starting point of everything is the craftsman's thirst for victory and defeat, for superiority and inferiority, for strength and weakness!
What Heavenly Furnace and Elder Anvil, the Association and You Sui, have jointly decided at this moment can even be called an absolutely rational choice.
Otherwise, victory and defeat become meaningless; there's no way to distinguish high from low, strong from weak.
"Then let's begin again!"
Heavenly Furnace let out a cold laugh, proclaiming to heaven, sea, and all phenomena: "Let this be the beginning, and likewise the End. Let the hundred-year duel between the Association and You Sui, Ember and Zhi Fu, rise again!"
Elder Anvil raised his hand.
Phantom and phantom clapped their hands together in oath, fixing a pact that neither put in their eyes, yet neither would ever break.
Craftsmen kill craftsmen; peers kill peers!
From here on, openly and uprightly, by any means necessary, bright and aboveboard, shameless and despicable, they will decide victory and defeat!
Whoever loses is Zhi Fu; whoever wins is Ember!