by <unknown>
"Therefore, I need to hear your opinion. I hope that you can make a decision for me!
"Honey, if you too think that I'm the most suitable candidate, I will join the mission, but if you don't think I should go, we can go to the professor right now and decline the mission!"
Ding Lingdang heaved the rays of sunlight in her hands to her face. Staring at her husband through the brilliance, she chuckled. "I get to make the call? You are so obedient?"
"Of course!" Li Yao clapped his hands. "Happy wife, happy life!"
"Very well, then," Ding Lingdang said with a smile. "Now, I can formally, gravely, and seriously tell you that, if what you said just now are all your reasons, I don't want you to go!"
"Huh?" Li Yao was dumbfounded.
"What? Did you think that I would agree because I should understand the importance of the big picture?" Ding Lingdang sniffed and poked Li Yao's chest hard. "In fact, I think that Professor Mo Xuan was quite right about one thing. Li Yao, don't overestimate yourself. The world can run normally every day without any individual, can't it? Why do you have to show off and solve every conundrum in person?
"Are Professor Mo Xuan, Brother Guo Chunfeng, or any other Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators who have done intensive training really not as good as you and absolutely incapable of such a mission? Are you that awesome?
"Chances are that they will accomplish the mission even better than you will!
"As for the vacancy after they leave, it is even less of a problem. I don't believe that we can't find two people who are suitable to be the director of the Secret Sword Bureau or the president of the Refiners' Association when the population of the Heaven's Origin Sector, the Flying Star Sector, and the Blood Demon Sector is already tens of billions!"
Ding Lingdang was poking Li Yao's chest hard after every sentence. Li Yao was gasping and grimacing in pain.
At this time, however, Ding Lingdang began to rub Li Yao's chest with her hands softly as she said, "All in all, the federation has countless superheroes. You are not the first one, and you will not be the last. Even if you hide in our home and sleep all day, the sky will not fall down, the earth will not collapse, and the end of the world will not come!
"But I have only one husband, and I'm too lazy to find a second one.
"You are not that important to the federation, but you are more important to me than anything else. Do you understand?
"Therefore, if your reasons are what you gave me just now, then this is my answer—No. Absolutely no! Whoever dares to fool you into the mission with bullsh*t reasons such as 'devotion', 'patriotism', or 'sacrifice', I will blow up their head!
"You have done enough for the federation. Even if you do have your responsibility as a Cultivator, you have long fulfilled it!"
Li Yao was rendered speechless by his wife. He was dazed in the clouds for a moment.
Pondering for a moment, he felt that there was a deeper meaning to her lines. "You will not agree if my reasons are what I gave you just now. So, you may agree if it is for something else?"
Ding Lingdang grinned and suddenly said, out of context, "Li Yao, thank you."
Li Yao was even more curious. "Thank me for what?"
"Did you know? In fact, a long, long time ago, before I met you, and even for quite a while after I met you, I thought that I would never be married in my entire life." Ding Lingdang opened her arms, melting herself in the gold sunlight. "After all, you know my personality best. I'm too uncivilized, and I'm too fond of adventures. What I like best is to blow a demon beast's brains out of its head. When I'm training crazily, I may not take a break for three days and three nights, during which time I know absolutely nothing around myself!
"I'd been thinking before—what kind of man would accept such a wife? Most men prefer girls who are cute, quiet, and homey, instead of crazy ones like me, right?
"But after so many years into our marriage, you have always supported me. You never stopped me when I enrolled in the highly-dangerous, experimental training programs, when I fought the strengthened demon beasts with real guns and ammos, and even when I trained at the edge of the gravity sphere of the pulsar, where I might have been dragged into it and compressed into a point smaller than dust if I was incautious.
"When I reported the training subjects to you exactly as they were, I could see the worry in your eyes, but you never stopped me, not once. Instead, you encouraged me while pretending to be lighthearted. Tell me, why?"
Li Yao's face was redder than the morning glow. He scratched his nose and said, "Do I need a reason? All the things were what you wanted to do. You could gain happiness, realize your dream, and even find the true meaning of life from them!
"As your husband, of course I had to support my wife to do anything she wanted and to shine brilliantly to her heart's content!"
Li Yao smiled carefreely again.
The sun reappeared behind him, putting her in a glorious halo. Pairs of wings seemed to be growing from her back.
"This is exactly what I want to say to you," Ding Lingdang said. "Regarding the issue just now, if you reason is simply 'the country needs me', then I will absolutely say no. Your country does not need you, but I do!
"The only way you can win my support is if your reasons have nothing to do with the country, the planet, the civilization, the future, or anything grandeur, but simply 'I want to go'!"
Chapter 1323: 105% Alive! |
"Ask yourself. When you heard Professor Mo Xuan's introduction on the exploration mission in the dark nebula just now, was the very first thought that popped up in your head 'I have to go because the mission is important for the federation' or 'I want to go because the mission is so interesting'?"
Ding Lingdang looked at Li Yao expectantly.
Li Yao's eyes passed her and darted toward the furiously burning sun. Under the sunlight, his face turned gold.
Holding Ding Lingdang's hands softly, he was deep in thought for a long time. His face flickered with confusion, calmness, excitement, and gloom until it became pureness in the end.
"I… want to go, from the bottom of my heart," Li Yao mumbled. "You're quite right. It has nothing to do with the grandeur concepts such as civilization, federation, or future. The universe is such a spectacular place. I just want to go out there and take a good look at it.
"There's something that I kept from you all the time.
"After more than ten years of soul-stirring adventures, in the past five years, I was finally able to live a peaceful and routine life like normal people.
"I had almost everything. Fame, position, power, enterprises, and support and admiration from the general public! You were by my side the whole time, too. No matter how hard we were training during the day, we were still able to share the same bed at night like a normal husband and wife.
"By logic, this should already be the most satisfactory point of my life, right?
"However, do you know who visited my dreams most when I was sound asleep at night?"
Blinking his eyes, Ding Lingdang said, "Yan Xibei, Xiao Xuance, Bai Xinghe, the star child, Jin Tuyi, Elder Nether Spring, Zhou Hengdao, Lu Zui?"
"How did you know?" Surprised, Li Yao scratched his lips subconsciously. "Do I talk at night?"
"Of course not." Ding Lingdang smiled. "It's because I often dream about my past enemies, too!
"During the ten years when you were away from the Heaven's Origin Sector, I was training and travelling in the depths of the Grand Desolate Plateau. I encountered many brutal and hideous demon beasts, and I only narrowly escaped from beast tides hundreds of times, too.
"The scenes often reappear in my dreams!
"It is quite odd. When I was wandering on the Grand Desolate Plateau, I often had to burn my life and soul, sparing nothing, in order to win a slim chance of survival. On many occasions, the physical and mental suffering were simply indescribable!
"Every time I survived a beast tide and dragged my bleeding and exhausted body back to the base, I told myself that
I would never do such a stupid thing as to wander in front of the wormholes on the Grand Desolate Plateau by myself again!
"But I would be reckless again after resting in safety for less than one week. I forgot the pain as soon as the scars were gone!
"In my dreams, when I am back in those moments of life and death, I often… relish them so much that I want to try them once, or a hundred times, more!"
"Yes. That's exactly the feeling!" Li Yao's eyes suddenly shined. He held his wife's hand more and more tightly and exclaimed, "In my dreams, I often find myself challenging Yan Xibei, Xiao Xuance, Elder Nether Spring, Lu Zui, and the rest of them again. What troublemakers they were! I only managed to defeat them with the help of countless companions and a bit of luck every time after the last bit of wisdom, courage, and determination in the deepest part of my soul were exploited!
"The unparalleled ecstasy after I defeated them, or simply while I was defeating them, made me feel that I was 100% or even 105% alive!
"Honey, make no mistake. I'm not saying that I didn't enjoy the peaceful life for the past five years or that I don't want to spend the rest of my life with you. It's just that—it's just that, compared to the blood-freezing adventures ten years ago, I feel that such a smooth, undisturbed life, which I can absolutely foresee will be like decades later, is a bit—a bit—boring!
"You—you can understand the feeling, right?"
"Of course!" Ding Lingdang's thoughts drifted to somewhere far, far away, too. Her entirely body seemed to be turning into a transparent diamond that was gradually melting into the air. She felt both real and illusionary.
Her voice was so deep that it sounded like it was coming from the cold, dark universe. "In order to advance into the Nascent Soul Stage, I once risked training for ten days and ten nights in the closest orbit to the pulsar.
"The special force fields of the pulsar were like a natural telescope that was magnificently built in the universe. It could collect all the information of light in history.
"Through the special filters on the crystal suit and the direction perception of the spiritual root, I seemed to envision that the whole universe was unfolding slowly in front of me.
"I 'saw' the galaxy arms made of billions of stars burning furiously. I 'saw' the nebulas expanding and shrinking like the raging behemoths inside an ocean. I 'saw' boundless galaxies blossoming like flowers before they slowly withered. I 'saw' the tide of the millions of colors released by the pulsar that enveloped me instantly. I even forgot my training. The brilliant plethora of the millions of colors were enough for anyone to pay their entire life to enjoy!
"Before I knew it, I was so attracted to the view that I moved closer and closer to the tipping point of the gravity sphere of the pulsar. I was almost absorbed by it!
"But at that time, I didn't feel frightened or regretful at all. Instead, I had a weird sense of calmness and delight. I felt that I was a grain of dust that came from the universe and was returning to the universe!
"It was in those ten days and ten nights of training that I polished my real belief. I understood the true meaning of 'reborn'. I was reborn from the universe!
"It was perhaps the greatest reason why I could march into the Nascent Soul Stage at such a young age!
"When someone has seen the millions of colors from the pulsar, the colliding and simmering rivers of stars made by the galaxy arms, and the unpredictable flowers made of the rays of stars from tens of billions of years ago blossoming slowly in front of them, how can they be at all interested in anything in the mortal world at all?
"Fame, power, wealth, position, honor… In front of the grand universe, the things that the mortals crave and fight for with their lives are as hilarious as the high towers made of sand!"
"We should've communicated on the topic earlier." Li Yao stared at Ding Lingdang in a very strange way before he said proudly, "Honey, you truly have chances on a daily basis. You are completely different from the past now!"
"Of course. Do you think that you are the only one making breakthroughs and other people never improve?"
Grinning, Ding Lingdang flicked Li Yao's forehead hard. "It's not too late to communicate right now. Tell me the truth. You think that the past few years have been a bit monotonous, right?"
"Not exactly monotonous. My life is never monotonous with you around. I just feel that it wasn't 100% me!"
Pondering for a moment, Li Yao shook his head. "No. More precisely speaking, in the past five years, Li Yao was living as an Ultra-Level Federal Hero and a super mascot but not purely for himself!
"The pure Li Yao only lives in adventures and fierce battles when he is burning his life and soul to have summit confrontations with formidable enemies such as Xiao Xuance, Bai Xinghe, Elder Nether Spring, and Lu Zui!
"I don't want to live as a 'super mascot' anymore. Not even for one day, much less the next five years, ten years, or decades until the Imperium of True Human Beings arrives!
"I yearn to visit the scenery in the wonderful worlds in the depths of the universe that nobody has ever set foot on, make friends with the experts there, study their civilization, and confront formidable enemies! In the ever-escalating adventures, I will feel my physical strength, my will, my wisdom, my life, and my everything being exploited to the maximum, knowing that the pure Li Yao is back!
"The most important thing for a Cultivator is to Cultivate your true self. My 'true self' is right out there in the middle of the stars!
"Stars are my destination!
"Therefore, it doesn't matter at all if the issue is related to the fate of the federation and the future of our civilization.
"Now that I have learned of the existence of such a mysterious world, and I've been given the opportunity to find out what it is exactly, I will certainly not let it go!
"It is mine. The last thing I want to see is it falling into somebody else's hands, its beauty and mysteries being enjoyed not by me!"
Li Yao's voice was more and more deep and resolute. Infinite dominance was spreading out from every pore on his body!
Even the clouds were dancing around him, cladding him in a battle robe.
If not me, who?
Hearing Li Yao's simple and majestic demonstration, Ding Lingdang chuckled, her eyes brimming with affection and tenderness. "This is the answer I wanted to hear. If that's the case, just go to the depths of the sea of stars, conquer new worlds, and live as your true self. I've absolutely got your back!"
"But—" His wife's empathy and support made Li Yao feel both moved and ashamed.
"No 'but'. I know that your soul has been stolen by the mysterious world. If I insist on you not going, you will live the rest of your life in regrets and without a soul!
"What I want is a man who lives up to all the wonders of himself, not a walking zombie!
"I understand you as much as you understand me. If you have never hindered or stopped me when I went out for travels and adventures, why would I hinder and stop you now?"
Chapter 1324: A Deal of a Hundred Years! |
The more outspoken Ding Lingdang was, the more hesitant Li Yao became. "But we are talking about decades!"
"It's not as serious as you imagine!" Ding Lingdang smiled. "As Professor Mo Xuan said, you will spend most of the time in the space journey in a hibernation state. You close your eyes, you open your eyes, and the journey is over. You will not perceive the passage of time at all!
"Even when you are awake, your sense of time will be vastly different from the outside world because you are at the sub-light speed. The decades in the outside may only be a few years for you!
"The time will only go at a normal speed again when you discover the mysterious world and begin collecting intelligence. So, it will not take many years for you.
"As for me, I certainly won't wait stupidly in the federation for decades after you leave. I will also join the 'Heavenly Road Plan' to explore a greater universe and enjoy a more marvelous life. I'll spend most of my time in the hibernation cabi
n, too, and I will not be unfrozen and woken up for adventures until new Sectors are found!
"If I have nothing better to do, I can always join the 'Solar Soldier' program. I will train myself in prolonged hibernation in a special cabin near the orbit of a star by absorbing the spiritual energy released by the star.
"In such a way, even if a hundred years have passed in the real world, in our perception and for our body status, it will only be three to five years or maybe around ten years at most.
"A departure of ten years seems acceptable to me. What do you think?"
Li Yao pondered carefully and realized that it did make sense.
Most of the time in a space exploration mission was always wasted on looking for new galaxies and worlds in the vast, boundless universe.
Such a dull task could totally be automatically accomplished by the navigation crystal processors, allowing the explorers to kill time in hibernation without knowing anything.
As long as a hundred years might be, it would only be a dream for them. They would not be conscious of anything.
If everything went well, in their perception, they would meet each other after only a few years.
"Li Yao!" Ding Lingdang suddenly grew excited. She waved her arms hard under the golden sunlight, like a leopard that was jumping at the sun. "Let's make a deal and have a competition!
"In the next hundred years, you will explore the mysterious world deep inside the dark nebula, and I will participate in the 'Heavenly Road Plan' to discover more Sectors!
"In a hundred years' time, when we meet again, we will tell each other the interesting adventures we've been through while we are exploring the new Sectors. Then, we will see whose stories are more intriguing and whose achievements are greater. How does that sound?"
Her ecstasy drove apart Li Yao's last hesitation.
Extending his finger to his wife, Li Yao curled his pinkie with hers!
"It's a deal then!"
With the most brilliant smile, Li Yao said, "I'll certainly bring the most beautiful flower of the Sector in the dark nebula back to you. Wait for me, honey!"
