The lines of veins that were cleanly engraved on the bodies of all creatures were the very spiritual veins that Xu Xiaoshou had been looking for to no avail.

‘Is Passive Skill related to the spirit-gathering array?’

Xu Xiaoshou could barely contain his excitement.

He recalled the days when he had almost lost his vision to study the spiritual-gathering array in depth.

Despite all of his efforts and the use of the Qingming Celestial Rock, he could not tattoo any spiritual veins on himself.

The efforts made him realize that to become a Spiritual Cultivator was equal parts hard work and natural talent.

Xu Xiaoshou had been unable to cross the threshold into the profession. However, the situation was different now.

‘It looks like hard work does pay off. Have I finally reached the state to learn the craft?’

Xu Xiaoshou opened his eyes as wide as possible.

It occurred to him that to reinterpret the marks on the bodies of creatures as spiritual veins was not a simple thing to achieve.

It looked as if Spiritual Cultivation Expertise ran through every being alive. The spiritual veins could be found on rocks and even individual leaves.

He inhaled deeply and held back his emotions.

Xu Xiaoshou wondered if it would be possible to engrave the veins on a human.

Human bodies were walking diagrams of the blood circulation chart. He wondered if he was supposed to dissect the veins according to it.

Xu Xiaoshou was dumbfounded.

‘Unless it’s Operation Expertise…’

There was no time for him to delve into his thoughts any longer. After all the creatures completed the metamorphosis process for the spiritual veins, their bodies seemed to have been annotated with a Vitality Diagram.

He stared intensely into the diagram of parallel and intersecting lines and tried to immerse himself in the new world he was in.

Xu Xiaoshou was lost in the scene before him. He was slowly falling into the rabbit hole.

However, once he had fallen in, he realized that the situation was rather amiss.

The Vitality Diagram on the creatures’ bodies seemed to be traceable to the existence of all creatures in this world.

He watched the tribe of giants who were aggressively tearing apart their enemies. Their every movement was mapped on their Vitality Diagram as if they were controlled like a marionette puppet.

Xu Xiaoshou studied the diagram and immediately gained all knowledge about the giant’s movements.

‘Oh my God!’

Xu Xiaoshou was quivering in his shoes.

If an ability like this existed, he was afraid of the power it contained.

He gingerly turned to the large border on the side.

The being was dead. No absolute signs of life could be found.

Its Vitality Diagram remained dormant after one year.

It remained the same even after two to three years.

However, as time dragged on for close to eternity, Xu Xiaoshou was surprised that the rock’s Vitality Diagram started to move slowly.

‘It’s breathing!’

As time progressed, it had been changing, transforming, and even breathing.

Eternity was simply a second for the rock.

His eyes lit up with realization. He seemed to have cracked the mystery of life. He felt that it had taken him a long time, but it was no more than the time of a single breath.

He was still within the world of the fantasy realm.

The blue skies and oceans of the new world remained eternal.

Xu Xiaoshou’s eyes lit up again as he lifted his eyebrow and refocused his line of sight away from the small beings of life to the void above him.

The physical landscape of the world around him was changing as well.

Under his watchful gaze, the Vitality Diagram of the world hidden within space and time had slowly revealed itself to him.

‘Path?’

The word appeared in his mind rather suddenly, but he was not confused this time.

He was taken aback.

Under the net of the law of the Great Path, creatures were categorized based on natural selection and the survival of the fittest.

After Xu Xiaoshou experienced his epiphany, the world began to shake around him like it was on the edge of shattering into pieces.

He was not convinced by this.

If the world around him had simply been a fantasy realm, he would have been convinced by the scene.

In fact, the fantasy realm presented to him was all built based on the foundations of the real world around him.

He had verified this point when he experienced the Sword Technique Expertise for the first time.

Even the Seven Swords of the Moving Heavens, which was the highest level of the White Cloud Sword Technique, was a technique that existed on the Shengshen Continent.

If the fantasy realm was real, did that mean the changing rules of the world were the truth as well?

Xu Xiaoshou recalled the words of Elder Sang in Qiu Long Words.

Regardless, he refused to believe in that.

He did not believe the old man when he said that all life was virtual.

He also did not believe in the cruel truth that the old man had told him.

As the void tore itself into bits, Xu Xiaoshou kept his eyes open to observe the last pieces of the world before it vanished.

The sky and earth had ceased to exist. The net of the Great Path’s law was slowly deteriorating in color.

The darkness had swallowed all forms of light.

Xu Xiaoshou felt slightly dizzy. He was aware that the strong inflow of information from the Expertise Passive Skill was about to start.

However, in his attempt to understanding the world around him, he gritted his teeth and held on to his search for a sign of life amidst the world of destruction before him.

‘That is…’

He suddenly caught of glimpse of something that made his eyes enlarge, but the darkness had engulfed his vision before he could focus. Xu Xiaoshou slowly closed his eyes.

‘Ho!’

When he had opened his eyes again, he had returned to the familiar surroundings of Yuan Mansion.

The transformation was life-changing and an indication of absolute power.

In comparison to the two other worlds he had previously experienced, the world he had seen this time encompassed all of the lives of creatures and turned it into a glimpse into the truth of a new world.

If he was honest, this was the most spectacular experience yet.

However, a wave of vulnerability trembled from the depths of Xu Xiaoshou’s soul.

A pang of despair hit him. His personal determination had led him to witness the last scene clearly.

Concealed within the darkness, in a space that he could not name, a gigantic pair of hands were glowing softly with spiritual light.

The hands were weaving the Great Path.

He could believe that the world’s Vitality Diagram and the net of the Great Path’s laws were born from the hands of someone.

‘What is that?’

Xu Xiaoshou did not understand his panic. If it was himself from the past who had witnessed this, he doubted he would be half as anxious as he was.

Perhaps it was his changing knowledge about the world that made Xu Xiaoshou rather anxious about the unfolding scene.

Some things came in pairs within the unseen world. As unrelated as they may have seemed, after more observation, they had a great amount of synergy that complemented each other.

‘Horrifying!’

Xu Xiaoshou tried to recover from his emotions and convinced himself to take the situation more lightly.

‘This is a fantasy realm,” he thought. ‘You will lose if you take it too seriously!”

The notification banner pinged. Xu Xiaoshou turned around to come face to face with a string of words.

Expertise Passive Skill acquired: Weaving Expertise

Xu Xiaoshou stared at the words and rubbed his eyes before staring at the words again.

Expertise Passive Skill acquired: Weaving Expertise

He thought that his vision had gone blurry. He looked at the words again, but there was no change.

The words remained what they were, reinforcing what they represented.

Xu Xiaoshou was baffled.

‘Weaving Expertise?’

His eyes were opened so widely that his eyeballs could have rolled out.

‘What kind of skill is Weaving Expertise!’

‘I saw the changes in the world! After all that, you tell me this skill is called Weaving Expertise.’

‘Shouldn’t this be Spirit-gathering Array Expert, the kind that lets me draw veins on others and pull the explosive trigger on my enemies?’

He felt that he had been lied to by the system. Xu Xiaoshou’s face went sour.

The system had been continuously glitchy and inconsistent, but this round was truly outrageous in Xu Xiaoshou’s book.

“Weaving…”

He muttered, but he tried to rationalize the situation. No matter what happened, he had at least seen a truth of the world.

The hand was without a doubt weaving the Great Path.

‘Don’t tell me I was overthinking?’

Xu Xiaoshou collapsed on the ground weakly. ‘Is this thing really a weaving type?’