Chapter 55: Murmuring
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

“Is it here? This murmuring…”

Zhou Bai’s heart thumped. Both Zuo Dao’s notes and all sorts of textbook materials explained the occurrence of this phenomenon.

In the process of reading Taoist Sutra and gaining comprehension of the Heavenly Tao, even if he made all these preparations and protections in advance, as long as he gradually got into the condition of synchronizing with the Heavenly Tao, there would still be distorted knowledge trying to infiltrate his primordial spirit.

Zhou Bai curbed his desire. He paid no mind to the murmuring and didn’t try to remember it. He tried his best to act like he didn’t hear it at all.

But the next moment, in this silent meditation room, the lights seemed to get dimmer slowly. The edges of the room even gradually fell into darkness. White light enveloped only the spot where Zhou Bai sat.

As darkness gradually descended, the meditation room became quieter and quieter. Only the sound of Zhou Bai reading the Taoist Sutra echoed in the room, as if a second person were reading along.

Zhou Bai forced himself not to look at those strange places. He continued to read the Taoist Sutra.

The thumping of footsteps sounded in the dark.

Zhou Bai suddenly paused his reading. Then, without care, he continued to read.

As Zhou Bai read, footsteps constantly sounded around him, as if a dozen children ran and played in the darkness.

“Hehe.”

Zhou Bai could even hear their laughter, and sometimes he heard whispering. Cold sweat continuously ran down his forehead.

After a mere ten minutes of reading Taoist Sutra 00, although he didn’t even finish reading its contents, Zhou Bai felt the murmuring in his ears get louder and louder, clearer and clearer.

“Zhou…Bai…”

With a light gasp, Zhou Bai immediately stopped reading. He closed the book, shut his eyes, slowed his breathing, and calmed down.

As he paused his reading and closed Taoist Sutra 00, the entire meditation room returned to normal again. The dimness and darkness from before vanished, as if they were just a hallucination.

A long while later, Zhou Bai slowly opened his eyes. “Tina, those things…did you see them?”

In his cognitive sea, Christina, who had been practicing quietly, said, “See what? Weren’t you just reading the Taoist Sutra?”

Was it a hallucination? It was so realistic, Zhou Bai thought to himself. If I paid any attention to it, what would have happened?

He quickly cleared his head, shaking off this thought. All textbook materials on Taoist Sutras stated that when you read a Taoist Sutra, you must ignore any abnormal phenomena.

Zhou Bai shook his head, then looked at the board.

When he was reading Taoist Sutra 00, he saw his Degree of Taoification on the board rise to 0.1%, but when he looked again now, he found his Degree of Taoification had already returned to 0%.

Zhou Bai knew this was a normal phenomenon. Increasing Degree of Taoification required reading Taoist Sutra 00 over and over again and slowly synchronizing with the Heavenly Tao in the process.

If his Degree of Taoification could reach 0.1% even when he was not reading Taoist Sutra, that would be the first step to success.

At the same time, he recalled the contents he just read and analyzed, and he realized he gradually forgot the contents of Taoist Sutra 00. In only a dozen seconds, he had already forgotten everything he had just read. Only a faint comprehension of it remained.

That was a feature of comprehending the Heavenly Tao through the Taoist Sutras. Even if they were just words, they contained supernatural powers. They were mysterious and indescribable.

If any passage from there were leaked and read by normal people, it might cause mutation and lunacy.

Even if a practitioner read it, if their realm was not high enough, they might not even be able to organize the contents into words and remember them by heart.

The contents of the Taoist Sutras alone symbolized the extraordinary.

Only by reading the Taoist Sutras over and over again and raising Degree of Taoification could one slowly engrave in memory the comprehensions of the Heavenly Tao.

“Zhou Bai? Are you done?” Christina asked in Zhou Bai’s head.

She wasn’t ready to increase Degree of Taoification yet, so when Zhou Bai was reading Taoist Sutra 00, Christina was practicing quietly on her own. She didn’t read the scripture, so she didn’t feel any abnormalities.

Zhou Bai nodded. “This is so difficult. Let me try again.”

Thus Zhou Bai repeated his reading of Taoist Sutra 00. He started from the beginning each time. The time that he was able to read increased from the initial ten minutes, gradually to 12 minutes, 15 minutes, and 20 minutes.

He did this until four in the afternoon, when he read for 25 minutes at a time. Only then was he unable to endure the influence of the murmuring and had to close Taoist Sutra 00.

But when he looked at the board, his Degree of Taoification returned to 0% again at the moment he stopped reading.

F*ck, it’s this hard? Zhou Bai stroked his chin, thinking to himself. Or is it because…I’m not a genius practitioner? Zuo Dao’s notes said that…”

***

Zuo Dao’s notes:

“Today was my first time reading the Taoist Sutra 00 sealed at home. It’s a little more difficult than I imagined; I spent approximately half an hour to finally keep my Degree of Taoification steady at 0.1%. It looks like it’ll take a long time for me to increase Degree of Taoification to 10% and enter the first realm…”

***

What the hell! Half an hour? Zhou Bai thought. I’ve been at it for nearly four hours, and I haven’t even reached 0.1%! If I keep practicing like this, I feel like I’m about to get a heart attack from the hallucinations.

This thought made Zhou Bai angry. He looked again at his auxiliary system board, considering whether he should increase Degree of Taoification with Laziness.

But he still couldn’t read Taoist Sutra 00 for an extensive period of time. He couldn’t resist the long periods of murmuring. If he were to directly increase Degree of Taoification now…

Wait, Zhou Bai thought to himself, Stand like iron, sit like steel, lie like a mountain…I’ve been reading Taoist Sutra 00 in a sitting posture this entire time. Would it be easier for me to do it while lying down?

At this thought, Zhou Bai immediately became excited, then calmed himself again. When he felt that he was at peace, he lay on the floor and began reading with the Taoist Sutra in his hands.

A moment later, Zhou Bai heard the murmuring come again, but this time it was faint to the point of being negligible. There were no other abnormal phenomena.

Zhou Bai felt as if he had turned into a mountain. Whether it be the comprehensions of the Heavenly Tao he analyzed from Taoist Sutra 00 or the endless murmuring in his ears, he was completely indifferent to them. They made no ripples in his heart.

He read like this for half an hour, finishing the entire Taoist Sutra 00, and Zhou Bai didn’t feel a single bit of influence from the murmuring. He closed Taoist Sutra 00. When he looked again at the auxiliary practice system board, his Degree of Taoification had already reached 0.2%.

“So that’s how it works! That’s how it works!” Zhou Bai cried out in realization. “The true use of star point Sumeru’s ‘lie like a mountain’ is not to defend in battle, but to defend against the contamination of distorted Heavenly Tao when reading Taoist Sutra 00 and increasing Degree of Taoification.”

Zhou Bai was ecstatic at this realization. Christina asked curiously in his mind, “How come you read for so long this time? Have you gone mad?”

Zhou Bai told Christina about the effect of lying like a mountain. The little cat had a face of envy; she kept stretching out and retracting her claws.

“D*mn it! I wish I could steal Zhou Bai’s plug-in! What do I have to do to steal his plug-in?”

On the other hand, after Zhou Bai understood the true effect of lying like a mountain, he lay down on the floor and repeatedly read the contents of Taoist Sutra 00.

He read like this until 11 at night. Each time he read, he went through it faster and faster. Now he only needed an hour and a half to finish the book, and his Degree of Taoification had increased to 0.7%.

Degree of Taoification got harder to increase as you progressed, which meant it was easiest to increase when it was low. It wouldn’t be possible for Zhou Bai to increase Degree of Taoification by 0.7% in a single sitting like he did today.

Zhou Bai glanced at the time. It was nearly midnight. Although the library of Tao academy was open 24 hours a day, he had to eat. And even if he didn’t have to eat, Elsa needed to eat.

So Zhou Bai stood up, planning to leave and take care of his and his dog’s meal.

But the moment he stood up, the murmuring in his ears rushed into his mind as if it were tangible, making his entire primordial spirit quiver endlessly, as if it were about to emerge from his body at any moment.

The light around him became dim. Faint footsteps sounded again.

Feeling all this, Zhou Bai immediately sat down. His quaking primordial spirit immediately quieted down. Although there was still murmuring in his ears, it was not so hard to bear anymore.

Zhou Bai stroked his chin and thought, So that’s how it is? Since I raised my Degree of Taoification when I was lying down, whenever I sit or stand, I’m still a little unaccustomed to it?

But the next moment, Zhou Bai’s gaze shifted, and his body suddenly froze.

He stared at a corner of the room. A small red footprint had appeared there out of nowhere.

But when Zhou Bai looked there again, the footprint had disappeared.

Zhou Bai exhaled deeply. “Is it possible…it’s not just a hallucination?”

Then he looked at the empty floor again, and said in a low voice, “It should be…just a hallucination.”

So Zhou Bai continued to sit for half an hour before he slowly stood up, gradually getting accustomed to his spiked Degree of Taoification.

He tried his best to ignore the murmuring in his ears. Zhou Bai thought to himself, This is bad, I shouldn’t have raised my Degree of Taoification by so much in one session. Starting tomorrow, I must increase it little by little.

He spent more than two hours repeatedly lying down and sitting back up to ease his discomfort. Only then did Zhou Bai regain his freedom of movement.

He tried to launch his primordial spirit power and immediately felt the difference.

After his Degree of Taoification increased to 0.7%, he felt his primordial spirit power seemed to be more agile, more rounded, and easier to control compared to before. Its range seemed to have increased beyond 10 meters as well, now reaching as far as 11 or 12 meters.

His launching speed became faster too, and he still felt unsatisfied after he used it. As he entered the Tao, Primordial Spirit Value also broke through its bottleneck, and he could now continue to raise it.