“Alright, I admit that it was because teacher went missing for quite a few days that I was able to pick up some clues about the situation,” Li Hao started laughing. “But I’m not certain of the particulars, so tell me about them, teacher...”

“Haven’t you said it all?” Yuan Shuo rolled his eyes and snapped back. “What else is there for me to say?”

“Has teacher not discovered anything else?”

“I have!” Yuan Shuo huffed after glaring at the young man. “All of the other daos are constantly changing, but you can lock onto a few major daos. That will give you some relative positions to reference, even if they keep changing.

“Take the five elements, for example. They are located once every two thousand daos. Finding one means finding the other four!

“Yin and yang are another example. They must be on opposing sides. The same goes for emptiness and revitalization! Therefore, based on these daos’ positions, you can find their counterpart if you find one!

“You can then use some comparisons to deduce the entire trend of the daos’ changes. Once you experience multiple cycles, you might be able to find an actual rhythm to it. A full cycle takes place once every forty days or so. I can’t experiment with that, but you can.”

Li Hao continuously bobbed his head. He understood. Daos of two extremes were highly useful here.

“Also, the gathering of ten thousand daos produces one droplet of time,” Yuan Shuo continued. “If you can figure out a way to extract that and use it against your enemies, I think you’ll have an easier time of things than you do now...”

The young man frowned slightly. That would be very hard.

“We can set that aside. Have you made any other gains, teacher?”

“Of course!” Yuan Shuo chuckled. “I can borrow from the star of time when I form a domain of the five elements. Stable and fixed daos are too easily broken. I’d like to try having constantly shifting daos!

“What you see will only be the surface level. In reality, they’ll be changing all the time. I’d like to create a domain of the five elements with endless permutations. No one will be able to wrap their mind around it!”

“You can give it a try, teacher!” Li Hao smiled. “I’m going to incorporate the false world into this world now!”

He said nothing more and utilized the rat dao that Yuan Shuo had just found to connect the great dao and immaterial world. A minor world began spinning into existence, gradually growing bigger.

At the same time, the minor world landed on the original world and covered it like an illusory shadow. The two slowly became one.

Nurturing a world with another world!

Li Hao waved a hand, summoning Director General Zhao. He made for the center of the world without a word of explanation, waving another dao of the chaos into existence.

Director General Zhao didn’t have a chance to see everything clearly before the star of time appeared in front of Li Hao once more. “Come, follow this dao toward its beginning. Don’t walk forward, but walk backward!”

A raging river of dao appeared! Director General Zhao was still gathering his wits when he fell into the river. He seemed to be the rat monster and gaped as waves churned toward him.

When one crashed over him, a memory floated to the fore—it was the one of the rat monster being killed!

The director general looked around blearily, he was somehow part of the scene and had become the rat spirit!

His heart shook!

So this was the river of memory? This was a marvelous tool with which to comprehend dao!

He could comprehend the daos of different cultivators and fully experience what they’d once undergone. It was incredible!

“You must be fast...” Li Hao’s voice rang in his mind. “This involves time, after all. The more spirited the waves are, the more unforgettable that memory is! Don’t comprehend too much of it, you might be assimilated and become the next rat spirit.

“It’s enough to just take a look at someone else’s dao. You don’t need to delve deep into it... Also, a price needs to be paid for studying all of this—primarily the depletion of your lifespan. In addition, don’t look at the future. What you see may not be real and it might affect yourself!”

Director General Zhao committed those words to heart and didn’t say anything else. He continued to immerse himself within the memory that seemed so very real.

This was the rise of a rat; each exalted emperor had a story about their rise to the top. Even if it wasn’t worth mention in the eyes of powerful existences, just a few memory fragments over a long life bequeathed a great harvest to Director General Zhao! He was personally watching how a rat beast became an exalted emperor and then the master of a world!

The director general stumbled out of the river after an indeterminate period of time. A lost look was in his eyes, one that turned slightly cunning and cruel in the next moment.

He returned to calm a moment later and looked at Li Hao next to him. “You better not let word of this method get out. There’s a fatal complication related to it—it’s easy to lose oneself once you’re immersed in the memories.

"You might even be replaced!” the director general declared with lingering fear. “Thankfully, the chaos beast’s memories weren’t complicated and it hadn’t experienced too many things in its life. I’ve lived through more in Silver Moon, so I quickly overlooked some things. Otherwise, I could’ve easily become the second rat monster!”

“This is the river of memories, not simply watching television,” Li Hao nodded. “One becomes the subject for the duration of the experience. Of course, regular people shouldn’t and can’t experience it!”

With that, he looked at the director general. “What do you think? Can you pose as the rat beast now?”

“I can!” the man nodded with surprise. “Unless whoever I meet decides to probe me in depth... otherwise, it will be very difficult for others to realize I am not the rat beast. I can imitate it in terms of speech, interaction, and presence!

“And unless the other is here in person, it will be very difficult for them to detect otherwise. But once a powerhouse probes my core nature, all will be exposed then.”

“They shouldn’t!” Li Hao shook his head. “That would be a gross provocation of an exalted emperor and a declaration of war. The Dragon master still holds a certain degree of authority here, so that should not occur!

“So this means I can officially commence my plan to nurture a world with a world!”

The young man grinned, then looked at the river with time in it. The river had connected to its first immaterial world. However, the more inconvenient factor was that the star of time may have to temporarily depart from his control and stabilize the illusory river. That would place the abilities of time out of reach for the immediate period to come.

Granted, that wasn’t a big problem. It might be a good test for himself to be cut off from time for a while and make his way through the martial world without it.

Li Hao looked at his teacher not far in the distance. Yuan Shuo seemed to be digesting new understandings of dao. Would he be able to construct a complete dao domain this time? If he could, did that mean seventh rank was at hand?

Granted, it wouldn’t be that simple since the young man didn’t have enough resources to support a seventh rank. They would just take things one step at a time!

His illusory world was also absorbing energy from this world to perfect itself. Li Hao chuckled. He had another minor world under his belt now.

......

Li Hao’s fake world had melded into the real world. The first step had been perfectly completed. A turtledove had occupied a magpie’s nest and replaced it.

The two half step emperors within the world quickly brought all of the humans under their sway. The general population would supply unlimited faith as there were many living beings within a minor world.

However, their numbers were fewer than what they could have been due to the massacres that regularly occurred in Dragon Region. A desolate backwater such as Silver Moon had ten billion citizens in Skystar Dynasty alone. After five hundred years of expansion, the general population had doubled and was continuing to grow.

Regular mid worlds could easily contain one hundred billion.

This minor world wasn’t as large as the pre-ascended Silver Moon, but it didn’t even have five billion humans. There were only four billion at most in this vast world—far fewer than one would’ve expected.

Li Hao didn’t find the outcome bizarre either. Given how chaos beasts ruled their world, it was impressive that there were still so many left. One had to say, humans were most adept at reproduction and survival.

They weren’t the strongest among intelligent species or the one with most potential, but they were most suited for survival. Some other species had higher reproductive abilities, but they lacked intelligence to make use of it.

......

Within the world.

Li Hao landed on the ground. Director General Zhao’s presence shifted violently and a faint chaos presence emanated from his body. A shadow appeared behind him, transforming into a violent rat.

“This is known as the Skytaker Rat!” said the rat. “It calls this world the Sky Rat World! The world is a subordinate of the Treasure World...”

Li Hao blinked. What did that mean?

The rat, ahem, Ole Zhao explained, “There are more local leaders than the Dragon master in the region. There is actually a chaos alliance within this quadrant of the universe! The masters of major worlds are alliance members, which means to say that the seventh and eighth ranks have formed a chaos alliance!

“Treasure World is a seventh rank world, with the seventh rank Exalted Treasure Emperor as its master. That one is also a rat, but a different species. It’s a Treasure Seeker Rat! Hence, Sky Rat World directly answers to Treasure World, but since Treasure World is part of the alliance, that makes them a Dragon major world vassal as well.”

He’d gained a lot of information after burrowing into the rat’s memories. People hadn’t known much about the Dragon Region before.

“A chaos alliance?” Li Hao’s interest was piqued.

“That’s right. Apart from the chaos alliance, there are two more small alliances within the region. One of them is the Ironeater Alliance created by native monster spirits, primarily targeting chaos beasts.

“Ironeater major world is helmed by several seventh ranks. The other alliance in the region is headed by the local humans—the Defense Alliance. There are worlds with humans in ascendancy in Dragon Region, but their ability is mediocre. There are seventeen major worlds of seventh rank in Dragon Region!

“Apart from the eighth rank Dragon major world in the Chaos Alliance, there are eleven other seventh rank worlds within it to make for an alliance of twelve major worlds.

“The Ironeater Alliance only has five major worlds of seventh rank, if including Ironeater major world as well. As for the human alliance...”

Li Hao didn’t even want to listen to the analysis. It’s obvious, isn’t it?

“The humans have only one seventh rank world, don't they?” The young man didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. There were seventeen major worlds in Dragon Region, plus an eighth rank Dragon major world.

Only one of those belonged to humans?

How was the Defense Alliance even an alliance?