Chapter 40: The Fortieth Day of Creating a Game at Zixiao Palace

Faced with investors wanting to personally experience and test the game's effects, how could Yuan Yi, as the game's planner, back down?

She readily agreed: "That is exactly what I wish to do, I dare not ask you."

The next moment, Hongjun threw the game in his hand into Zixiao Palace, and under the drive of his spiritual power, it instantly enveloped the entire Zixiao Palace.

Before the three thousand guests of Zixiao could react, a Taoist in purple robes and black hair appeared before them. His strength was profound and his aura mysterious, clearly indicating that he was no ordinary person.

"Greetings, Dao Ancestor." Everyone present reacted and bowed to the Dao Ancestor. As the Dao Ancestor's will shifted, everyone entered a separate space.

In the vast sky, only the Dao Ancestor and himself were present. The Dao Ancestor sat silently, but a huge character for "Dao" appeared behind him.

A voice rang in my ears: "Why do you ask?"

Outside the game, the Yuanyi panel showed that three thousand more guests had logged into the game, but they were all linked to the same IP address.

Yuan Yi was amazed by Dao Zu's move; the same game could have completely different effects in the hands of different people.

Despite being the game's producer, all he can do is urge players to register; for longer distances, he has to remotely control the farm to connect.

But the moment the Dao Ancestor made his move, it was clear whether he was capable or not. With just a light touch, he directly pulled these three thousand Great Luo Golden Immortals into the game, giving them no chance to refuse.

Hongjun then opened the game's built-in premium item, the "Dao Ancestor Hongjun" card, and recorded the first stage skill, "Seeking the Dao," on the spot. At this moment, everyone in Zixiao Palace was immersed in the journey of seeking the Dao that the game card contained.

"My path is to seize a glimmer of hope for all living beings." Tongtian blurted out without even thinking.

At this moment, the others were still deep in thought, contemplating their first meeting with the Dao Ancestor and facing his questions, striving to leave a good impression on him.

Only Tongtian, relying on being Hongjun's disciple, remained unaffected by his emotions and answered the question first.

As Tongtian finished speaking, the enormous character "Dao" changed, finally settling on the character "Jie" (截), which was imprinted on Tongtian's forehead and disappeared into his sea of ​​consciousness.

As the word "Dao" disappeared, the Daoist principles concerning this Dao continuously flooded into Tongtian's mind, bringing him great benefits.

When he opened his eyes again, he found himself back on the prayer mat in the Zixiao Palace.

The Dao Ancestor had already settled firmly on the high platform, and Yuan Yi was sitting to his right, carefully placing the two eggs under his sleeve.

Tongtian was the first to wake up. Hongjun nodded to him, and Yuanyi winked at him as well.

But when he realized that other players were about to complete the game, Yuan Yi immediately stopped his little actions and sat up straight on the table.

The second and third to pass the test of seeking the truth were Laozi and Yuanshi. However, when they woke up, they realized that it was just a dream and they had been unknowingly pulled into an illusion.

Now that they have finally met the Dao Ancestor in the real world, they wanted to pay their respects, but Hongjun stopped them, since there were still many people present who had not yet passed the test of seeking the Dao.

Therefore, those who have passed the test can only wait patiently in place.

Fortunately, those who could reach Zixiao Palace were all outstanding figures in the prehistoric world, having long since forged their own paths and possessing unwavering Daoist convictions.

Before long, they awoke from their slumber, and many of them had even more profound auras, clearly having gained a great deal from the slumber.

When Xuanming, one of the Twelve Ancestral Witches, awoke covered in rainwater, the questioning of the Dao came to an end.

The game that had been hanging above Zixiao Palace was also taken back into Hongjun's arms. As the bell rang to open the Daoist temple, the sermon officially began.

Everyone present felt indebted to the Dao Ancestor and bowed to him. Yuan Yi, who was on the platform, wanted to step aside to avoid the bow, but there were too many people present, so he had no choice but to accept the lower half of the bow.

The audience noticed that there was another person sitting next to Hongjun, and they couldn't help but become curious about Yuanyi.

After all, the Dao Ancestor was recognized by the Heavenly Dao. No matter how powerful or dominant they were in the prehistoric world, they could only remain below the platform. How could this seemingly uncultivated young girl be able to stand beside the Dao Ancestor?

Faced with the curious gazes of the crowd, Yuan Yi couldn't help but straighten her back even more.

Stop looking. She was really just providing technical support for the Zixiao sermon segment and was simply representing the logistics staff as an attendee with the organizers.

Although the support staff consists of only her, Yaochi, and Haotian, please don't look at me with that scrutinizing gaze, like you want to skin me alive and analyze me thoroughly.

Fortunately, this visual torture did not last long, because Hongjun soon began to preach.

"The beginning of the Tao..."

Yuan Yi thought he wouldn't understand, and was about to take out the game to optimize the formation program to pass the time.

After all, she can't be considered a prehistoric cultivator. She follows the path of merging with the earth's veins and becoming one with heaven and earth. The stronger the earth's veins, the stronger she becomes; when the earth's veins suffer disaster, she suffers a backlash. This is completely different from the path taken by the orthodox cultivators of the prehistoric world.

The last time Hongjun became a saint, he preached to Tongtian. She sat on the side and listened to the whole thing, but she couldn't understand anything and just listened to nothing.

What does it mean to enter a treasure mountain and return empty-handed? She was right next to the Dao Ancestor, yet she found herself unable to understand anything! It was so disheartening that she could only set up the recording array in advance and make the CGs for the lectures more exquisite in the future.

After realizing he couldn't understand, Yuan Yi's mind wasn't on the sermon at all; instead, he was looking at the people from Zixiao Palace and setting up their chibi-style avatars in the game.

When the game becomes popular, we can use these chibi characters to make merchandise and rake in the profits. Wouldn't that be wonderful?

At this moment, Hongjun, who was originally focused on expounding the Dao, realized that Yuan Yi was half-hearted and decisively explained the content about the formation within the original Dao intention.

At this moment, Yuan Yi was captivated by the Daoist meaning within, listening with rapt attention, and for a moment he lost track of time.

The two small eggs beside it had their shells stained with gold. The larger egg was visibly cracked, but the little creature inside refused to come out, curling itself up into a ball and stubbornly sealing the crack closed.

Yuan Yi was jolted out of his mystical state when a whisk touched his forehead.

At this moment, Zixiao Palace was empty, with only Sanqing and his two elder brothers, Hongyun and Zhenyuanzi. It was Zhenyuanzi who had just awakened him.

"...Has the sermon already ended?" Yuan Yi snapped out of her astonishment. In her sense of time, it seemed that Hongjun had only been lecturing on formations for less than a month.

But judging from the current situation, almost everyone from Zixiao Palace has left, clearly indicating that they have already finished speaking.

In the blink of an eye, three thousand years had passed. Yuan Yi couldn't believe it and even wondered if he had time-traveled again.

But looking at the new Dao patterns appearing in his meridians and his understanding of the Dao in his sea of ​​consciousness, he had to admit that he had indeed been listening to the Dao for a thousand years, and because of the profoundness of the Dao, he had forgotten the passage of time.

Zhen Yuanzi shook his head: "It's not over yet."

Yuan Yi let out a long breath. She said that no matter how much she forgot about the passage of time, it was impossible for her to confuse three thousand years with one month. Maybe it was a break and everyone else had gone out for some fresh air.

Otherwise, if you open your eyes and suddenly go from being a hundred years old to a thousand years old, there won't be enough candles to fit on the cake.

"The Dao Ancestor has already preached the Dao twice, and is about to open the Zixiao Palace for the third time to preach the Dao. Only after this preaching will it be over."

Alright, he's not just a thousand years old, he's about to reach ten thousand years!

Even Yuan Yi had to hold his head in his hands and doubt himself at this moment, considering the possibility of him traveling through time again.

Seeing Yuan Yi so shocked that he froze, Tongtian leaned over and said, "You slept for quite a long time. Luckily, I told Master to come here to wake you up in advance, otherwise you would have missed the last sermon."

What does it mean to sleep? She calls this an epiphany after hearing the sermon, only it took her a while.

However, the thought that he had sat there in front of everyone for thousands of years, listening to the discourse and then leaving in an orderly fashion while he remained seated beside the platform—and that this had happened twice—and that Tongtian had to find the Dao Ancestor to wake him up, even Yuan Yi couldn't help but feel somewhat embarrassed.

Not wanting to get caught up in these emotions, Yuan Yi quickly put the matter out of his mind: "At least I didn't miss a sermon; the last one is crucial."

In the final lecture, Hongjun Daozu will discuss the path to sainthood, and his role in the game is to be a key point in spreading the Dao in the prehistoric world, providing buffs on the path to sainthood.

She had finally managed to reach an agreement with Senior Hongjun to promote the game during the Zixiao sermon. If she were to miss this great opportunity by getting too caught up in listening to the sermon, she would feel like vomiting blood even if she got up in the middle of the night.

Thinking of this, Yuan Yi grasped Tongtian's hand with emotion: "It's good that you called in time, I'll start making preparations now."

Now we don't care about age, we're about to enter the game's promotion phase, and this time Yuan Yi is going to do something big.

Zhen Yuanzi couldn't just stand by and watch the brat try to seduce his sister again. He was grateful that the boy had taken him and Hongyun to Zixiao Palace earlier, and he couldn't let him lay a hand on her now.

He conveyed the message to Hongyun, then pulled Tongtian's hand away and turned to walk towards Yuanshi. He spoke of discussing the Dao together, sharing his insights from listening to the Dao over the years.

Tongtian originally didn't want to leave, but Zhen Yuanzi pulled him back, and Hongyun also secretly used a trick. He couldn't push his two elder brothers to the ground in front of Yuanyi. He could only swallow this humiliation and go back to face Yuanshi's critical gaze.

Hongyun finally squeezed through and, as always, patted Yuanyi's head, saying with great affection, "You've grown quite a bit."

It felt right. When she woke up, a thousand years had passed, but Hongyun still treated her like a cub. The familiar feeling returned.

“It’s not that we didn’t call you at the time; it’s that the Dao Ancestor said this was your opportunity, so he let you come here to comprehend the Dao.”

Hongyun's gentle eyes held a hint of shame: "It's just that we can't stay in Zixiao Palace for long. We can only calculate that we will come to Zixiao Palace with Tongtian on the day you wake up."

"However, the game has been running normally all these years, and the ginseng fruit tree in Wuzhuang Temple has grown much taller, so I know you are doing well."

When all this was revealed to be alright, even Yuan Yi couldn't help but be moved.

But Hongyun wasn't just talking; the cushion under Yuanyi's feet and the pillow he was holding with his two disciples were now wrapped in red clouds, making them even more comfortable.

Hongyun even picked up the two large golden eggs and gently wiped their shells, advising, "This place is special, so you can't be so lazy in the future."

Yuan Yi then noticed that her two disciples had grown two or three times larger without her noticing. One of them, the younger disciple, had accidentally created a crack, which then closed up visibly right in front of her.

A quick scan with divine sense revealed that the two eggs, one large and one small, were long overdue to hatch. Their golden shells were covered with countless cracks and repairs. It was fortunate that they had willingly endured being trapped inside their shells for thousands of years.

Yuan Yi instantly understood what they were thinking. They had a great opportunity to sit next to the Dao Ancestor and listen to the Dao. As an egg, they could continue to take advantage of the situation and pretend to be an egg. But once they were born, they would have to start from scratch again.

“You two are quite clever children. After this sermon is over, I will choose a good birthplace for you.” Yuan Yi took the two eggs and placed them back on the pillow.

Hongyun thoughtfully covered them with another layer of protective clouds and instructed Yuanyi: "The Dao Ancestor said that you have an opportunity to preach this time, so don't miss it."

"I understand, but how much time has passed now? I need to make some preparations for when the next sermon will begin."

Hongyun smiled slightly: "We came to Zixiao Palace ahead of time. The other fellow Daoists will be arriving in an hour."

An hour?!

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Author's Note: Yuan Yi: Whose cake did I disturb? I fell asleep halfway through, and when I woke up it was like a million years ago! [frightened]

This incident teaches us that it's best not to daydream when sitting next to the teacher. [doge emoji]

The update will be posted tomorrow at 11:30 AM. My little angels, you don't need to wait; just check back the day after tomorrow morning! [heart emoji]