"Your tone sounds like you're accusing me." The woman's voice remained perfectly calm, seemingly devoid of human emotion.

"Shouldn't I be angry? If you hadn't sent her to that Heavenly Realm, she wouldn't be unable to come back," Zuan said in a deep voice. The Mermaid Queen was perfectly fine here, but because of her actions, she became Chang'e in the Heavenly Realm.

"I did send her back, and I didn't just send her back; I also sent back your other confidantes," Houtu's illusory figure replied calmly.

"Why do this?" Zuan asked, both puzzled and angry.

"You can interpret this as their destiny," Houtu's illusory voice had an epic quality. "These things were destined to happen to them."

"But if you hadn't interfered, they wouldn't have met such a fate!" Not to mention the Mermaid Queen, Jiang Luofu also disappeared in the Heavenly Court world.

"Then how do you know that everything I do isn't a preordained arrangement?" Houtu countered.

Zuan was stunned for a moment, and countless thoughts rushed through his mind.

After a long silence, he finally spoke: "You can see destiny?"

Houtu answered without hesitation: "I am in charge of reincarnation, and I can indeed vaguely see the direction of some destinies, but I am not omniscient or omnipotent. Many times, I can only understand how to do certain things on a whim."

“I remember hearing Zhuanxu of Heaven and Earth mention in the Heavenly Court that time doesn’t mean much to beings like them. So he gave me the Sun-Shooting Bow in the ‘future,’ and I in the ‘past’ also possessed the Sun-Shooting Bow, which I could also use to shoot down ten suns in the sky,” Zu’an said with a distant look in his eyes. “In the Heavenly Court, there was also a Houtu Goddess who gave me a drop of Wu Clan blood essence. Can I understand that you are actually one and the same?”

"Back then, you also possessed all the memories you have now, knew me, and knew about my past missions, etc."

"Although your understanding is somewhat simplistic and straightforward, and contains some errors, it is still acceptable to understand it this way given your current way of thinking." The phantom of Houtu seemed somewhat surprised that he could think of this.

“Di Jun wanted to eliminate the Wu Clan and dominate the world to become a saint, while Di Yao wanted to make the human race prosper to become a saint. All the powerful beings in that world tried to become saints in their own way. Now that I think about it, I’m afraid everything you’ve done is also for the purpose of becoming a saint.” Zu An looked at the powerful phantom in front of him. “The difference is that they all failed, but you have obviously succeeded.”

Pei Mianman blinked. She had always been praised for her intelligence since she was a child, but why could she understand every single word they said, yet completely not understand them when they were put together?

That makes me look really silly.

"You're half right. I did all this in order to become a saint, but I haven't become a saint yet," the phantom of Houtu said frankly.

Zuan said blankly, "I'm afraid I'll need a few more things in my possession to refine the Six Paths of Reincarnation before I can truly become a saint."

Houtu's method of becoming a saint is obviously to establish the Six Paths of Reincarnation, allowing the wandering souls in the Six Paths to be reincarnated. At the same time, in order to be reborn into a better realm in the future, everyone will consciously accumulate merit and do good deeds and reduce evil deeds. When this system is running, it will generate an enormous amount of merit.

"That's right, I can only become a saint after the Six Paths of Reincarnation are established." The phantom of Houtu glanced at Zu'an. "Are you trying to use this to blackmail me?"

Zuan smiled and said, "I do have that idea. After all, you need to rely on this to become a saint, and since you haven't become a saint yet, even if you want to use force, I'm not without the power to fight you."

Pei Mianman tensed up instantly upon hearing this. They had been acting like friends when they first met, so how did they end up fighting like this?

Of course, she would stand with Zuan through thick and thin, secretly circulating her cultivation, ready to make a move at any time. However, this time the enemy was a mysterious and unpredictable phantom, and she didn't know how to hurt her.

"Have you forgotten something? You just said that time has no meaning for beings like us. My past self, my present self, and my future self are all one. My future self has already become a saint, so how can you deal with my present self?" The phantom of Houtu seemed to be talking about something completely unrelated to herself.

Zu An's heart sank. He knew the other party was not lying, but he still tried to gain more leverage: "But without the Six Paths Authority that I provided, you probably wouldn't be able to refine the Six Paths of Reincarnation, which would still have a great impact on your path to sainthood."

"It seems you still haven't truly understood time and history. Since my future self has already become a saint, then proving that my sainthood is a given fact is certain. Even without your help, there would be others who would help me achieve this. The course of fate cannot be changed by individual power." Houtu's illusory voice was faint and ethereal.

Zuan thought of how Xihe had done so many things to try and change history in order to alter the outcome of the ten suns in the sky, but without exception, all of them had failed.

Mi Li once said that some important historical moments will be fixed and cannot be changed at all.

Houtu's attainment of sainthood through the Six Paths of Reincarnation is clearly an important and unchangeable turning point.

But he wasn't intimidated: "That's right, you can indeed become a saint, but you haven't become a saint yet. If I don't cooperate, although there may be other people to help you gather the materials to refine the Six Paths of Reincarnation, this back and forth will waste time, and you may have to wait for who knows how many more years."

The phantom of Houtu shook her head: "You may not understand our kind of existence. What seems like a long time to you humans is just the time it takes to sleep for us."

“Indeed, what I said just now was inappropriate. Let me put it another way: if I don’t help you this time, there will be more variables in your path to sainthood, and what beings like you fear most is variables,” Zu’an said calmly. “In the future, Houtu will indeed become a saint through the Six Paths of Reincarnation, but can you be sure that Houtu will be you?”

He drew inspiration from the recent ten-day sky eclipse. While historical moments are indeed unchangeable, the process has changed. Even if the outcome is the same, many things have already been drastically altered.

As expected, the phantom of Houtu showed an unusual emotional fluctuation: "I must admit, you are indeed a very intelligent human. You have successfully persuaded me. Tell me, what do you want?"

Human cunning and political maneuvering are of little use to someone like her, and she is well aware of Zuan's purpose.

"Help me rescue the Mermaid Queen, and my other companion Jiang Luofu," Zu'an said. Although he could ask for help before, Houtu might not have gone all out to help if it didn't concern him. But now it was different.

Houtu's illusory figure frowned slightly: "Let's change the conditions, this really can't be done."

Zuan pulled Pei Mianman and turned to leave: "Then you can find someone else to help you collect the authority of the Six Paths again."