The Realm Lord's Honorific Title

The Heavenly Dao was eternal. Supreme heavenly treasures, immortal artifacts, Dao methods, and even blessed lands and grottos could not be named arbitrarily. If a name was not bestowed by the Heavenly Dao, it meant the subject had not yet reached the point of stirring the Heavenly Dao, nor had it left its imprint upon the Great Dao. Thus, consecrating an honorific title to complete one's conceptual imagery was truly a monumental affair. Feng Chutang had planned ahead, thinking through the matter with exceptional thoroughness. When it came to honorific titles, the Academy and the Great Baohua Pure Land cared about them the most. The Sword Palace did not care much for their own honorific titles, but they cared immensely about the names of their swords. The immortal swords wielded by successive generations of Palace Masters bore names each more explosive than the last—things like Chaos, First Ascent, Sweep Clean, Purge the World—stopping just short of Heaven-Opening and World-Destroying. From the Patriarch down to the Fifth Generation Palace Master, the Palace of Grand Beginning had paid no heed to honorific titles whatsoever; they had spent their entire lives fighting until their untimely deaths. Intermediate masters aside, when it came to the contemporary Grand Palace Master, he had simply severed all karmic ties, vanishing from the world in all but name, and thus had no title. After him, Yanshi's ascension to immortality had flaws, and as a practitioner of the arts of heavenly mysteries, honorific titles were something he could not touch even if he wished to. Zhu Yan, never shedding his assassin's nature, certainly possessed an honorific title, but no one knew what it was. Wei Yuan, however, was different. He had established Qingming, reshaped heaven and earth, and shepherded myriad mortals while gathering human luck, effectively treading a fraction of the path of a Human Sovereign. For him, an honorific title became exceptionally vital. The vast majority of mortals would never see Wei Yuan in their entire lifetimes; their first impression of him would largely stem from his honorific title. Consequently, this title would dictate just how much karmic luck Wei Yuan could gather. A Dao name, by contrast, was determined by Wei Yuan's Dao path, used between fellow cultivators to address one another. For Wei Yuan, it was not as crucial as an honorific title, though different Dao names could still subtly influence his cultivation progress. As for an immortal name, it pointed toward the Great Dao authority he wielded. Certain authorities could accommodate only a single immortal name. For instance, with an immortal name like the Immortal Lord of Passing Years and Flowing Light, if two ever emerged, a fight to the death was inevitable until one was completely annihilated. When a Dao name and an immortal name merged into one, it came remarkably close to the fruitions of Buddhism and Daoism. The only difference was that attaining a fruition required complete mastery of the relevant authority, whereas a Dao name and an immortal name did not; holding partial control was enough to sustain the title. Wei Yuan glanced at the progress bar of his cultivation, which still had a hundred and fifty thousand years remaining, and temporarily set aside both Dao name and immortal name. An honorific title, however, could already be considered now. Since an honorific title required gathering the will of the masses, Wei Yuan felt there was no harm in brainstorming. He activated an obscure avatar, had Jialuo possess it, and then, wearing a face that closely resembled Xiaoyu, posted a task within the Splendor of the Many Realms: *Soliciting Honorific Titles for the Realm Lord*. When he first posted the task, Wei Yuan assumed it was a trivial matter. Not long after the task went live, small ripples stirred within the Splendor of the Many Realms. In the blink of an eye, over a hundred thousand honorific titles surfaced, ranging from the Sky-Soaring Demon Lord to the Floor-Sweeping Holy Monk, covering every conceivable variation. The cultivators' enthusiasm then surged to new heights. Everyone took an extraordinary interest in the Realm Lord's honorific title, launching round after round of debates and votes. As the great waves sifted the sand, countless titles vanished like foam. Fewer and fewer remained, and the discussions grew deeper by the hour. Yet the course of events was unpredictable. In next to no time, the focus of the discussion shifted from what honorific title should be conferred upon the Realm Lord to what kind of person the Realm Lord actually was. Once such a discussion began, it could not be stopped. In the span of a breath, it delved deeper and deeper. Within moments, several of Wei Yuan's avatars were dug up. He was stripped bare down to his undergarments, scrutinized beneath countless magnifying glasses. Every past word and deed of Wei Yuan, anything from which public information could be gathered, was compiled together. Then, the grand masters of mathematics among the cultivators grew too restless to contain their itching hands, constructing model after model to begin their analysis. From the very start, Wei Yuan could not comprehend a single one of these models. Mathematics seemed to demand an entirely separate talent, having nothing to do with one's innate bones or karmic luck. Fortunately, information flowed openly in Qingming, and those gifted in mathematics possessed exceedingly high comprehension; they knew full well that reckless gossip about the Realm Lord could easily invite heavenly tribulation. Thus, they carefully skirted several minefields—such as the origin of the "three thrusts" rumor, or the Realm Lord's enigmatic progress with the Desolate Roar—analyzing only public, legitimate facts that Wei Yuan was willing to let the world know. In truth, Qingming had an abundance of such materials, the largest single source being various visual records and the statues of Wei Yuan erected in dojos. Wei Yuan had no idea that amidst countless numbers, a version of himself so real it was practically naked was gradually taking shape! Fortunately, this was a world of profound power. Although Wei Yuan did not know what had transpired, a sudden premonition struck his heart, informing him that something unfortunate was bound to occur. For such matters, the immortal realm had long possessed numerous immortal methods to counter them: one could divine heavenly secrets, cast curses to strike back, or even play along and fish for culprits. However, Wei Yuan was currently preoccupied with Baoyun. That matter was more important than anything else, so he did not take the slight premonition to heart, failing to notice that a tiny splash had quietly vanished from his sea of karmic luck. In a secluded corner of Qingming, an unkempt template cultivator lay sprawled on the stone floor of a grand hall, his eyes tightly shut, his primordial spirit having already entered the Splendor of the Many Realms. Countless numerical symbols drifted around his divine sense. To outsiders, these symbols were chaotic and devoid of meaning, but in his eyes, the Realm Lord stood in the very center of them, walking forward at a measured pace. With every stretch of distance walked, a silhouette would separate from the Realm Lord's body, heading toward a distinct trajectory of life, ultimately playing out a different existence. Some of these lives were vast and magnificent; others were tragic and poignant. Their endings varied wildly, yet not one spent his days in mediocrity or lived out the rest of his life in quiet serenity. Looking upon this, the slovenly template Dao foundation cultivator grew uncontrollably excited, calculating with all his might to drive the model forward. By now, the model's operational speed had long surpassed his limits. Even though he relied on the Splendor of the Many Realms for computing power, adjusting the model still demanded calculations of his own, giving him a splitting headache. Yet the model was running so smoothly that stopping was out of the question. Just then, a new life trajectory emerged, instantly revitalizing the cultivator's spirits. "Yo, yo, yo! A shaman? It's a shaman? The Realm Lord himself has a taste for that?" "What's this? The Realm Lord perishes midway through his life, and then his seven thousand six hundred and eighty children rise up in vengeance? That many? How did he even find the time?" "...Huh? The Realm Lord likes being the passive one?" At that moment, across the dozens of life trajectories that had already branched out, every single silhouette suddenly stopped in unison and turned to look at him! The template cultivator's eyes instantly rolled back. Blinding light flooded his consciousness, wiping away every coherent thought. By the time the brilliant light dissipated, he felt as though he had forgotten something. Staring at the scattered numerical symbols around him, he could recall nothing at all. Pale with shock, he inspected himself and found that his mathematical knowledge was still entirely intact, allowing him to breathe a sigh of relief. Yet for reasons unknown, he simply could not remember what he had been doing just moments ago. The surrounding numerical symbols vanished abruptly, and a young cultivator materialized before him. The cultivator stood with hands clasped behind his back, looking down upon him, inspiring awe without anger. The unkempt template wiped the greasy sweat from his palms, feeling that the young cultivator looked somewhat familiar. After pondering for a long time, he finally remembered where he had seen that face before. The person standing before him was none other than the Realm Lord! This shock was no small matter; he hurriedly prostrated himself in reverence. Wei Yuan did not say much, merely placing a stack of dossiers before him. "Here is all the available information on a certain individual. Analyze it thoroughly and see what you can deduce." "Understood!" By the time the template looked up, Wei Yuan had already vanished. He picked up the dossiers and flipped them open, finding biographical records for dozens of people. These individuals came from all walks of life, having lived in different eras and through varied experiences, yet every single one was connected to someone known as the Immeasurable Bright Light Bodhisattva. Inexplicably, the slovenly template felt that he was remarkably adept at this sort of work, even though he had clearly never done anything of the kind. Yet a faint confusion immediately arose within him: if he had never done it, why did he feel as though a model was already poised to leap from his mind? Above the Sea of Bitterness, a Bodhisattva seated within a great sun slowly opened her eyes and began a silent deduction. The calculation yielded results with effortless ease, yet her brows knit slightly as she muttered to herself, "So it is merely a minor cultivator calculating me... But how could a single speck of karma disturb my state of mind?" The result of the divination was plain and clear, yet precisely because of this, it defied reason. Today Wei Yuan contested against the Pure Land, but the Pure Land had faced formidable foes in the past as well, to the point where its lineage had nearly been wiped out. Those who had calculated against her, cursed her, or even hurled hexes at her had never been few. Yet never had there been a moment like this, where the mere movements of a minor cultivator as insignificant as a speck of dust could draw her attention. Since she could not divine the truth, she ceased forcing the matter, saying softly, "It seems I still need to have words with that fellow after all." Returning to the space that belonged exclusively to him within the Splendor of the Many Realms, Wei Yuan finally opened a file. This file had been extracted from that slovenly template's model. The model had nearly run its course to completion, automatically generating an honorific title for Wei Yuan; before the template could even see it, the entire model along with its diverse life trajectories had their karma erased by Wei Yuan. Yet because Wei Yuan was not yet an immortal, the erasure had not been entirely clean, leaving behind a trace of its root. Wei Yuan had held back from looking at the file until he returned to a secure space. Only now did he eagerly open it, ready to see what kind of honorific title such a wondrous model had produced for him. Right in the center of the file were several large characters: *Immortal Monarch of Manifesting Holiness Across the Realms*. A coincidence, an accident... Wei Yuan silently erased the file. A minor cultivator running a bizarre model—the output proved nothing. By now, the open selection for the Realm Lord's honorific title had reached its final stage. The title holding first place was ahead by a landslide, unanimously endorsed by mathematicians and metaphysicians alike. Wei Yuan stared at that honorific title, his face devoid of expression: *Immortal Lord of Past and Present Holy Manifestation Across the Heavens and Myriad Realms*.