Chapter 964: Chapter 964: A Moment from the Past
(Did this time scare you?)
The Goddess Garden might be the place with the most intense life aura I have ever seen; everything here is alive, including the tables, chairs, roads, and walls. The lush green vines weave into neat vertical walls, and the soft and thick unusual lawn beneath our feet is as comfortable as a carpet. The large round wooden stumps scattered everywhere serve as tables and chairs in the garden—of course, the Wild Dingdang who live here use them as a plaza.
"These stumps are actually branches of the World Tree," Jiajia said to me, sitting in mid-air. "Chopping down growing trees would be very painful, and I can’t bear to do it. These are branches that the World Tree naturally shed. All the items in the temple are made from such materials."
A branch can be large enough that several people hugging it wouldn’t encircle it, and the cross-section of the thinnest leaf petiole is big enough to serve as a sofa for a person of normal physique—why do these little ones, who have an average height of 0.1 Pandora, love planting such huge trees?
Sitting atop a halved, horizontally-placed World Tree petiole, I gazed around the Goddess Garden. Everywhere I looked were plants, a dazzling array of exotic flowers and grasses with hardly any signs of lifeless man-made traces. Such an environment inevitably evoked thoughts of the deep, uninhabited parts of a primordial forest. For a normal person, it would be hard to imagine what it’s like living in such a setting. But for the Life Goddesses, perhaps such an environment is the most comfortable. Their favorite bed is always a soft floral bud, and their favorite bedroom is always one that grows on vines. Ah, these little beings born from plants.
Of course, since the Goddess Temple is a temple, there can’t be nothing but a circle of surrounding wall with plants inside. It’s just that the part covered by plants is the Goddess Garden. In other parts of the temple, there should be normal halls and the like. But I am really curious if the Supreme Life Goddess "ma’am" ever uses those places, considering Dingdang only needs a lampshade to sleep at home, and Jiajia looks just a tad taller than Dingdang—a tiny bit.
The pile of candies I took out from my Personal Space was snatched away by the Wild Dingdang who had just finished playing "chess." Each little guy carried a big bag of colorful candies and buzzed away, even taking Dingdang’s stolen chessboard along from home. They might be planning to continue this seemingly fun game sometime: fighting on a tarp. Dingdang, with nothing else to do, lay lazily on top of my head, occasionally combing through my hair and making soft purring sounds like a lazy cat. I must remember to place a handkerchief on my head when she gets ready to eat something. Meanwhile, the Supreme Life Goddess Jiajia kept flying back and forth in front of me, her face full of interest.
From just a glance, she figured I’d encountered something in the brief period earlier (confirmed that the dream, which I thought lasted an hour or two, actually lasted only a second or two; I experienced all those weird things the moment I stepped across the temple’s outer wall). This had to be said about the Supreme Life Goddess living up to her title; she’s much more useful than the little Dingdang who only eats, plays, or acts cute. Look at her sharp insight!
"The outer wall of the Life Temple, it’s also called the Travel Wall, meaning the journey of life," Jiajia said, pointing to the temple wall covered by vines at a distance. "Almost everyone passing through this wall for the first time undergoes a life recall, where your consciousness will instantaneously dive into a point in time from long ago. This time point is ’automatically’ remembered by your life. It might not be something particularly memorable, maybe even trivial after you rethink it, but your life journey remembers it because, at that moment, it fundamentally changed your life journey. It’s like a crossroad."
"Many times, even gods have difficulty realizing where the crossroads of their life are because these crucial moments occur not with much fanfare but rather ordinary events. Your life might veer dramatically on either side of this pivotal point, but this effect often becomes evident when you’ve nearly forgotten the moment. That’s why every now and then, the Life Temple gets visitors—usually newbie gods who have just started managing worlds. They think managing a world on their own is impressive, even capable of tackling a half-baked Abyss. So they confidently pass through the Travel Wall of the Life Temple to review and confirm where their turning point in life lies."
"Oh, and then?" Honestly, I wasn’t interested in this topic, but seeing Jiajia "ma’am" so invested, I felt compelled to feign interest and probe further.
"Most of the rookies just pass through like that. What in their life is significant enough for a turn?" Jiajia shook her head. "Xingchen once said, the truly powerful never see themselves as special, while those who think themselves invincible usually can’t even match the janitor guarding the messenger’s room at the Father God Temple. But Jiajia is quite surprised: who’d have thought the Travel Wall could work on a Void Creature like you—Father God didn’t react at all when he passed through the wall for the first time."
I pondered for a moment, realizing that it might be because I was still a rookie, having yet to fully manifest my true form after all the efforts. Could one of my stature, who’s been awakened for barely four years, compare to Father God who treats two million three hundred thousand years ago like it was just the other day?
"That’s possible," Jiajia agreed with my speculation. "So, what did you see?"
Hmm, this question intrigued me. The events of that intense recall journey were now vividly imprinted in my memory. Despite not understanding what it meant, and knowing this self-proclaimed Supreme Life Goddess with a childlike demeanor wouldn’t be much help, I still shared with her the scenes I had witnessed. Of course, I briefly mentioned the encounter with the loli version of Qianqian, focusing on that bizarre event after the dark tide.
"Oh, oh, so that’s how it is," Jiajia circled around in the air, a subconscious action when the Wild Dingdangs were deep in thought, as I learned from the Domesticated Dingdang, "It seems like the darkness at the end was the main event... Don’t you feel the scene seemed very familiar? Black shadows, a sense of oppression, a dangerous aura and such, Jiajia is quite familiar with it."
Jiajia said this and even proudly puffed out her tiny chest, which was slightly smaller than a mung bean. I glanced at it, thinking to myself that, proportionally speaking, even Dingdang’s was bigger—of course, this didn’t mean much, as they were among those who saved the most on fabric.
"I thought of the Abyss, the aura is a bit similar," I shook my head, "But when I recall it now, it seems a bit strange. The Abyss wouldn’t be so gentle. Those black shadows just made people feel dangerous but didn’t really harm anything, not even killing the spiders on the walls. At that time, Qianqian was just an ordinary person, she was in the area affected by the shadows, and she just got startled. That girl’s innate nerves shouldn’t be thick enough to withstand the Abyss. What puzzles me most is how I had no memory of this event at all before today?"
This is the strangest part, according to Jiajia’s account, what I went through should have been a tangible memory, that black shadow and the bizarre events afterward would be an unprecedented terrifying event for a little kid who hadn’t even graduated from elementary school—you didn’t see Qianqian from back then get scared to tears—but neither myself, nor Qianqian, nor Big Sister, who were present back then, nor the neighborhood crowd at the time had any similar memories afterward. I believe even if I went back now to flip through old newspapers from K City’s old district, I wouldn’t find a report about a sudden solar eclipse. It’s as if this event vanished from history, the only evidence left being Jiajia’s words—the memory of Life.
"You were all ordinary people then, even the gentlest Abyss could disrupt your memory," Jiajia thought about it and gave me a guess from a doctor’s perspective, "If I’m not wrong, even the events from before the shadows appeared are probably blurry in your memory, and you likely lack memory for quite some time afterward. You could try asking your sister, see what others remember after that day, you might find some clues."
I noted Jiajia’s suggestion, but regarding the bizarre occurrences after that darkness, especially the voices echoing in my mind, neither she nor I had any clue; we completely couldn’t figure out what was going on.
The only vague guess was that I suspected it might be related to the Old Empire—anyway, associating strange happenings with the Old Empire had become instinctive for me; haven’t they caused enough trouble?
"Hey, hey, Ah Jun, Dingdang is bored! Dingdang wants to go home!"
The Little Thing lying on my head started tugging hard on my hair and yelling, because her little sisters all got new gifts—a chessboard and candy packet, somehow this one got tossed aside, and she was completely disinterested in the discussion between Jiajia and me, so she began to fuss about going home. I reached out to comfort the Little One, but as soon as I put my hand down, she hung upside down chewing her own finger...
It seems that even Jiajia couldn’t provide much more explanation about my journey through memories—I’m already amazed she, this super Dingdang, could tell me so much—so I took Dingdang, who had started gnawing on her fingernails, and left the temple, received through spiritual link that Bingdisi had just been released too, and the two of us went to pick her up and go home.
Actually, I wanted to say, it seems to me that the Divine Realm is more of a home for these two, right?
Bingdisi had been dragged to me by her dad, and when leaving, the previously spirited Sister Bing now looked utterly despondent, like she’d bought a box of instant noodles only to find a single packet of seasoning inside. Seeing me and Dingdang goofing around as we approached, Sister Bing instantly looked aggrieved: "Please take me back quickly! I can’t stay a second longer in this place!"
I was shocked, thinking could there still be someone in the world capable of making Bingdisi despair? Even being dragged by her biological father to apologize wouldn’t make her like this, right? It turned out I was in for another shock: this poor soul, upon arriving at the Pantheon, happened to encounter the Dragon God looking for someone to chat...
"He first asked me about the customs of the Lower Realm, then chatted about mortal culture, the topic progressed from the cycle of life to increasing wheat yields, he spent half an hour lecturing on law, then another half hour emphasizing why he was lecturing on law, he mixed celestial motion with divine creeds, concluding that having just one child isn’t enough, my dad dozed off twice, those elders pitched hammocks five meters away, three divine servants burst into tears upon entering, yet I had to keep listening! Forking circles, how is this bearable? I wanted to sleep but didn’t dare, wanted to leave but couldn’t—otherwise he’d start all over again from the beginning!"
Bingdisi looked completely aggrieved. From her miserable appearance, if Xiang Lin stood next to her, she would probably shout that life is good, and standing beside her, Uncle Kuwayin shrugged after his daughter finished her grievances: "At least because of this, the Pantheon didn’t punish you; you saved several thousand words on reflection."
Bingdisi’s face continued to be gloomy, and Uncle Kuwayin whispered, "The Pantheon gave this girl a major credit."
Me: "..."
Bingdisi patted my shoulder, "Chen, you’re buddies with Father God, go tell him, just say the Supreme Dragon God needs to be confined again..."
"Don’t talk nonsense!" Uncle Kuwayin glared at his daughter and then looked at me, "I’ll be waiting for you outside the Father God Temple."
Guess what?
It’s said that it took the Dragon God two months to be released.
Uncle Kuwayin hoped his daughter could stay home peacefully for a few days or honestly handle the affairs in her own temple, but unfortunately, the word "honestly" simply doesn’t exist in this female hooligan’s dictionary, not to mention that this time coming to the Divine Realm, Bingdisi encountered a major life crisis. So, her father could only hold my hand with tears in his eyes and entrust his daughter to me. At that moment, my hair stood on end because Uncle said:
"Take good care of my girl, be a good parent, tell Little Light that grandpa will visit her after a while..."
Bingdisi was forcibly dragged back by me, otherwise, she would have been desperate to fight with her own father...
We didn’t delay too long in the Divine Realm, adding up to just half a day, and it was still bright when we got home. Everyone in the house seemed to have gone somewhere, leaving only a group of smaller ones, including Cui Xingshi and the others who had not left yet, crowded in the living room watching TV. I, along with Bingdisi and Dingdang, returned smoothly without drawing the attention of this group of doll heads. The reason was probably that they were all captivated by the TV show. I curiously leaned in to see what was playing that could get everyone so engrossed, and upon looking, realized it was an OVA of "Rose Maiden" someone had bought, and sitting in the prime spot before the TV were the two protagonists...
Well, with today’s OVA added to the first and second seasons they’ve watched before, the entire animated version of "Rose Maiden" is now complete for them.
Mercury Lamp and Zhenhong sat side by side on the sofa watching TV, while other doll girls circled around nearby. Lilina occasionally turned her head to chastise, "How could you two be so brainless back then?"
Cui Xingshi, who couldn’t sit still, was twisting around and suddenly noticed me standing behind, exclaiming, "Wow! The adults are home!"
A group of little ones suddenly turned into a hive of bees, buzzing to life. Zhenhong turned off the TV, Cui Xingshi unplugged it, Cang Xingshi found the power already cut while trying to remove the disc, so she hefted the player and dashed upstairs. Lilina grabbed the still-dazed Chiruno, turned the TV to her back, and commanded, "Whirlwind!" Mercury Lamp then flapped her wings fiercely, fanning Chiruno and the TV. Little Baobao was knocked off the sofa and started wailing...
Bingdisi and I were dumbfounded.
"What are you all doing?"
I hurriedly picked up Little Baobao while reaching out to catch Lilina, who was about to sneak past my feet. I easily lifted the little girl to eye level.
"Experiencing the thrill of erasing evidence when parents suddenly come home," Lilina grinned foolishly at me, "Isn’t the biggest joy for children cleaning up the traces of over-watched TV the moment dad comes home?"
A group of Rose Maidens and the still-clueless Chiruno hung their heads low together.
Bingdisi sighed faintly, "These kids lacking fatherly love... Speaking of which, Dingdang has quite a peculiar bishop."
"She’s been peculiar for years." Casually tossing Lilina onto the sofa, I lightly slapped her on the arm, just as a burst of chatter came from the entrance, announcing the return of the women of the house.
"Wow, Ah Jun’s home!" Qianqian sensed my presence before seeing me, kicked off her shoes, and ran across barefoot with a pattering noise, recklessly giving me a peck before hugging my arm cheerfully, "Any fun stuff in the Divine Realm?"
See, I told you, this girl would probably start digging for gossip from me right away—I bet if I couldn’t mention anything fun, she’d nag me on this topic until next year’s National Day goes by!
"We went out and bought some things, including ribs and other fish you like," Big Sister started unloading all the treasures the women had bought from the cheap and cheerful supermarket specials, signaling she’d taken the lead in this shopping trip, "Qianqian even bought some gifts for Little Cui Xingshi and the others."
Cui Xingshi immediately jumped off the sofa, chatteringly asking, "Where? What are they?"
Then a bunch of little dolls found a pile of cute little dresses among the gifts Qianqian dumped out, and I noticed keenly that all the clothes had Barbie doll logos printed on them... only Qianqian could have thought of this.
"Ah Jun, you seem to have something on your mind."
Finally, Sandora quietly came to my side while others gleefully distributed the gifts and softly asked.
Me: "Father God tinkered with something amazing in the basement."
(If I have time at the company... actually, it won’t have to be extended by an hour or two.) (To be continued. If you like this work, please vote with recommendation tickets or monthly tickets at Qidian (). Your support is my greatest motivation.)