Lady Mo Yu's eyelashes were very long. Because of the small drizzle just a while ago, tiny drops of water dabbed the edges of the lashes, making her seem very beautiful. It was a great pity that upon hearing the Divine Empress's words, her eyelashes fluttered, causing those little beads of water to fall, fall into the abyss of the dark night that lay before the Dew Platform.
The Dew Platform was located in the very front of the Imperial Palace and was a hundred zhang tall. Constructed of pure copper, it presented a spectacular sight. Embedded on the platform were several thousand Night Pearls. Even from several dozen li away, one would still be able to see their light. However, tonight, the Night Pearls emitted not a single ray of brilliance.
Mo Yu gazed at the edge of the Dew Platform. There, the Black Goat stood in the radiance of the stars, its head raised towards a certain place in the night sky. She turned her head to the most forward position of the Dew Platform and confirmed that the Divine Empress was also gazing at that place in the night sky. She couldn't help but grow a little suspicious.
"Empress, what are you looking at?" she asked.
In the Great Zhou, and even in the entire continent, Lady Mo Yu possessed an extremely high prestige. This was because of her family background and also because of her unfathomable strength, but the most fundamental reason was her relationship with the Divine Empress. In this world, the people that could chat so casually with the Divine Empress were growing fewer and fewer.
The starlight shone over the Dew Platform, only allowing that woman's back to be clearly seen.
It was just a simple back, yet it seemed like tens of thousands of worlds could be seen upon it.
Because in tens of thousands of years, she was the world's first female emperor. She was the master of the Great Zhou.
"A person has lit up a star."
The Divine Empress turned and indifferently noted.
Lady Mo Yu fell silent. Every night, there would always be cultivators lighting up their Fated Stars, but she knew that even the Divine Empress would rarely see it. However, tonight, the Divine Empress had seen and even quietly gazed at it for a very long time. What did this mean?
"That star is very far away from us."
Upon hearing the Divine Empress's next words, Mo Yu believed that she understood.
After a moment's thought, she replied, "No matter how far it is…it doesn't signify a true genius."
The Divine Empress did not reply.
Mo Yu was like a little girl whose opinions were not valued by her elders. Rather unhappy, she snorted, then said, "The Dragon Soaring Star that the child from the Qiushan clan fixed as his Fated Star when he was four was one of the ten furthest stars in the past one hundred years. Yet on that night, a disciple of a small sect on the Hundred Li Stream began Purification, and the star that he fixed as his Fated Star was even farther than the Dragon Soaring Star, but that disciple could not compare to the child of the Qiushan clan…in the end, Purification depends on the strength of the meridians within the body. How could an ordinary person compare to the blood of the true Dragon?"
This was a very illustrative example. Before the age of eighteen, Qiushan Jun had always remained first on the Proclamation of Azure Sky, a genius acknowledged by the entire world. As for that disciple from that small sect by the Hundred Li Stream, he had long since vanished amongst the masses. If Mo Yu had not possessed such broad and extensive knowledge, how could she have remembered such a person?
The Divine Empress replied, "The person that lit up this Fated Star tonight—his spiritual sense is so strong, his mind so serene. Such a person is very rare in this world. Perhaps this is some old scholar who bitterly studied for a hundred years, then in one day comprehended the principles of heaven and earth. Only this way could this person have such good fortune. Just like Wang Zhice all those years ago, this person accumulated their strength and then rose up. Naturally, this is no ordinary person."
Mo Yu said, "At the time Sir Zhice needed only one night to reach Star Condensation and the entire capital felt it…how is it in any way similar to tonight? Moreover, no star cast its shadow on the ground, indicating that this was not some special bloodline. No matter how strong, I'm afraid that there's a limit."
The Divine Empress did not turn around, but the smile on her face could still be felt. "What does a child like you know about cultivation?"
Mo Yu was young, but she was already a grand expert of the Star Condensation Realm. Whether in the Great Zhou Dynasty or the cultivation sects of the south, she would be regarded as an anomaly. Even the Pope had words of praise for her. Yet in the Divine Empress's eyes, she was still a child that did not understand cultivation.
In the entire continent, just how many people were there that could evaluate her in such a fashion?
The Divine Empress was naturally one of them.
So Mo Yu was not angry, only sticking out her tongue at the Divine Empress's back.
She was no longer the child of the past, but she could still act cute because the person before her was the Divine Empress.
The Divine Empress naturally knew that she was making faces behind her, but only silently smiled.
Mo Yu stepped forwards and stood beside her, gazing up at the multitudinous stars in the night sky. After quietly looking up for a while, she suddenly asked, "Empress, Fated Stars…do they really represent each of our fates? Then can we see our future fates?"
The Divine Empress replied, "Besides fate, there is perhaps another explanation."
Mo Yu asked inquisitively, "What explanation?"
The Divine Empress gazed deeply into the night, not replying for a long time.
Over there was a faraway star that had once flashed brightly and then become impossible to see again.
The Divine Empress declared, "It can also be…the baneful star upon one's fate."
...
...
Chen Changsheng had lit up his own Fated Star.
In the entire continent, only a scant few people were lucky enough to coincidentally see the instant at which it flashed.
Because of that invisible crystal wall, those people miscalculated the distance between the star and the ground. But even so, his Fated Star's distance from the ground was still enough to be ranked amongst the very top in human history.
In the demons' Xuelao City to the north, Holy Maiden Peak and the Longevity Sect's Mount Li in the south, and the River of Oblivion deep in the territory of the demi-humans, perhaps people saw it, or perhaps they did not. As long as they saw it, they would inevitably regard the sight with extreme importance and attempt to discover who had lit up this star.
(TN: In Chinese myth, the River of Oblivion is the river of the underworld. Crossing the River of Oblivion is the Bridge of Helplessness, on which stands an old lady called Granny Meng. Before crossing the River of Oblivion, a soul is fed Granny Meng's soup, which makes them forget all their memories so that they can be reincarnated, hence the name of the river.)
This was not that important. The night sky contained millions upon millions of stars associated with the millions upon millions of humans. It was a world that could never be touched, and that line could never be seen. As long as Chen Changsheng himself did not speak of it, no other person would be able to know.
But there would always be surprises, or perhaps they could be called exceptions.
There were some people whose cultivation level was too low to be able to see the star lighting up, let alone follow that line to find Chen Changsheng. However, by sheer coincidence, they were looking up at the night sky the instant Chen Changsheng lit up his Fated Star, just like the Divine Empress. Even more coincidentally, one of them had been cultivating at the time, her spiritual sense extended towards that ruined land separated from her by just a wall.
The most fundamental reason was that she had an innately close connection to starlight and could intuitively realize many things.
This was a sort of innate gift. To be more precise, this was the innate gift of her species.
On the other side of the Orthodox Academy's dilapidated academy wall was the Hundred Herb Garden.
On that night, she was in the Hundred Herb Garden.
She clearly sensed how serene and tenacious was the spiritual sense that had lit up that Fated Star.
She was very curious as to the owner of this spiritual sense.
She wanted to find him and then ask him a few questions. For this, she would not mind gifting a few priceless treasures rarely seen in the world.
Because she was called Luoluo (落落), and she was very generous (大方).
(TN: 落落大方 is an idiom that is used to describe someone that is very natural and generous.)