Chapter 3: Reincarnation
Long Tian opened his eyes after his contemplation. For a moment a complex look appeared in his eyes before he closed it. After a sigh, he opened his eyes again. This time a thoughtful look appeared in them.
He knew that there was no way for him to have lived after that explosion. He had used up every drop of energy in his body while delivering that strike. He could not have defended against the devil emperor's counter attack. He should be dead.
'Whatever. I should be grateful for being alive.' Long Tian thought. But figuring out why he was alive was extremely important. If this happened naturally or by accident, then it was fine. But if it was done by someone with ulterior motives then the situation would change.
He sat on the bed he woke up in and started to think. Without knowing the exact situation it was not suitable to walk around.
After he thought for a while Long Tian could only think of four ways in which he would be in this body.
The first was that someone had messed with his memories. He quickly threw this out the window as doing so was pointless.
The second was soul possession. During the explosion, his soul would not have died, but rather flown far away. But soul possession required one to be awake, and doing it unconscious was next to impossible.
The third was reincarnation. But Long Tian knew that this was impossible, plain and simple. This was because once one entered the god step, they would be unable to enter the reincarnation cycle. This was because their soul would be branded by a heavenly dao god mark, and this made sure that any god who entered the cycle of reincarnation would have their souls destroyed. Besides he had not only reached the titled god level in qi, but also the god state in the soul system also, meaning that it was extremely difficult to kill him without completely destroying his soul.
The fourth method was if someone reversed time, and saved him from the explosion. Then that person could have put his soul in this body. But to do so one would have to be at least a titled god. And this was only the starting condition. To save him from the self explosion of the devil emperor would require the strength of an incredibly powerful titled god. On top of this, he wasn't even certain if it was even possible to do so because of the terrifying heavenly dao undulations that were emanating at the time from the rift. Even now Long Tian had no idea what the rift was.
Long Tian decided to delve deep into his soul to see if he could get to remember what happened on that day. Even though he could not remember them, as a titled god, his soul should automatically remember what had happened. Even though it was a bit dangerous to delve into his soul's subconscious, as someone who had once he reached god stage in the soul system, he was confident he had the required control necessary to pull himself out in case of something going wrong.
Long Tian closed his eyes and started to meditate. As he stayed in that state, time quickly flew by. As the night went on, the entire city started to move. A few of the strongest people in the city had observed the mysterious changes that had happened to the sky earlier. Orders were quickly given out and people started to move in order to find out what had caused the change. Many people were of the opinion that some kind of great treasure had been born, but it's birth had been quickly covered up by someone, and were now determined to find the truth.
Time quickly passed by and the night turned into morning. As the first rays of sunshine arrived, Long Tian opened his eyes. An unmistakable shock could be seen in his eyes.
The answer that he got by searching his memories surprised him a great deal. He had actually reincarnated!
It was truly a series of coincidences that led to his reincarnation. When the reincarnation cycle of the universe senses a god level dao mark, that soul is destroyed by it. Even though there are only three major systems of cultivation in the world, it was not like there are no other systems of cultivation existing. There was the blood cultivation system, or the circle system for demon beasts, or the nether cultivation system for sprites and ghosts, and even the ancient cultivating system of the now extinct celestial race.
But the one common thing among all these cultivation systems is the god step and that the names and steps of the god step are the same for all the cultivation systems. And the dao mark that you get when you become a god is also the same across all cultivation systems.
It was theoretically possible for people below the god step to reincarnate. But due to the overwhelming power of the reincarnation system, one needed their soul to be as powerful as a soul in the immortal step of the soul system at the minimum. Otherwise, no matter how powerful one was, or even with a powerful treasure protecting you, their souls would be destroyed.
And even then it was not possible for an immortal step soul cultivator to simply reincarnate. They had to take many steps before reincarnating. If you entered the reincarnation cycle after death, then your soul would be unconscious, and your unconscious soul wouldn't be able to put up any defences.
Thus not only would you have to open a special path towards the reincarnation cycle, which requires the strength of a titled god, then you needed a soul treasure powerful enough to allow you to be conscious through the reincarnation process and also a great knowledge of souls in order to remember their memories of their past lives.
Long Tian only knew of one person who had successfully done it and reincarnated. He also knew that that person had spent ten thousand years in preparation for it.
Many gods had tried to modify or hide their dao marks and enter reincarnation once again due to many reasons. But without fail, they had all died.
But what happened with him was truly coincidental. When he died he had just broken through from a god to a titled god. As a result, his dao mark had been in the middle of upgrading to that of a titled god and had been in flux. But this alone would not have been enough to help him survive the reincarnation cycle. The similarities between his fluctuating dao mark and the god level dao mark would have been seen through by the reincarnation cycle.
The true reason that the reincarnation cycle was completely unable to see through him was due to the devil emperor. When the devil emperor self destructed, in order to deliver the maximum damage, he didn't just explode his soul or cultivation, he exploded his very existence, down to the last drop. He destroyed his cultivation, his body, his soul, his dao, memory and even his very existence. Long Tian did not even know that such a thing was possible until then.
As he realized this, Long Tian broke out in cold sweat. He suddenly realized that he could not recall what the Devil Emperor looked like. He remembers what he did, his laughter and his actions, but he was completely unable to recall what he looks like. He was even unable to recall his name, even though Long Tian could remember the Devil Emperor saying his name in front of him when he first arrived.
A feeling of awe appeared in his heart. It took incredible ruthlessness to do so. Dying along with your enemy was one thing. But to erase your very existence in order to maximize the damage to the universe you were invading took a special brand of ruthlessness and determination.
Everyone dies sometime. All that one leaves behind when one dies are memories of what one did. To be able to destroy even that was not something anyone could do.
And it was this ruthlessness of the Devil Emperor that allowed him to reincarnate. When the devil emperor self exploded, he was too weak and barely had any energy left. Thus his self explosion was not as thorough as it should have been. Thus some pieces of his dao mark and some of his memories, aura, dao, and energy were mixed along with the explosion. And since Long Tian's soul was in the middle of transforming, it was in an unstable state, and it got itself mixed with the remnants of the devil emperor.
The Devil Emperor was not from this universe, and thus his dao mark was quite different from that of this universe. The dao mark that was from the fusion of the two was quite different. Also, the resulting energy protected Long Tian's soul, and even though he was killed, it allowed his soul to not be completely destroyed, and thus enter the reincarnation cycle.
As the reincarnation cycle could not recognize his dao mark, his soul wasn't destroyed and he continued forward. But when faced with the terrifying pressure of the reincarnation cycle, his soul, which had reached the soul god stage in cultivation, created a protective covering for him. This protective covering not only held itself against the reincarnation cycle, but it also kept his soul asleep while tending to the injuries he had suffered and allowing himself to heal. Thus his soul, which was injured, went through the reincarnation cycle, and healed in the meantime.
As his soul healed and the protective covering weakened, he went through millions of reincarnations. As his soul was asleep during them, it appeared as if he was born with a damaged soul. Thus he quickly lived out his life and died in each of them, and continued on the reincarnation path.
By the time he had reached his current life, his protective covering had thinned to an almost imperceptible degree. By his estimate, if nothing had happened, he would have continued on for three more reincarnations before the protective covering broke. Then he would have awoken at the moment of his birth and then he would have lived a life as normal.
Long Tian frowned as he realized it. Even though the protective coating had grown thin, it wasn't something that could be destroyed so easily. It was created to protect against the pressure of reincarnation. Even though its defences against other forms of attack were weak, it did not mean that there was none. Only a powerful soul attack could have destroyed it.
This confused Long Tian. His current life should have been that of an idiot. There was no reason for anyone to attack him. He was no threat to anyone.
Long Tian closed his eyes once again. He had to read the memories of his current life to understand the situation better. Earlier he had been reading his memories related to reincarnation and did not have the time to look into the situation of his current life.
He closed his eyes and delved deep into his memories. Due to the fact that his soul was damaged, he was unable to recollect all the things that happened in his current life. But he still had many memories and he went over them one by one quickly.
A moment later Long Tian opened his eyes once again. A cold light appeared in his eyes. He finally recalled how his protective covering had been destroyed.
The very last thing in his memories, was a small opaque orb rolling slowly towards him. It stopped in front of him. In curiosity, the current life of Long Tian, touched it and it exploded into many pieces before he blacked out.
Long Tian recognized that object.
It was a Soul Shaking orb.
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone