Volume Four: High Mountains and Flowing Water Chapter Forty-Two: Soul Transcending the Supreme Realm

Leaving the institution of higher education, Chen Chen did not walk away with a college diploma.

According to university rules, venturing into society in this manner would at best earn one a certificate of completion.

Chen Chen felt no attachment to such things; he was a pragmatic person down to his core.

The genuine collegiate journey, along with the experiences and insights gained there, constituted his most precious spiritual wealth.

Having gone through more than two years of college life, he already possessed enough fond memories to keep him from feeling inferior.

While those who had finished college held higher academic degrees, he felt his own standing was not lacking either; he, too, had once been a part of that student demographic.

Stepping out of the school gates, Chen Chen walked into the distance.

With his luggage in hand, bearing expectations for love and a pursuit of future life, he gradually drifted farther away without realizing it.

Boarding a long-distance bus, carrying a modest amount of baggage, Chen Chen set off to make a living in a foreign land.

Life there was equally bustling, work was hectic, and the pace of living was rapid.

Sometimes, amidst it all, Chen Chen would find himself with nothing much to do.

He merely anticipated some kind of beauty, much like his youthful fondness for a lover.

It was a pity, however, that he was Chen Chen, not the original master of that physical form.

Chen Chen was a book spirit, conjured into being from the hazy realms of the Supreme.

The Supreme had bestowed upon him a name, a soul, a plotline, and existence itself.

Countless grievances and entanglements would ultimately be resolved within the Universe Clock.

In past lives, one accompanied others in distant lands, while wandering dreams drifted back to the Heavenly Abyss.

Reviewing the cycles of past epochs, it was ultimately the Supreme who brought all things into being.

Chen Chen was a book spirit, one created by the Supreme.

The original host of this mortal embodiment also possessed a name.

That true self was equally awe-inspiring across the ages; in this lifetime, he had rushed toward distant places for the sake of love and affection.

As it turned out, it was the Supreme who had set out to pursue romance and meet his lover.

Separated by space and time, the Supreme had personally penned the prologue, paving the way for the romance of years gone by.

Along this journey, through every minute detail of preparation, a distant and safe path was laid out.

Chen Chen still had many destinations yet to visit, while the Supreme in the unfathomable void seemed akin to a divine deity.

Seated upon an unknown divine throne, with a flick of his fingertip, a command emerged within moments from the misty void, manifesting across the eternal firmament.

Upon the five-dimensional temporal plane, a single character appeared: "Live!"

That character pierced through endless emptiness, leaping instantly to the sky above the city where the physical body inhabited by Chen Chen resided.

It was the decree of life bestowed by the Supreme upon him from years past; it seemed that as long as one aligned with the Dao and the law, this life would earn the qualification to continue surviving there.

That was a karmic path of survival. Countless years after attaining enlightenment, the Supreme still existed, enduring within the spacetime from which that message had been cast.

Chen Chen still lingered in hesitation. The true physical host was surviving in the mortal realm with a meager sum of money, having rented a local hotel room to stay in.

His funds were limited, and continuing this way would eventually deplete them. Chen Chen disliked the feeling of sitting passively waiting for doom.

Being in a strange place, having a suitable job was the only way to secure sufficient living supplies and the qualification to survive there.

The Supreme also shared the surname Chen, and for the time being, he could be referred to as the Lord of the Body.

In that bustling city, Chen Chen had arranged to meet his lover.

She was on relatively good terms with him; she had come to this foreign place for her studies.

Chen Chen met with her there, and following a period of getting along day by day, the two blossomed into an inseparable couple.

During those few days, Chen Chen went through a prolonged slump.

Indulging in video games, staying in a hotel, and waiting for his lover, it was an indescribably decadent and wasteful state.

Such a lifestyle was merely a brief phase for Chen Chen before he embarked on a new path.

Living without a job was ultimately nothing more than a joke.

Without a job, Chen Chen would search.

Without a stable residence, Chen Chen would search.

Living in a hotel could never be a long-term solution.

With his funds running low, Chen Chen had to sort out his employment first.

The young woman was studying in this distant place, a freshman or sophomore in college.

Having left the academic institution and stepped into society, Chen Chen now faced the true test of his survival skills.

At that time, he possessed only a shred of work experience and a modest drive to improve himself.

He knew a job was essential; otherwise, consuming without income would soon become unaffordable.

He knew earnings were a must; otherwise, once his money scattered like wind, there would be nothing left to sustain him until dawn.

Chen Chen still had much of life to navigate. Coincidentally, the second semester of the third year of college was designated as the student internship period.

This allowed Chen Chen to arrive in City G and seek employment there, treating it as his internship.

Establishing a foothold in City G under such an identity did not make him seem particularly out of place.

Speaking of which, many other interns had left university alongside him during that phase.

Perhaps one day they would return to campus to write their graduation theses, but Chen Chen no longer needed to do so.

He had taken a step ahead to leave university, stepping into the university of society during the second semester of his third college year.

It was within this great melting pot of society that he would learn and grow, forging his own Dao and achieving his own survival.

Having traveled thousands of miles for love and met his beloved, Chen Chen watched as his lover returned to campus to resume her life as a student.

Meanwhile, Chen Chen had to navigate a realistic society where money was required at every turn, bruising and hardening himself in the process.

Life bestowed upon him the wisdom that effort was prerequisite to survival, compelling him to first secure a suitable job to stay alive in that city.

Survival was the primary objective; love was an exceedingly luxurious commodity.

At the time, Chen Chen did not yet understand. He had journeyed to a distant place carrying the modest living expenses and tuition funds provided by his parents, seeking both survival and romance.

Yet survival and love were equally costly; falling short on cash meant failing to endure.

Struggling to survive in the mortal realm, he threw himself into endless work, finding therein a shred of value for his existence among humanity.

Chen Chen first took up a job as an internet cafe administrator, earning a meager monthly income that barely kept him afloat.

Ever since then, Chen Chen began to accept the realistic division of labor.

He had not managed to squeeze into industries of the wealthy and noble, nor had he attained a prestigious status or position.

There was nothing particularly proud to speak of, yet these were the authentic experiences of real society.

It was a place where every bite of food and every utility cost money—this was Chen Chen's realization from working there.

It had to be this way, and so he settled for it for the time being.

The world was bustling; he was not the only one struggling to survive, nor was he the only one laboring.

Sojourning in a strange land, Chen Chen was temporarily isolated by himself.

Back then, his survival skills were still relatively rudimentary.

Seeking a livelihood and seeking love, as long as love remained, he was still somewhat content.

From then on, Chen Chen grew accustomed to a routine of four days off per month and twenty-six working days.

Although Chen Chen did not yet know whether such an income in that position constituted a perfect balance with the local cost of living.

Still, survival was not easy, and the earnings he reaped served as a testament to the gains and losses of that phase.

From that point onward, Chen Chen gradually adapted to the solitary struggle for survival.

Even though, from the distant Supreme,

Chen Chen had received information that one day, that once innocent and lively young woman would glare at him with disdain, abandon him, humiliate him, and target him.

Yet for now, Chen Chen stumbled blindly through his current life.

Chen Chen paid no mind to the immediate affairs of the Lord of the Body, even though one day that master would ascend to the level of the Supreme.

Even the heavens themselves were merely one of the titles given to him by all living beings.

The story between the Lord of the Body and his lover in the mortal world would ultimately have to be figured out and resolved by the version of him existing at that time.

Both Chen Chen and the Supreme gradually withdrew from active participation in that segment of time and years.

Through spatial communication and observation, the Supreme and Chen Chen knew that it would remain a reasonably healthy working and living environment.

Henceforth, the Supreme temporarily set the matter aside, shifting his focus back to his own realm of spacetime.

Chen Chen had new destinations to attend to; he and the Supreme each bore their own missions and survival laws while existing in this human world.

In the grand chessboard of the mortal realm, staying alive was no easy feat for anyone.

The Lord of the Body resided within that spacetime, surviving across the seven-dimensional temporal plane.

He had his own survival circle, his own reincarnation, and his own work; those were the most cherished and wonderful years of his life.

Chen Chen fell into a brief slumber during that period.

Although Chen Chen would occasionally awaken and return to the human world,

Wandering among mortals without any clear purpose,

He felt only that everything was merely a state of existing, sinking into oblivion, or awakening.

Chen Chen knew that he was not the only Chen Chen in this world, nor was he the only life form on the rise.

Toilsome efforts were made every day, and the cruelty of reality could not be simply described in a few words.

Competition was fierce; for the sake of survival, money, status, pride, love, and the desire to endure as long as possible,

The Lord of the Body continued to toil every day—that was his designation at the time, proving he was the master of that physical vessel.

Otherwise, if Chen Chen alone occupied it, and Chen Chen was merely a book spirit, what would have become of it?

Chen Chen awoke, having traveled an unknown distance to distant lands.

Years, perhaps even a decade later, Chen Chen awakened once more within the cycle of reincarnation.

The Lord of the Body had endured all manner of hardships, having experienced schemes, fierce competition, and the daily hustle just to stay alive.

His physical burden was heavy, and the skin on his toes had been cracked for years.

Often accompanied by a foul odor and unhealthiness, it was a truly dismal phase.

Chen Chen knew that in the near future, he would inevitably become the substitute for that physical form once again.

Even though it was uncertain when the Lord of the Body would rise again after that physical vessel collapsed, the truth was that he would indeed rise once more.

Reclaiming control of the body and mastery over the flesh, Chen Chen would eventually need to step onto a grander stage or platform to experience an even more splendid life.

Having weathered countless hardships, the Lord of the Body finally began to recover after several years.

The cracked skin on his toes healed, and the various physical deficiencies within his body gradually mended.

His health improved, and he secured a suitable job back in his hometown.

Despite enduring numerous hardships, his lifestyle remained quite busy.

As the era of contract workers gradually faded from the stage, he stepped into the role of a boss, greeting arriving guests and setting off to transport them back and forth.

Regarding his earlier stints as a store manager or supervisor, which had initially been managed in utter chaos,

He had started off as a poor employee, but as time passed,

The work was brought into immaculate order, and the staff gradually ceased to harbor resentment toward him.

Later on, when he worked as a store manager and supervisor, the actual owner returned from out of town,

And he casually handed the shop back over for the owner to manage, remaining himself—yet transformed into a better, more exceptional version of himself.

Having weathered the vicissitudes of life and walked step by step, the Lord of the Body finally arrived before the Supreme, sitting within the vast expanse of his fingertips to chronicle events, ultimately becoming him.

He became the Supreme, the Supreme of boundless fingertips and a brilliant pen.

The name Chen Chen finally became that of the protagonist within his own book.

In the days to come, the Lord of the Body might still face numerous pressures and dilemmas of survival.

Yet Chen Chen existed in the void between fingertips and was reborn through the cycles of reincarnation.

He was Chen Chen, and through his own story, he would ultimately awaken one man and woman after another, helping them survive this world with greater clarity.

The Supreme later discovered that certain plagiarists and fraudsters wished to steal the vessel representing the book spirit Chen Chen.

They hoped to utilize this vessel to achieve personal ambitions through another individual.

Those people sought to steal someone else's past, toil, and fruits of labor to elevate a certain person.

Yet the Supreme remained unhurried, knowing only that from then on, whenever Chen Chen's book spirit vessel was illicitly targeted for malicious intents,

A voice would inexplicably echo across the heavens and earth: "Scoundrel, forfeit your life!"

As time passed, no one dared harbor thoughts of stealing the book spirit Chen Chen to elevate others anymore.

Such theft involved using Chen Chen's vessel and enacting dark arts to siphon the vitality of another in order to replenish the life cycle of a specific mortal man.

Having accumulated a degree of achievement, those practitioners of dark arts sought to usurp Chen Chen through technical means.

First granting Chen Chen a semblance of freedom, they intended to keep him close by their side.

They were hidden culprits; Chen Chen was innocent, yet too many mortals were sentimental, and human life was fraught with schemes. It was best to simply live well in the mortal realm.

Eventually, that pack of petty thieves and scoundrels was uncovered by government authorities.

Realizing their plot had been exposed, those individuals hurriedly halted their actions and tried their best to return to running legitimate businesses.

Any remaining fish that slipped through the net were likewise subdued by law enforcement teams, preventing them from continuing to prey upon the mortal world.

With this chapter concluded, Chen Chen's story came to another temporary close.

In the plotlines to come, many more tales concerning the character Chen Chen awaited.

Regardless of what future livelihoods might bring, as long as the masses lived and worked in peace with no major disasters, the mortal world remained a beautiful place.