156: Chapter 156 The Stunningly Beautiful Empress! You Win…

Within the intersecting lines of the chessboard, flowed a Chaos radiance that Zhou Liangan could not fathom.

In his ears was the whistling wind, sounding like the whispers of countless living beings, mixed with the clear "clack" of chess pieces landing on the board. One sound after another, they struck steadily at his consciousness, causing his originally tense awareness to gradually blur, like having drunk the strongest aged wine. In his stupor, he almost forgot who he was and where he was going.

He did not know how much time had passed; perhaps it was only the blink of an eye, or perhaps centuries had flowed by.

Zhou Liangan finally felt a sudden shift in the surrounding radiance. The force tearing at his consciousness vanished, replaced by an unprecedented sense of stability—not the kind of stability a Cultivator feels when stepping into the Void Realm, but the grounded, earthy stability of feet planted firmly on solid soil.

Subsequently, he seemed to be completely swept into the torrent of life, death, and Reincarnation.

Within the cycle of Reincarnation defined by this chess game, he lived through three lifetimes and played three completely different games of chess.

In his first life, he was just an utterly ordinary person.

In this lifetime, he was still named Zhou Liangan, born into an ordinary family in a small southern county town. His parents were workers laid off in their early years, supporting the family by running a grocery store at the entrance of their old neighborhood.

The day he was born was midsummer. The cicadas outside were chirping noisily, and the ceiling fan in the grocery store whirred. His father held him in his swaddling clothes, grinning from ear to ear, saying, "We don't ask for our child to be wealthy or noble in the future, just that he lives a safe and peaceful life."

This sentence truly became the footnote of his entire life.

His childhood was without waves. In the summer, he would lay out a bamboo mat under the parasol tree at the entrance of the grocery store to help his parents mind the shop. When someone came to buy something, he would stand on tiptoe to reach items on the shelves. Occasionally, if he gave the wrong change, his mother would gently scold him, and his father would secretly slip him a mung bean popsicle, patting his head and saying, "It's okay, just be more careful next time."

His grades were always neither good nor bad. He wasn't the top student in the teacher's eyes, nor was he a troublesome student. Every semester, his report card comment was always, "Steady and dutiful, room for improvement." If thrown into a crowd, he would vanish in three seconds.

In middle school, he harbored a secret. A girl in his class, Chen Xi, would pass by the grocery store every day after school to buy a five-cent popsicle. She wore a high ponytail, and when she smiled, her eyes curved into crescents.

Every time, he would secretly tuck an extra preserved plum, pickled by his mother, into the plastic bag with her popsicle. It was sour and sweet, just like his unspoken little crush.

He saved his pocket money for three months to buy a silver Walkman, wanting to give it to her on graduation day. But when graduation day finally arrived, he watched as a boy rode a bicycle, carrying her away. The Walkman was never given away, and later he gave it to his younger sister who had just entered middle school.

He didn't get into a key high school, so he went to a local ordinary high school. In the college entrance exam, he only got into a local second-tier university and studied accounting.

The year he graduated, he had received an offer from a company in the provincial capital and wanted to go out and make his way. But his father suddenly suffered a stroke, became hemiplegic, and was hospitalized. His mother was already in poor health, so the burden of the family suddenly fell onto his shoulders.

He didn't think much about it. That same day, he called the company to decline the offer, returned to the small county town, and found a job as an accountant at a small company. Every day after work, he rushed to the hospital. He worked during the day, stayed by the bedside at night, and also had to keep an eye on the grocery store's inventory. At his most exhausted, he could fall asleep while standing.

Yet he never complained once, just as his father often said, "For us ordinary people, life is just about enduring; once you get through it, things will be fine."

Later, his father's condition slowly stabilized, and he could walk with a cane. He also met his future wife, Lin Hui.

Lin Hui was a nurse in the neurology department. She was exceptionally attentive when caring for his father. She was gentle and capable, didn't mind that his family's situation was poor, and didn't think he was a failure.

The two dated for a year and held their wedding at a restaurant near their home. They only set up a dozen tables, all for relatives and friends.

That day, he drank too much. Holding Lin Hui's hand, he repeated the same sentence over and over, "In this life, I will definitely treat you well."

After marriage, the two of them supported this family together.

Lin Hui kept the home in perfect order and was filial and thoughtful toward his parents. He quit his accounting job, renovated the old grocery store, and turned it into a small community supermarket. He worked from dawn till dusk, and business slowly improved.

Later, they had a son, and then added a daughter. With a son and a daughter, they completed the character "Good", and life moved forward at a steady, unhurried pace. There were no earth-shattering events, no surprises of great wealth, just the trivialities of daily necessities and the warmth of family life.

It wasn't that there were no difficulties in life.

In 2008, the road in front of the supermarket needed repairs. It was closed for half a year, and business plummeted. They could barely pay the rent. He was so worried he couldn't sleep for nights on end. Lin Hui took out all her dowry money, stuffed it into his hands, and said, "It's okay, at worst we'll start over. We won't starve to death anyway."

Later, the road was repaired, and business slowly warmed up. Every time he thought back to that time, he felt the luckiest thing in his life was marrying Lin Hui.

He never had high demands for his children. His son's grades weren't good, but he never forced him, saying as long as the child followed the Righteous Path and was healthy, that was enough. When his daughter fell in love early, he didn't scold her but sat down and talked with her for a whole night, saying that liking someone is a good thing, but one must first improve oneself to be responsible for others.

Just like his father who guarded the grocery store back then, he guarded this home, guarded his little supermarket, and walked forward step by step, steadily and surely.

Later on, his parents passed away. They went very peacefully and didn't suffer much.

His son graduated from university and stayed locally, took over the supermarket business, married, and had a son. His daughter married into a neighboring city and would bring her husband and grandson back every weekend to visit them.

He and Lin Hui were finally free. Every morning, they would go to the park together to walk and practice Tai Chi, return to buy groceries and cook, and in the afternoon, sit on the rattan chairs at the entrance of the supermarket to bask in the sun, watching the children running back and forth on the street, just as if he were seeing his younger self.

Lin Hui passed away when he was seventy-five. Before she left, she held his hand and said, "Being with you in this life, I haven't suffered any grievances. I am very content. You must take good care of yourself in the future."

He held Lin Hui, not crying out loud, but tears flowed uncontrollably. A man who had rarely had red eyes in his entire life cried for a whole night that day.

After Lin Hui passed away, he still opened the supermarket door on time every morning. Even though his son didn't want him to worry, he would still sit at the entrance, staying from morning until night, watching the people come and go, as if Lin Hui were still by his side.

The day he passed away was an afternoon with a particularly beautiful sunset. He was eighty-nine, with no illness or disaster, dying of old age. He lay on the rattan chair at the entrance, covered with a thin blanket, clutching a polished, shiny glass jar in his hand—the same kind of jar he used to store preserved plums for Chen Xi back then, containing a few glass marbles he played with as a child.

The warm sunset fell on his face. Looking at the distant sky, with a smile on his lips, he slowly closed his eyes.

At the very last moment as his consciousness faded, he suddenly heard a clear sound of a piece being placed.

In his life, he was never an official, never made a fortune, never went to any distant places, and never did a big deed that could be written into a book. He was just the most inconspicuous pawn on the chessboard, walking forward step by step, unhurriedly.

There were no earth-shattering brilliant moves, no legends of turning the tables against the wind, and no regrets of losing the whole game due to one careless move. Just like that, steadily and securely, he finished the entire game of chess.

It turns out that the life of an ordinary person is also a complete and perfect game of chess.

When the last trace of consciousness was pulled away from that small supermarket filled with the scent of parasol trees, Zhou Liangan hadn't even had time to savor the warmth of that lifetime before he was once again dragged into a new torrent of Reincarnation by an invisible force.

This time, when he opened his eyes, he did not see mottled cement walls, but the dome of a palace with carved beams and painted rafters. The tip of his nose was filled with the faint scent of dragon incense, and in his ears was the cautious breathing of palace maids, along with someone whispering, "Your Highness, Your Highness, are you awake?"

In this lifetime, he was named Zhao Heng, the Third Prince of the Great Qi Dynasty.

Completely different from the ordinary Zhou Liangan of the previous life, in this lifetime, he was born into an imperial family and, from the moment he landed, was at the very center of the chess game.

His mother was an unfavored concubine in the harem, like a transparent person among the three thousand beauties. Consequently, he, the Third Prince, also became the existence with the least presence in the imperial palace.

As a child, he was accustomed to the deceit of the deep palace. He had seen favored concubines bully his mother at will, seen the Crown Prince and the Second Prince treat him as a punching bag to be beaten and scolded at will, and seen the gaze of his Imperial Father when looking at him—so cold it was almost dismissive.

At that time, his greatest wish was to grow up, beg his Imperial Father to grant him a fief in a remote area, and become an idle prince who didn't concern himself with worldly affairs, living a safe and peaceful life with his mother, never again touching the muddy waters of the imperial palace.

Yet, while he did not want to enter the game, fate insisted on pushing him into the deepest part of the chess game.

When he was fifteen, the struggle for succession between the Crown Prince and the Second Prince reached a white-hot stage.

To suppress the Second Prince, the Crown Prince plotted to frame his mother, claiming she had an illicit affair with the Second Prince and had defiled the imperial palace.

His Imperial Father couldn't even be bothered to investigate thoroughly and directly granted his mother a cup of poisoned wine, ordering her death.

He knelt outside the Hall of Mental Cultivation, kowtowing for three whole days and nights until his forehead was a bloody mess. He fainted several times, but his Imperial Father never saw him once.

Finally, the old eunuch who had served him for many years in the palace secretly told him, "Stop kowtowing. It's not that His Majesty doesn't know your mother was innocent; it's just that he needs to use your mother's life to balance the forces of the Crown Prince and the Second Prince."

At that moment, he finally understood completely that in this imperial palace, there had never been any affection, only the chess game.

His Imperial Father was the high and mighty chess player, and they—the princes, princesses, harem concubines, and the civil and military officials of the court—were all chess pieces in his hands that could be sacrificed at will.

If he wanted not to be crushed at will, if he wanted to avenge his mother, he could only climb up, climb to that highest position, and become the chess player himself.

From that day on, the Third Prince who only wanted to be an idle prince died; what lived on was Zhao Heng, who was determined to seize the throne.

He began to hide all his sharp edges, pretending to be an unlearned, idle playboy, making the Crown Prince and Second Prince feel he was no threat, while secretly beginning to lay out his plans.

He befriended officials suppressed by the Crown Prince and the Second Prince, won over disgruntled generals in the Imperial Guard, cultivated secret guards who were loyal only to him, and bit by bit, accumulated his own power.

He endured for ten whole years. In these ten years, he watched the Crown Prince and the Second Prince kill each other, both suffering losses. He watched his Imperial Father's health decline day by day, watched the changing winds and clouds in the imperial court, and without missing a single step, laid out his own inescapable net.

Finally, in the year his Imperial Father fell gravely ill, he launched a palace coup.

Overnight, the imperial city flowed with blood. The Crown Prince was ordered to die by him, the Second Prince was imprisoned in the Imperial Clan Court for life, and those who had once bullied his mother and obstructed his path all paid the price in blood.

When he, wearing a blood-stained Dragon robe, stepped onto the throne in the Hall of Supreme Harmony, turned to look at the civil and military officials kneeling below, and heard the tsunami-like cries of "Long Live," that familiar sound of a chess piece being placed echoed in his ears once again.

This game of chess, he seemed to have won.

That year, he was twenty-five, changed the reign title to Yongxi, and became the new Emperor of the Great Qi Dynasty.

After ascending the throne, he did not indulge in the pleasure brought by power; he knew better than anyone that sitting on the throne was not the end, but the beginning of a larger game of chess.

He governed diligently, rectified the administration, severely punished corrupt officials, reduced taxes for the common people, built water conservancy projects, and encouraged agriculture; he led his armies in person, quelled the Xiongnu rebellion on the border, and doubled the territory of Great Qi; he established special imperial examinations, promoted children from humble families, and broke the century-long monopoly of aristocratic clans over the court.

During the Yongxi reign, the people lived and worked in peace, the world was at peace, and ten thousand nations came to pay tribute; later generations called it the "Yongxi Golden Age."

He became the Emperor through the ages praised in history books, possessing the highest power, the vastest territory, and the most subjects in the entire world.

But he also became a truly lonely man.

The brothers who had accompanied him through life and death and launched the palace coup were either executed by him with a cup of poisoned wine because their merits overshadowed the master, or, having seen through his cold indifference, voluntarily retired to their hometowns and never stepped foot in the capital again until they died.

The three thousand beauties in the inner palace were all selected to balance the forces of the court; not one of them treated him with sincerity, and not one dared to treat him with sincerity.

His sons, just like he, the Crown Prince, and the Second Prince in the past, slaughtered each other and schemed for the position of Crown Prince; some even colluded in secret, wanting to force him to abdicate.

He sat on that cold throne, possessing the whole world, yet could not find a single person to whom he could speak his heart.

On countless deep nights, he sat alone in the empty Hall of Mental Cultivation, looking at the desk full of memorials and the map of the vast empire on the wall, and would always suddenly remember his previous life—Zhou Liangan in that small southern town.

At that time, he did not have power over the world or wealth that could rival a nation, but he had his parents, Lin Hui, his children, and a lively home.

When sleeping at night, there was someone to warm the quilt for him; when sick, someone guarded the bedside to bring water and feed him medicine; when happy, someone laughed with him; when sad, someone held him and said it was okay.

And now, he had everything, yet he had nothing.

In this life, he played countless games of chess. The power struggles between monarch and minister, the life-and-death wars at the border, the schemes of the human heart in the inner palace—he never lost.

But in his later years, he suddenly realized that although he had always thought he was the chess player, he was actually just a chess piece in this game of empire, trapped in this tiny imperial palace by that throne and that supreme power for his entire life.

When he passed away, he was seventy-one years old, having reigned for forty-six years.

He lay on the dragon bed, surrounded by civil and military officials and his children and grandchildren, but in his hand, he only clutched a small, polished safety amulet—it was something his mother had stayed up all night to sew for him when he was a child, and it was the only warmth he had ever received in this life that was free of any calculation.

The moment he closed his eyes, he heard that sound of a chess piece being placed again.

In this game of possessing the world, did he win, or did he lose?

In the end, he never found the answer.

His consciousness was drawn away from the cold imperial dragon bed once again; this time, Zhou Liangan was not distracted by the sudden Reincarnation.

The memories of the previous two lives were like two eternal lamps, shining steadily in the depths of his consciousness; even as the memories of this life were rapidly covering them, he still clearly remembered the warmth of the ordinary human world and the loneliness of the peak of the Emperor.

In this life, he finally took back the name Zhou Liangan.

He was born in the Xuanhuang World in an inconspicuous third-rate small Sect, the Qingyun Sect; his father was an outer Sect steward, and his mother was an ordinary Utility Disciple.

His Aptitude was mediocre; he had the Five Spiritual Roots, which had the least future in the Cultivation world, and the Elders in the Sect all asserted that if this child could achieve Foundation Establishment in this life, it would be a stroke of immense luck.

But they did not know that inside this young body, there were two complete lives.

The ordinariness of the first life taught him to be down-to-earth, to take things one step at a time, to be neither arrogant nor impetuous, and to be steady; the imperial career of the second life taught him to plan and layout, to endure and lie dormant, to have a grand vision, and to be decisive in making trade-offs.

When others Cultivate, they all think of ascending to the sky in one step, looking for shortcuts, snatching Opportunities, wishing they could rush from Qi Refining to Golden Core in a year.

But he did not; he was like the Zhou Liangan who guarded the grocery store in his previous life, polishing every small Realm of the Qi Refining stage to Perfection, building a foundation more solid than anyone else's; while others scrambled to Cultivate top-tier Cultivation Techniques that looked infinitely powerful, he chose the most basic and least practiced "Qingyun Formula" in the Sect, chewing over and thoroughly understanding every verse, and forcefully practiced this third-rate Cultivation Technique into the power of a top-tier one.

He was like the most inconspicuous pawn on the chessboard, never rushing forward, but every step he took was incomparably firm and without flaws.

The path of Cultivation is inherently Heaven-Defying, with murderous intent at every step.

He had seen fellow disciples turn against each other and draw weapons to fight over an Opportunity; he had seen large Sects slaughter an entire small Sect just to seize a spiritual mine.

He had seen the war between Immortals and the Demon Race, with corpses strewn across the fields and thousands of living beings turned into scorched earth. He himself had encountered countless life-and-death crises, chased for thousands of miles by enemies, fallen into ancient forbidden lands with a slim chance of survival, and nearly had his Dao collapse and soul destroyed by the backlash of a Heart Demon, several times stepping one foot into the gates of hell.

But every time, he pulled through. When encountering danger, he would be like Zhao Heng, who laid plans in the deep palace, calmly analyzing the situation and finding a way to break the deadlock in a desperate situation.

When encountering a Bottleneck, he would be like the Zhou Liangan who guarded the small supermarket, calming his heart to slowly polish, neither hurried nor impatient, letting success come naturally.

He walked, watched, and Cultivated along the way.

He had killed Devil Heads who were wicked and slaughtered thousands of living beings, and he had saved ordinary cities affected by the flames of war.

He had broken into ancient forbidden lands that no one dared to enter and obtained the Legacy of an ancient Emperor.

He had made life-and-death brothers to whom he could entrust his back, and he had loved a girl who was willing to walk hand in hand with him toward the great Dao.

But the path of Cultivation is the most ruthless.

Lifespan has an end, but the Dao has no destination. The fellow disciples who entered the Sect with him had long since exhausted their Lifespan and turned into a handful of yellow earth.

His brothers, with whom he shared life and death, died under the butcher knives of the Demon Race in the Realm war to cover his retreat.

The girl he loved for a lifetime, due to limitations in Aptitude, could not cross the shackles, and in the end, her Lifespan exhausted, she closed her eyes in his arms.

He watched the people around him leave one by one, just like watching his parents and Lin Hui walk away one by one in his previous life.

But this time, he did not have much grief, only calmness.

He knew that this was the norm of the Cultivation path, and also the norm of Reincarnation.

He just kept walking forward, step by step.

When he crossed the Nine Heavens Heavenly Tribulation, shattered the Void Realm, and became a powerful figure, the entire Xuanhuang World was shaken.

No one expected that the little Utility Disciple with Five Spiritual Roots in the Qingyun Sect could actually reach this step.

But he did not stop his steps.

He walked out of the Xuanhuang World, stepped into the myriad worlds of the heavens, saw a broader world, encountered more powerful opponents, and touched the higher Origin of the Dao.

After unknown tens of thousands of years, he hacked through thorns and thistles, killed Immortals, killed Demons, quelled the Chaos of the Realms, and realized the Dao of Samsara; in the end, he stood before the threshold of the Emperor Realm, becoming one of the few Half-Step Emperor Realm powerful figures in the myriad worlds.

At this Realm, he could already make flowers bloom with a single thought, cause mountains to collapse with a single thought, and in a single thought, cause stars to fall and the galaxy to reverse.

He could see the past and future in one glance, and travel through the myriad worlds with a single thought.

His Lifespan was almost as long as the heavens and earth, shining with the sun and moon. Looking at the entire heavens, the people who could contend with him could be counted on one hand.

Everyone felt that as long as he took one more step, he could prove the Dao and become an Emperor, becoming another invincible Emperor in history.

But only he knew that he could not cross this last step.

He stood above the galaxy, with the flowing myriad worlds under his feet and the roaring space-time turbulence around him; he could see the endless Reincarnation, see the birth, aging, illness, and death of countless living beings, but he could never touch the threshold of the Emperor Realm.

His Dao Heart was flawed.

He had Cultivated the Dao for a lifetime, wanting to jump out of Reincarnation and not be bound by life and death, but in his heart, he always carried the obsessions of two lifetimes.

In the first life, he wanted to keep the warmth of the human world in the small southern town.

In the second life, he wanted to untie the bone-chilling loneliness at the peak of the imperial palace.

He thought he was Cultivating the ruthless Dao, but in fact, he had never let go.

Just at the moment when his Dao Heart was turbulent and he was about to suffer Qi Deviation, the familiar sound of a chess piece landing on the chessboard echoed in his ears again.

He suddenly understood.

His three lives were never separate; they were three closely connected games of chess in the Reincarnation chessboard.

The ordinariness of the first life was to let him understand the fireworks of the human world and know the various states of all living beings.

The Emperor of the second life was to let him understand the rise and fall of power and know the coldness and warmth of human hearts.

The Cultivation of the third life was to let him understand the impermanence of the Dao and know the true meaning of Reincarnation.

He had always thought that he wanted to jump out of Reincarnation and be the chess player outside the chessboard.

But only now did he understand that every living being in this world is in the chessboard of Reincarnation, and no one can truly jump out.

Every person you meet, every thing you do, and every path you choose is a move on the chessboard.

There is no absolute winning or losing, no absolute right or wrong, only experience, only Perfection.

The threshold of the Emperor Realm that he could not cross was never because his strength was not enough, but because his Dao Heart had not yet reached Perfection.

He had always regarded the lives of the previous three lifetimes as three hurdles, not knowing that these three lifetimes were actually the three puzzle pieces of his Dao Heart.

The moment he figured this out, the Dao aura around him surged violently, and the entire galaxy trembled because of it; those Laws of Reincarnation that he had never been able to grasp before were now as clear as palm prints in his eyes.

The threshold of the Emperor Realm that had trapped countless powerful figures for billions of years opened with a roar at this moment.

Just at the moment when his consciousness was about to completely step into the Emperor Realm, that Reincarnation power wrapping around him suddenly dissipated.

The galaxy, the Dao, and the myriad worlds before his eyes instantly shattered and faded away like the tide.

Zhou Liangan's mind shook violently, and he suddenly came to his senses, finding himself still standing before that ancient Reincarnation chessboard.

Not far away, the Ancient Emperor of Reincarnation smiled beautifully; between her brows, besides appreciation, there was also a hint of shy femininity...