Chapter 1988: Chapter 1983: Heavenly Hammer

Not bad at all.

In the long-missed pleasant prompt, Fu Qian’s hand held the golden gourd hammer without a tremor, pulling it out from the shattered skull.

Pity, there’s not much energy left to clean it off.

The bloodstains on the golden gourd, the essence upon which these creatures survive, each drop reflected an endless whirlpool of desire in Fu Qian’s eyes.

As the final blow landed, the ecstasy in his mind erupted completely.

The thugs brought in were counter-killed, clearly enraging Lord Stomach to the extreme.

The layers of escalating pleasure, under a more violent turbo boost, have now become indescribable — yet indescribable does not mean unexplainable.

It’s like a stuffing chopped so finely and originally indistinguishable, yet with enough patience and effort, it can still be unraveled layer by layer.

Form is emptiness, emptiness is form... Whether it’s the Ancient Man who explored Paradise for years, or the Superior Being, the clear stream Lord Stomach, they ultimately failed to grasp the essence of this phrase.

What Fu Qian just did was simple — in a mind full of ecstasy, he forcefully imagined true "blank pleasure."

At the true peak of layered negation, abandoning any symbol to define and describe, allowing the concept of pleasure to directly reflect the self.

It sounds abstract, not easy in execution, even the thought seemed somewhat deranged — unless one had previous enlightenment.

When Akons was doing a task, Hilary’s therapeutic philosophy was elaborately described in the task introduction —

[...Trying to fit the conglomerate body of impulse and desire into a symbolic self-portrait is the root of all tragedy...giving up any vocabulary to describe the aroma entering the nose...bringing pleasure like thoroughly washing off grime...

...Pleasure continues to expand, transcending the scope of language...no longer burying the head in the cage forged by oneself, no longer letting self-awareness bind the self...]

Knowledge is power, but it’s never just a saying.

Fu Qian never ignores the valuable information accumulated in tasks, including some excessively abstract concepts.

At the same time, mere accumulation is insufficient, imagination is a vital tool to transform knowledge into power.

Desire, pleasure, Paradise...when encountering these seemingly similar concepts, Fu Qian habitually compares and verifies them.

Especially the therapeutic philosophy Akons encountered, likely derived from some "pure and noble force" enlightenment.

Although it was essentially to expel Akons’s obsessive thoughts and then refine him, the pinnacle of metaphysics is interconnected.

Upon witnessing the incessant progressive proliferation of pleasure, Fu Qian speculated whether this "true purity" was perhaps the ultimate answer.

It’s not white, but emptiness.

Moreover, this was not the only reason, the story mentioned to the Ancient Man just now was based on a classic paradox —

The rabbit obviously runs faster than the tortoise, but if the tortoise is allowed to run a distance first during a race, by the time the rabbit catches up, the tortoise has already run another distance, and then the rabbit chases again, the tortoise runs again... and so forth, never catching up in layers of progression.

This story was what Fu Qian thought of when he first faced the endless layers of pleasure.

And just now, the Ancient Man also helped to prove a point, that having climbed to the Nine Layers Heaven, he still hadn’t touched the pinnacle of Paradise.

Is it possible "running this way" never leads there?

In realms of the mind, strict mathematics might not be as applicable, but may still provide inspiration.

For instance, as the chasing rabbit, directly leap to the endpoint?

And that is exactly what I just did.

The reason for not favoring climbing the Heavenly Ladder sequentially is also due to a previous task called the Furnace, where the deeper one blended, the higher the SAN Points consumption.

Early upon discovering that entering each heaven required door tickets with continuously increasing prices, Fu Qian was already highly cautious of this path.

...

This task may seem passive all the way, but "the Ancient Man projected onto Confession Brother again," knowing full well of such a worst-case scenario yet coming and probing, how could there not be a contingency plan?

Running into the church to face off against Lord Stomach actually had a third purpose.

Earlier, advancing to the third heaven was achieved by forcefully imagining thirty-three layers of false pleasure, eventually successfully resonating with Paradise.

It was also through this that it was proven the authority of the stomach itself and Paradise had similar facets.

And back then, I hadn’t even been seeded with the Seed of Ecstasy yet.

So, would truly possessing the power from Lord Stomach result in better resonance?

Although that lord himself did not succeed, perhaps He hadn’t been exposed to such masterly influences as yourself.

Therefore, from entering the incense hall and discovering Confession Brother was still alive, Fu Qian put most of his energy into simulating that ultimate ecstasy.

The specific manifestation was seeing with the eyes, observing the nose, the nose observing the heart, the heart observing the golden gourd hammer.

The process wasn’t easy, and to increase success rates, he even deliberately accelerated the decay of "self."

But so many verbal battles weren’t in vain, while the other side was stalling for time, wasn’t he doing the same?

The final result was just moments ago, resonance truly appeared once more, granting him a perspective of Transcendence over everything, thus confirming the target before him was indeed the mission’s.

...

The Ancient Man was still too optimistic.

Nine Layers Heaven indeed isn’t the peak of Paradise, but the layers beyond may exceed his imagination.

Ten, eleven, twelve...layer upon layer, abstractly twisted to incomprehensible extents, endless.

This endlessness doesn’t imply infinitely large, but infinitely small, akin to the infinitely divided distance in the hare and tortoise race, ultimately unable to reach the endpoint.

And standing directly at the endpoint does feel nice, even if ascending to the highest, the Ancient Man is but a self-perceived leader pityingly.

Whether reaching the pinnacle of Paradise allows one to master it remains uncertain for Fu Qian.

It was only but a resonance, still far from reaching that step.

Of course, it’s already sufficient for the moment.

Overlooking, dimensionally reducing, that hammer just now was exactly the method the Ancient Man dreamed of, capable of annihilating the target completely.

Along with the brain splattering, that death eradicated him from each heaven completely.

Even Fu Qian was confident at that moment that, even without Lord Stomach sending people, it wouldn’t affect his ability to lock onto the target.

That was true dimensional reduction strike.

Fighting speed with speed, finally implementing this concept, cleaning up this astonishingly numbered leak.

The only two regrets are, one, the Ancient Man never introduced himself up until the end, coming from a thousand years ago, leading to believe his identity was special.

Two, there wasn’t much time to experience "Paradise."

With the aid of that precious perspective to take another look, Fu Qian simultaneously turned directions, amidst endless struggles, hammered his own head to smithereens.

As though a tooth swollen for a month was finally chiseled open by a dentist, at the moment the screen turned black, Fu Qian believed the contents of his head must have sprayed onto the ceiling like magma from a volcano.

[Task Rating: Heavenly Hammer]

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