Chapter One Hundred Sixty-Five: Pangu Answers — Dao-Transformation Is Fate

Volume Five: Body-Perish Dao-Transformation — Myriad Realms First Born

'Does it hurt?'

When Xiwei asked this, her voice was so small she could barely be heard. She kept her light low, the radiance flowing quietly across her surface like a glowing river searching for an outlet.

Pangu was silent for a moment.

'Yes,' he said.

Xiwei's form trembled faintly.

'But the pain is not what you imagine,' Pangu continued. His voice was calm, as if he were describing something that had nothing to do with him. 'It is not the pain of being torn apart. It is not the pain of being pierced through. It is a very slow pain — as if something is flowing out of your body bit by bit, neither too much nor too little, just enough for every part of you to realize it is disappearing.'

He spoke without any trace of complaint. He even tilted his head slightly, as if recalling a sensation that was still happening but not yet finished.

'At first, the pain was in my chest and back — the points that bore the weight of the heavens. The Celestial Dome pressed there for so long that the qi in those places was the first to be consumed. Then the pain spread to my shoulders, my arms, my hands — every part of me that touched the sky. After that, it moved down to my legs and feet — the parts that held the earth in place.'

He paused, then added quietly: 'Now it is everywhere.'

Xiwei's light flickered. 'Why must it be this way?'

'Because this is my fate,' Pangu said. 'Dao-Transformation is not punishment. It is not failure. It is the natural conclusion of what I am. The Dao shaped me to create this world. Now that the world is complete, I must return to the Dao. This is not an ending. It is a returning.'

He looked at Xiwei, and in his fading eyes, there was something that might have been a smile.

'Do not grieve for me. I am not losing anything. I am gaining everything.'