Chapter Eighty-Six: The Primordial Source Gradually Depleted, the Mortal Form Begins to Fail

Volume Three: Supporting the Cosmos Across Eternal Ages — Heaven and Earth Take Fixed Form

The long labor of supporting the heavens was consuming Pangu's Primordial Source, bit by bit. The star-sea within his Spirit-Platform Sea, once so brilliant, was now dimmer than before. Those points of starlight that had once blazed like suns could now emit only a faint fluorescence. His Spirit-Consciousness, too, was no longer as acute as it had been; its coverage was gradually shrinking.

The decline of his mortal form was even more apparent. Pangu could feel that his Dao Body was not as supple as before. His movements grew slower; his reactions grew duller. Though his strength was still immense, that innate spiritual vitality was fading. Like a treasured blade — still sharp, but no longer the blade that had just emerged from the forge.

He began to need rest more frequently. He could only enter a semi-dormant state while still standing — not true rest. He shut down most of his senses, retaining only the most basic supporting strength, letting his body operate at minimal consumption.

Yet the episodes of rest grew ever more frequent, ever longer. Pangu knew this was not a good sign. His body was sending him a warning: the Primordial Source was running low — he needed to conserve. But what could he do? Heaven and Earth were still growing; he could not release his grip.

The Primordial Source gradually depleted; the mortal form began to fail. Standing between Heaven and Earth, Pangu was like an ancient tree whose roots were slowly withering — its branches still held firm, but the life-force within was ebbing away.

The primordial qi within his body was being consumed at an irreversible rate. With each day of supporting the heavens, his Primordial Source thinned by a fraction. He tried measuring the rate of consumption — roughly one barely-visible thread's thickness every ten days. After three thousand, six hundred days, he had lost three hundred and sixty such threads. After a hundred and eight thousand days, he had consumed more than a third of his Primordial Source. He could still hold on for a stretch, but the outline of the endpoint was already clear. The depletion of his Primordial Source left ever more visible traces upon Pangu's body. His hair had turned from its original raven-black to ashen gray, and the gray was spreading from the tips toward the roots. His skin, though still elastic, had lost its surface luster — grown dull, like a stone wiped too many times. His eyes were the most honest: before, his gaze had been as clear and bright as the faint light of the Celestial Dome; now that light was dimming, like a flame on a lamp-wick slowly shrinking.

It was during an ordinary supporting motion that Pangu first felt old age. That day was no different from any other — the Celestial Dome rose as usual, and he adjusted the angle of his shoulders as usual to receive the newly added weight. But in the course of that adjustment, his right shoulder joint emitted an unfamiliar sound. It was not the resonance-sound of bone, but a dry, grinding rasp — like two desiccated stones rubbing against each other. The sound was small, yet in the stillness between Heaven and Earth, it was clearly audible. Pangu froze, halted his motion, and carefully felt the state of his right shoulder joint — there was a faint friction-sensation there, as though the lubricating fluid between the joints had been utterly exhausted and bone was directly grinding against bone.

He used his Spirit-Consciousness to examine his body from within. Projected in his Spirit-Platform Sea, the structure of his Dao Body unfolded clearly before his consciousness — bone, muscle, meridians, Primordial Source core — every layer was aging, slowly but inexorably. The surfaces of his bones bore a network of fine cracks, like dry riverbeds — web-like lines spreading across the entire bone-surface. The grain of his muscles was no longer as orderly as before; in some regions, the fibers had loosened, losing their original elasticity. The walls of his meridians showed deposits visible to his inner eye — residue left behind by long ages of energy transport, slowly clogging the channels, bit by bit.

He tried using his Primordial Source to repair those injuries, as he had always done before. But when the Primordial Source surged out from his Spirit-Platform Sea, he felt the difference — the flow-rate of that energy was slower than before, and the total volume was less. The energy that had once surged like a river now moved like a gradually drying stream; it barely moistened the few cracks most in need of repair before it was spent. The deeper cracks remained untouched, waiting for the next repair — if there would be a next one. His restorative capacity was declining; injuries were accumulating, and the rate of accumulation was exceeding the rate of repair. This was a trend he could not reverse.

He lowered his head and looked at his own hands. Those hands had once torn Chaos apart, pried open the Celestial Dome, sustained the order of the world. They were still strong now, but he could see dark patches surfacing on the backs of them — marks left by the sluggish circulation of qi and blood. He spread his palms open, then closed them, repeating the motion several times. With each closing of his fist, he could feel strength draining away — diminishing by a hair with each grip, as irretrievable as sand in an hourglass.

The semi-dormant state could no longer satisfy Pangu's needs. Before, one hour of semi-dormancy could restore the energy he needed for half a day; now, two hours of semi-dormancy restored less than half. His recovery rate was dropping, while his consumption rate was increasing — this scissor-gap was slicing away his life-force, bit by bit. He found that after completing a normal supporting cycle, he would involuntarily enter a brief state of Spirit-Consciousness dispersal — a protective shutdown of consciousness, akin to the body automatically cutting non-essential energy supply when running beyond capacity. That state appeared ever more frequently, and each episode lasted ever longer.

Once, he did not know how long he had stood there — it could have been days, it could have been months. When he came to, the Celestial Dome had already risen another great stretch; his shoulders were pressed lower than they had ever been. He looked up at the new height and felt, in his heart, no panic — only a calm acceptance: his body was moving toward its endpoint according to its own rhythm. He would not struggle against it, would not fear it. He would keep standing until the day he could stand no longer. What would happen after his Primordial Source was exhausted — he did not know. Perhaps the weight of Heaven and Earth would crush him outright. Perhaps his body would disintegrate, dissipating like foam in Chaos. Perhaps he would become part of this world — his bones transformed into mountain ranges, his blood into rivers, his breath into wind and cloud. He did not know which possibility was the true one, but the last seemed the most likely. In those moments, he dimly sensed that perhaps his endpoint was not an ending at all, but a more complete merging — his existence as an individual would disappear, but his essence would scatter into every corner of Heaven and Earth.

Pangu tried using his Spirit-Consciousness to look inward at his Spirit-Platform Sea. That space, once vast as a sea of stars, had now contracted considerably. The star-points at its edges had already gone out; only the central region still held a faint glow. That light was not steady — it flickered, like the flame of an oil lamp nearly burned out, struggling in the wind. From the results of his inward probe, his Spirit-Consciousness read a clear fact: his Primordial Source was irreversibly diminishing. The energy he had once believed could cycle and regenerate had now become a one-way depletion.

He tried to recall what his former self had been like. His body had been lighter; his primordial qi had been more abundant; the light of his Spirit-Platform Sea could have been described as "dazzling." He could sustain the heavens for years on end without rest; his rate of physical recovery had been so fast that the consumption was nearly negligible. But now, all of that was past. He could not help but wonder — if he had known from the beginning that this would be the outcome, would he still have chosen to open the heavens? The answer held no hesitation — he would. Because Heaven and Earth were worth it.

He tilted his head slightly upward. The base of the Celestial Dome hung at a remote height above him; his palms supported that thin membrane. He could feel the temperature of that membrane — it was lower than before, because the heavens were higher, farther from him now. But his conviction had not cooled.

Pangu's legs had stood within the Great Earth for too long. He could feel a dull ache transmitted upward from the soles of his feet — the accumulated fatigue of bearing heavy pressure across the ages, now sunk deep into his marrow. But he could not move. The moment he shifted, the Celestial Dome would tremble faintly and the Great Earth would develop fissures. He could only endure — like an ancient tree enduring wind and rain, absorbing the pain into its growth-rings.