Chapter 145 – Cultivation with the Heart of Heaven

When the Seeker put down the last hat, all 19 hats on the table were glowing green.

The dark and decaying bark which made up the wooden house began to peel off, and the candles on the side extinguished on its own, but a warm glow continued to fill the dark cabin.

They belonged to the floating ghost souls.

A warm yellow glow radiated from the ghost souls, which gradually eradicated the fluctuating mist of the spirit. The ghost souls reached out to pick up the hats on the table. When a song sounded from somewhere far away, they began passing the hat in their hands to the right.

The song was in a language that Ren Suo did not understand. It sounded like a branch of ancient Chinese which had vanished over time, but also seemed like a hymn of praise to the gods in a witch ritual.

However, Ren Suo could miraculously understand the meaning of the unknown lyrics. The sounds seemed to activate the language center of his brain directly, just like playing the piano, where the meaning was conveyed directly into Ren Suo’s brain through music.

It was akin to him equipping the animals in the “All-Devouring Soul” with various language abilities through their evolutions. Ren Suo was finally able to experience what it was like to be able to understand what someone was saying even if he was not speaking in a humanly understandable language.

“The wind howls, the snow flurries, and the rain falls. These are natural phenomena and so are natural disasters. The resulting prosperity is based upon luck, while downfall is the result of destiny.”

“Life is impermanent. To live extraordinarily, affluence is based upon luck, while misfortune is the result of destiny.”

“Since a long time ago, the times of parting and separation outnumbers the times of unity, looking back, regrets are aplenty. Life is also not all smooth-sailing, and regrets are aplenty. All of these regrets slowly destroy our will.”

“Such are the sufferings of life.”

“In this endless light, how can this be my own soliloquy?”

The Seeker and the girl shrouded in the black mist were also part of the hat-passing party. As the ghost souls passed on the hat, they would don their own when they received theirs. When the Seeker was given her hat, she wanted to pass it on but the ghost soul beside her did not move.

When the Seeker and all the ghost souls donned their own hats, the girl shrouded in the black mist seemed to sigh in sadness.

She said, “All of you have donned your hats, but what about me? My hat is too heavy for me to wear…”

At that instant, the wooden house fell apart, and the liberated ghost souls fled and vanished.

The space in which the Seeker was in began to distort, and only the Seeker herself remained unchanged.

In the end, everything turned into darkness, and only the Seeker’s hat glowed weakly.

As soon as the Seeker took off her hat, it immediately dissipated into air and turned into a light that expelled the darkness.

To Ren Suo’s horror, he saw on the screen that the Seeker was in a room with windows. However, the windows looked like one solid panel of glass and could not be moved.

The room was almost empty, and cameras were installed at the four corners of the room, focusing on a table in the center of the room. There were four incandescent lamps hidden in the ceiling just above the window. They filled the entire room with light.

And in the center of the room was a glass safe with a black hat in it.

It was called a hat as it looked somewhat like it—in fact, however, the hat was merely sculpted by a black mist. If it were turned over, it would have passed off as a bowl.

When the Seeker approached the hat, the black mist floated upwards, even passing directly through the solid glass safe. The black mist reformed the shape of a pure black witch’s hat outside the glass safe.

When the Seeker took the hat and put it on, many people suddenly appeared outside the room. They stood on the other side of the window and remained still as they watched the Seeker; as there was a distance between them and the Seeker and it was also not clearly shown on the screen, Ren Suo could not make out their expressions clearly.

At that moment, a booming sound echoed from the television. Ren Suo was so shocked that he dropped the game controller on the ground. The voice said, “Hurry, put it down!—”

Then, the Seeker donned the hat.

That was really not Ren Suo’s fault…

[The Seeker dons the Hat of Resentments.]

[The Seeker is experiencing the resentment of Wan Changqing.]

[The Seeker is experiencing the resentment of Yasui Doton.]

[The Seeker is experiencing the resentment of Taiper.]

[The Seeker is…]

In an instant, a long chain of messages appeared on the screen. Ren Suo watched as his 55-inch 4K television screen was filled with information about the experiences of the Seeker, and the entire screen became a white sea of words.

It was way more than Ren Suo could control.

Just as Ren Suo thought that it would lead to an automated plot sequence, a distinct message appeared at the center of the screen:

[Faced with the 9,645,287 resentments, the special ability of the game character “Seeker” is activated: Heart of Heaven.]

[Heart of Heaven: Those who rightly pledge their faith in cultivation will breed a pure state of the mind. Although life is still sustained with the physical body, their thinking is no longer affected by the hormones and chemicals of the body, becoming perfectly selfless.]

[With the Heart of Heaven, the Seeker experienced all 9,645,287 resentments.]

[The resentments have no effect on the Seeker.]

[With the will of the heavens, the Seeker calms and eliminates all 9,645,287 resentments.]

[The Seeker successfully transforms the Hat of Resentments.]

Throughout the barrage of messages, Ren Suo had no way to control anything in the game, and could only watch the Seeker complete the game by herself.

When the Seeker successfully transformed the Hat of Resentments, the series of messages instantly ended. On the screen, the Seeker removed the hat on her head and found that it had turned into a pointed white hat. Details of the hat also appeared:

[The Hat of Practice and Cultivation]

[Grade: 4-star Prop. Pre-requisites: Presence of a mind and the ability to activate Reiki currents.]

[Effect: Upon donning the hat, the user would be able to untie all knots in the heart and calm all troubles. The user would be freed from all qualms and troubles, and the ability of understanding would be temporarily increased by 300%.]

[Remarks: In ancient times, wild gods once lived in the Yellow River. They were known for consuming sorrows and devouring hate. They were proficient in relieving disasters and resolving challenges and were commonly seen working in the rain donning their conical hats. Later on, they achieved a perfect understanding of the world, but vast numbers of their believers remained despite the end of their fights. Their believers continued to worship them by offering their resentments. With a perfect understanding of the world, they embraced all resentments and sought to trace its roots to eliminate them. But for those who were not gods who fought, they had no power to relieve disasters. Ultimately, those who bore resentment fell into a deep slumber and those who suffered lost their memories, leaving sorrow and resentment behind.

Practitioners who wore the crown lost all conscious thought. Their bodies were turned into reflections of sorrow and resentment, and while they appeared holy in the eyes of the ordinary, they led them in to sleep in a world without sorrow. The world was a place where resentment and sorrows naturally bred, and suffering in life was unavoidable. The only way to solve this problem was to embrace the impurity and be freed as a result.

Today, the Seeker managed to dispel the resentments from ages ago, and the drive for cultivation becomes a crucial force for leading countless years of devotion towards the right path. Grievances are washed away and hopes are raised. Finally, another generation of Reiki-filled objects is born.]

Amazing! Can I take this away, I want this as my reward!

Ren Suo’s eyes lit up. That was a useful object cultivated by the Seeker, and it must be the reward earned by the Seeker—

But the next second, the hat passed through the Seeker’s hand and fell to the ground like a falling leaf.

At that juncture, the room seemed to be opened and many people came rushing in. However, Ren Suo could not remember what they said.

He only saw the female Seeker began to fade away under a white glow of light, and eventually turned into a ball of light which then dissipated completely—

[Mission Completed.]

[There is no mission score given. There is no mission score to upload.]

[“A Strong Warrior Ascends 10,000 Meters” can now continue to be played.]

Mmm? Would games not be playable when they were used in the bets?

Ren Suo had not noticed such a setting earlier for he did not have so much free time to play the same game again.

Even though it was reasonable for there to be no rewarded merit points and no mission score, there should at least be a specialized reward!

[Based on the gameplay, you have received the following specialized reward: The Hat of Cultivation and Practice. You may activate the reward in the savehouse inventory.]

Then, the game automatically quit and Ren Suo was brought to the main page, and the next second, the game “Passing Hats” appeared to disintegrate and disappear from the main screen. Ren Suo stared wide-eyed as he watched the game delete itself.

The game “committed suicide” so quickly!

However, the reward he received was not the “Hat of Practice and Cultivation” but instead the “Hat of Cultivation and Practice”… Why were the two words reversed?

Excited, Ren Suo quickly navigated to the “Equipment” page to query the details, but his face immediately fell.

In the “Props” section of the “Equipment” page, there was a new Prop, the “Hat of Cultivation and Practice”, in addition to the “Unlimited Fried Chicken Set” and “Jade Pendant of the Goddess of the Luo River”.

The problem was that the description of that item was not the same as what Ren Suo was familiar with!

[Hat of Cultivation and Practice]

[Grade: 2-star Prop. Prerequisites: Presence of a mind and a physical hat.”

[Effect: When equipped, the player would gain a 10% increase in the ability of understanding. The player would acquire effects like “enhanced confession”, “enhanced apology”, “enhanced comfort”, and “enhanced compliment”.]

[Remarks: This hat was cultivated from the memories of the Seeker. After acquiring the abilities from other hats, this hat also received the powerful abilities of those memories, although the original effects of the abilities were reduced slightly.]

What a scam! How could this be the result of “the powerful abilities of those memories”!

Were the acquired effects not just the abilities gained by the hats with a red glow which was only somewhat useful in the game “Passing Hats”?

Ren Suo had always been living a life without regrets and did not need those abilities to help him untie the knots in his mind!

Moreover, the original “+20% increase in the ability of understanding” was cut by half!

The game was such a waste of time and energy!

When Ren Suo calmed down, he muttered to himself as he thought about something else, “Nonetheless, no mission scores are uploaded for this game, and it ends immediately upon completion…”

“Somehow, I feel that it is not only me who is anxious to complete it, even the game feels very rushed for me to clear it.”

“The place where the hat appeared is very modern, where could it be…”

At that juncture, a message appeared on the top left corner of the main screen:

“You have received a message.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep