Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

As Ryu's Heavenly Favor soared, the geniuses around him felt more and more suppressed, and though they didn't notice, their own Heavenly Favor began to plummet.

Not much was known about the Convergence, it was an event far too rare, even to the extent that the likes of the Ruin Master Guild had to be cautious in how they approached it and secretive in their actions. However there had always been legends about it and many wrote tales of what it could be like if the Convergence was taken to the most logical extreme.

Many wondered about what the Convergence was and what it existed for, if it was a random event brought about by coincidence and simply a byproduct or necessity of a function of a long enough period of time, or if there was a deeper meaning to it all.

Ultimately, the Heavens had a much heavier hand in many things than most gave it credit for, but it was also known for its fairness and order. The Convergence seemed to be something out of the ordinary, something that wouldn't appear unless there was a viable and tangible reason for it.

This was especially so because a single Convergence seemed to be followed by several cycles of Cataclysms, or periods of time where Fate was entirely and dried up. As a result, there seemed to be a heavy price to pay for allowing the Convergence to take place.

There was one theory that was more interesting than the rest, though...

The True Martial World had a cap of 3333 Founding Daos, and yet they had nowhere near that number filled out. In fact, they foolishly added artificial restrictions on lower level Daos in order to maintain control over the Lower Heavens.

The oddity here wasn't the selfishness of the large Clans and Sects, this much was a given. But the real question was about whether the Heavens were happy, enraged, or indifferent about this.

If the Heavens were happy, then everything would be fine. It was in the nature of everything to want to survive, so since the Heavens had a cap of 3333 Founding Daos, maybe it was the fact that it didn't want too many Daos as it would place too much stress on its existence.

This seemed to make sense, until one realized that it was entirely contradictory to almost everything else the Heavens stood for.

The Heavens had always pressed for the evolution of the people under its charge, this was why it was the natural state of living beings to improve through natural selection, it was an inevitable pressurized outcome pressed on by the Heavens themselves.

And then there was something else to If the Heavens really wanted to limit Daos, then why would it allow the Convergence to happen to begin with? Especially since the Convergence was maybe the greatest opportunity in existence for those of Lower Heavens to make their way to Upper Heavens? If the Heavens really wanted to limit the number, then why allow this chance at all?

It was possible that the Heavens were neutral, but while this wasn't as contradictory as it being happy, it wasn't perfectly in line with what was known about the Heavens either for the same reasons as listed previously. Everything seemed to point to the dissatisfaction of the Heavens with the current state of things, even to the point of allowing several cycles of cataclysms to occur in exchange.

So the question was why? If the Heavens were unhappy, then what was it trying to do about it? There were a few hypotheses but the one that rang the loudest was maybe the reason the Ruin Master Guild was so anxious, and it was also the why Sacrum, which had a chance to break through the current mold thanks to its Shrine, was having so much attention paid to it despite being a mid level world...

This answer came in the form of a very fascinating question...

What if the goal of a Convergence wasn't to concentrate the Faith of several Generations into the hands of the leaders of just one... But was rather to concentrate it in the hands of just a single person? What if only that was the true Convergence?

The light on Ryu became fiercer and fiercer.

After using up all of his Heavenly Favor on unsealing his Spiritual Foundation, he had crashed back down. Luckily, he still had one step left to go in the tower and was able to reclaim much of it, though unfortunately it wasn't enough to return to number one.

At this moment, though, first place seemed to be nothing more than a joke. The sudden gap between Ryu and his great grandfather had expanded to the point it didn't seem right to place them on the same list any longer.

The numbers jumped and jumped, moving so quickly that it was impossible even for their eyes to track what was happening. And then...

The ancient cube cracked.

At first it was just a small splinter, but it quickly began to spread, moving faster and faster until it suddenly entirely broke apart.

The cascaded down toward Ryu in a blinding torrent, but unlike the previous time when Ryu was pushed to the ground, this time... it felt like a gentle spring breeze, caressing his skin and rustling his hair.

Oddly enough, Ryu couldn't feel much of anything outside of that. He didn't feel his power skyrocketing, he didn't feel his cultivation increasing by leaps and bounds, he didn't feel his blood rumbling or his heart thumping with anticipation. He just felt....

Peace.

It was like a security blanket was wrapping around his shoulders, like his mother was kissing his forehead or his father was giving him a pat on the shoulders.

the first time in a long while, Ryu just felt... relaxed, like everything would be like there was nothing to worry about.

He took a breath and then exhaled.