MC and ML have been tragically separated for 3000 years and at the beginning, when MC's soul inhabits the body of a youth who's a total stranger to ML, they often play this tug-of-war mental game with guessing MC's identity. And as soon as ML stops "pulling" aka trying to guess, MC gets all petty about it. Like... ? Why are you so intent on lying and keep your identity hidden if it bothers the fact that ML doesn't press you for answers? This served the author the function of establishing that MC is not the perfect immortal that the side characters think him to be, he's fallible and human, but considering his eons-long life, it just reads as childish. Even when I read till the very last word and understood what the author wanted with this kind of scenes, I still think that a world-hopping thousands-years man would not be this petty, and it left a jarring impression on the characterisation. Like, if this character contradicts himself and acts irrational, why bother with his lofty background story at all?

Another instance of the author using broad strokes for this novel can be found in the plot. If I had to put a tag on it, I would use "Case Fic" cause the underlying rationale behind what these characters do comes from the imminent catastrophe and the mass murderer. both of which suffer from the author moving along a bit too fast for my liking. Imagine if the scenes of the MC and ML finding the slaughtered sects played like Record of a Missing Sect Master? That would be so sick. Each scene would have been described poignantly and give you shivers of anxiety and terror, and each plot point would be foreshadowed just a bit for those readers who pay attention, and introduced properly when the time comes, so that everything flows at a nice consistent pace. Whereas here, you mostly hear about the massacres, and the protagonists only inspect two murder scenes very swiftly, and visit one potential victim sect (which marks the only properly fleshed out arc). So much wasted potential.

And finally, I don't like the fact that the author starts the novel with a focalized narrator on MC and shifts to omniscient narrator with additional momentary shifts between MC and ML. This was very bad because you don't need to show scenes from the pov of ML at all, his utter devotion for MC bursts at the seam from the beginning, that part is written quite well. Whereas MC, the character who has most need of being carefully analysed due to his background story, ends up not being described properly. How does he change from a lofty, impassive person to a tenderly loving shou? Who the hell knows. The texts goes from "my family's snake was so small and cute, now overbearing and ruthless" to "I just want to kiss you all the time, of course we can **** any time babe" Like... lol. There's a gray area in the middle of these stages where MC is often incapacitated and ML rubs himself on MC sexually and MC gets hot and bothered and frustrated before pushing the other way, but as far as feelings development, you need to read the author's mind to fill in the gaps.

What's half-assed the most is the world-building. Half-assed Heavenly Principle role, half-assed the whole 1000 years catastrophe, half-assed """"solution"""" to prevent it and half-assed lifestyle that the protagonists live after the ending. Like these two deadass hear a premonition of worldwide catastrophe and go "who cares about that as long as we get our thousand years together and spend our honeymoon world-hopping, let the secretary deal with that shit" Most half-assed ending I've ever seen fr.

Is that, 3000 years ago, MC left the world after saving it. But before that, he passed on his knowledge of the cultivation of the Dao for his disciples to carry on. Note that, 3000 years ago, there were barely any cultivators. There were no big sects or cultivation books. Rather, people had to figure stuff out on their own. So when MC passed on those "sacred cultivation texts", that basically gave people a way to cultivate, the world's population of cultivators exploded.

As the years passed by, more cultivators = more exploitation of natural resources, i.e. spirit stones, which power everything. Think of spirit stones as coal or oil. The world basically became very greedy, and heavily exploited the natural land. The "Heavenly Will" predicted that, in the present day, if this went on, the world would become extinct in 1000 years.

When MC ascended, he left his physical body behind. The Heavenly will basically wake that physical body, and randomly selected a bunch of sects for the physical body (without MC's soul) to kill. Basically, by culling the cultivators, the tax on natural resources would lessen.

The plan was, the soulless body would go on a murder spree to cull the population, and then MC's purpose for being called back into the world was to kill the soulless body after the culling was over.

MC's physical body. Who is being puppeted by the "Heavenly Will"

MC's soulless body needed a sacrifice to return to full power, so it was hinted by the Heavenly Will to take ML's eyes--but those eyes had to be willingly offered, so the soulless body tricked ML and took ML's sight.

He thought that he was supposed to die, 3000 years ago, but somehow he continued living. So his goal this time, originally, was that once he finished his mission, then the Heavenly Will would free him and he could be a mortal and die. Because being an immortal is super tiring, and taxing on his mental.

Is really good, and not very rushed.

I'll make this short. They basically spoil Heavenly Will's plan, and ML tries to sacrifice himself, offering his 3000 years of cultivation up, to take on the punishment MC would have received for resisting the Heavenly Will. MC arrives in time, just as ML is about to die, and subsequently, Uno Reverses ML and takes ML's place as an envoy of the Heavenly Will again. The deal is that he has 1000 years to try and prevent the world's extinction, and if he succeeds, he will be free again. If they both fail, then they will be greatly punished.

MC laments that he's once again bound to immortality, but this time, having recognized ML as his love--and realizing that he had come to see ML as a reason to continue to live, so he has ML to accompany him the entire time. They are super lovey-dovey.

I didn't like the revised ending, but in the revised ending, MC basically fights the Heavenly Will and takes his place. This happens in the last two chapters. I didn't finish reading it because I wasn't interested, felt a bit too Deux Ex Machina for me. Because for me, I felt that, even if MC ultimately fell under the Heavenly Will in the end, it was not a bad end by any means. He is happy, and he has a forever lifetime to spend with ML. Not all endings need to be grand and crazy and circumvent the current norms. Being ruler of the world is cool, but it's not my style of ending.

Though the ending (original) was good, I'm not fond of how MC and ML basically left the world to triapse around in parallel worlds together. Because even though they came up with some measures to slow down spirit stone usage, like, it feels a bit irresponsible. Especially considering the horrible end that awaits them if the world goes to sht at the end of the 1000 year time limit. MC's attitude is basically "leave the troubles for future me", which I'm not a fan of. I thought they'd go more hardcore, implementing rules and regulations, etc. etc.

But they don't leave for a long time, so it's aight I guess.

his body has been stolen.