Primordial Era: Starting with the repair of Penglai Immortal Island

In the primordial land, countless beings, except for a few powerful beings, have not yet discovered that the power of the sun, moon, and stars is manifesting more clearly, and its laws are easier to explore.

As the sun rises and sets, the mountain stream flows ceaselessly day and night.

Shennong, who observed the heavens and the earth, would see in the morning which mountain peak the sun would rise from and in the evening which mountain ridge it would set behind.

At night, observe which direction the handle of the Big Dipper points, and when Venus rises and sets.

When spring flowers bloom, he watches to see when the first peach blossom appears on the mountainside; when summer cicadas sing, he listens to the night when the first cicada's song rings out in the valley; when autumn leaves turn yellow, he watches to see from which branch of the maple tree below the cliff begins to change color; when winter snow falls, he records this cold season.

One year, three years, five years, ten years...!

In the twentieth year, one night a thick fog rolled in, and the mountain wind, carrying the damp and cold fog, surged up from the bottom of the cliff, enveloping him in a thick white mist.

He opened his eyes, but all he could see was a blurry blur; he couldn't see anything at all.

He wasn't in a hurry, so he just sat there and waited for the fog to dissipate.

As the fog dissipated, the first glimmer of dawn appeared on the horizon, and the handle of the Big Dipper had somehow shifted to point in another direction.

Shennong suddenly felt as if he had understood something.

He took out a piece of innate spiritual jade that he always carried with him from his bosom, and with his right index finger, he condensed spiritual light and drew the first mark on the smooth surface of the jade.

After that, he observed the sky while making inscriptions.

That day, the sun rose at 3:45 AM from the gap in the third mountain peak to the east, and he inscribed the words "Spring Equinox" on the jade slip.

That night, he counted the changing patterns of brightness of the star Yao Guang in the Big Dipper, added "Summer Solstice" to the jade slip, but erased it the following year.

Decades passed in the blink of an eye. He carved and polished the jade repeatedly, until it was more than half full.

The writing was densely packed, some arranged according to the seasons, some with annotations of the corresponding star positions, some with simple diagrams of the flourishing and withering of plants, and some with extremely fine lines indicating the changes in the length of the shadow.

On this day, Huanglong and Duobao were playing chess, while Xuandu watched from the sidelines.

Huang Long casually picked up the last black piece and was about to place it on the board when his fingers suddenly paused.

A beam of light shot into the sky from the side.

It was a beam of clear light, a simple, unadorned beam of bluish-white light, rising from the giant stone platform at the mountaintop and piercing straight into the sea of ​​clouds in the heavens.

Countless Daoist runes appeared within the pillar of light, arranged and spiraling in a grand order, their ends connected, flowing endlessly within the pillar of light, like a blue dragon coiled around a celestial pillar.

Eight more archaic characters appeared one by one: Beginning of Spring, Spring Equinox, Beginning of Summer, Summer Solstice, Beginning of Autumn, Autumn Equinox, Beginning of Winter, Winter Solstice.

The eight distinct sections divided that year into eight neat segments.

Shennong stood up.

He sat cross-legged on the mountaintop for decades, observing the movement of the heavens, earth, sun, moon, and stars. His cultivation level was reduced, and he appeared like an ordinary person.

Holding the fully engraved spirit jade in both hands, the characters on the jade emitted light spontaneously, echoing the pillar of light that reached the sky.

"Spring Begins... Spring Equinox... Summer Begins... Summer Solstice..." He read each word carefully, and when he got to the Winter Solstice, his voice trembled slightly.

A complete calendar.

Over several decades, he incorporated celestial phenomena, terrestrial phenology, the flourishing and withering of plants, and the rise and fall of rivers into the eight solar terms.

From now on, just by glancing at the direction the Big Dipper's handle points, you'll know it's time to turn the soil; just by knowing how many days have passed since the Spring Equinox, you'll know it's time to sow seeds; and by counting the days after the Beginning of Autumn, you'll know it's time to harvest.

No more guessing when the weather will warm up or when the frost will fall.

The stars in the sky have already made their own words clear.

Shennong put the spirit jade into his sleeve and turned to look at the three people in the pavilion.

Now that the calendar was complete, they realized the painstaking efforts of Huanglong and the others.

He suddenly felt a lump in his throat.

Huang Long was still sitting in front of the chessboard.

Xuan Du was holding the last white piece, which was hanging in mid-air and falling.

Duobao had already noticed the commotion beside him, and his eyes were now full of anticipation.

Shennong quickly stepped forward and bowed to Huanglong and the other two.

"Thank you for your guidance, Master! Thank you for your protection, Teacher!"

Huanglong's gaze swept across Shennong's face and the manifested Great Dao of Heaven and Earth.

Finally, it landed on the bright light in his eyes.

"Let's go," Huang Long said, casually tossing a chess piece onto the board. "It's time to go back."

......

Shennong returned to the ancestral land of the human race.

He stood before the temple in the center of the ancestral land, holding the jade inscribed with the calendar, and used spiritual light to imprint its contents, transmitting them to all human tribes.

Wherever there are human settlements, a bluish-white streak of light descends from the sky. The streak of light enters the ground and transforms into a stone tablet. The tablet is engraved with the complete eight solar terms, from the beginning of spring to the winter solstice. Each solar term is accompanied by a concise guide to agricultural activities.

Within a few decades, the entire human race changed.

Each tribe cultivates according to the solar terms and works according to the seasons.

When the spring equinox arrives, the land is turned over; around Qingming Festival, millet seeds are sown; when summer begins, the hoes are ready to be used; and when autumn begins, the sickles are sharpened. No one misses the farming season due to uncertainty about the timing. When the tribespeople place offerings before the statues in their respective tribal temples, they pray for the protection of the human emperor "Shennong".

Millet is harvested crop after crop, and the granaries are fuller year by year.

With more children, the elderly became more rosy-cheeked, and the village walls expanded outwards in concentric circles.

The prosperity of the nation is unprecedented.

Invisible auspicious clouds of fortune shrouded all human settlements, like a second sky. Any non-human beings recognized by the fortune that entered its coverage were suppressed.

Then, the auspicious clouds of fortune slowly surged along with the growth and reproduction of the human race, each wisp of auspicious cloud demonstrating the strength of the human race.

And in the ancestral temple of the human race, there is a seal enshrined.

That was a symbol of the emperor's authority. Ever since Fuxi entered the Fire Cloud Cave, it had been lifeless and had never moved.

After the calendar spread, old farmers would go to the temple to kowtow after harvesting their crops and say, "The solar terms given by the Emperor are really accurate." Women would go to the temple to add incense to their newborn babies and say, "Thank you for the Emperor's blessing." Even teenagers would touch the door frame when passing by the temple and mumble, "Grandpa Emperor."

The sounds were so soft, as soft as the rippling waves of wheat in the fields.

But all of these, day and night, year after year, continuously flowed into that stone seal.

The Kongtong Seal began to tremble day and night deep within the ancestral land of the human race, emitting a low, humming sound that resembled a dragon's roar yet was not quite.

The sound traveled from the ancestral land of humanity all the way to the temples of various tribes across the human realm. Each tremor fell upon the hearts of countless people, as if someone were whispering a call in their ear...!

"The Human Emperor!"