Wisdom and Folly Reversed

A world that had been locked in a cage for far too long finally found someone to fix the lock, then kick the door down. In the Ancient Era, countless races stood side by side, and the Heavenly Dao was an open, inclusive “System of rules.” Regardless of intelligence or bloodline, every living being could find a path to cultivation. Humanity rose through its “intelligence” without upsetting the balance. The true upheaval came at the end of the “Ancient War of the Gods.” The defeated side, whose identity we will leave aside for now, did something as they faced annihilation: They sacrificed all their divine souls to carve a curse into the “underlying code” of the Heavenly Dao. That curse was called “Wisdom and Foolishness Reversed.” It rewrote the Heavenly Dao's original rules so that the more intelligent a being was, the harder it became to cultivate. It wasn't that the Heavenly Dao itself “punished intelligence.” It had been “poisoned.” Like a System whose algorithm had been tampered with, it was carrying out faulty instructions. As a result, the myriad races dwindled and civilizations fell into decline. To protect themselves, the powerful within humanity went along with the distortion, turning it into a tool of control.