It is cold.
The moment he recalls that, the boy bursts out of the water.
Cough, cough!
Spitting out the water, he looks around with blank eyes.
Huuuuuuup—
Naturally, he warms his body through the breathing he has been doing his whole life and expels the cold water in his lungs.
At the same time, he activates his brain, sorts his memories, and grasps his surroundings.
Tuk— Tuk—
The boy taps his head a few times, then, through the subtlety of issuing force, even drains the water that has gotten into his ears. He then rises from where he is, and only then does he recognize what situation he is in now.
"...The past?"
The eye-crippled who had become an old man connected countless stars to stars to make an altar and performed a long ritual.
Praying that if there is a next life, to please let him not be unhappy, and then died.
And the one who was the eye-crippled, after death, regressed to that single moment of his childhood when he was drowning in the water.
Now, the eye-crippled who has become a boy makes a quick judgment.
There is no leisure to fall into sentiment.
Huup—
He draws a breath again and, through breathing, takes perfect control of his whole body.
Then he burns the life force in his body and, for an instant, dashes somewhere at a speed a seven-year-old child can never produce.
Part of his lifespan is shaved off by the excessive movement, but that is none of the boy's concern.
Right now is the time to act.
Paatt!
The place the boy reaches by moving at a transcendent speed is the shabby thatched house where he lives with his mother.
The boy flings the door open and runs to his mother.
He quickly takes his mother's pulse and does what he did not manage to do before the regression.
Tuk, tuk, tuk!
He pricks points all over his mother's body and activates her life force.
He knows as many ways to kill a person as one could want.
In the first life, just how many people died by his hand?
The structure of the human body and the principle of life and such are not difficult.
He cut, he split, he sliced, and it was just not once or twice that he rummaged through the skin.
And before long, the boy's mother looks at the boy and smiles.
"Child...my baby..."
"Yes, Mother. I am here."
The boy holds his mother's hand tight and speaks in a trembling voice.
His mother's eyes regain life, and affection and will stand in her gaze.
"It is cold outside. You must go about warmly."
"Yes, Mother. I will dress warmly."
"Good, my baby. You even listen...well..."
The boy's mother, having finished speaking, looks at the boy with loving eyes and closes her mouth.
Whoooooosh—
A cold wind blows from outside.
The boy lowers his head.
Though he tried to activate her life force by opening points, it was already too late.
In the end, all the boy accomplished through regression is nothing more than staying by his mother's deathbed and hearing her last words.
The result does not change.
The boy knows this too.
In the first life, even transcendents who dominate the entire Cosmic Great Desolation trembled with fear before the boy and poured out countless wisdoms.
Even the rulers of the galaxies where innumerable stars and stars gather, and the mighty divine spirits who devour those entire galaxies...
The divinities who spend and adjust the lifespans of humans and other living spirits...
All of them kneeled before him, stricken with fear, and answered everything he was curious about.
In the last life, the boy even had the chance to transcend life, death, and lifespan itself, becoming a divinity of the pantheon like other divinities and transcendents.
Since the herald of the Chief God, the one who rules the Cosmic Great Desolation he lives in, even proposed to him the Seat of the God of War, he could have become an undying, everlasting being as much as he pleased.
However, he threw all of that away with his own hands, and in just one corner of the infinite Astral Realm, he made an altar out of starlight and kept praying without end until he died.
Even if he becomes an undying being...
The pain he received in that life, the misfortune, the sorrow and grief...
He knew they could never be repaid.
He wanted to erase the very existence called himself, become nourishment for the beings after himself, and live as a completely new being.
"The first...principle of history..."
History that has passed does not return.
The past [absolutely] does not change.
Even if there is a being who turns back time...
Even in the time that has passed, history repeats.
That is the knowledge he obtained while he slaughtered and captured countless divinities and transcendents during the first life.
"If it is going to be like this...then why on earth did you send me back...?"
The boy, letting out a grievous groan toward some vague someone who would have sent him back to the past, sobs with choking sounds before his mother's corpse.
Even the God-Killer who killed countless gods in the past life cannot change the flow of history that was once carried out.
Even if it is merely the matter of lengthening a little the lifespan of a mother who is only a mortal...
The first day of returning to the past.
The boy who was an eye-crippled feels to the bone the realization that he cannot turn back the time that has gone by.
After holding his mother's funeral, the boy slowly begins to recover the cultivation he accumulated in the past.
A power that overturns the world by willpower.
A secret art that, through such powers, completely separates himself from the world so that he does not receive the influence of the world's laws, and allows him to wield miracles.
Star Extinguishing True Chapter, Revised.
Darkness World.
The boy's hearing, taste, touch, and smell are sealed, and the sixth sense that all living beings have.
Even the sixth sense is sealed.
He focuses his mind on the consciousness of intent, called the seventh sense, and grasps the structure of the world at once.
The Law of Causality shaped like a net enters his sight, and the boy cuts some of the causal laws around him and inhales them.
Having devoured a portion of causal laws, the boy reorganizes the world's principles applied to himself, leaves the house, and walks slowly along the road.
In the boy's hand is held his mother's keepsake, a mother-of-pearl hairpin.
He walks and walks slowly, heading somewhere.
It is to the neighboring village beyond the mountain.
He goes to the market of the neighboring village beyond the mountain and meets a person he met in the first life.
"Hah, spare a coin...for this wretch's sake, at least...spare just a coin..."
Since he sealed his hearing, his ears do not hear, but while detecting the vibrations of the Law of Causality that are heard by the seventh sense, the boy looks at the face of the leg-crippled begging before his eyes.
'Was it such a face?'
He perches in front of the leg-crippled and speaks to him.
"Hey, you."
"Aigo, young master. Please, spare just a coin for this wretch."
The boy thinks.
'The flow of history does not change. But...'
The boy lost all senses, but unlike the last life, he did not lose sight.
He also heard his mother's last words, and he stayed by her deathbed.
Though he could not protect his mother herself...
'A little. If it is just a very little...might it change?'
Holding a small hope, he recalls before the regression.
He recalls the first life.
That time when the leg-cripple amicably calls the blind boy who cannot see and said to be friends.
It was not an attitude like serving a master as now.
"Let's be friends. I will become your legs."
Looking at the old connection, the boy, holding a faint hope that perhaps a person can change, makes him an offer.
The leg-crippled boy stares at him blankly and then asks a question.
"Wh-Why do you...? Why someone like me, a beggar...?"
"I am a beggar too. I will carry you on my back and go around together, so let's go around begging together. How about it?"
"B-But...uh...you look like you have no discomfort anywhere in your body... Why do you want to go around...with a cripple...like me...?"
The boy recalls the leg-crippled before the regression.
He tried to sell off the keepsake of the boy's mother to a merchant, got caught, and was torn to death by the boy.
'Was that...because this guy is innately evil? Or was it something that could have changed depending on circumstances?'
"...I too, was blind before."
"Wh-What...?"
"But..."
The boy smiles faintly and says,
"I prayed to Lord Heavens...and prayed again, and guess what. Lord Heavens gave me back my eyes."
"Wh-What...?"
""So...I want to become friends with you. Travel together with me and let's pray together to Lord Heavens. So that your legs can heal again."
He smiles faintly and hoists the crippled friend onto his back.
At the first kindness he ever feels in his life, the leg-crippled seems flustered for a moment, then soon starts to heave on the boy's back.
"Kkeuk...kkeuk..."
The leg-crippled is crying.
It must be because emotions surged up before he even knew it.
As the boy listens to the leg-cripped's heartbeat and the ripple of his soul...
He realizes the leg-crippled is truly moved.
"Stay with me. Even if Lord Heavens does not hear our prayers, I will fix your legs."
The boy thinks about the reason he returned to the past.
Even thinking again, he does not know the exact principle.
However, one guess he can make is that, as he committed killing and slaughter up to now, the footwork and techniques he studied to kill others even better seemed to cross some limit and feel like crossing time.
Another guess is the altar he connected stars to make is an altar he saw at a place in a secret cave where the brazier was, where he discovered the Star Extinguishing True Chapter. The function of that altar is an 'altar for making wishes'. It is an altar with a tale written that if one prays to God at that altar, God will grant the wish. The wish he prayed at that altar may have been fulfilled in this form.
Lastly, the moment he died,
He felt the will of some transcendent being come to him, caresses his soul, and something inside himself awaken.
He does not know which of the three made him return to the past.
But one thing is clear.
'Time that has passed does not return. The flow of the past also cannot be changed. But...if it is a small thing...'
For example, keeping sight by giving up another sense in place of his eyes.
Staying by at his mother's passing.
Or things like the first meeting with the leg-crippled friend being subtly different.
Fate itself cannot be changed, but the form of the connection can be different.
'If it they are small things...maybe I can change them?'
He still cannot know the principle, but the boy's regression likely originates from his own wish that he not be unhappy.
'In this life...can I be saved?'
Can he receive recompense for the unhappy first life?
The boy holds hope.
And this leg-crippled friend is the first test subject for him.
He begs together with the leg-crippled friend, and unlike the previous life, he teaches tricks and teaches breathing.
He kills a tiger living on South Mountain, sells its hide and gives him wealth, and he catches and kills a flood dragon under a bridge that eats people, and even feeds its Inner Core to his friend.
As a result, the leg-crippled friend gains wealth and becomes able to walk again.
"Th-Thank you, Blackie...thank you...!"
About one year.
In around a year's worth of time, the leg-crippled friend gives the boy the name 'Blackie'.
This is the same name he gave in the first life.
Because the boy roamed while wearing black clothes to honor his mother's death in his own way, the leg-crippled friend gave him the name 'Blackie'.
"It's nothing, we are friends."
Blackie hugs the leg-crippled tight and smiles.
One year of time.
It is the same time he spent with the leg-crippled in the first life.
During that time, he saw his own kind of hope.
And today,
Today, exactly the first anniversary of meeting him, is the day when, in the first life, the leg-crippled betrayed him and sold off his mother's keepsake.
'The peddler who coaxes this kid...I already killed him.'
Within the leg-crippled boy's heart, killing intent or greed cannot be found.
He fixed his legs.
He killed the person who would tempt him.
He even removed the curse called poverty that would make him possess greed itself.
He also did not show any bodily defect that would make him be looked down on as blind like in his previous life.
The situation differs from before, so he will not betray him.
Moreover, the waves of intent he feels also reflect the leg-crippled boy's heart, showing that he does not particularly harbor an evil heart.
'If it is only a little...I can change it.'
Of course, because this boy's lifespan is exactly until today, he might not be able to avoid dying today.
But just as he stayed by his mother's deathbed.
The very process by which the leg-crippled dies may be different.
He may be able to regard the leg-crippled boy not as a filthy betrayer, but as a friend.
If the boy who came to have the name 'Blackie' can only become like so...
The heart of himself that suffered in the first life...
The resentment and pain knotted in a corner of that heart might be able to be saved.
Thinking so, the boy vows that, if he does not betray him, he will kill even the god who spends out lifespans to save his 'friend'.
And so, that night arrives.
Puuuk—
Blink—
'Blackie' looks at the knife embedded in his body.
"Y-You bastard...what kind of eight-year-old brat doesn't even let out a single scream...!?"
Blackie looks around.
They are the village butchers.
He knows well that they are people who habitually do dirty deeds, and sometimes even take on murder-for-hire requests.
Crack—
Blackie crushes the knife with his bare hands and pulls it out, then lifts with one hand the butcher who stabbed him and flings him away.
Kwaang!
One butcher smashes through the room's ceiling, flies away, and becomes a lump of blood.
Blackie looks around with clear eyes.
"D-Don't move, you monster bastard! If you move, I will kill your one and only friend!"
"Heuheuk... B-Blackie..."
He looks at the friend held hostage by the butchers.
This life,
The friend did not betray him.
In this life, those who attack him are only marketplace butchers unrelated to him...
From that alone, he feels relieved.
Crunch—
An instant.
In only an instant, all the butchers die at once.
In a flash, the entire room where Blackie was sleeping blows apart, and wind pressure and shockwaves cover the area.
The courtyard of the manor where Blackie and the leg-crippled friend lived together enters his eyes under the moonlight.
"Don't worry. You won't die today."
Under the moonlight, whether at someone's instigation...
Numerous contract killers, assassins, and bandits hold weapons and look at Blackie with tense eyes.
With a calm face, Blackie faces his friend, who is a little older than him but still a child.
"Because you are my friend. Even if your lifespan ends today...I will kill even the power of the god who decides lifespans to save you. So don't worry..."
Puuuk—
"...Fri...end..."
Blackie looks at the leg-crippled who, trembling, drives a knife into his chest.
"...What are you doing?"
He truly cannot understand.
There is no one as well-versed in murder and killing as himself.
He definitely did not feel killing intent from the leg-crippled boy.
He also did not feel any will to commit murder.
Lately he seems a bit depressed and confused, but Blackie thought that, since the leg-crippled friend's physical age is a little older than his, it is only confusion arising as he goes through puberty.
Then, why...?
"D-Don't make me laugh... You beat to death the tiger of South Mountain... You beat to death the flood dragon under the bridge... You picked up a completely useless me and raised me... Everyone fears you..."
Blackie looks into the leg-crippled friend's eyes.
In those eyes lies an emotion Blackie can never understand.
For ordinary people, they are called 'despair' and 'inferiority'.
And an emotion they call 'fear'.
They are emotions that, across his past life and this life, Blackie has never once felt and cannot understand.
"The magistrate of Ju County...s-said if I help kill you...he will marry me to his daughter..."
Greed similar to the previous life.
However, that greed only seems like an excuse.
Because the leg-crippled friend regards Blackie as an 'incomprehensible monster' and 'something that must be dealt with'.
"You're a monster...die... Please die...!"
Chiiiiii—
From the sword the boy stabbed into Blackie, a faint sorcery shines and makes the boy's body heavy.
Poison energy whirls through his body, and black shackle-like patterns appear all over him and bind him.
"The sorcery worked!"
"Attack all at once!"
"Hunt the monster wearing a human mask, the one who killed the tiger of South Mountain and beat to death the flood dragon under the bridge!"
To ordinary beings, an incomprehensible fear.
That is the greatest superficial reason the being called 'Blackie' was betrayed and shunned.
But...
Blackie knows.
"...So I cannot change it."
Because he can see how the causality, history, and fate of this world flow...
He thought he could change small things.
But the flow of the world does not change no matter what he does.
For history that has already repeated once only goes along the original flow.
'Betrayed by the one he trusts.'
'Made to have his heart shattered'
The world moves to recreate history and fabricates reasons here and there.
First principle of history.
History does not change.
Even if one twists small currents, the result never changes.
Blackie laughs.
"Heh."
With a face all distorted, with tears dripping down, he laughs.
The experiment failed.
A person's effort cannot change the fixed result.
Rather...
He should not have become friends with the leg-crippled at all in this life.
He should have eliminated the very opportunity to build friendship and trust.
For if he had not expected from the start, there would not have been disappointment.
Kururung—
Above Blackie's hand, something black rises.
Above his mother's keepsake, the law of the world that he twisted up with Darkness World sucks in the surrounding causality, recombines it, and spits out a new power.
Shamans and yaoguai, sorcerers, monks, and daoists call the power they use when wielding mysterious sorcery Qi.
He refines that mysterious power and tempers it into the form of pure death.
The pure death of the North Pole.
Gang (罡).
The mother-of-pearl hairpin of his mother in Blackie's hand.
From the keepsake that the leg-crippled stole from him in his first life, black Gang Qi sprouts like countless teeth and claws and begins a slaughter.
Kwagwagwagwa!
Gang Qi swirls.
It is a single storm.
The Ju County magistrate, in order to suppress the little ghost that threatens his power, had eminent high monks make binding spells and, using the friend, set them upon Blackie. However, those binding sorceries shatter helplessly.
Just as a tornado turns a city into a wasteland, a black vortex blankets the entirety of Ju County.
A great massacre begins.
Countless human lives and living souls are torn to shreds and become lumps of meat, and the entire county is destroyed and becomes a ruin.
The magistrate and his family are dismembered and scattered like trash.
In that desolate ruin where everything is gone...
...the morning sun rises.
Blackie looks at the 'old friend' he alone kept alive until sunrise.
The 'old friend' looks up at Blackie with blank eyes.
"...Friend."
Looking down at the human who betrayed him twice across two lives, Blackie opens his mouth heavily.
"I killed the magistrate too. Now speak honestly. Why did you betray me?"
"...Y..."
He opens his mouth.
"You...monster... You're...a monster..."
The old friend, looking at the magistrate and the magistrate's daughter who roll on the ground as lumps of meat, still spits curses toward Blackie while wetting himself.
"You...are not even human...!"
"..."
"You're a monster...! You...you're...that's right. A snake. A snake...! How...how can you wear human skin...and do something like this...you snake bastard...? You're a monster...you're not human...inside you're pitch black...a black snake...!"
Black Snake.
The name his first friend gave him for the second time in the first life.
In this life too, he gains the same name.
History repeats.
Crunch—
The child who gains the name 'Black Snake' crushes one of the old friend's legs.
"Is that all you have to say?"
"Aaaaaaaagh! Aaagh, aaaagh...! G-Go...go to hell! Killing so many people...killing the sacred tiger of South Mountain, and killing the flood dragon under the bridge...n-now even killing the magistrate...and his innocent daughter...! You, you monster who dragged me in, raised me like a pet, and only mimics a human life...! You..."
Crunch—
The remaining leg is crushed.
He becomes a leg-crippled again.
"Kuaaaaagh...!!! Y, you...are not human. Don't...try to mimic a human...!"
"..."
Slice—
Black Snake cuts off the leg-crippled's neck.
In the morning sun, having at last cut off the neck of his first friend, he collapses on the spot.
Even though he regressed, nothing changed.
No...
Rather, even more blood stains his hands.
"...Wrong..."
The Black Snake, before the hope that has died, collapses and grits his teeth.
"Instead of saying black snake...or monster...you should have said...'I'm sorry,' 'the bad magistrate made me do it, I had no choice'...something like that..."
He knows.
All these lines are exactly the same as the words the leg-crippled spit out in the last life.
Back then he did not show such overwhelming force, and they were the words the leg-crippled spit out while being carried off on someone's back and fleeing.
However, even though he showed this overwhelming force and showed slaughter...
The past did not change.
More precisely, the lines that wedge into Black Snake's chest and give him the most painful wound did not change.
The great currents of history cannot be changed,
But the small ones can be twisted.
Only, the existence called the Black Snake...
By its very being, is a great current.
Second life.
In the first regression, the Black Snake gains the lesson that innate fate and its outcome cannot be changed.
However, he does not abandon hope.
People do not change.
They do not reform to goodness.
If so...
The person who gave him hope.
The meeting with the one who alone breathed hope into a life with nothing but pain and misfortune...
And the happiness he enjoyed within it...
They will never change.
Thus, for salvation, the Black Snake begins to walk to meet the wife of his previous life.
-x-X-x-
The Black Snake sets out on the road.
Leaving behind the great massacre of the county, he leaves his hometown and heads for the far west.
Passing countless counties and counties, crossing cities and cities, he reaches the border beyond mountains and rivers.
His home country, the Central Spirit Holy Kingdom.
Beyond that country, in order to meet the wife of the first cycle who lives at the far western edge...
The Black Snake crosses a country called Byeokra, and also crosses a country called Yanguo.
Crossing country after country, unlike in the previous life, he gathers wealth and creates status.
He captures bandits he meets along the way and subdues them with overwhelming force.
He puts them through training close to torture, makes them his subordinates, and then forms a group.
The first name of the group is taken from the Black Snake's name, the Heuk Sa Society (黑蛇會).
As the master of the Heuk Sa Society, as 'Heuk Sa', the Black Snake leads his subordinates, builds status and wealth, and at last, reaches the country at the far west.
He reaches Shengzi.
And even within the Shengzi, the country at the western edge...
He reaches a place where the great mountain range of Shengzi lies.
"I came quickly."
Heuk Sa arrives with his subordinates at a village halfway up the great mountain range.
Now ten years old, in his hand he holds his mother's keepsake, a mother-of-pearl hairpin.
His mother said this.
That she came from the far western edge country, Shengzi.
That in that Shengzi, she was born and raised in a village on the western edge of a mountain range...
Only, having been caught by a bandit gang, her entire family was taken as slaves, and being sold and sold again, she drifted all the way to the land of the Central Spirit Holy Kingdom, gave birth to him, escaped from a slave trader, and barely managed to settle down.
Before Heuk Sa meets the wife of his first life.
He goes to a corner of this village.
"Mother..."
Heuk Sa's very first life.
At that time, Heuk Sa lost his eyes and a friend, and...
Recalling his mother's words, he came all the way to the western edge so that at least the keepsake may tread upon the soil of her homeland.
The woman he met there was the wife of his first life.
This place was his mother's hometown and his own new starting point.
When he arrives, what greets him is a ruin in collapse.
His mother always went around saying this.
That if she is born again, she wants to be born as a man.
Born as a man, she does not want to live a fate where she is kidnapped by mere bandits, forced away from her homeland, and sold here and there.
She said she hoped to become a learned person who can give her child a proper name, not just some name picked up and stuck on carelessly.
Yes...
If she is born again...
"If you are born again...you said you wished...for at least a body that can protect your child, a mind that can give a good name...a homeland to settle down and live peacefully...and to be a person who could live by telling stories..."
Heuk Sa walks in, and, remembering the words his mother said whenever she had a moment, he strokes the ruin.
"If there is a next life...please. Even if only as a learned bookstore owner, be born and spend your whole life in peace..."
He leans against the ruin, sets his mother's keepsake upon it, and closes his eyes.
And if his mother is indeed born again...
He imagines her born as a boy of a good family, becoming a bookshop owner, giving meaningful names to children, telling fairy tales every day, and living long without hunger or illness.
It is fine even if he himself is not in that picture.
Even if Heuk Sa himself, fallen into the Hell of Killing Karma is to be born again merely as a bug or a beast...
After leaning against the ruins for some time and praying for his mother's blissful rebirth, Heuk Sa buries his mother's keepsake before the ruins, and the Heuk Sa Society settles in a suitable cave on a peak across from the village.
The villagers treat the Heuk Sa Society, which takes up residence in a nearby cave, as a band of thieves and fear them, but so long as they are there, there is no longer any chance that this village will be attacked by other bands of thieves or bandits and that someone will be horribly murdered or dragged away.
Moreover, even while the Heuk Sa Society itself is shunned and feared, Heuk Sa himself is, in outward appearance, a ten-year-old boy.
He does not come to the village filthy in rags like in his past life, instead, being served as the chief of the Heuk Sa Society, comes wearing neat clothes...
The villagers may think of Heuk Sa as the child of an officer belonging to the Heuk Sa Society, but they do not imagine that he is its master.
People neither hate him nor fear him.
On the contrary, some village notables, seeking to make a connection with the bandit gang by tying a connection with Heuk Sa, the 'child of a bandit gang officer', even introduce their daughters to him.
But Heuk Sa does not so much as glance at such connections. He only inquires after and seeks out a girl of the same age, a maid being raised in a noble household.
Having just turned eleven this year, one year older in body than Heuk Sa, the maidservant's name is what people roughly call her because they picked her up from under a willow on the western mountain slope, 'Seo-agi (West Baby)'.
No, in truth even that is not particularly fixed, so, changing the pronunciation as is convenient, she comes to be called by various names such as 'Seo-ak (Western Peak)', 'Seo-yak (Oath), 'Seo-yeok' (Western Region), or 'Westy' (Seo-jok).
And she is precisely the leper woman whom Heuk Sa met in his very first life.
"Excuse me...I heard a girl called Westy is here."
"Oh right. The nanny definitely said that girl is being made to work in the back garden. Why are you curious about her? Let's see..."
To meet Westy, the maid of the noble household, Heuk Sa befriends a child of the noble household, then goes to that house to play and heads to the back garden where Westy is said to be.
"Ah, there she is. Hey, hey, wait—what are you eating right now!?"
The son of the noble household, who is about to guide Heuk Sa to the back garden and introduce the girl called Westy, has his eyes go wide, and Westy freezes on the spot at his shout.
In the back garden, Westy was secretly taking a big bite from a large peach.
No matter how large the noble household is, peaches are not food a maidservant can taste, so she is surely stealing a bite.
Caught by the noble household's young master and Heuk Sa, Westy freezes with her cheeks puffed out from a big bite of the peach, and her eyes well with tears.
"Mm...hic... I-I am sowwy..."
"Eek, how shameful! I finally brought a friend over and you're stealing that again. Just how does that make me look...?"
The noble household's young master has his face turn red and blue and goes to look for a six-sided club, saying he will beat the maidservant, and Westy drops down on the spot and sobs bitterly, crying 'wah-wah'.
Heuk Sa takes that sight into his eyes.
In the past life he was in a blind man's body, so he could not take it into his eyes, but.
Westy's face and skin, hair, small hands and feet...
Even though he honed his senses and could say he understood her form, still, her color that he never once saw...
...is beautiful.
Not her looks or her mannerisms, but her very existence is beautiful and lovable.
"Don't cry."
Though she is one year older than he, Heuk Sa lifts Westy, who sits and whimpers, and soothes her.
In the end, perhaps the noble household's child does not have the heart to actually beat the girl with a six-sided club. Seeming only to want to imitate adults for fun, he breaks off a little foxtail grass and stands beside her, pretending to beat Westy as a game, and only then does Westy stop crying, realizing she is not truly being beaten and driven out.
"I-I'm sorry, young master. The peach looked so delicious..."
"Huff, huff..."
The noble household's young master, who is only seven years old, pants there on the spot appearing to be tired. Looking at him, Heuk Sa speaks.
"Friend."
"Hm? What is it?"
"I'll be taking this Westy."
"Huh? Uh..."
The child recalls the nanny's words of 'You must not carelessly give the household's property to others as such is waste.'
But at the same time, he recalls the words of his mother and father this morning when he brought Heuk Sa who he made as a friend, saying 'That boy has a vicious bandit of the nearby bandit gang for a father, so absolutely do not offend his mood, and if possible, keep on friendly terms.'
Because the village where they live is a place where government troops do not come often, for them the bandit gang settled beyond the ridge is a far more fearful and terrifying presence than the distant government troops.
But for the child, on the one hand he was told not to give away property, and on the other he was told not to offend, so from a seven-year-old's standpoint it is hard to judge.
"Uhh... The nanny said I can't do that...but Mother and Father should be okay with it..."
"Got it. We happen to have a jar of salt at our house. I will give that in exchange."
It is one of the goods the Heuk Sa Society seized while sweeping away nearby thieves and bandit gangs.
Since most of the seized goods are too burdensome to give to a rural village's noble household like this, Heuk Sa decides to choose something moderately acceptable to give.
"A jar of salt?"
At those words, the child nods.
For that much, it seems fine to give away a maid who steals peaches from the house as much as he likes.
In that case, he is not carelessly wasting property as the nanny said, and he is not offending the other as his mother and father said.
"Good! Let's do that! Hey, you! From now on our house doesn't need a maidservant who steals peaches like you, so you are going to be sent to Heuk Sa's house from now on. Got it?"
At those words, Westy bursts into tears again.
Having been picked up and raised in this house since she was a tiny baby, this house is truly her home.
Moreover, she already heard all about this young master 'Heuk Sa' in front of her wearing those black clothes.
It's because she heard the other maidservants chattering.
She heard that young master Heuk Sa's house is the house of a fearsome bandit gang, and that the bandits are all ferocious and brutal, often beating their subordinates and, if it is severe, even killing them.
If it is that young master Heuk Sa's terrifying house, surely a slow and sluggish maid like her will be beaten every day and, if displeasing, killed.
Heuk Sa smiles as he watches her bawling at the sight of him.
Just the fact that he can see her face makes him so overwhelmed, and she is lovable.
Heuk Sa takes her hand, and as he leads the still-sobbing Westy out of the noble household, he speaks.
"Don't cry, Westy."
"Heueooong! I-I am Seo-agiooooh...heueoong!"
"From now on, I will let you eat lots of peaches."
"Hekuk...!?"
"I will let you wear silk clothes. I will buy you many pretty ornaments. I will let you wear flower shoes. Instead of a vague name...I will find a good namer and give you a good name that has a proper meaning."
Holding the hand of the girl called Seo-agi or also called Westy, Heuk Sa gently speaks as they walk together over the ridge to the Heuk Sa Society's den.
Because his voice is so soft and kind, Westy stops her tears and looks at Heuk Sa.
"I will make you happy. Marry me."
Clench—
Heuk Sa holds her hand and vows inwardly.
Ten years from now.
She contracts leprosy, her body rots, and she is caught by a bandit gang and burns to death.
'If a person cannot be changed...'
The happiness she gives him until she dies will also not change.
'I will change the world.'
Therefore, he will not let the world kill her.
The small entities called germs are beings sufficiently graspable to his senses.
He has the skill to prick and pop each and every leprosy bacillus to death.
The form of connection cannot be changed.
But the heavens that bestows that connection can be changed by his skill.
No matter how much you cut and tear people, they cannot be changed, but the heavens can be torn apart and twisted.
'I will not let you die. I will give you a good name...and a happy life.'
Perhaps...
In this life they may even be able to have the child they could not have in the last life.
"Let's...become happy together in this life."
Heuk Sa thus, taking Westy, heads toward the Heuk Sa Society's den, smiling brightly.
A few years have passed since Heuk Sa settled in the village.
"Since you were born under a willow, your surname will be Yang (楊)."
To give an even more meaningful and good name to 'Westy' who has become his wife, he sought out a namer said to be famous in the vicinity.
"For the name, Hwe (回) is good."
"Hwe (回)..."
Heuk Sa originally did not know how to read.
In his first life he was blind, so the blade was always more meaningful than writing.
Therefore, only now is he learning a little bit of letters together with Westy who's become his wife.
Thus he knows that the character Hwe (回) carries the meaning of 'to return' or 'to cycle'.
Shaaah—
The atmosphere near the namer's house becomes chilly.
With clear eyes, Heuk Sa looks at the namer who gave his wife the name 'Yang Hwe'.
In truth, it is the name she received even in the past life.
But at that time, he did not even know the meaning of the name, and he simply thought that a learned namer would surely give a good name and accepted it gratefully.
However, only now that he underwent regression (回歸) can he understand what on earth the namer who gave the name has done.
"Who are you?"
Black Gang Qi surges from Heuk Sa's body.
In the last life, when he met this namer, it was before he gained fortuitous encounters such as the Star Extinguishing True Chapter, so he did not know who it was as he had not yet grown explosively stronger.
But now he can tell.
The namer who bestowed a name upon his wife is not human.
It is a divinity who borrows a human body and has come to this place.
"Are you the one who sent me back?"
At those words, the namer smiles faintly and speaks.
"I do not understand what the distinguished one speaks."
"What do you...?"
"However, my master seems to know something."
"Master?"
At those words, the namer points to the sky.
"One day. If you are curious about the cause of everything, come seek my master. They measure and know all things that happen in this Cosmic Great Desolation."
"..."
Only then does Heuk Sa know who the namer's master is, and who the namer is.
He blinks, and the namer disappears.
The envoy of the Chief God who, in the first life, proposed to him the Seat of the War God.
Heuk Sa understands that the envoy was the namer just now.
The master the namer speaks of must be the Chief God.
The being he also calls Lord Heavens.
'Has Lord Heavens...known?'
Why he underwent regression.
By even having an envoy give such a name to his wife, it is a hint that they know the true nature of the ability called regression.
"..."
Heuk Sa looks at the sky and then heads back to the village.
In any case, he obtained his wife's name.
Yang Hwe (楊回).
'Hwe-ah...'
It is a name bestowed not by a mere ordinary namer but by the Chief God who rules this world.
'Hwe-ah. In this life...I will never let you suffer.'
Through the envoy, the Lord Heavens is speaking.
That if he wants to know the truth, to come seek them...
But for now, he cannot go.
To reach the being called the Chief God requires far too much time...
And within that time, his wife Yang Hwe, according to history, will contract leprosy and die.
'In this life, I will not let you catch any illness and will let you live a long and healthy life... Even if I have to kill the god who determines lifespan, I will protect you.'
Even if everything repeats, he will make it so this does not repeat.
If fate, if history, if connection stands in his way, he will save her even if he must kill them all.
Hoping for such modest happiness...
Heuk Sa moves his steps toward his wife, who is waiting for him at home.
As [I] read Hong Fan's memories, [I] do not dare read beyond those hopeful memories.
I have not yet read the memories beyond, but the memories that contain the story afterward are filled with even darker and more painful emotions.
Yes.
This very moment is the last moment in Hong Fan's life when normal hope and joy remained.
-x-X-x-
"Hoho...our sir Heuk Sa~."
Squish, squish—
Heuk Sa returns to the village.
And what greets Heuk Sa is the touch of his young wife, one year older than him.
Westy—no, now having received the name 'Yang Hwe', she ambushes Heuk Sa's soft, squishy cheeks from behind and kneads them like crazy.
Having now turned fourteen even though they held the wedding and he became her husband, she pampers Heuk Sa, who is still a thirteen-year-old child, to her heart's content.
"Where did you go, my cutie?"
"Uu...lugu..."
Saying 'let go', Heuk Sa barely escapes from her touch and then tells her where he went.
"Westy—no...dear, I went to meet a high person to receive your name."
"Wow, really? But I like being Westy too..."
She seems happy yet conflicted.
But in the end, she hugs Heuk Sa tight enough to crush him and smiles beaming.
"Then what is my name?"
"Your name is...Hwe. Yang Hwe."
"Hwe...Yang Hwe..."
Now that she has the name 'Yang Hwe,' she beams and plants kisses all over Heuk Sa's cheeks.
"Oh my, you adorable thing. You went to get big sis a good name."
Heuk Sa barely wriggles free of her hands.
It has already been years since they began living together.
Now Yang Hwe no longer fears Heuk Sa as she used to. Rather, eating whatever she wants and learning whatever she wants, she's grown.
Unlike before, she did not contract leprosy.
It's because Heuk Sa popped and killed all the germs by her side.
"Um...Heuk Sa."
"Mm? What is it, Hwe-ah?"
"Hey. Not 'Hwe-ah,' you should call me something like 'honey' Don't keep treating me like a kid when you're the younger one."
At the address 'Hwe-ah' that calls her young, Yang Hwe's mouth puffs out and she pulls on Heuk Sa's two cheeks.
"By any chance...can I also give you a name?"
"Uh...?"
"It's just...'Black Snake' and all...it's a bit, you know...so I'll find a better name and give it to you."
Heuk Sa ponders Yang Hwe's words.
He of course likes it.
Far better than a name like Black Snake given amidst betrayal by an old friend is a name given by the one he loves.
Even if she names him Dog-dung or Cow-dung, he would feel grateful.
Therefore, though he naturally wants to say okay, he looks up at the sky.
Countless threads of causality stir and determine the future.
It is a history that has already passed once.
"..."
Yang Hwe's lifespan still has not changed.
'Do I have to kill them after all?'
Following the threads of causality, he senses the place where the god who decides lifespans is, and he considers killing them.
"Then...give it to me a bit later, Hwe-ah."
"Eeeh, I told you not to call me like a kid! I'm going to name you and call you like a kid too!"
Heuk Sa looks at Yang Hwe, who throws a tantrum in front of him, puffing her cheeks and kneading his cheeks all over, and thinks.
To give a name directly influences connection.
The internal energy method Darkness World he attained is the result he obtained by cutting all threads of connection and standing alone.
The thread of connection between him and Yang Hwe is what he gained by deceiving causality until now.
In other words, if Yang Hwe directly gives him a name and he accepts it, Heuk Sa's internal energy method will weaken.
'If I am going to kill a god...I must be in the best state and make thorough preparations.'
To kill a god, he must always stake his own life.
Even for a trivial lower-ranked god, it is the same.
For a mortal body to kill a god always means facing death.
Because he did not fear death in his previous life, he faced death while wearing mortal hide and hunted down and killed gods.
But...
'Now...I am afraid.'
He can no longer stake his life recklessly.
Because there is now something even more precious than life.
Yang Hwe has become Heuk Sa's weakness.
Therefore, he does not want to grow that weakness any further.
He does not want to face death.
'Without facing death, I must kill gods.'
With his talent, he can do it.
With his insight and potential, it is enough.
'Even now, the time of fate keeps drawing near...'
History keeps flowing.
Thus, he plans to twist fate and history themselves to protect Yang Hwe.
"...Just wait a little, Hwe-ah. Until the time I can receive a good name from you..."
Heuk Sa hugs Yang Hwe and soothes the whining her as he speaks.
In his eyes, he sees countless causalities beyond Yang Hwe.
The gods who dwell on this star.
Only after he kills all those gods can he feel even a little at ease.
From that day on, Heuk Sa goes about hunting gods to extend Yang Hwe's lifespan.
The very first he kills is the god of lifespan.
: : O Mortal Being! What could possibly change in the world if you kill me alone? I am merely one who records lifespan! The flow of history and fate cannot be changed! : :
"It can be changed."
As Heuk Sa organizes his killing techniques that are beginning to reach the apex of slaughter, he speaks toward them.
"For if it does not change, I will annihilate fate and history."
Even if he must destroy both Heaven and Earth, he will protect what he must protect.
When he cuts down the god of lifespan, countless people's lifespans jumble into a mess and great chaos comes to the world, but he does not care.
Because, more than some world, his one connection is more precious.
After the god of lifespan comes the god of disease, the god of calamity, the god of misfortune, and so on.
He hunts down and kills gods who could suddenly kill Yang Hwe.
: : What have we done that you murder us!? : :
: : O Mortal Being! Do you not know that we are not only those who scatter misfortune, but also beings who hold disaster and suffering in check? : :
: : Because of your ignorance, the world will sink into misery! O Mortal Being! No, you must not, you must not kill us! : :
"No."
With eyes like frost, Heuk Sa looks down on them and kills them.
"Because of you..."
He still remembers.
In his first life, Yang Hwe died because of them.
Wretchedly, and miserably...
"She..."
She contracted leprosy...
And without even being able to find medicine, and while Heuk Sa disappeared to find medicine, bandits robbed her of wealth and burned the house down, killing her.
While bearing Heuk Sa's child...so wretchedly, so miserably.
"...died...you know."
Killing all the gods who became the prime culprits who killed Yang Hwe, Heuk Sa clutches his chest.
He treats the present Yang Hwe well.
But why is it?
Whether the Yang Hwe of the first life and the Yang Hwe now are the same being or not...
Whether the Yang Hwe he truly loves is the Yang Hwe of that time...
He cannot know.
From childhood he discovered her and prevented her from suffering leprosy, and she did not leave the noble household on her own feet to drift through the village corners, living a life picking up garbage...
She, who brightened to the utmost and dotes on Heuk Sa.
Whether she truly is the one Heuk Sa wanted to save...
He cannot know.
Small currents can change, but great currents do not change.
Because Heuk Sa's very existence is a great current, the connections related to him also do not change.
Therefore, the Yang Hwe who loves Heuk Sa now is also that unchanged Yang Hwe.
But if so...
'If I extend the present Yang Hwe's lifespan...is she still the Yang Hwe I know? Or does she become another Yang Hwe?'
He cannot possibly know.
As he kills countless gods, Heuk Sa eliminates every possibility of Yang Hwe's death.
Starting with the gods of ill omen and sudden death, he hunts down and kills, one by one, even the divinities who govern heart attacks, meteor impacts, and lightning.
But the more gods he kills and kills,
The more Yang Hwe gradually grows differently than in the last life...
The more the anxiety and doubt dwelling in Heuk Sa's heart gradually grows.
And at last,
On the day Heuk Sa kills every god of the star where they live.
Yes, on the very day Heuk Sa turns exactly twenty.
He finds the answer.
Huarururururur—
The entire village burns.
And, centered on the tiled-roof house Heuk Sa has built in the village, hundreds of corpses lie in rows.
Heuk Sa's subordinates.
They are people of the Heuk Sa Society.
"...What...is this...?"
To remove the very possibility of her death...
He came back after killing innumerable gods.
Sometimes, after killing gods and coming down, he stopped by Yang Hwe, shared love...
Felt happiness...
Checked her condition, read books together, ate together, and kneaded each other's cheeks.
Huarurururuk!
Pushing through the flames that incinerate the whole village, he heads for the house.
From the inside of the house, a familiar smell comes.
The smell of a burning corpse.
Yes...
It is the very smell Heuk Sa smelled when his wife burned to death in the last life.
"Chief...we couldn't...stop it..."
One of Heuk Sa Society's subordinates, dying, lets out a groan.
"...You did well. Rest."
Leaving his subordinates behind, he heads to the inner quarters where Yang Hwe would be.
There...he can see a monster with countless spears and blades stuck into it.
With a black body hissing breath, gathering fire energy, it lies with its strength exhausted, dying right in front of Yang Hwe.
It is an imoogi.
"You..."
An imoogi that did not obtain a dragon pearl and so could not become a dragon.
For that reason, it went mad with rage and frenzy and became a monster that brings drought and disaster.
And Heuk Sa recalls who that monster was in the first cycle.
"You...!"
A being who was a divine Dragon King.
They, this time, failed to obtain the dragon pearl and became a monster, turning everything Heuk Sa has gathered into nothing.
[O evil god who brings ruination.]
The monster, which would originally have become a sacred dragon, looks at him as it dies.
[Because your subordinates fought desperately, they ended up bringing me down...yet in the end, you too failed to protect what is precious.]
The monster laments as it looks at Heuk Sa.
[Do you wonder why it has become like this...? O evil god. All things are of cause and retribution. As the divinities you have been killing died, the entire world fell into misery. In the end, to save a world drowned in misery, I came to know that this was the only way.]
"..."
Heuk Sa passes the monster and approaches Yang Hwe.
Her whole body is burning.
Her belly is swollen.
[The resentful grudges of the gods flew into me and told me to kill you. All of this is what you brought upon yourself. O evil god...]
Crunch—
With a sweep of his hand, he smashes the jaw of the jabbering imoogi.
Heuk Sa carefully lifts Yang Hwe into his arms.
Yang Hwe, burning to death, opens her mouth toward Heuk Sa.
Thanks to the breathing method Heuk Sa taught her and the health exercises that make one healthy, she, even as she burns, did not die at once.
But within the fire dwell the grudges and pain of countless gods, so death is inevitable.
"I...thought...of a...name..."
Yang Hwe smiles brightly and speaks.
"I saw...your real name..."
The name Heuk Sa's mother, passing by a school, picked up because she thought it looked respectable and gave him.
In a way, Heuk Sa's true name.
"Gu Ju (九疇)..."
It is a name Heuk Sa himself has forgotten for far too long.
"To fit...that name...I found a good...name..."
Yang Hwe's hand touches Heuk Sa's cheek.
Chiiiii—
Heuk Sa's cold energy puts out the fire clinging to her body, and his will calls wind and summons rain across the area.
Rain falls and the fire subsides.
"Hong Fan (洪範)...how about it...?"
The name his mother, passing by a school, gave him: Gu Ju.
To match that, the new name Yang Hwe gives him: Hong Fan.
"You took it...from the Great Plan Nine Categories (洪範九疇)."
"Yeah...do you like it?"
Hong Fan smiles brighter than ever.
"...Yeah. I like it so much."
"That's...a relief."
She smiles at Hong Fan's reaction and closes her eyes.
That is the end.
Yang Hwe dies.
Tsuaaaaa—
At the same time as her death, something gushes out from her flesh and enters Hong Fan.
It is one of the powers of Darkness World that Hong Fan has lent her until now.
A power that divine descents a portion of history and reads the information of the past and causality.
It was so through this, if the Law of Causality shuddered and ill fortune descended, she could at least evacuate by herself.
But she did not use that power to evacuate.
Rather, she used it to find a better name for Hong Fan, and sat still in this place, facing head-on the ill fortune that enveloped her.
The reason was but one.
Feeling Yang Hwe's lingering thought contained in the power that returns to him, Hong Fan grits his teeth.
— I cannot evacuate alone.
—Because...the Heuk Sa Society family. This village. This house. All of it...are what he gifted me. They are...
"Why...?"
—The greatest blessing.
"Why...did you not run away...?"
— If we endure just a little, he will come to save us. As he always has...
[All things are of...cause...and retribution...]
"Why...did you believe in me...!?"
— So, everyone. While this disaster focuses on only killing me, join forces and block it. If it is you all who have received his teachings...then you can definitely stop it.
The imoogi whose jaw is shattered opens its mouth.
Hong Fan grabs the imoogi's head with one hand, tears it out, and shouts.
—For you whom he has raised are, at this very moment, nothing other than the light of our village.
"Why...why on earth...!? Why am I always like this...!?"
Hong Fan weeps and laughs.
He doubted her.
He thought she was not the 'she' he had thought of.
She was.
For no matter how time was turned back, she was still a being with a fixed ending.
"I committed evil deeds and so she died... If so...then why did she die in the first life...!?"
He remembers the first life.
He did not live a life like now, stained with great massacres and blood.
But even then, she died.
More wretchedly than now.
"Why must a person die wretchedly!? O God! Someone answer! I'm saying, someone answer!"
Hong Fan cries out.
"Why is this world...filled only with such miserable things...!?"
His wife died again.
He vowed that he would protect her no matter what, and with his own hands handled all possibilities that could kill his wife.
But in the end, an unforeseen variable twisted history into the same way.
Hong Fan's heart, this time too, was not repaid.
Beuduk...dududuk...
Hong Fan clutches his chest.
And with trembling hands, he gouges out his own eyes.
They are the eyes he kept until now because he wanted to see his wife's face, because he wanted to hold her smiling face in his eyes.
Eyes that failed to protect his wife are utterly useless.
He becomes blind again.
"Why...do humans...die so easily...?"
He buries with his own hands his wife's corpse, and the entire Heuk Sa Society that diligently protected his wife.
He also buries with his own hands all the innocent villagers who burned to death because of his undeserved self.
"Why is the world filled with suffering...?"
Where is the answer to this world?
Why did he receive a fate to suffer like this?
Why did he come to suffer again and again even though time was turned back?
Why can't he change anything?
"An answer...I need an answer..."
Hong Fan, blind once more, claws at his chest and sets out to seek an answer.
"Lord Heavens..."
He decides to go seek the Lord Heavens whom he could not even dare to visit before his wife died.
He wants to ask for the answer to everything.
Thus, the boy who has become a youth, in order to obtain an answer as to why the world is filled with suffering and why he must suffer like this...
For the first time, he completely steps off the path he has followed in his previous history and begins to go seek Lord Heavens.
Whioooooo—
Hong Fan, now blind, leaves the star he was born on and looks back.
'This time...I did not split the star.'
He also did not let his own heart be split.
He did not allow a strand of Heart Demon that slipped out from his body to gain form and dare to act as his wife.
In this life, no fox was even born.
For the heart of the fox that dies facing its old hill (狐死首丘) that seeks to be born, yearning for Yang Hwe as the homeland of his heart.
That tender and confused Heart Demon...
He strangled it to death with his own hands.
Thus, even though he killed gods, Hong Fan leaves the star without splitting his homeland.
And at that moment, beyond the Law of Causality, he sees the world undergoing division.
'This is...'
A single world splits into two worldlines.
Hong Fan enters one of the worldlines, and there he looks at the other worldline that has split.
'Ah...I see.'
Hong Fan smiles.
'The cause of all misfortune and suffering...was it myself...?'
Beyond the split worldline, in the other worldline, he can see 'the self of the first life' again gets bewitched by the Heart Demon, and, clutching the keepsake of his dead wife, go mad and rampage, only coming to his senses after cutting the star in half.
That was his first life.
He realizes how this bizarre regression is carried out.
'If I walk along a similar flow of history, the timeline itself does not change, but within that timeline, countless inevitabilities bunch together and somehow reproduce the history I experienced... But if I choose a completely different flow of history, then at that moment the worldline differentiates and heads toward another result.'
Kiiiiiiing—
Indeed.
The reason Hong Fan of this life became unhappy again was that he followed the trajectory of the first life and tried somehow to change things within it.
"Rather...if I had not met anyone...I would not be this unhappy...!"
If he had not met the old friend.
If he had not met Yang Hwe.
They would not have been entangled with him and become so unhappy.
"You all became unhappy because of me...!"
Realizing that fact, Hong Fan laughs like a madman.
Indeed.
From the beginning, he was the source of misfortune.
"...I must...meet you."
At that painful realization, Hong Fan swears to meet Lord Heavens no matter what, and he begins to sail the distant sea of stars.
He sails the universe to meet the Chief God of this universe and meets countless gods.
He also meets an imoogi who, though already having reached divinity, gathers dragon pearls excessively and thus cannot ascend.
The imoogi asks Hong Fan, saying that if he is going to meet Lord Heavens, to also resolve its question and find out how it can ascend.
The imoogi reminds him of the Dragon King, and at the same time the imoogi's desire that cannot discard its dragon pearls brings to mind his own futile, modest happinesses.
Annoyed and ashamed of himself, he bisects and kills the divine rank imoogi that has gathered ten dragon pearls.
He also meets a divinity in the aspect of a young master who cultivates a colossal Dragon Flower Tree whose roots spread through the entire galaxy, and who laments that the Dragon Flower Tree does not bloom.
The divine young master asks Hong Fan, who is going to meet Lord Heavens, that if he does meet Lord Heavens, to find out why the Dragon Flower Tree does not bloom.
When Hong Fan looks closely, he observes that countless fortune and virtue crowd together at the roots of that Dragon Flower Tree, so the Dragon Flower Tree cannot breathe properly and thus cannot flower.
Seeing it bawl while failing to make use of its own fortune and virtue makes Hong Fan feel ashamed as if he is looking at his own past self, so he cuts down and kills the Dragon Flower Tree, and also tears apart and kills the divine young master as well.
And after passing through countless time, just before Hong Fan at last reaches Lord Heavens—
He hears the voice of a certain divinity seeking a partner.
Tormented by countless Heart Demons and dreaming of Yang Hwe on his way here, Hong Fan tries to kill the owner of the voice.
But since he cannot possibly find the owner of the voice, Hong Fan vows that he will someday kill that owner of the voice as well and approaches Lord Heavens.
Lord Heavens exists at the center of this universe.
"O Heavens. Owner of all truths and wisdom that exist in this world."
At the center of the universe sits a giant of light upon a jade throne woven from countless lights.
A divinity of flames whose upper body is that of a human and whose lower body is that of a snake.
That is the Chief God of this universe.
It is the great Serpent God Fuxi (伏羲) who gives birth to all life that exists in this universe.
"Why was I born unhappy...? Why do I possess the power of regression...? Why can't I change anything...? Why do all who are connected with me become unhappy...!?"
Lord Heavens answers.
: : You have come. My partner. : :
"Pardon...?"
At that out-of-the-blue answer, Hong Fan asks back toward the god.
"What on earth do you mean...?"
However, the god does not answer Hong Fan.
: : You have suffered much to come here borrowing the body of a mortal being. In the first timeline, I tried to confer upon the mortal being a suitable divinity so that you would arrive quickly, but since the stubbornness is strong, only now do we meet. : :
"O God...what are you saying...!?"
: : My partner. Seek reason, cast off the mortal body, and assume your rank. : :
As if Hong Fan does not even appear in their sight.
The god stretches a fervent hand toward another [someone].
Only then does Hong Fan realize who the owner of the voice seeking a partner before he reached Lord Heavens was.
And he realizes why Lord Heavens gave his wife the character Hwe (回).
"O God...what on earth am I...!?"
: : Mortal who is good at killing. In praise of the merit of carrying my partner to this place, I shall tell you what you are curious about. Do you know of the great Three Daos (三道)? : :
"Three Daos...?"
: : The three Daos that some call Fate, History, and Miracle... We Chief Gods are born from those Three Daos, and by nature we are innately endowed with the rank of god that governs the universe. : :
As if explaining to a child.
The Serpent God reaches out a hand to Hong Fan and gives an explanation.
: : But as with all life and fate, all beings are immature after birth. Therefore, right after being born, an existence of Chief God rank chooses a cradle to wrap themselves in. They enter the body of a living being, and by being with it, they gradually come to have reason and gradually come to have wisdom and power, and are reborn as a Chief God like me. : :
In short, to summarize the Chief God's words, Hong Fan is a host.
The host for another Chief God who is to be born as the partner of the great Serpent God.
: : I am an existence born receiving the fate of Brightness (明) from the Three Daos. My partner possesses the fate of Light (光). If we join and become Radiance (光明), then us couple-gods will fuse into one, receive the recognition of the Three Daos, become the light that illuminates the entirety of this Gestation Palace of Omnipotence, receive the other Chief Gods of the Five Elements, and open creation. : :
Woo-wooong!
As if the Serpent God Fuxi dreams a beautiful dream.
Trembling with emotion and soaked in hope, they reach out to Hong Fan...
No.
They reach to the God of Light, the source divinity of regression, that parasitizes Hong Fan.
: : My partner. Cast off the mortal's body and become one with me. We shall become the First Light and make Heaven : :
And Hong Fan floats a vortex of slaughter above his palm.
"Even here...is there no answer."
: : What? : :
Hong Fan sheds tears and laughs.
"You cannot be the answer..."
: : You. My partner and I are the answer and the truth of your life. : :
The Chief God reclines upon the throne of light and speaks.
: : If we open creation, this world shall become Heaven. : :
"Whose Heaven does it become...!?"
And Hong Fan bursts into wild laughter and howls.
"How much we suffer...how many mortals miserably tangle beneath the sky and die...?"
How much hope is crushed?
"What do you know that you dare to put Heaven in your mouths...!?"
Kwarururururu!
The Three Great Ultimates of slaughter floating in Hong Fan's hand steadily grows and begins to tear apart all of his causality.
The Chief God only looks down at Hong Fan as if he is pitiful.
: : You. Do you intend to kill my partner within you? : :
"From the moment I heard the voice, I have wanted to kill it."
Why did the Chief God give the name Hwe to Hong Fan's partner Yang Hwe?
It was surely to use the power contained in the name Hwe to awaken the reason of the Chief God parasitizing Hong Fan.
Even now, having reached before the Chief God, the Chief God keeps trying to awaken their partner's reason.
In other words, the god that causes regression inside Hong Fan is, at present, nothing more than a lump of law without even reason.
: : It is impossible. How can a mortal being kill a being that attained Undying by birth? : :
"I can do it."
: : It is impossible. All your talent and potential originate from my partner that is put within you. As much as you strive, my partner grows strong along with you, and along with you seeks reason and wisdom. : :
"My talent and fate all originate from that parasite...!?"
Hong Fan laughs like a madman.
Crunch—
At the same time, as he sweeps through his entire causality in suicide, he recognizes a certain being that parasitizes him.
It has the form of a black snake.
A black snake.
That thing, which has not yet awakened reason, which is nothing other than a symbol of misfortune, is the one turning back Hong Fan's time.
: : Foolish. In any case, Chief Gods are not affected by that regression. : :
Looking down at Hong Fan's struggle with eyes as if watching a child's antics, the Chief God chuckles.
: : Yes, struggle as much as you like. The more you turn back time...the more worldlines you branch...the more we will obtain the flesh of a true Creator God, and my partner's intellect shall swiftly awaken. : :
'Even if I meet a god...is there...no answer.'
He thought there would be an answer if he met Lord Heavens.
There was no answer.
Rather, he only came to know about his own birth.
He only learned the cause of his misfortune.
'Then, if I kill a god...will an answer come out?'
Hong Fan, sensing the Chief God and the Chief God rank that parasitizes himself, closes his eyes.
Even when meeting the heavens, he did not find an answer to save his heart.
Then, if he kills the heavens...
Will it then spit out an answer?
Like the countless divinities who, dying by Hong Fan's hand during the first cycle, spit forth countless wisdoms?
'Then...let's kill.'
Even if he has to kill them all, he will, without fail, find an answer to this painful life.
Vowing thus, Hong Fan moves toward the next cycle.
That is Hong Fan's second return.
Two regressions.
Three lives.
Becoming a boy again, from that day on, Hong Fan begins desperate cultivation to kill the God of Light that parasitizes his life and makes him unhappy, and the Chief God.
Time flows.
The Chief God is split in half by Hong Fan and dies.
: : Just how...how can a being that only borrows talent and fate from my partner kill its master...? : :
The Chief God looks up at Hong Fan with eyes that see the incomprehensible, falls into panic, and trembles.
: : You are nothing but a shell chosen by my partner. How can a shell possess strength surpassing its master...!? : :
"...So it seems it is not talent borrowed from your partner."
Looking at the god who dies miserably, Hong Fan's eyes become even more empty.
"What kind of gods are you?"
Crunch—
"You will now...become nothing more than my arts."
Three lives.
It is a miracle achieved by a regressor of their mere third cycle.
Splitting the Chief God in half and killing them, seizing the Chief God rank that parasitizes him and is forming intellect, completely subjugating it and blowing away its reason, Hong Fan sits vacantly upon the Chief God's throne and emptily looks at the firmament.
"...There...is no answer."
He thought if he met the Lord Heavens, there would be an answer.
There was no answer.
Rather, he only came to know about his own birth.
He thought if he gave up on his life and killed the god, there would be an answer.
He even gave up meeting his old friend, and even gave up meeting Yang Hwe and enjoying brief happiness.
Even so, even by killing a god and giving up even such brief happiness, there was no answer.
Woo-woooong!
Hong Fan seizes the Chief God rank that tries to be born by parasitizing him and twists it, then processes it using the power of Darkness World.
In Hong Fan's homeland, the daoists call the mysterious arts they use Immortal Arts.
"You...will now become my Immortal Arts."
Processing the divinity that parasitizes him into an Immortal Art, Hong Fan gives it a name.
"Immortal Art, Radiance."
An Immortal Art of Light that governs the flow of the years.
And, he processes the body of Fuxi, the God of Brightness (明), whom he split and killed.
"Immortal Art, Immortal Cultivation."
The power of Darkness World dwells in the two Immortal Arts and grants Hong Fan authority close to omnipotence.
Becoming the master of the two Immortal Arts, Hong Fan thus...
"I will...find an answer."
In order to find the truth of the cause that makes his life painful.
In order to find an answer that resolves the root of pain, he begins to make a new throne.
[I] watch the story proceed and see the story of chapter 7 in the fairy tale come to an end.
But the seven chapters of the fairy tale, even after ending with the boy killing the Supreme Deity, continues the tale thereafter.
Chapter 8 of the fairy tale.
The boy who killed the Supreme Deity...
Leaving the universe ruled by the Supreme Deity, he wanders through the Primordial Chaos world inside the Gestation Palace of Omnipotence, kills five universes along with the five Chief Gods who rule the five universes, and stitches six universes together.
And then,
Even after he gives birth to a single new world, he cannot find how he can be saved...he cannot find that answer.
The boy who goes to the Jade Emperor to find happiness, even after killing the Jade Emperor, still cannot know what happiness is.