The higher the torii gate stretched, the more the boy could see the sky unravel into its infinite brilliance. Stars shimmered like molten jewels scattered across velvet, comets arced gracefully like silver threads, and distant suns glowed with life both warm and terrifying. His breath was caught between the raw beauty of the cosmos.
But he suddenly felt someone's presence. Then he saw it: a figure standing among the cloud, impossibly tall, impossibly majestic. A god. Not merely powerful, but forged of fire and lightning, adorned with golden beads that spun slowly across his shoulders, swords piercing upward like obsidian spires, and eight arms radiating both destruction and authority. Behind him, five ancient symbols, their edges jagged like molten crystal, had transformed into massive drums that pulsed with explosive power. A halo-like ring connected them, thrumming with energy, each beat sending ripples through the heavens.
The boy was calm and smiled at him. The god's eyes found him, red as magma, burning with unbridled wrath. His mouth trembled with the promise of lightning. "Hunh… you survived." The god's voice rumbled like the core of a planet cracking. "Perfect. Now I can end you myself."
The boy stared back, expression unwavering, tilting his head slightly. Then, with a light laugh that carried the patience of countless aeons, he turned his gaze toward the infinite sunya above. The god's glare followed, sharp as volcanic rock.
"You heretic!" The god bellowed, his voice echoing across galaxies. "Do you think yourself powerful? I have achieved godhood! Hahaha! Bow before me!"
"Godhood?" the boy said softly, almost curiously. "You haven't gained anything. Just a facade, a hollow mirror of what a dog calls divinity. You still cannot match me. Not yet. Not ever."
The god's rage flared, coiling around him like a living storm. With a flick of a finger, lightning erupted from the ring behind him. Arcs of blinding energy shot forward, twisting into serpents of fury and light. Yet the boy's hand shot out, calm and precise, and the lightning transmuted, turned into swarming black-and-white animals, tearing forward like spectral predators. They leapt at the god's eight arms, claws and wings shredding the air, splitting his thunderous assault into fragments.
He realized it then, that even with his remaining power, even with his last drop of divine blood, it was insufficient. He was not ten percent of what he had been, and the boy had already drained all opportunity from him.
"Do not waste thought on cleverness," the boy said quietly, his tone was like a little child got a puzzle to solve. "I will end you cleanly… utterly… because there is nothing left for you. Your last drop of god-blood is gone. Your half-ascension means nothing. Prepare to die."
The god roared, fire surging from his nostrils, a volcanic furnace burning with frustration and rage. Every limb launched assault after assault, twisting lightning into dragons, phoenixes, and spectral lions, each one a nightmare of form and fury. The boy's presence remained unshaken.
Then it happened.
From the boy's forehead, a sudden eruption of light blazed outward, pure and blinding. Lightning streaked from the god's eyes in instinctive defence, but it was useless, the light enveloped him, searing his vision and burning the edges of perception. His eight arms trembled, the rings behind him quivering with energy that no longer obeyed him. He raised his hands to shield his eyes, but even the shield could not contain the radiance.
"What… what is this…" the god gasped, voice strained with fury and awe. "How… how can this light…"
Behind the boy, a second illusory, colossal form began to emerge. It grew larger with every heartbeat, radiating warmth and brilliance like miniature suns igniting in the void. The sea of lotus below reflected it like a thousand burning mirrors.
When the blinding light finally waned, the god stared in disbelief. Floating before him was a body identical to the boy's, yet larger, more imposing, as if the cosmos itself had molded it into perfection. Behind him, a ring of energy rotated lazily, bigger and more intricate than the one he had ever seen, a perfect combination of geometry and chaos, pulsating like a living heartbeat. From the figure's forehead, a black-and-white eye opened, slow and deliberate, a calm that defied the storm raging in the god's chest.
He swallowed, voice breaking between awe and terror.
"You… you bastard…" His words trembled. "Why… why do you possess this form? We… we sealed this! How… how is this even possible?"
His fingers twitched over his palm, tracing invisible runes as calculations and memories collided in his mind. Every detail, every number, every sequence, matched. Perfectly. Another war was inevitable. Another war loomed, like a storm about to crush him whole.
"No… no… no… I have to warn them… I have to stop this…!" The god's chest heaved as fear clawed upward. His mind raced, visions flooding in: a man, countless centuries ago, wielding rings, nine of them. A monkey tearing through his ranks, a pig devouring the legs of his soldiers, and a human slaughtering with crude tools. Entire armies fell like ants beneath their relentless might.
The oppression of inevitability hit him like a hammer. His own body began to freeze in place, black and white flames curling from the boy's forehead like serpentine smoke, burning through his essence yet leaving no physical sensation. The ring behind him trembled, warping and dissolving, its energy siphoned, transmuting into attacks that surged toward him uncontrollably.
"Stop! Stop it!" he screamed, voice hoarse and broken. "Do not follow his path! You will… you will suffer endlessly! Don't…"
But the oppression pinned him like iron. His arms, once divine instruments of annihilation, trembled and refused command. Even his colossal eight hands, the culmination of millennia of ascension, hung inert. Desperation seized him. His mind screamed for motion, for dominance, for escape, but the cosmic weight of inevitability crushed him.
With trembling resolve, he grasped his last functioning hand drove it to his throat. The blade of his palm cut cleanly, severing his head. The decapitated form rose, spinning upward, energy siphoning from the body below as if it were the last tether to life itself. Residual power pulsed faintly, flickering like dying stars.
From the severed head, three eyes blinked open, twin black and white, one central iris like a sun swallowed in shadow. A beam of light shot toward the sunya above, fracturing the void. Space itself seemed to recoil. A voice, ancient and resonant, echoed across the planes:
"How dare a mere fallen god summon me…"
A gate opened suddenly within the ruptured space. Its frame was molten silver, lined with stars and comets, a threshold that radiated authority beyond comprehension. Beyond it, a brilliance rivaled the rising sun itself, forcing the boy's light to tremble as if in recognition of something far older.
The boy's brush hovered mid-air, motion deliberate.
"Clause Three: One Seed, Thousand Blooming." He whispered, almost reverently.
From below, in the endless sea of lotus, the stamens shimmered, transforming into black-and-white droplets, each pulsing with potential. They rose, merging with one another as they ascended, forming horses first, then the riders atop them, soldiers born of light and shadow, motion and stasis intertwined.
Some droplets failed to merge, falling back into the lotus sea with quiet plinks, dissolving into mist. Others combined in groups of four, then ten, then hundreds, cascading into formation. Thousands, tens of thousands, then uncountable cavalry charged upward, tearing through the clouds like living spears.
The black-and-white cavalry, their spears growing with each heartbeat, began to merge into a singular force. Thousands of horsemen fused, each movement synchronized into a violent, living machine. Their hooves churned the air into whirlwinds, scattering petals and fragments of lotus stems, the scent of blooming and decay mixing like a battlefield perfume. Spears lengthened, glimmering with ethereal energy, some black as void, others white as crystallized light. And then, without hesitation, they launched themselves.
Thousand after thousand, spears blinding the sky, streaked toward the god. In mere blinks, his head was pierced countless times, the pain ripping through his consciousness. He roared, black-and-gold blood splattering into the void, as his vision splintered, yet even as the torii gate began to open behind him, the spears halted mid-path, the merged cavalry suspended as if the world itself hesitated at the precipice. The head, skewered atop the spears, writhed, screaming instructions:
"I don't have time to chat! Deploy them… one was reborn… quickly, find him! Now!"
The spears continued their assault, puncturing nerve, will, and even his voice. The head struggled to form words: "Where… where are you taking me?"
A calm, steady voice answered from above, echoing through space and lotus sea alike:
"Look forward. See clearly."
He blinked through pain and shattered senses. Far above, the boy's illusory body towered, at least a hundred times larger than the god. The ring behind him rotated violently, a cyclone of energy and symbols, spinning with the weight of destiny itself.
Suddenly, a colossal hand came forward from the illusionary body, gripping a sword longer than entire islands. The boy's voice rang out, resonant and calm:
"Clause 13: All Things Submit to Death."
The three eyes on the god's head darted to the torii gate, and then to the towering figure of the boy above. The sword descended, slicing the air like the cutting of time itself. As it fell, everything around him, the spears, the lotus sea, the black-and-white cavalry, was caught in its aura, twisting and transforming into alternating shadows and light. His head, pierced and screaming, was obliterated into nothingness, the last spark of defiance extinguished with a resonant roar that shook even the heavens.
Beneath him, his colossal body, still burning from the assault, began to drip a single, thick drop of ichor from his navel. It fell like a molten pearl toward the lotus sea. Yet before it could touch the waters, she appeared, silent as moonlight on black waves. With precise grace, she caught the drop on the tip of her sword, a gleaming shard of salvation, and hurled it back toward the boy.
The boy's reflexes screamed to capture it, but the force behind the throw was unimaginable. He was hurled backward like a comet. Behind him, the ring vanished, dissolving into fragments of light that scattered across the void. He slipped into a trance, his immense body falling toward the sea of lotus below, powerless to resist.
She exhaled, voice soft yet heavy with relief:
"Everything is over… you are the sixth to pass through here. Thank you. Because of you, I am free, from lifetimes of bindings, from endless suffering… again, thank you."
But the stillness did not last. Something in the sky drew her attention. The gate, far above, remained. Its edges shimmered, faintly, impossibly, as if resisting obliteration. She narrowed her eyes, noticing the subtle glow emanating from the boy's forehead. Veins of black and white cracked across his skin, healing almost instantly, merging like rivers of shadow and light.
She murmured to herself, voice tinged with awe and exhaustion:
"The last attack… it was… beyond imagination. Even I trembled watching it. I… I cannot counter such power, even at my peak. Sage art… truly, the monks' teachings… astonishing."
She felt the last echo of the calamity, the surge of power that had obliterated the head and body, yet now lingered like a memory in the wind. She whispered, almost reverently:
"Interesting… truly interesting… yet alas… even with all my lifetime's power, I cannot counter this… not in this life."
Without a word, she reached for him. Her fingers, though ethereal, curved softly around his wrist and pulled him toward a slab of fallen rock. Both of them sat down onto it. "Hold still," she murmured, her voice echoing strangely, like several versions of her speaking at once. "Let me see whether your body can be corrected…."
Her expression softened, but there was a shadow behind the gentleness. "Everyone who arrives at this place is 'something.' Monsters, prodigies, sinners, saints… it makes no difference. Even I was once 'something.' And yet… look at me." She raised her hand, transparent skin shimmering with trapped moons. "You still have time. I don't."
With a slow breath, she allowed her soul to slip forward. Her form broke apart like smoke and poured into his body.
Inside him, she stood on an endless sea. Islands floated across the horizon.
She smiled bitterly. "That drop… So it already fused with your power." In the heart of the ocean, the boy's voice echoed. "Why can't I absorb it? I can feel it… but it's like swallowing a storm."
She walked across the water, each step forming icy lotus petals. "You're right, this energy is violent. Stronger than me at my peak. You're suppressing it, but it's still fighting to devour you."
A heartbeat. Then his voice again: "Do you know any sealing method? Or absorption art?"
She sighed. "Before that, do you even know how to sense properly?"
"My veins can't handle it," he answered bluntly. "So no. I can't. Just, seal it for now. Please."
She nodded and a glyph ignited beneath them, blossoming like a lunar plum. She whispered, "Seal of Fivefold Moon-Plum…" He hissed, startled. "Where did you learn it?"
Her palm pressed to his forehead, and a flood of ancient symbols poured into him, petals of moonlight turning into lines of scripture, lines into diagrams, diagrams into breathing cycles and sigil formations.
The endless sea trembled. Far away, a dormant island cracked open, unfurling like a colossal flower awakening after ten thousand winters. His voice sharpened with curiosity. "Another island appeared… Could you tell me how I enter the others?"
She chuckled weakly. "You're doing it already without knowing. Your 'previous form,' the one you used during the fight… You were simultaneously sensing two energies at once. And from those energies, you crafted a body around your soul, using it to control each attack. Your physical body… is far too weak to handle that level of force."
He gave a bitter laugh. "I know. But how did you see through it?"
For the first time since he met her, she truly smiled. A weary, ancient smile. "I am one of the Five Sovereigns of this land. 'She‑Who‑Sees‑Through‑Snow.' I can pierce the layers of any technique. Yours included."
"How?"
"Because," she answered, eyes glowing icy blue, "the energy you carry… is something this world has never seen. I don't recognize it. But I can sense how you fuse soul force with the breath of nature. Even weakened, my Soul Gaze is unchanged."
A long silence. The boy looked away, then asked quietly:
"You never demanded anything from me. No price, no bargain. Aren't you afraid helping me gives you nothing? Maybe you're expecting something greater, but… I have nothing to offer." She stared at him. For a moment she looked almost fragile—like frost that could break with a whisper. "I don't need anything from a greenhorn who can't even circulate his own energy," she said, smirking.
He snorted. "Big words from someone who also doesn't know how to circulate my kind of energy."
She pouted, kicking a ripple across the sea. "Tch. I can't circulate yours, because it isn't spiritual or demonic or divine. It's… wrong. Unnatural. But powerful."
Her voice suddenly darkened, like a cavern swallowing its last candle. "I only want one thing," she whispered. "My rebirth."
"My curse has chained me for a million years. I want it gone. I want to be free. Even if I must gamble everything on you. Please take care of my techniques... one day might be..."
To be Continued...