Chapter 160: The Refugees from the Divine Land
To kill himself.
That had been Rowe's ultimate objective from the moment his journey began, so using that objective as the reason to forge a sword felt almost too fitting.
He genuinely hoped this blade would one day be able to end him.
Of course, that kind of result was not something you could force overnight.
The Age of Gods had not fully receded. The East Sea stretched tens of thousands of miles, and its depths ran for a thousand more. Even if Rowe pushed his original manifestation to its limits, it was still impossible to cleanse all of it in a single moment.
So he did it the slow way.
Leaving at sunrise, returning at sunset.
When the last light of day thinned into dusk, Rowe rode the sword light back to the Fusang Tree.
The vast divine tree swayed gently. Nightfall made everything quieter, but the trunk still held a faint glow.
A concept made visible.
The sun, refusing to sleep.
Rowe turned his head as the sword light settled.
"We are back… hmm?"
No irritated snort answered him.
No forced disdain.
Instead, something soft pressed against his back.
Arms hung loosely around his sides. A slight weight leaned into him. Black hair spilled forward like ink, framing a face that looked almost unfairly peaceful.
Consort Yu was asleep.
Rowe paused, then glanced down at her expression and raised an eyebrow.
So she can look this calm.
The stubborn Stellar Spirit who insisted on acting defiant even after he had absorbed and dispersed her turbulence now slept like she had forgotten how to be difficult.
"If she is asleep, then let her sleep."
Rowe turned carefully. He slid one arm around her slender waist and braced her thigh with the other hand, lifting her with controlled ease. He stepped off the sword light and landed on the shore without stirring her awake.
Above them, the Pure Yang Sword shimmered.
It hummed, its edge more radiant than before, and the heat in its glow felt slightly warmer, as if it had learned a new shade of sunlight.
The blade's clear resonance was almost lively, like it was trying to report its accomplishments.
Rowe smiled.
"Go up. Wait for sunrise."
The sword shot upward and hovered near the Fusang Tree's crown, quietly hanging in the night like a star that refused to dim.
Rowe lowered Consort Yu to the ground, wrapped her in his robe, and sat beside her with his legs folded, facing the sea.
He watched the dark water breathe.
He calculated.
How long would it take to purify this stretch completely?
A few days.
It should be enough.
"After the purification is complete," Rowe murmured, closing his eyes as the sea breeze moved past him, "I can finally step onto the Divine Land properly."
Morning came.
The first edge of dawn broke over the horizon, and the world turned gold.
Consort Yu groggily opened her eyes and immediately squinted into the dazzling sun.
"So bright…"
She rubbed her eyes, shook her head, and pushed herself upright.
In the sunlight, her silhouette looked almost innocent, despite how little her original outfit bothered to conceal. She swayed as she stood, still half trapped in sleep, her posture loose and unguarded in a way she would have denied if asked.
She did not notice Rowe beside her.
Her foot slipped.
And she toppled straight onto him.
"Hmm?"
Her mind snapped awake at the worst possible time, but gravity had already made its decision.
She instinctively planted her hands on Rowe's shoulders and pushed down, trying to stabilize herself.
Rowe ended up on his back, eyes opening to find Consort Yu pressed above him.
Black hair curtained part of her face. Her ruby eyes still held a trace of fright. Her hands braced on his chest, keeping her upper body lifted, but her legs were tangled far too close, her thighs shifting with each breath.
Morning sunlight poured over them.
The most vibrant hour of the day, bright enough to make every sensation painfully clear.
Consort Yu felt what she was pressed against and sucked in a breath despite herself.
Then, in the same heartbeat, she realized she had an opportunity.
Her expression changed.
"Hmmph. Surprised?" she said, tossing her hair back with deliberate flair.
She licked her lips, tongue briefly visible, and then she intentionally swayed, rubbing side to side as if she were proving a point to the universe.
She had failed before.
But she had just woken up. Rowe had been resting too. Surely he would be off balance now.
She wanted to see him lose composure, even for a second.
Rowe stared at her in silence for a moment.
Then he spoke, tone dry.
"Indeed. I am surprised."
Consort Yu's eyes brightened.
Rowe continued.
"You really are crazy."
Her expression froze.
Again?
Before she could recover, a voice came from the side, calm and mildly amused.
"And you are still a bit short if your goal is to make a fool of me like this."
Consort Yu whipped her head toward the voice.
Rowe was sitting beside her, perfectly composed.
Where she had been pressing down a heartbeat ago, there was now only a piece of clothing that had slipped free, as if he had stepped aside at the exact instant her weight fell.
Consort Yu gnashed her teeth, furious and helpless all at once.
If Rowe wanted to avoid her, she could not stop him. Not even slightly.
"You hateful guy. You insensitive bastard…"
Rowe yawned and rose to his feet, rolling his shoulders as if waking up properly.
"It is time to fully wake up."
"Hmph. I have always been wide awake." Consort Yu turned her head away with practiced disdain. "You are the one who is always muddled."
If I were truly muddled, you would not be standing there so intact right now.
Rowe did not say it aloud.
He simply narrowed his eyes and looked up toward the sky, expression faintly suspicious.
They are not watching, are they?
A clear hum descended like a ringing note.
A brilliant red light fell from above, clean and sharp, and the Pure Yang Sword appeared before him with crisp, resonant clangs.
Rowe reached out, gripped the hilt, and slid it into the scabbard on his back.
Consort Yu watched, curiosity briefly winning over irritation.
"Your sword… it feels more alive."
"It gained a new program yesterday," Rowe said casually, "from condensing the cycle of the three waters. Here you would call it spiritual growth. It absorbed the sea's spiritual power."
Consort Yu blinked.
Then, without thinking, she asked, "Are we continuing today?"
The question left her mouth too smoothly. Even she did not catch how much expectation sat inside it until it was already in the air.
Continuing was inevitable.
Purifying the East Sea faster benefited Rowe.
But before that…
Rowe's gaze shifted to the horizon.
"Someone is coming."
Consort Yu stiffened. She followed his line of sight.
People.
Figures drifting on the water, clinging to broken logs. Their clothes were ragged, their skin pale in the morning light. They floated toward the Fusang Tree as if the sea itself had carried them here on purpose.
Their faces held no surprise.
No panic.
Only exhaustion, and a numb acceptance that looked like it had been worn in for years.
As if they had come for refuge.
But what kind of disaster forced people to throw themselves into the sea?
Rowe frowned.
Consort Yu, oddly, did not snap at the intrusion.
She remembered what Rowe had said.
That the people who truly represented humanity were not the ones who stood atop palaces, but the ones who built them.
These drifting figures looked exactly like that.
"I will go see."
"I will go too."
The words left Consort Yu so naturally that she startled herself.
Rowe looked at her.
Consort Yu immediately added, too fast, "Do not misunderstand. I do not care about them."
I am only going because of you, she did not say.
Rowe did not press.
"Suit yourself."
Consort Yu pulled her robe around herself. Her revealing attire shifted into a black, wide sleeved ancient robe with layered fronts. Her long hair fell neatly, and her red eyes looked like polished jade.
For a moment, she actually resembled the immortal image mortals worshipped.
She stepped closer and extended her hand first, smiling in a way that felt dangerously pleased with itself.
"Let us go, Mister Rowe?"
Sword light rose.
Before they even reached the drifting people, voices carried to them across the water.
"They are crazy. All of them are crazy!"
"It should be safe here, right?"
"Why did it become like this…"
"Where do we go…"
Fear, dread, grief, and exhaustion tangled in the air.
Rowe felt the chaos within him stir and circulate, drawing it in.
Through the mechanism of that seed, he could see fragments of their hearts.
He glanced at Consort Yu.
She met his eyes.
They shared the same confusion.
Perhaps because the Divine Land once held too many primordial sovereigns, and even higher existences, Rowe could not simply look inland from the East Sea and observe everything directly. He could only notice clearly when someone invoked his name, when the concept of Monarch was called.
So if he wanted answers, he had to ask.
Rowe paused the sword light.
He summoned a kun from the deep.
The refugees looked up at the sky, still sobbing and murmuring, and then the seawater beneath them suddenly surged.
Something immense rose.
It lifted them all together.
Only a small portion surfaced, and even that felt like an island appearing from nowhere.
"Has the Sea God manifested?"
"May the Sea God protect us… may the Sea God protect us…"
A wave of relief rolled through them, the kind that comes from surviving only because something greater decided you were allowed to.
Rowe's voice reached them with the sea breeze.
"Tell me what happened."
The Sea God truly appeared.
The refugees shook with terror and joy, and they spoke in overlapping bursts, desperate to be understood.
"We are from Chu. We do not know what exactly happened, but since yesterday, people have been acting like they went mad…"
"My wife, my parents, they get angry and beat anyone they see…"
"It is not just us. Even the nobles and the army started fighting among themselves. Beasts gathered like a flood and attacked villages. We were among the few who stayed clear headed. We could only run. We kept running…"
"Leaving the village did nothing. Leaving the town did nothing. We fled until we reached the sea…"
"We did not dare look back, but we could hear whispers."
"It kept saying Taiyi."
"Taiyi. Over and over."
"That is the supreme god our ancestors revered in Chu."
"I could not stop thinking… maybe Taiyi has gone mad too."
"But that is impossible. I do not believe it…"
Sorrow thickened the air again.
Rowe listened, expression tightening into thought.
He knew Taiyi.
A solar sovereign of Chu, and also a creator god.
Recorded in Taiyi Gives Birth to Water: Taiyi gives birth to water, water in turn assists Taiyi, thus forming heaven. Heaven in turn assists Taiyi, thus forming earth.
Taiyi embodied the concept of nurturing heaven and earth into being.
One of the many primordial beings said to exist within the Divine Land.
So why would it become this?
Rowe turned to Consort Yu, the one most likely to know, and asked with his eyes.
Consort Yu pondered, then rose slightly onto her toes.
Rowe leaned down despite himself, already mildly irritated at the theatrics.
Her lips brushed his ear as she whispered.
"I do not know."
Rowe went still.
For a heartbeat, he tasted the purest form of defeat.
It really is the best answer.
Consort Yu pulled back with a smile that looked far too satisfied for someone claiming ignorance.
Finally, she had landed a clean hit.
Then her expression sobered.
"But even if I do not know, I know this much," Consort Yu said quietly. "Back then, to resist madness and to transcend further, many gods and immortals became entangled with those evil gods from beyond the heavens."
"Deep within their divine nature, there was a mad side."
"The gods and immortals vanished during the Battle of the Gods. People always suspected it was related."
"I did not experience it. I only watched. So what I know is limited."
The madness of divine nature…
Rowe's gaze swept over the refugees kneeling and weeping on the kun's back.
Consort Yu hesitated, then spoke as if moved by an impulse.
"Do not mind them…"
As long as we live our own lives, that is enough.
She almost said it.
Then she stopped.
They had only known each other for two days. The words felt too intimate, too revealing, so she swallowed them.
Even so, what she did say was sincere.
If Taiyi truly was the original Taiyi, then the being moving in Chu was not merely dangerous.
He was a supreme god.
An existence whose standing was above the newly named Monarch.
Consort Yu did not want Rowe involved.
Rowe spoke, voice almost regretful, yet his eyes betrayed him.
"The unfortunate part is that he is coming for me."
Taiyi was an ancient sun god. The Fusang Great Emperor was a new sun god.
When Rowe spoke the name Taiyi, he felt it.
A clear hostility in the fabric of divinity.
Taiyi's intent had locked onto him.
Rowe's expression should have been cautious.
Instead, it looked eager.
A chance to leave a name in history and perish in the process had walked straight up to his door.
Even if he failed, it did not matter.
A mad Taiyi would surely produce enough malice, enough negativity, enough ruin to feed the chaos within Rowe until it grew into something that could finally kill him.
A huge profit.
And…
Rowe remembered his own words.
I hope the sun I command shines upon them.
Just looking at the refugees at his feet, he could already imagine the scale of disaster in Chu.
He wanted to save them.
Because he had the ability.
And because he needed to.
A god should protect the people.
Consort Yu stayed silent for a moment.
Then she smiled, resignation and resolve mixing into something unexpectedly gentle.
"Then there is no helping it."
"I will reluctantly accompany you."
She lifted her chin as if she were doing him a favor.
"I know where Taiyi might be. I can help you."
I still want to be with you.
My only kind in this world.
She did not say those words.
But her crimson eyes held only seriousness, and the seriousness did not waver.
She had lived too long. She had been lost for too long.
And now, she had found something she wanted to hold onto.
Even if it had only been two days, that feeling had never been about time.
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