Ren sat within his domain. Flames licked the horizon—an endless circle of heat and silence. Beside him, Emperor Shadow rested upon a throne carved from the blaze itself. His presence etched into every flicker of fire. The inferno crowned them both, unyielding and divine, as much a symbol of authority as of entrapment.
Ren cultivated at the heart of the flame. It did not scorch; it refined. Each flicker taught, each roar carried whispers from the heavens. He had reached the early tier of Step 200—a realm few touched, fewer understood. Yet he did not yearn for Step 1000 or the distant Divine Realm with haste. He was patient. Power without purpose was ash scattered to the wind.
When he stepped beyond the inferno, the flames receded like breath drawn inward. At the riverside, where water thundered down the mountainside, he found Mianmian and Gao Yun. Power shimmered around them—delicate and new—as if the river itself acknowledged their ascent.
Later, beneath the hum of daily life, they walked the marketplace once more. Past lacquered trinkets and fragrant stalls, past merchants shouting stories into the dusk. They browsed without urgency, drawn not by gold or glory, but by the quiet pull of possibility. Memory, maybe. Or a beginning in disguise.
"This place is… remarkable, Master," said Gao Yun, his gaze lingering on a stall of wind-chimes and calligraphy scrolls. "Even though it's filled with mortal trinkets and little cultivation worth, it's… still wonderful. I had forgotten what it's like to be simply mortal—just walking. Browsing. Doing something—not for power or progress, but for the quiet ache of living."
"It is, isn't it…" Ren said softly, hands folded behind his back as he watched a child haggle for plum candy. "Not long ago, I walked as a mortal. On my homeworld. Earth. The year was 102,502. I posed as a student at Kulun's university—the greatest of its kind. I remember the gardens suspended in air, the library rings circling the moon, and the professors who taught philosophy as if it could save a broken civilisation. For a time, I wasn't a cultivator. Just curious. Just… human."
"I must admit, Master… your homeworld sounds strange. No cultivation? It's difficult to imagine. Our world was born in flame and ascension—we measure time by breakthroughs, by steps climbed toward the divine. But yours… it thrived on stillness, on study, on something softer. Browsing stalls, attending universities, dreaming without a spiritual core—that's foreign to me. And yet, something in it feels pure. I wonder… did they know how close they stood to their kind of transcendence?"
"Maybe. Maybe not," Ren said, voice low beneath the market's hum. "But my world did have the supernatural—because of me. Most humans never knew. The vast majority walked through their lives untouched by it. Only a handful saw beyond the veil. Fewer still understood. And those who did… kept their silence. Sometimes out of awe. Sometimes out of fear."
Gao Yun leaned in, curiosity steady.
"I see. Then… the supernatural—what was that, Master?"
Ren glanced up, half-smiling.
"The supernatural? Well… where do I start then?"
Ren's voice dropped into something older than memory.
"The supernatural… It's not supposed to exist. It's unnatural. Something that shouldn't be—but it does. My world was filled with animals, humans, machines… Nothing beyond the veil. At least, not until I died. And came back—a true immortal.
I created the supernatural with my own hands. Werewolves, vampires, hybrids. Ghosts, wraiths, gods, devils. Countless things. All were born from me.
Because I am the beginning, and I am the end.
I remember returning even before my birth, before the Big Bang. I was there. I did many things then—things the universe still echoes in silence. What mortals call legend… I called Tuesday."
Ren let out a quiet breath, watching the river coil like memory.
"I made this place, too. Shaped it with my own hands, long ago.
The ancient clans... yeah, I remember them.
I can know everything—every thread, every outcome, every origin.
But I can also forget.
Wipe something clean from my mind like it never existed.
And honestly... I kind of like that.
It makes it easier to let go of things I'm not ready to carry.
I forget for a while.
Then I bring it back—when I'm ready to remember."
Gao Yun's eyes widened, voice trembling with quiet reverence.
"Then that means… You are the Emperor of all gods. You even told me once—those Christians from your homeworld, the ones who worshipped a being they called 'God'—you created him."
Ren's gaze didn't falter, but his tone carried no pride.
"He was like all the others. I created gods, devils, legends, and myths. Not for worship. Not for empire. Just… because I could. Because I had returned from beyond what existed. I didn't plan any of it. I was just there, before things began. Before light. Before the stars had names, and sometimes, I wonder if I remember too much… or not nearly enough."
"You already know—I intend to conquer this place for the Eternal Empire. I forged that empire with flame and decree, ruled it beyond mortal memory. But in the end, I gave it to Bai—Eternal Empress. My wife. She held the kind of grace the throne demanded, and I knew she'd shape it better than I ever could.
We've worn more names than years, traded identities like robes, shed lives across centuries. We could've wiped the memories of humanity clean and left them in blissful ignorance. Or we could've spoken the truth and unstitched the illusion.
We chose silence.
In my homeland, they knew me only as Prince Ren—the descendant of the Black Dragon, general. But they were all my masks. The emperor they revered was me, just wearing different titles.
My 'parents' were a performance—blood-born relatives, children of my siblings. Close enough to mimic truth, distant enough to avoid it. Every piece of my identity was a construct… except the weight I carried behind it."
Ren's quiet revelation rippled through dimensions.
"I created another reality—Earth Two. A mirror of my homeworld, distorted by time and temperament. On Earth Two, the supernatural breathed from the beginning: Spirits woven into its soil, magic tangled in its oceans, myths older than memory. But in my world—the original one—those forces slept. Dormant. Until 2020. That's when the arcane stirred. When I stirred. I forged the flame
The disciple staggered back, hand pressed to their temple, eyes wide with a mixture of reverent fear and awe.
"Master… you're telling me so much. I understand it—at least I think I do—but something feels strange. It's like my cultivation is growing on its own just from hearing you.
I need to lie down. My head… It's spinning. There's too much. Too deep. I feel like something inside me is shifting."
Ren chuckled, soft and weathered like thunder in retreat.
"Forgive me… I wasn't trying to boast. You asked, and I answered. But I can stop now. I don't want to sound arrogant."
He lowered his gaze, the weight of centuries simmering in silence.
"I've seen too much to mistake storytelling for pride. Sometimes truth just... spills out."
Ren turned his head slightly, feeling the light weight of Mianmian on his shoulder. She looked unconscious, breathing slowly, qi rippling faintly through her frame.
He chuckled under his breath, then reached up and gently stirred her awake.
She blinked, slowly rising to her feet, though still leaning on him like the world hadn't quite stopped spinning. Her brows furrowed as invisible streams of knowledge coiled behind her eyes.
Her cultivation—like his moments ago—had risen again.
Ren watched her quietly, then exhaled a soft thought aloud.
"I need to be careful not to improve too quickly. I've always preferred taking my time with things… even if it doesn't always look like I do."
Ren still finds it amusing how this empire is perceived as merely a mortal one. In reality, it is inhabited by countless mortals, cultivators, gods, and other mystical beings who disguise themselves as humans. Even the emperor and empress are not entirely human; while they appear to be so, their lineage is tied to the ancient clans. Their bloodline descends from the ancient gods, making them the strongest of the three ancient clans.
Ren is the creator of these three clans; he was known by the name Aizen, the True Immortal of the three ancient clans. The three ancestors were responsible for creating Mìngjiè Xiānlù beside him.
These clans tested the cultivators of this world to determine if they had the strength to advance in their cultivation. There exists a sort of heaven in this world that further tests them. Interestingly, many people no longer believe in the three ancient clans, despite their myth being very real. These clans also engage in cultivation, though in a slightly different manner.
"I wonder how everyone is doing since I left."
They kept walking. Ren didn't raise his voice. He didn't need to. The world had already heard him—it just hadn't remembered yet. "I wasn't just the first," he said. "I was the beginning. The breath before breath. The silence that shaped sound. Everything that came after—every star, every soul, every story— It all unfolded from me." He paused—not for effect, but because the truth didn't need embellishment. "I didn't arrive into existence. Existence arrived into me." He spoke as if others were listening. Not beside him, but somewhere—distant, unseen. Not to convince them. Just to let a little of it out. Only a sliver. The rest stayed buried, where even memory feared to tread.