Chapter 119 – I Love Heaven and Earth with Sincerity
“The Heavenly Dao has dissipated,” Huai Ningjun said.
He gazed at the mortal realm from afar, faintly seeing the white jade palace in the clouds. He suddenly understood. It didn’t matter how many times he entered the illusion array of Ru City or how many truths he revealed; the answer had been clear from the very beginning. Some labyrinths are destined for only one person to enter, not anyone else. After a long time, Huai Ningjun withdrew his gaze. He stepped over the crisscrossing corpses and ascended the steps, heading for the final tower.
A golden saber descended from the sky. Three thousand flying boats arrived at the Undying City, where black clouds surged, at the last possible moment. The disciples of the Mountain Sea Pavilion, clad in silver cloaks, unhesitatingly followed the woman in red and leaped down. The golden saber engraved with “Hualiang” was embedded in the steps, like a final, sharp dividing line—the mortal realm above, the netherworld below. A great fire blazed. Yan Huatang walked straight out of the fire, her fair wrist holding the golden saber, her skirt like a bridal gown.
Huai Ningjun stopped. Yan Huatang’s killing intent was palpable, yet he asked a completely unrelated question: “Do you know how I persuaded the Moon Mother?”
Yan Huatang pulled the golden saber from the stone steps. She held it horizontally. His white robes gradually turned into silver armor. Huai Ningjun raised his head, his pupils reflecting the flying sparks. Perhaps it was Zuo Liangshi during the Zhunan calamity that reminded him of someone, or perhaps everything tonight was just too ironic, so mocking that he felt an urge to say something, no matter to whom. “…Just one sentence.”
“I told her, he bet…”
The sparks swirled, flickering between light and dark.
“He bet that from then on, a thousand would be for me, ten thousand would be for me, tens of millions would be for me.”
The firelight illuminated Huai Ningjun’s face. The sealing of the Netherworld of the Great Wilderness didn’t have much effect on this former White Emperor, now the Desolate Lord. After tonight, there would be no more Heaven Beyond Heavens, no more Heavenly Dao, and the mortal realm would lose its southern pole. Perhaps he was the biggest winner, but he didn’t seem particularly joyful.
“Such a great, selfless statement. But to her, it must have been the most ironic joke, right?”
Huai Ningjun’s voice was distant, as if he were miles away, asking another person in the clouds. The Moon Mother had guarded the Vicious Plow Earth-Mound for millennia. Even though her people had died because of the immortal sects, even though she resented the mortal realm, she had held her post. Because… she still remembered the original promise. On the Fusang Tree, a girl with blue feathers had once promised the white-robed Divine Lord. She promised that once the eastern pole was established, she would go guard the Vicious Plow Earth-Mound. She was reborn once every hundred years. She wasn’t afraid.
She withstood the miasma, withstood millennia of confusion, withstood millennia of loneliness, but what did she get in the end? To be told that even in death, the Divine Lord’s eyes were only for mortals, only for cultivators, only for the immortal sects. Only humans could follow in his footsteps. So what did her millennia of guarding the eastern pole amount to? A joke?
“But she doesn’t understand at all why it would be a thousand for me, ten thousand for me, tens of millions for me—”
Huai Ningjun suddenly burst into laughter, abruptly spreading his arms.
“Because he had no other path to take!”
It wasn’t that his eyes were only for mortals, nor only for cultivators and immortal sects. What the white-robed Divine Lord, who ascended Incomplete Mountain with his sword, had hoped for was that Kongsang. Kongsang had already shattered and could not be returned to. The gods no longer acknowledged him, and the demons already hated him… Everything he had sought in his life had become a reflection in the water, a flower in the mirror. Where else could he place his hope? No path to take, no way to turn back. Only hope remained.
…May the immortal sects be like me, with immortals and demons protecting each other. …May there be no distinction between immortals and mortals, with both loving each other. May Kongsang, though like a dream, leave behind embers. May the fire burn unceasingly.
A White Phoenix cried out, its call shaking heaven and earth. A fierce wind raged, and ten thousand grim ghosts surged from behind him. The disciples of the Mountain Sea Pavilion roared in unison, drawing their sabers and swords to meet the oncoming demons. Yan Huatang spun, her golden saber transforming into a shower of light that fell upon the equally roaring Wilderness Emissaries. The slaughter erupted on the final high tower. In the vortex of life and death, only Huai Ningjun, in his white robes and silver armor, was left laughing alone.
How could there be such a ridiculous god?
***
A Kui Dragon Bracelet. It fell from the air, flipping halfway and refracting a golden thread of light. Chou Bodeng caught it.
His fingers curled, the fine scales of the Kui Dragon searing into his flesh… The person who had taken him to watch the sun rise and the moon set, who had taken him to where the sky meets the water, was gone. The world was vast and empty… That foolish simpleton, just how many years had he hated himself? Hated himself so much that his obsession became a demon, yet he never dared to let him find out.
“How can you be so foolish?” Chou Bodeng asked softly.
Looking back and looking forward, for thousands and tens of thousands of years, how could this world have nothing to do with him? Born a god, but ultimately not acknowledged; friends with demons, but ultimately turning against each other; trusting in humans, but ultimately burdened with karmic obstruction… If even heaven and earth no longer loved him, what did he have left? What was there? Heaven and earth were silent. The Moon Mother stood coldly in the marsh, neither leaving nor approaching. The immortal sects’ robes were stained with dust and blood; some sighed, others were filled with shame.
Gratitude and grudges.
Chou Bodeng looked up and covered his face with his hand. He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, there was nothing… He wasn’t afraid of death, nor of the cold. He could die, his soul could scatter, but the one thing he couldn’t lose was a person… Not just the Heavenly Dao, that was A Luo, his A Luo. He had protected him for so many years. Was it favoritism? Or was it for the sake of the mortal realm? In the end, he was not a perfect saint. The first snow fell among the clouds, lightly kissing the Divine Lord’s eyes. Vaguely resembling an old friend.
…Once, there was a carriage traveling through the rugged mountains, and a youth who went from a profligate who spent money like water to a merchant who haggled over every penny, who said, ‘You must say you love me in the morning, you must say you love me in the afternoon, you must say you love me in the evening. You must say you love me when spring comes with the awakening of insects, you must say you love me when summer arrives with the great heat, you must say you love me when autumn comes with the first frost, you must say you love me when winter arrives with the solstice snow.’ His lover said, ‘Alright.’ His lover was clumsy, but he would do whatever he promised.
“From now on, every time snow falls on the mountains and rivers, it will be you saying you love me.”
Chou Bodeng slowly released his hand, speaking softly to the one who had disappeared. There was no echo, only falling snow. But Chou Bodeng smiled, the corners of his eyes as bright as ever. He looked down and slowly fastened the dark gold Kui Dragon Bracelet over his wrist, then looked around. On the white clouds, among the rows of pillars, the painted ridges and flying eaves, every blade of grass, every tree, every hall was as familiar as before. In the distance, the sun was rising from the horizon, gilding the palace with a magnificent splendor.
“But A Luo, this is their Heaven Beyond Heavens, not my Cloud Center,” Chou Bodeng said softly.
He raised his hand in the sunlight, and the two ancient bracelets collided with a crisp sound. Vermilion fire shot into the sky. Fire and wind swept through the white clouds, swept through the pillars and flying eaves. The palace in the clouds collapsed behind him with a roar, and the sea of clouds became a sea of fire. The Divine Lord in white, with broad sleeves, walked out of the firelight. A spark landed on his shoulder, and in an instant, it burned down his robes, dyeing the white garments in flames. The Divine Lord pulled a scarlet silk ribbon from the void and casually tied up his black hair.
“I love heaven and earth with sincerity, and heaven and earth love me with sincerity.”
He stepped onto the Heavenly Staircase. Step by step, he walked from the heavens to the mortal realm.
“Come.”
Chou Bodeng said softly, his pupils reflecting the Moon Mother, the immortal sects, a thousand mountains and ten thousand ravines, white waters and black rivers, the birds and beasts of the Twelve Continents, and all living beings.
“Hate me, love me, resent me, respect me, blame me, revere me.”
With the final step, the red-robed figure re-entered the mortal realm.
“Come!”
The Taiyi Sword cut through the air and arrived.
“I enter the cage!”
Chou Bodeng grasped the sword, spun, and with one strike, shattered the city in the clouds.
End of Volume One: Prisoner of Heaven and Earth