Against the Gods

"Do you… understand now?"

The Ancestral Will's voice rang in Yun Che's soul sea once more, but it felt like it was a lifetime away.

"..." He didn't give a response even after a long time had passed. Yun Che's soul sea was so silent it was as if he had died.

"Xia Qingyue is the Artifact of Fate. It was always a matter of time before she discovered the truth of herself. As for you, your affinity with nothingness will grow as you cultivate the World-Defying Heaven Manual, but you can never surpass the Ancestral Nothingness. Therefore, the occasional dreams are the most you can glimpse of the truth."

"Even then, you will only treat the dreams as what they are, dreams. You won't think of them as the truth."

In other words, even with his current mastery over the laws of nothingness, he would never have discovered the truth on his own. He would've been kept in the dark forever if the Ancestral Will hadn't told him everything.

"I never thought that I would be the one who would tell you everything when I started all this."

"Even a fate that has been engineered is so difficult to predict."

There was still no response from Yun Che.

If this had happened to another person, if this had been a legend from the distant past, he would've needed a long time to digest and ruminate over it.

However, he was smack dab in the middle of everything… so of course it took him even more time to digest it all. Even now, none of it felt real at all.

Xia Qingyue… was created…

For me…?

The day we married, the day she and I met for the first time… it might very well be the first day she was born to the Primal Chaos.

No wonder she could never feel any concern for Xia Hongyi. No wonder Xia Hongyi couldn't be sad over her death. Their relationship was something that had been artificially implanted into their consciousnesses, and their shared memories were merely the result of a karma fix. How could there be any familial love between them when they had never even spent a single day with each other?

No wonder Yue Wuya had stopped for Xia Qingyue despite not knowing her, and why he had given her his love without any reservation. It was because of instinct and the extraordinary bloodline resonance that existed between the two.

No wonder the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor, a woman with a tragic fate, had said that Xia Qingyue's fate was the most sorrowful she had ever met. As it turned out, sorrowful didn't even begin to describe how tragic it really was.

No wonder she had made that ultimate choice and refused to divulge anything even during her final moments. She even went so far as to create a great lie to fool him into thinking that she truly was an evil person who more than deserved her death.

No wonder she had wept before Yue Wuya and Yue Wugou's graves and claimed that she was the one who killed them and Yuanba…

No wonder she had chosen to clothe herself in red on her final day. She had arrived in this world in red, and she decided that she would depart in red as well.

No wonder…

……

As it turned out, he really had died when he was sixteen.

The reason any power or bloodline, including the absolute opposites that were light profound energy and dark profound energy, could exist harmoniously in his body, thus stunning even the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor herself… was because his Sacred Body had been the Ancestral God's own Sacred Body!

The Heretic God's profound veins, the Phoenix, the Rage God, the Heavenly Wolf, the Golden Crow, the Ice Phoenix… even Hong'er, You'er, the Divine Miracle of Life, and the Eternal Calamity of Darkness…

Four of the seven Heavenly Profound Treasures were on his person right now. The World Piercer was held by one of his beloveds, Shui Meiyin, as well.

He had gone through countless tribulations in his life, but they were always accompanied by great progress or even great evolution after he overcame them.

Even when he was still in the Profound Sky Continent, Jasmine had said multiple times that she didn't believe in fate until she came to know Yun Che. She had declared unironically that he was a person of great destiny.

He had begun his journey at the age of sixteen, and it had taken him only twenty years to become the first true emperor of the God Realm.

The first sixteen years of his life had been perfectly ordinary, but the two decades that came after his wedding day were filled with opportunities and great fortunes that another person wouldn't even dare to dream of in a thousand lifetimes.

As it turned out, fate really did exist in this world.

As it turned out, everything was driven by it.

But the price of this fate…

The cost it took to climb to place him at the peak of the pyramid was…

…………

"I'm just… thinking about something. If you would believe it, it is even more bizarre than the past five years of experiences you've told us about."

On the night he returned to Blue Pole Star, his father Yun Qinghong had looked at the stars and let out a melancholic sigh. "Are you… really my son?"

"You are my and Yurou's son, and both our blood runs in your veins. The world may turn upside down, but that is one fact that will never change. However…"

"I have never known the world named the 'God Realm', but knowing that someone from that world can turn the entire Blue Pole Star to dust with a simple wave of their hand, I have no doubt that they are a kind of existence that I fundamentally don't understand. In fact, I may never understand it for as long as I live."

"But you… from the time you departed this world, to the time you became emperor of all things in the universe… it hasn't even been two decades yet." Yun Qinghong closed his eyes for a bit. "I just can't help but wonder… if I, Yun Qinghong, truly am capable of sowing a son like you."

"A person's destiny, horizon and limits are often determined by their bloodline and birth. That is a cruel but immutable fact. However, you currently stand at a level neither I nor the entire Yun Clan can ever hope to look up to, Che'er. Can you blame me for thinking what I did? If I am being honest, I feel more melancholic than proud after learning of everything you've achieved, son."

…………

His father's laments were spot on after all.

With his level of background and talent, he would at most be Yun Qinghong's equal even if he wasn't born a cripple, and he never encountered any true hardships in his life.

He wasn't the heaven chosen child he thought he was, but he had definitely been chosen by someone.

And that person… was the final incarnation of the Ancestral God herself.

His status as Emperor Yun, his turbulent yet dazzling life… it had been founded on the sacrifice of the Ancestral God and Xia Qingyue's most tragic life…

No. It wasn't even good enough to be called a life.

…………

.

"Why…" Yun Che's voice sounded raspy and unclear when he finally spoke again. It sounded like a strained groan from the lowest depths of his soul. "You are the Ancestral God… even the king of the world is but a speck of dust to you…"

"Why… would you sacrifice six hundred cycles of reincarnation for a crippled mortal like me…"

The Ancestral Will answered indifferently, "If the Ancestral God incarnate next to you had been anyone from the previous nine hundred and ninety nine cycles, then none of this would have happened."

"You are aware how nonsensical it is for the Ancestral God to sacrifice her Sacred Body to save one mortal, and six hundred cycles to forge the cruel Chain of Fate."

"However, the Ancestral Will must fall aslumber during the one thousandth cycle to attain perfection, and Xiao Lingxi is this cycle's Ancestral God. Her will is the main will of the Ancestral God, while mine was considered foreign because I was prematurely awakened before our wills could fully merge."

"No matter how weak the main will is, it is still higher than the 'foreign' Ancestral Will. As a result, I am unable to defy her."

"The Ancestral God was the one who caused everything, but the decision… was really made by a despairing fifteen years old girl who had just lost her true love."

Yun Che: "..."

"I had not foreseen this until it happened. I have watched the world for eons, but it is clear that I still underestimated the power of a person's emotions."

Life was like a dream, and the world an illusion.

However, the reality he was living was something not even a dream could weave.

He recalled the Xiao Lingxi he knew before and after he was sixteen. Her eyes and her behavior were the same as ever.

"Does she… remember anything about this?" Yun Che asked softly.

"No," The Ancestral Will answered directly. "She rejected everything about me. In this life, she (I) only wants to be Xiao Lingxi and Xiao Lingxi only. She doesn't want anything to taint her identity and her feelings until she reaches the end of her natural life."

"That was why her memories were reversed just like your death was reversed when the wheels of time were turned back… again, this was her choice, and I could only obey it."

"I should've returned to sleep and awaited my next cycle after everything was done, but I was curious about the result of the Chain of Fate I personally created and both your and the Artifact of Fate's ending."

The Ancestral Will didn't tell him that Xiao Lingxi, the main will's influence, was the main reason she became uncontrollably concerned toward Yun Che's fate.

"Therefore, I stayed awake and roamed the universe just as I did before while observing your and Xia Qingyue's lives… However, it also caused Xiao Lingxi to occasionally experience my memories as 'illusions' or 'dreams'. When I finally fall asleep, all these 'dreams' and 'illusions' will vanish forever. She will never know that she is the Ancestral God, never know about her heartbreak, and remain the purest Xiao Lingxi until the end of her natural life."

"You will forever keep this a secret from her. Otherwise, her overly soft heart will surely be mired in eternal regret."

"Are you… leaving?" Yun Che noticed the finality in her tone.

"You have already become the unparalleled emperor of this world. The Artifact of Fate has also chosen to end her own life. Her (my) wish as the Ancestral God has been fulfilled, and I've fully witnessed the entanglement of fate that is caused by the Chain of Fate."

"Now that the 'Artifact of Fate' is deceased, the Chain of Fate between the two of you has disappeared as well. There is no longer any reason for me to remain in this world. Starting today, I will return to my slumber in order to recover my lost origin power as soon as possible."

The Ancestral Will sighed. "Another six hundred cycles of life await me… I can only hope that my concerns regarding the Abyss are just me worrying over nothing."

"Telling you the truth of everything is my final labor for her (me). You should understand what I mean."

"..." Yun Che couldn't say anything to that.

It had taken the Ancestral God's six hundred cycles of reincarnation and Xia Qingyue's lifelong tragedy to give him the life he currently enjoyed…

"The relationship between you and the Ancestral God, Xiao Lingxi is the natural product of your fifteen years of interaction. Her love for you runs as deep as the soul itself."

"I have not interfered with the Artifact of Fate, Xia Qingyue's emotions in any way. After discovering the truth of herself far sooner than she should've, she chose to submit to her fate instead of defying it… her only act of defiance was in choosing her own ending."

"She fought against her fate, but not the boons that were gifted to you as a result of it."

"You had left your image in her mind during the short period you were together after your marriage. During her days in Frozen Cloud Immortal Palace, she would sometimes remember the day you walked out of the Xiao Clan."

"When you gave her hope at the Heaven Basin Secret Realm… your image became permanently fixed to her soul. To her, that brief moment may as well have been an eternity."

"The bonds between you two may have begun from an obligatory promise, but that was the day she truly thought of herself as your wife. She never stopped doing so even until the end."

"Yun Che, you are the luckiest man in the entire universe. For you, Xiao Lingxi chose to remain as Xiao Lingxi for eternity. For you, Xia Qingyue submitted to her cruel fate and even painted herself as a monster just so that you wouldn't be hurt by her death. Neither of them ever regretted their decisions."

"You don't have the right to lead a bad life."

"Don't let these truths become shackles and burden your soul. What you have today is the culmination of both Xiao Lingxi and Xia Qingyue's wishes. If only for everything that they have done for you, you must not let yourself sink into a mire of inescapable darkness."

"When you have shed all of your tears, sorrow and guilt, please greet Xiao Lingxi, the woman who will forever wait for you to return home, with a warm smile, and think of Xiao Qingyue, the woman whose fate was tied to yours fondly… for their sakes and everyone else who loves you, you can do it, can't you?"

The soul sea world started shaking violently. The Ancestral Will's parting words imprinted themselves into every corner of his soul and broke the dam that had been containing his turbulent emotions completely…

"This is it, then. Goodbye, Yun Che."

As the Ancestral Will's voice grew more and more distant, she said one last time in a very, very gentle voice:

"May you and my incarnation enjoy eternal peace."

When the soul sea world faded completely, Yun Che finally broke out into a full cry at the silent hill.

Her last worries resolved, the Ancestral Will finally turned herself off and returned to sleep.

Right before she completely disappeared though, a trace of puzzlement flashed through her consciousness.

She remembered the cracks that appeared suddenly after Xia Qingyue fell into the Abyss of Nothingness.

The Chain of Fate between Yun Che and Xia Qingyue had been formed using the Mirror of Samsara as the medium.

The Chain of Fate had disappeared when Xiao Qingyue passed away. There was nothing unnatural about that.

However, that crack on the Mirror of Samsara was…

It was almost as if the Chain of Fate had been broken by some sort of foreign force, and the resulting blowback had caused the crack on the Mirror of Samsara.

If that was true…

What in Primal Chaos was happening inside the Abyss…?