BOOOOOM!!!
An explosion ripped through the air, causing a building to collapse instantly.
"So this is how I die, huh?" Long Huang thought, frozen in place. His ears rang and his pupils dilated as he watched the walls of the collapsing building next to him come crashing down.
"I don't want it to end like this. I haven't even begun to live."
"It can't end like this!"
"Move!" he screamed for his body to move, but it wouldn't budge. The last thing he saw was a wall falling towards him, before he was crushed. The word 'Why' echoed through his mind. As his soul slipped away, the air quivered, a low hum resonating like the breath of the universe.
Space rippled before his soul, and an eternal hand reached out, piercing through the fabric of nothingness. Its fingers clung to Long Huang's soul before pulling it from the void with a soft whump.
K-k-khh..
Cold— that was the first sensation that he felt. Goosebumps prickled across his entire body; each breath came out in pale puffs, vanishing into the icy air. As he opened his heavy eyelids, his vision was blurry and unfocused as he tried to adjust them to the dim, ethereal lights.
What he saw wasn't rubble or a wall on top of him. But a vast, cavernous hall with pillars that soared into a shadowy ceiling, carved with images of serpents locked in eternal struggle.
And in front of him, stretching into the gloom, was a path of jet-black tiles, each one gleaming like a shard of obsidian. At the end of that path, on a throne carved from a single, massive raven skull, sat a figure.
As Long Huang's eyes landed upon the being, his body began to shake uncontrollably, his breathing ragged, and his heart sounded like it was beating in his head.
It was a man, or something that resembled a man. Clad in robes of profound black that seemed to drink the light from the room. His features were sharp and ageless, his skin ebony, and his beast-like eyes shone like a distant gleam of ancient stars.
A simple, dark crown rested on his head as he held a scythe of polished bone. His presence was a weight, pressing down on Long Huang's soul, demanding reverence, demanding fear.
"You're awake."
The voice was not loud, yet it filled the entire hall. Long Huang stared, his mind reeling, trying to process everything. "Where... where am I? Who are you? No, what are you? The explosion... didn't I di...."
The being on the throne tilted its head, responding as if it knew Long Huang's thoughts.
"Yes, you are dead."
"Your cries of regret were the last echoes of life."
The finality of the words crashed down on Long Huang. This was real. The being's starlit eyes peering into him.
"Long Huang. Your life was brief, a flicker. Your record is... unremarkable. Neither great sin nor great virtue marks your name."
"Now, a new life, with no memory of this one, to begin the cycle anew."
Reincarnation? To forget everything? The regret he felt in his final moments surged back, 'I haven't even begun living.'
"No."
The word was a ragged whisper filled with bitterness as it echoed in the silent hall. The being hummed slightly, amused at his answer.
"No?"
"Haha"
"You, a mere mortal, dare refuse the celestial cycle!!!"
Hearing this, Long Huang staggered to his feet. His legs trembled, but his voice grew stronger, fueled by a defiant will that had survived even death itself.
"I can't accept that," he said, his gaze locked on the being.
"It can't end like this. I had... things I needed to do. A life I needed to live."
"The dead do not make demands," the being said, his voice a low thunder.
"The path is set. Your fate is sealed."
"FUCK FATE!"
As he spoke, a faint, almost imperceptible tremor ran through the realm. A hairline crack, no wider than a thread, appeared on one of the massive fangs. In the profound stillness of the court, the sound of splintering bone was as sharp as another explosion.
Boom!!!
" Demon bastard, you dare!" the being shouted, its voice filled with anger that shook the hall and even the void itself.
"Thank me later."
Those were the last words Long Huang heard before being sucked into the rift. He felt that the voice was strangely familiar, but that was a story for another time.
13 years later....
"Hugh! This is life."
It was late at night, the moon and the stars hung low, illuminating the misty western mountains. The scene was a breathtaking mixture of beauty and tranquility that enveloped the landscape, free from the presence of humans.
Except for one- a boy lying on the grass, lost in thought, as he gazed at the vast night sky. This boy had striking features and long, raven-black hair; he appeared to be 16 or 17 years old, tall and a bit muscular, but in reality, he was just a 13-year-old.
That boy's name is Long Huang.
In a twist of fate, a sudden building collapse claimed his life. Upon awakening, he felt he had forgotten something important, but he didn't linger too long on that, as something more pressing was a foot. He was reborn into the body of an infant who was abandoned.
Thirteen years had passed since Long Huang was reborn in this new world. Throughout the years growing up, he found out that this world was vastly different from his own, but similar in some aspects.
He even found out he was on the Eastern Sun Continent, in the North-Northwestern Province, in a city called Blossom City.
A city nestled in a protective mountain range on the border of two powerful kingdoms, it was a place of beauty, but beneath its surface, it was far more dangerous than its citizens ever realized, rife with schemes with the Azure Lotus Sect at its center like a venomous spider in a web.
The thing Long Huang mostly pondered about was why he had no true family, and why did he always ended up alone.
Even in this beautiful moment, he couldn't rid himself of these thoughts.
"Am I really that unwanted to be abandoned in both worlds?"
The sting of abandonment felt familiar.
Long Huang sighed, memories washing over him like the gentle night breeze. Memories of a rainy day that soaked through clothes, leaving the streets shimmering.
Young Long Huang, around six years old, stood alone at the school gate, watching as other children rushed to their waiting parents, their laughter echoing in the air.
His small hand clutched tightly to his drenched backpack while the rain became a curtain, isolating him from the warmth and safety others embraced. That day, he had walked back to the orphanage alone, his tiny shoes splashing through puddles, feeling utterly invisible in a world filled with love he couldn't touch.
And now, even in this new world, he again felt the sharp edge of solitude, left at the entrance of the sect, a child without a family once more.
It would not be right to call him an orphan, for he hadn't always been truly alone. But for the past two years, he had lived in solitude near the sect in the western mountains. He didn't have many friends, and the reason was as simple as it was cruel: he was born with a disease.
A physician had coldly informed him that he would not live past the age of sixteen unless he could cultivate to the peak of the Body Tempering realm.
Hearing that verdict, a young Long Huang felt his fate was sealed once more. He had cried for days, the bitter words a mantra of despair:,
"I'm cursed, there's no other explanation."
The path before him was impossibly steep. The stages of cultivation were a brutal ladder: the Body Tempering realm contained the skin, meridians, bones, blood, and viscera tempering realms. Followed by the Qi Converging, Qi Condensing, and Profound Xiantian Origin Realm, and higher realms beyond.
The strongest experts of Blossom City were in the Profound Xiantian Origin Realm, and they were all individuals in their fifties who had cultivated for decades.
And cultivating from the Skin Tempering Realm to the Peak of the Viscera Tempering Realm usually took 6 years without external help, but 4 years with, and only 3 years with help for those geniuses.
So it was nigh impossible for him.
Long Huang knew this, and with such little time to live, he isolated himself to avoid any attachment to the world since he wasn't from it in the first place. But he still hoped to be one of those geniuses to survive, because even though he had already died before and felt nothing towards death, he wanted to live.
So he spent most of his days training in calisthenics at the abandoned training ground because even if he wasn't a genius, he would work extra hard to make up for the lack of talent.
"Can't have bad thoughts if you're exercising now, can you?"
He said to himself as he started his usual calisthenics routine. Long Huang continued his practice for two hours. Sweat dripping from his body, lying on the cold training ground floor, he looked towards the night sky and mumbled to himself,
Fww!
"If only I had a camera to capture these scenes."
He stopped and went towards a modern-type tiny house not too far from the training ground. At this moment, Long Huang heard footsteps coming from the direction he was headed. Not startled by the fact that someone came to this remote mountain.
Long Huang continued walking because he knew who it was without even looking, and sure enough, as he guessed, a tender childlike voice cried out,
"Junior Brother, my dad is looking for you."