A mound of yellow earth, a thousand years of green mountains

[…Yun Yao.]

[When the matters here are finished, shall we go back to Qianyuan together… okay?]

In the chaotic darkness, watching that white-clad figure drift further and further away—beyond reach, dissolving like melting snow—Yun Yao lunged forward with a startled cry:

“Mu Hanyuan!!”

She sat up abruptly from the couch.

The daylight before her eyes was so bright it startled her. Having not seen the sun in the Immortal Court for so long, Yun Yao felt for a moment as if she had fallen into a dream, unsure of where she was.

She only remembered that in the final moments before losing consciousness, the Universe Primordial Array had opened, and the power of the End had finally begun to dissipate.

Then she should be… dead, right?

And where was this?

“Ah! You’re awake!”

From behind a screen some distance from the couch, Yun Qiao—the little maid of the Fate Palace whom she hadn’t seen in days—ran toward her with a face full of surprise, stumbling in her haste. “Immortal Lord Green Wood was right—you really are awake!”

Yun Yao stared at her blankly.

She remembered clearly that Yun Qiao had been eroded by the power of the End and turned into a fallen immortal. How was she standing here perfectly fine?

Just as Yun Yao looked down at her own hands, almost wondering if she had returned to a previous point in time.

“Ah, I’ve overstepped,” Yun Qiao said, seeing no reaction as she reached the bedside. She sheepishly lowered her hands, her disappointment unable to hide the joy that brought her to the verge of tears. “Immortal maid Yun Qiao of the Fate Palace congratulates the Saint Origin on her awakening and return to the Immortal Court.”

“—Are you truly Yun Qiao?”

Yun Yao felt her heart being yanked upward. She hurriedly turned her head. “The power of the End… has it been eliminated?”

“Rest assured, Your Holiness. Under the Universe Primordial Array, the power of the End was completely cleansed within three days.”

“The fallen immortals… are they all alright?”

“Yes, we are all fine,” Yun Qiao smiled bashfully. “It’s just that we don’t remember anything from the time we were fallen. Immortal Lord Green Wood said the Demon Lord of the End erased our memories.”

“…”

Yun Yao’s eyes grew moist, and she could barely control her voice. “Then… what about him? Since you are all fine, then he… he must…”

“Congratulations, Your Holiness.”

Yun Qiao knelt, offering her greetings with irrepressible joy. “The Demon Lord of the End has been eradicated; the three realms no longer have any lurking threats.”

It was as if a bolt of lightning had struck, splitting heaven and earth.

Yun Yao’s uplifted heart plummeted heavily.

“No, impossible. The power of the End exceeded the Three Saints; there is no way he could have died just like that…”

Regaining her senses, Yun Yao frantically threw off the thin quilt and ran barefoot across the floor.

Yun Qiao froze in place, her joy turning to panic.

She turned her head and shouted, “Your Holiness! Though your soul is intact, you have exhausted yourself too much! Immortal Lord Green Wood said you must rest for a hundred years—”

By the time she finished shouting, Yun Yao had already run from the inner hall to the outer hall.

Oh, this was the Origin Divine Palace.

She remembered now.

This was where she had bidden farewell to Mu Hanyuan.

Yun Yao’s barefoot steps gradually slowed as her gaze, vacant and grief-stricken, swept over the vast, empty hall.

Until, behind a curtain not far away, by a couch, a silhouette seemed to flicker.

“Mu Hanyuan…?”

As if afraid of shattering that shadow, Yun Yao’s voice trembled as she cautiously moved around the curtain.

However, before she could see clearly.

The person had already turned around, taking a step forward and speaking coldly and calmly: “Greetings, Saint Origin.”

“…Immortal Lord Green Wood.”

At the moment she answered, Yun Yao also saw the couch behind him.

A figure lay there.

Like jade, like snow, like frost.

Snow-white hair spread across the couch. It seemed as if all the blood in his body had drained away; his entire being was a chilling white, translucent as water.

It felt as if, in the next moment, he would dissipate into the desolation of this palace.

The last ounce of strength supporting Yun Yao was drained away. She stumbled forward, clutching the edge of the couch, and collapsed beside him.

“Mu Hanyuan… Mu Hanyuan? Open your eyes…”

Tears surged out uncontrollably. Yun Yao’s voice was broken by sobs. She raised her hand, wanting to touch his face, but didn’t dare to make contact.

“Open your eyes… Have you forgotten? You said we would… would go back to Qianyuan together… You can’t forget what you said… Mu Hanyuan—”

Yun Yao’s fingertips finally touched him.

Ice cold.

Colder than the Heavenly Cold Jade atop the Ninth Heaven.

And Yun Yao could perceive it—this shell beneath her fingertips was already dead, empty.

Not a trace of soul or life force remained.

“The Saint Origin need not persist further.”

Immortal Lord Green Wood spoke slowly behind her.

“You likely do not know that on the Heaven-Peering Stone, the original ending was for the power of the End to be eliminated, with Origin dying and the End surviving. The End was to take over as the new Origin—the way of Heaven is a cycle, endless and ever-renewing—that was the intent of the Heavenly Dao.”

Those words had to be pieced together countless times before they could enter her ears.

Yun Yao gripped Mu Hanyuan’s already cold hand, her eyes rimmed with red from suffocation as she looked back. “Then why is it like this?! I was the one who died, and I was the one who sacrificed to the Universe Primordial Array! Why is he the one lying here!?”

Immortal Lord Green Wood looked at her silently.

Yun Yao froze.

She looked back in disbelief at the space between their joined wrists.

The Soul Pact.

The technique he said he had created himself… he said it was only for communicating thoughts and linking the five senses…

The golden soul chain tied to their souls was gone.

“The Demon Lord of the End extracted his own five senses and used the Soul Pact to swap places with you, deceiving the Heavenly Dao.”

Immortal Lord Green Wood’s every word was heavy and stern—

“When you sacrificed yourself to the Universe Primordial Array to perish with the power of the End, what was actually drained and exhausted was his soul and life force.”

“The array was successful. The End is dead.”

“…”

“The Demon Lord said that he did not believe in fate. This was the end he chose for himself and the Heavenly Dao. It has nothing to do with you.”

“…”

Under the weight of Green Wood’s words, Yun Yao slumped down, clutching Mu Hanyuan’s cold hand, her body trembling uncontrollably.

She wanted to say something, but her internal organs felt as if they were being churned with pain. She glared at the person on the couch with resentful, tear-blurred eyes, opening her mouth, but not a single word or sound would come out.

“The end is decided,” Immortal Lord Green Wood finally sighed, lowering his head. “Saint Origin, please restrain your grief.”

BOOM!

An earth-shattering sound erupted.

The entire Origin Divine Palace seemed to shake slightly.

Immortal Lord Green Wood frowned and looked back, yet he did not seem surprised.

At that moment, an immortal lord came running in from outside. Before even reaching the center of the hall, he shouted in a panic-stricken voice, “Immortal Lord Green Wood! The immortals of the various palaces can no longer hold back Saint Lord Calamity! When will the Saint Origin—”

The word “awaken” never left his mouth.

The immortal lord saw Yun Yao looking back, the golden butterfly divine mark on her brow prominent. He stumbled in a panic and knelt where he stood. “Saint Origin! Excellent, you are truly awake—you must go to the Ninth Heaven and see! Saint Lord Calamity has… has fallen into demonic possession!”

Calamity.

Yun Yao’s wavering gaze slowly grew still and cold.

She turned back, lightly brushing the snow-white hair at the temple of the person on the couch, her voice as soft as if she were afraid of waking him: “Wait for me. I’ll finish dealing with those matters and come back quickly.”

Yun Yao let go of his hand and stood up, swaying slightly.

Immortal Lord Green Wood stepped across, blocking her path. “Though the Saint Origin had her life saved by the Soul Pact, your soul was still wounded after passing through the power of the Heavenly Dao. You must not move recklessly.”

Yun Yao stared at him intently. “You want to stop me?”

In that instant, within the Immortal Court, the Saint Origin—known by all eight Divine Lords for being gentle and carefree—had eyes that seemed to hold a gathering thunderstorm.

Immortal Lord Green Wood stared back for two breaths before yielding his gaze and stepping aside.

Without another glance at him, Yun Yao walked coldly toward the exit.

Until Immortal Lord Green Wood’s voice came from behind: “I only wished to remind Your Holiness—the life he sacrificed his own to obtain… I hope you cherish it.”

Yun Yao stood at the palace gate for a long time before finally stepping out.

The Ninth Heaven. Thunder was crashing.

When Yun Yao arrived, she saw that of the nine jade columns that connected to the heavens, half of one had been shattered. This was clearly the source of the tremors she had felt in the Origin Divine Palace.

Amidst the scattered and disheveled immortals, Calamity’s hair was a mess and his expression was manic. He had indeed lost every bit of his usual solemn dignity.

Furthermore, Yun Yao saw him clutching something in his hand.

It looked like a piece of stone.

“…Heavenly Dao! How could you be so unfair!!”

Waving the stone tightly gripped in his hand, Calamity pointed fiercely toward the chaotic firmament hidden above the jade columns. The veins on his neck bulged like gnarled, twisting dragons.

He was surrounded by the power of Heavenly Punishment, making it agonizing for the encircling immortals to resist.

“Why? Why is it that only they can be the head of the Three Saints!! Father God… hahaha… Father God! Even you were partial to Origin!! Clearly, I am the strongest—clearly, it is me!! I waited for tens of thousands of years… to finally get this chance… Why, why is it that even a lowly demon can be ordained by the Heavenly Dao to succeed the seat of the Saint Head!?”

Yun Yao dismissed the immortals behind her.

At the moment she faced Calamity, she finally saw clearly.

What he held in his hand was indeed a piece of stone.

Specifically, it was the Heaven-Peering Stone that should have been suspended high above the Ninth Heaven, hidden within that chaotic firmament.

“Origin, you’ve finally come.”

The moment they faced each other, Calamity recognized Yun Yao.

He turned around, and the lightning power behind him grew even more frenzied, nearly tearing countless holes in the Ninth Heaven.

The columns were linked to the very foundation of the Immortal Court; if something happened here, the three realms would suffer.

…There was no room to hold back.

Yun Yao’s expression turned cold and somber. “For the sake of Father God, I have tolerated you again and again, but that is not a license for you to bring calamity to the Immortal Court. If you do not want tens of thousands of years of cultivation destroyed in an instant, put down the Heaven-Peering Stone immediately and go to Father God’s tomb to confess your sins.”

“—Laughable! Who is letting whom go!?”

“Hahahaha—” Calamity was evidently possessed, staring at Yun Yao with a cold, sharp expression. “In the past, I left your immortal essence intact only because I was waiting for you to fulfill the Heavenly Dao’s… I just never expected that the Heavenly Dao would even hide it from me… wanting to raise that lowly demon as the new head of the Three Saints!? Since that’s the case, since that’s the case…”

He gripped the Heaven-Peering Stone with all his might, finally shattering it with the power of lightning, turning it into black and gold powder that flowed from his fingers.

He slowly turned his head back, looking at Yun Yao with a manic gaze.

“I have no need to keep you either. If the Heavenly Dao will not choose me as the Saint Head, then I shall simply kill everyone in this Immortal Court—”

“Calamity, you truly have fallen into madness completely.”

“So what!?”

Calamity laughed toward the sky, his veins bulging like blood-red lines.

“I govern the sins and punishments of the three realms; I am the Saint of combat in this Immortal Court! If it weren’t for me strictly following the Heavenly Dao all these years and not creating slaughter—you! And Transcendence! Which of you is my match?!”

Before his voice could fade, a bolt of lightning that horrified all the immortals erupted from his hands. Like a lightning dragon or a thunder serpent, it lunged ferociously toward Yun Yao.

“Saint Origin!”

“Look out!!”

“Your Holiness—”

The power of Heavenly Punishment was naturally suppressive toward immortal essence. For immortals, it was the most terrifying existence in the three realms. This bolt of punishment lightning, carrying the intent of extinction, left the immortals behind Yun Yao in utter despair.

However, Yun Yao did not take a single step back.

She stood right before that sea of lightning that threatened to swallow her and the world together.

She slowly raised her cloud-patterned sleeve and clenched her fingers.

Boom!

Boom!

Boom—

Nine successive thunderous sounds rang out. After each one, a golden sword phantom, as if piercing through heaven and earth, emerged from the nine jade columns surrounding the Ninth Heaven.

After the nine sounds.

The nine swords of the Heavenly Dao seemed to support the sky and the earth, their aura overwhelming.

Among them, the shortest light sword leaped out, stabbing toward the space before Yun Yao.

And that sea of sin-and-punishment power formed from lightning instantly became like a fragile sheet of paper, slowly tearing open before Yun Yao.

Behind the annihilated power of punishment, Calamity’s expression of disbelief and shock was revealed. “How… possible… I, I should be the Saint of combat in the Immortal Court… no, impossible… it must be the Heavenly Dao! It’s Father God! They are partial to you!!!”

Seeing Calamity gather the power of Heavenly Punishment again and lunging forward manically, Yun Yao raised her hand once more.

Stronger than the weakest one just now, the second-to-last golden sword phantom from the jade columns slashed down toward Calamity—

BOOM—!

The nine heavens shook together as dust billowed.

With one sword strike, Calamity was knocked down one level of heaven.

However, it was not over.

The second sword.

The third sword.

The fourth sword…

After eight swords, Calamity fell beneath the Ninth Heaven. His green robes were stained blood-red, and beneath his tattered clothes, his holy body was scorched and seared by the sword energy.

In the past, not a speck of dust touched his clothes; now, he lay pathetically in the dust beneath the Ninth Heaven.

He propped himself up, coughing blood as he looked up with hatred—

Above him, the Ninth Heaven was majestic and remote, out of reach.

Yun Yao also descended from the Ninth Heaven, landing before him. “In the way of combat, I do not show off because I do not wish to compete with you, but that does not mean I am inferior to you.”

Nine golden sword phantoms circled around her, awe-inspiring and inviolable.

“Inferior… I am inferior to you…”

His voice dropped.

Looking at the sword phantoms around her, Calamity laughed tragically. “Good, very good… Sure enough, from beginning to end, you, the Saint Origin, have always been the head of the Three Saints…”

Yun Yao frowned slightly, about to step forward.

Suddenly, Calamity shouted sharply: “I am inferior to you—”

“SO WHAT!?”

He suddenly crushed the lightning power in his hand. “Even if I am defeated today, you cannot save them—just watch… see how many people in your most pitied three realms will be buried with me!!”

A sound like the heavens tearing apart came from above.

Yun Yao’s expression changed drastically.

She looked up—

In the nine jade columns atop the firmament, the lightning power from the half-shattered column that Calamity had struck earlier suddenly erupted into a sea of light, threatening to swallow the entire column in an instant.

If even one of those nine jade columns were to break, not only would the Immortal Court be shaken, but the three thousand realms would surely be lost!

Yun Yao surged upward, turning into a streak of light, the nine sword phantoms following behind her straight into the firmament.

However, the lightning power was a moment ahead of her.

Seeing the column about to collapse—

Whish.

A holy throne phantom suddenly preceded Yun Yao, supporting the ninth jade column.

Yun Yao struck out without hesitation toward the lightning power that had been briefly stalled by the throne, pressing down heavily and using her immortal power to forcibly constrain it, condensing the bolt into a sphere of punishment lightning in her palm.

Ensuring the column was safe, Yun Yao turned back to look at where the holy throne had come from.

A figure appeared gracefully before the immortals.

Yun Yao saw the person, and the sharp killing intent in her brow softened slightly.

From beneath the Ninth Heaven, Calamity’s shrill, unwilling voice echoed—

“TRANSCENDENCE!!”

In the silence.

The immortals behind that person snapped back to their senses and knelt in greeting. “We welcome the return of Saint Lord Transcendence to the Immortal Court!”

“Welcome, Saint Lord Transcendence—”

Amidst the clamor, Transcendence raised a hand to Yun Yao with some helplessness. “How is it? I just woke up from the mortal world upon receiving your divine message. I’m not too late, am I?”

“Neither early nor late, it’s just the right time.”

Yun Yao smiled faintly.

But in the next second, without looking back, she threw a sword phantom down toward the Ninth Heaven—

SHING!!

The golden sword phantom pinned the fleeing Calamity firmly to the spot.

Simultaneously, a cold holy voice resounded throughout the Immortal Court:

“Calamity, for your own selfish desires, you have offended the Immortal Court and oppressed all living beings. As a Saint Lord, you viewed the sentient beings of the three realms as mere ants. Your sins—Pride, Greed, Envy, and Wrath—are unforgivable.”

“In the name of the Heavenly Dao, I strip you of your immortal essence and shatter your divine marks!”

“I sentence you to undergo tribulations for ten thousand lifetimes, tasting every pain of the mortal world, so that you may know the suffering of the common people!!”

The golden holy voice spread throughout the Immortal Court. Beneath its power, the former Saint Lord Calamity’s cries of agony and shrill screams echoed through the nine heavens until they fell silent.

The eight directions fell into total stillness.

Once the immortals, under Transcendence’s arrangement, withdrew from the Ninth Heaven—sending the unconscious Calamity to the Pool of Reincarnation along the way—Transcendence returned, sighing with a bit of a headache. “Dear me, dear me. I’ve only just come back, and already there’s such a massive mess.”

“Perhaps it’s because you’ve been idle for too long these past years.”

Yun Yao withdrew her gaze from Calamity’s receding figure and mocked herself. “I am the same.”

“Fine, consider it as me coming back to pay a debt,” Transcendence turned slightly serious. “The holy seat of Calamity is now vacant. How shall it be handled? There must be a Saint Lord in the Immortal Court to govern sin and punishment.”

“Let it wait for a future day. As long as the holy seat remains, who’s to say when a new one might appear…”

Yun Yao didn’t know where she was looking as her voice fell silent.

Transcendence followed her gaze.

He saw that between the jade columns of the Ninth Heaven, countless flecks of black and gold powder were slowly rising into the air, finally condensing into a giant stone that propped up the broken ninth column.

“Is that… the Heaven-Peering Stone?” Transcendence asked uncertainly.

“Yes,” Yun Yao said with a complex expression, “Calamity crushed it.”

“Heh. Something left by the Heavenly Dao isn’t that easily broken.”

Transcendence was about to say something, whether in mockery or self-deprecation, when he saw Yun Yao staring unblinkingly at the Heaven-Peering Stone.

Suddenly, her eyes began to rim with red.

Transcendence was stunned. “Don’t scare me. What does it say up there?”

As he spoke, Transcendence looked back.

He saw that on the newly reconsolidated Heaven-Peering Stone, four lines of golden characters were originally imprinted:

[Immortal Court Year 76,372, Era of Records: The Saint Origin, to protect the sentient beings of the three realms, perishes together with the power of the End.]

[The Demon crosses over to become a Saint.]

[The End is the new Origin.]

[The way of Heaven is a cycle, endless and ever-renewing.]

Transcendence’s expression changed, and he was about to speak in question.

However, he saw those four lines, at that very moment, being forcibly erased by an invisible force and replaced by three new lines:

[Immortal Court Year 76,372, Era of Records: The Saint Origin, to protect the sentient beings of the three realms, perishes together with the power of the End.]

[However, the Demon Lord of the End, using the Soul Pact, performed an act against heaven. Substituting for Origin, he sacrificed his soul, severed his five senses, and exhausted his life force to perish together with the power of the End.]

[The Demon crosses over to become a Saint.]