In the Prison of Shadows, Ouyang and the others stepped out of the black sphere like ink from a well, and ran headlong into the guardian like a wall of steel.

“You dare break into a prison to steal a man,” the blue-clad guardian said, voice cold as river water, long sword steady as a winter branch.

“You really don’t put this warden in your eyes,” he added, his face sealed in armor like a moon behind clouds, his emotion unreadable as stone.

“Sigh, hey, you,” Ouyang muttered, voice a reed-whisper in the dark wind, “didn’t you say you’d turned their clan, Wutong?

“Why does he look nothing like our man?” He held back like a hunter under a storm, not wanting to clash with a Demigod.

Wutong and Ouyang kept their mouths shut like clams at low tide, but Kooson sidled up with a grin, lively as a stray dog wagging its tail.

“Hey, brother, heard of the legendary Lord Kooson?” he chattered, words flowing like a brook that never freezes. “We’re all family here, let’s do proper introductions.”

Ouyang went speechless, his sigh drifting like smoke against a cold sky.

That guy’s second persona loved to boast and never stopped, a drumline that pounded day and night without rest.

Give him any breathing creature, and he’d talk three days and nights, topics unfurling like a river that never loops back.

That frightening talent made Kooson feared in Demon King circles, his name buzzing like a mosquito you can’t swat.

“Family?” The guardian lifted his blue helmet like lifting the lid off the night, revealing a handsome face and short black hair bright as wet ink.

Wutong tugged Ouyang aside, their steps light as shadows, his whisper dry as old parchment. “That ‘turning’ I mentioned was many years ago.

“Those old fossils have died like leaves, and this generation doesn’t owe us a grain of rice.”

Ouyang finally got it, the truth clicking like a lock — Wutong had bought off guardians ages ago, and time had buried those coins under snow.

A bribe to a city lord ten years back turns to dead leaves; ten years later, a new tree stands and doesn’t care.

Ouyang and Wutong glanced at Kooson chatting away, and a helplessness rolled in like fog over a still pond.

The guardian noticed them and made an ancient gesture, stars-and-dust precise, a rite Ouyang had only seen in chronicles like pressed flowers.

“This sir who can be male or female should be the ally our ancestors spoke of, right?” the guardian said, solemn as a stone gate.

Ouyang nearly burst out laughing, breath popping like a cork; in the Nightfall Clan’s eyes, this person still sat between phases like a half moon.

A normal person would flare like dry tinder, but Wutong was an exception; he nodded with pride glowing like lacquer.

“As the perfect lifeform, even drifting years can’t bury my light,” he said, voice ringing like a bronze bell.

After a round of probing, Ouyang understood their choice, the picture clearing like mist lifting from a pond.

The Nightfall Clan had no road left, their population problem a guttering wick in a winter lantern.

All told, including the so-called guardian, Yiyue Qianliu, their entire clan numbered three, three stars in an empty sky.

“Maybe our forebears saw something,” Qianliu said, his breath steady as a mountain stream. “In the Eighth Era, before the end, they left a hand-written edict.

“When Mr. Wutong appears again, we must keep the ancient pact,” he said, words falling like pebbles into a deep well.

“Where are the rest of your people?” Ouyang asked, heart tight as a fist. “Not even one immortal?

“You were once an imperial house ruling the Myriad Worlds, yet only three remain?” His shock flared like lightning behind cloud.

Yiyue Qianliu shook his head, a slow sway like a pine in wind, neither denying nor confirming.

“Our masters went to war with His Majesty at the Domain Gate long ago, and never came back, like ships swallowed by night seas.

“The remaining sparks did reach the god-thrones, but each vanished without exception, like candles snuffed by the same cold wind.

“Before they disappeared, they left the same message carved like knife-marks on bone: hide.

“Unless we gain power to rival a Creator God, no Demigod in the clan may take that step.”

Ouyang smelled conspiracy like smoke that won’t wash out; someone had cast a net for the Nightfall Clan in dark waters.

The so-called Creator God had two names: the common tongue called it creation-class, the academic name was Realm God, the god of worlds.

To stand against a Creator God was a mountain beyond the clouds, both absurd and almost impossible, a horizon that keeps walking away.

Such a being was law made flesh, order in a robe; even at his peak, Ouyang hadn’t reached that summit beyond ice.

Even Kooson fell silent, his face heavy as a storm stone, the drumbeat of his tongue gone still.

Wutong thought a moment, then thumped his chest like striking iron. “A mere Realm God?

“Relax. Give me a few hundred thousand years, and I’ll climb to that height,” he said, eyes sharp as a hawk.

Ouyang couldn’t argue; he’d witnessed Wutong’s talent, a seed that sprouted even in frost.

Without the curse, the man wouldn’t have sunk so low, and now, unbound, he might truly grow a forest given time.

“But… a few hundred thousand years?” Ouyang’s mouth twitched like a line snagged on a rock. “Do we have that?

“Counting out my sealed years, the time I actually lived doesn’t even reach ten thousand,” he said, bitter as sea brine.

Wutong waved him off like batting a gnat, his eyes already on tomorrow’s line of hills.

“In short, our enemy could be a Creator God, and our strength is clearly shallow water.

“Unless we gather the top ten seats of the Demon King Council, we drown.

“So the task now is to free the Demon Kings scattered everywhere and braid our strength like ropes.”

Kooson let out a laugh like thunder rolling off cliff faces. “Ha!

“Let the age of Demon Kings fall again… wait, wait for me!”

Ouyang and Wutong took leave of Yiyue Qianliu, their bows brief as passing shadows, the plan set like stakes in earth.

Qianliu believed their bloodline bore a mark, an ink-seal in the vein, so the Prison of Shadows was safest ash.

When the Demon Kings broke their seals, he’d lead out the last ember of his clan like a shepherd at dawn.

On the clock tower, Ouyang propped his chin, thoughts circling like ravens in a gray sky, gears ticking like cold teeth.

After a while he said to Wutong, his voice low as a night stream, “You move alone.

“Me and the big lug still have business to handle.”

Wutong nodded, chin tilted like a swan, his disdain neat as frost on glass.

“Stay around you foolish creatures too long and my IQ nosedives,” he said, stroking his hair tips like silk, ready to leave.

“Hold up,” Ouyang called, voice cutting the air like a thrown pebble, and a tattered Oil Paper Umbrella bloomed in his hand like a withered lotus.

“Take this as protection. I know your wisdom crowns the world, but your weak spot is painfully obvious,” he said, half a smile, half a sigh.

Wutong neither refused nor accepted at once, his gaze calm as a still lake watching the moon.

Just as Ouyang wondered why, Wutong smiled, and for a heartbeat the night brightened like dawn on an ink-black sea.

He took the umbrella, eyes tracing its scars like old riverbeds, searching the age in its weathered skin.

“An item of that legendary His Majesty,” he said softly, voice like a flute in fog. “Only you, heir to the Other Shore, would be this generous.”

He set the umbrella on his shoulder and leapt from the clock tower, light as a drifting petal, cloak flaring like a crow’s wing.

Ouyang felt the umbrella had a thread to Wutong, a knot tied somewhere in old time, but the man wasn’t talking, and Ouyang wouldn’t force it.

Back when he met Wutong, the man had tangled himself around Ouyang because of that umbrella, a moth orbiting a lantern.

About the umbrella, Ouyang knew little; only that it was ancient, a road paved back to a far era under cold stars.

Its master was said to be a being who played a hymn, a true name unspeakable, a thunder kept sealed in a jar.

All that now felt far from him, constellations beyond his reach, light across a dark sea.

“Let’s go,” he said, breath misting like smoke. “I’m guessing that low-IQ Blair will cover for us.

“But if those two girls really go check the ‘Confinement Room,’ they’ll see the footprints.

“Better we get back early.”

Ouyang grabbed Kooson and leapt, a whoosh like a hawk diving, the city under them a chessboard of cold slate.

“Boss Ouyang, I’m afraid of heights!” Kooson howled, his voice fluttering like a torn flag, but Ouyang didn’t care.

Midair, he hauled Kooson close and shoved him beneath like sliding a shield under a falling stone.

Thud — they hit, earth booming like a drum, dust jumping like startled sparrows.

With Kooson as the meat cushion, Ouyang was fine, just a little dizzy, his vision wobbling like heat-haze.

Kooson was fine too; he was a Demon King, and life at that tier didn’t bruise for such trifles.

“So what was the point of that?” Kooson asked, shock rinsing him like cold rain, his honest persona back in place.

Ouyang wouldn’t admit it was reflex, a habit carved like grooves in an old stair.

He’d made a small art of tripping his own people, and in that instant his body just did it, quick as a fox.

“Sorry,” he said, wry as bitter tea. “Those shameless guys back then rubbed off on me too deep.

“Now it’s a stain I can’t wash out.”