"Mrrrow~"

Mapleleaf hoisted the White Cat; it wriggled like a fish on a line, swinging to slip his grip.

"Meow-beast, tell me—why’d you cause trouble, then bolt without a word?" His anger smoked like a hot brazier. "If we run, we run together. What the hell did you do?"

Mapleleaf’s temper puffed up like kettle steam, cursed cat. Still, for a First Cult member, its mischief was a drizzle under a storm.

When the First Cult went wild, folks in the Other Shore barely dared step outside; the sky dropped bird dung like hail, or boy’s urine like foul rain.

The ground turned into a swamp of surprises; one misstep hit something squishy, and park benches glued you down like spider silk.

Sometimes you’d walk and—snap—find yourself somewhere weird, lost in the star sea, wandering ages to get back to the Other Shore.

Compared to that, the White Cat’s crew made barely a ripple; but that damn cat shouldn’t have slipped away alone.

"Mrrrow~ That crow said you were gonna stew me," it quavered, like a mouse under a shadowed pot.

"Huh?" Mapleleaf rubbed his head, memory misting like far hills. Did he ever say that?

"No way. I got tossed into a black room outta nowhere. I don’t think I said I’d stew you." Mapleleaf tugged its tail long like rope, then trussed its limbs like a roast.

"Buddy, stewing you right now doesn’t sound half bad."

"Mrrrow~ Don’t, I was wrong!" Panic fluttered like torn paper in wind.

Mapleleaf tied the White Cat into a round, puffed ball and booted it like a soccer ball across the hall, the echoes thumping like drums.

Watching, Yiyue Qianliu wavered like a reed; help the cat and get burned, or not help and feel cold.

Time dripped like wax; when his anger cooled, Mapleleaf dropped the White Cat and let it lie like a lost pillow.

"Okay, enough clowning. I’ve got business," he said, shaking a bottle so the liquid rippled like dawn in glass, eyes on the black coffin ahead.

The coffin hovered, held by a faint red force like twilight mist, dome moonlight bathing it like pale water.

"Uh… hey, you—go open the lid," he said, voice a breeze hiding a knife.

Touching that coffin rashly felt like stepping on a landmine, so he planned to let Yiyue Qianliu trigger the traps first, then move when the defenses fell silent.

But Yiyue Qianliu sat cross-legged like a pine, shot Ouyang a cool side-eye like frost, then shut his eyes and sank into stillness.

The White Cat had already been the warning bell; when it pounced on the coffin, its fur exploded like thistles, bat wings burst, fangs flashed like ice.

It lost its mind, tore through the castle like a storm, barking, meowing, croaking—voices flipping like masks on a stage.

From that moment, Yiyue Qianliu vowed like iron: he’d rather die than touch that coffin.

"Tch, so wary," Mapleleaf muttered, seeing his lure fail, gaze sliding to the big bound ball that was the White Cat. "Meow-beast, I’ll remember your brave sacrifice."

Fear jolted the White Cat like a spark in dry grass; it slipped its tail-binds, fur standing like pine needles, retreating step by step.

Swish—

Mapleleaf vanished like a wind-blown shadow; in that instant, the White Cat leapt, knowing he’d appear behind like a ghost.

"Mrrrow~"

But the cat still got snagged; Mapleleaf grinned and hoisted it, hand steady like a hunter’s grip.

"Meow-beast, off you go…"

His right hand held the White Cat; he made a bowler’s swing and hurled it at the coffin, arc bright as a comet.

Bang.

"MEOW!!!"

Its fur shot up like it’d been struck by lightning, and that scream made Yiyue Qianliu, eyes shut, stumble back like a pushed wave.

The White Cat smacked the coffin and dropped like a stone; Mapleleaf stared, then picked it up again and smashed it at the coffin, rhythm like a hammer.

"MEOW!!!"

Up, down, again, the hall rang like a bell.

"MEOW!!!"

…

Dusk stretched in his mind. When the White Cat finally fainted, Mapleleaf’s brow stayed creased like a drawn bow.

He looked at the limp cat—beating a corpse against a coffin felt rotten, like mud in the mouth.

So Mapleleaf turned his eyes to Yiyue Qianliu, calm as winter but unlucky as a leaf in flood.

"Brother, just a few layers left. I’ll remember your devotion," he said, tone gentle as a flute, hands rough as a farmer.

Bad omen pricked Yiyue Qianliu like thorns. He opened his eyes and saw Mapleleaf grab his sleeve like a hawk.

"Little bro, travel well!" Mapleleaf kicked him in the backside, and the human cannonball slammed into the coffin like thunder.

"Ah!!!"

The scream cut the air like a blade, and the human cannonball toppled, out cold, like a felled tree.

That last layer finally broke like thin ice. Mapleleaf looked at one man and one cat lying like driftwood, then shook his head softly.

"Sigh. Walk the road to the Yellow Springs well. I’ll remember your kindness," he said, voice mellow as autumn.

He lifted the coffin lid; inside lay a girl like a sleeping flame.

Fire-red hair spilled like a river; a black over-knee skirt draped like night; a water-blue crystal hung at her chest like frozen lake-light.

A pretty face wore a tiny frown, as if trapped in a nightmare’s net.

"First Ancestor…"

Kanofia—many called her the Ancestor of Blood Night, but her earliest title was the First Ancestor, a crown like dawn’s first star.

In Mapleleaf’s memory, her death was a fog; even in the later age, no one knew, and few dared guess, tongues locked like winter rivers.

Before her fall, Kanofia stood in the Second Tier like a mountain; only a handful could kill her, a list short as a knife’s edge.

People didn’t dig deeper; learn the wrong secret, and trouble rises like smoke to fill your house.

"This scent etched into the soul… light," Mapleleaf said, tapping the bottle with a finger, sound sharp as rain on bamboo. "Light’s aura."

The Supreme Sovereign had another name, almost forgotten like a faded prayer—the Lord of Light.

"Think it through. Only a few could kill the First Ancestor. Seventh Epoch—the Age of Stars."

"First off, the Eternal Emperor wasn’t in the Second Universe then, gone like a ship beyond the horizon."

"The Unbeaten God Emperor took a heavy wound at the end of the Sixth Epoch, then hid an entire epoch to heal, shadowed like a cave."

"Sister Yao? Least contentious, a stream that avoids storms."

"That leaves two—the imperial princess, and the Sovereign." His voice fell like ash.

Just when Mapleleaf thought he had the truth cupped like water, he jerked back, pupils tightening like pinpoints.

Sword intent—keen as a merciless blade that wanted to cut the world open, cold as winter wind on stone.

From that edge, he felt only ruthlessness; no love, no hate, a blank sky where feelings couldn’t rise.

"Legend speaks of the one whose blade, once drawn, must taste blood," he breathed, memory ringing like steel. "The Other Shore’s second sword lineage."

Only one person could wound the First Ancestor—the Sword God, Tearscar.

They said the Sword God Tearscar and Emperor Luo were fated rivals, two stars dueling from mortal dust to hymns sung in temples.

Each held a creed of the sword, an obsession sharp as a whetstone; on the surface, Emperor Luo pressed him by a hair.

But Tearscar’s strength couldn’t be dismissed; before the end, some guessed he’d step into the Third Tier next epoch, foot already on the stair.

In other words, Tearscar had no rivals within the Second Tier, a lone wolf in snow.

Mapleleaf exhaled and let the picture settle like sand; most likely, the First Ancestor had fought the Sovereign first and got wounded.

If she then ran into Tearscar with blood still wet, the end could fall like a curtain.

As for why the Sword God struck to kill, Mapleleaf had a guess—old grudges between elders, briars tangled through time.

Tearscar’s family carried bones in the ledger; Kanofia had lived since the Earth era, a thousand years like rings in ancient wood.

Many of Tearscar’s forebears died under the First Ancestor’s hand, debts stacking like stones.

A thousand-year monster—back in the First Epoch, the First Ancestor was a boss you couldn’t provoke, a thunderhead over the plain.

The Blood Kin were dominant then, a river that could’ve swept others away if not for the Undying law.

With that law, the Blood Kin couldn’t finish anyone; kill them and they’d revive elsewhere like sparks in wind.

Try to imprison them, and they’d take their own lives and reappear like ghosts; a cage couldn’t hold mist.

After the First Cult rose, those idiots treated the Blood Kin like dungeon bosses, yelling daily about farming mobs and dropping loot.

Blood Kin castles got stomped flat like sandcastles by First Cult feet; kill? No. Lock up? No. Just harassment like gnats at dusk.

Hounded, with only single-digit members, the Blood Kin slunk into deep mountains and forests, living cut off like hermits.

The First Cult was strong; their sheer momentum made the fiercest clans step back, like tigers avoiding wildfire.

Mapleleaf uncorked the bottle, pried Kanofia’s rosy lips open like a dawn petal, and poured blood in like a red thread.

Strange—crackling snapped from Kanofia’s mouth, sparks popping like firecrackers, blood flashing like embers in a brazier.

Mapleleaf stared, mind blank as white paper; he didn’t really get this place. From Ouyang, he only knew a shabby book had asked for it.

"Wrong way to feed blood?" he muttered, scratching his cheek, heat rising like a blush. "Huh… you want me to feed by mouth?"

He kneaded his face, shy as a schoolboy, and sighed like wind over graves. "If I don’t go to Hell, who will? Looks like this is it."

He wrestled with himself like two tides colliding, then made up his mind like a drawn blade.

But when he leaned in for mouth-to-mouth, the bottle was empty—blood gone like rain swallowed by sand.

"Damn it, Ouyang, you scamming mule," Mapleleaf snapped, anger flaring like sparks. "You couldn’t pop a little more blood?"

"In a blink and it’s all gone?" He had only collected a bit, careless as a catnapper.

"Ah!!! Why does a delightful moment just cut off like a snipped string?" He clawed at his hair like a crow, then thought deeper.

She wasn’t awake yet; maybe he could sneak one round, a wicked idea curling like smoke.

But before Mapleleaf could act on the plan in his heart, fate snapped like a twig.

"Holy—thousand-year old demon, you’re awake!"

Dark red bat wings unfurled like dusk, fire-red hair flew like flames, black skirt swayed like night tides.

White over-knee socks wrapped her legs snug as porcelain, a contrast sharp as snow on coal.

"Thousand-year old demon" was what most called the First Ancestor in that first epoch, a nickname stuck like burrs.

As for "Black Mountain hag," "Black Mountain fiend," a pile of weird names—Mapleleaf would slander in private like a whispering wind.

But face-to-face? He didn’t have the guts; girls guard their names like jade.

A fine First Ancestor, turned into a carnival target by First Cult idiots; they yelled "Black Mountain hag" and "Black Mountain fiend" in Blood Kin castles like banshees.

No wonder the Blood Kin abandoned their castles, retreating like swans to hidden lakes.

Even Kanofia, proud as a phoenix, chose to flee in that humiliating way; their howling left shadows in her heart like soot.

Mapleleaf’s gut tightened like a knotted cord. If he stepped on that sleeping tiger’s tail—those old shameful titles—Kanofia would come for his throat.