“Ouyang, I found you…”

Atop the tallest spire in Laviason, a black cat stared down at a city drowned in ash, the ruins smoldering like a dying sea of embers. A little girl appeared at his side without a sound, a pale smile resting on her lips like a crescent moon.

“Ouyang… why do this? It means nothing.” Her voice was soft, and her breath carried the chill of dusk rain.

Ouyang watched the city crumble in a tide of fire, his back to Saya, his shadow long as a blade. “Hey, Saya, have you guessed?” In his little band, aside from Ouyang who held the whole truth, the only ones likely to uncover it were Saya and Mo Rain.

Saya didn’t need to touch the Philosopher’s Stone; her life-form was strange as fog over a lake. If she chose to read the world, she would find its seams. With the clues she held, she had already seen the scaffolding behind the sky.

“Yeah, I’ve guessed a little. From the time-stamped resonance in that fragment of the Philosopher’s Stone, then cross-checking with the outer star field, the shattering should be at the end of the Sixth Epoch. Of the grand events of that epoch that could break the Stone… there’s only one.”

“No matter what, I’ll back whatever Ouyang does.”

——

Laviason’s ruin shocked countless hearts. A lord-class beast raged through the streets like a storm of tusks, and the fire swept everything clean, old or young, man or woman, all folded into a single red horizon.

Sarayka’s power was undeniable; before the sun dropped, she had burned the city into a field of black bones.

“Why? You demon—why?” Yulithilis, saved only because she’d been hiding among a clutch of cats, pointed at Ouyang with hands that shook like leaves. That black cat—that black demon—was the root of every tragedy. Sarayka was strong, but Laviason was a rich city with many mages like pillars in a hall.

She had watched the grandfather-mage who taught her since childhood rush to stop that lizard, only to be killed by the black cat. Brutally killed—the paw that looked cute as a toy slipped into his chest like an iron thorn. The old mage had no chance to resist; he fell like a candle in wind.

Black has always been an omen, a color of knives in the dark. This cat seemed made to fulfill that omen, a black demon walking. He destroyed the city her father had built stone by stone; he killed everyone in the ducal manor like a scythe through wheat.

She had thought to beg help from the other cats. But…

“Sorry. I can prank him when we’re goofing off, sure. But when it’s serious, I won’t cross him. He’s the First Demon King, after all.”

The one most often at odds with the black cat in her eyes was the big gray cat, but Dufei refused without hesitation. Even not knowing what Ouyang was plotting, he chose to trust him. White Cat and Devila were the same. As for Hell Lord Christo, she was still angling to cozy up to the Tiered Beings behind Ouyang—cross him now, and she might offend that ladder of gods.

Not a single cat stretched out a helping paw. They had the strength, yet not one moved to save the city.

Sunset bled into dusk. A fine rain drifted like silk.

“Hate me. Dying under my hand as the Void Messenger is a kind of honor. Better than dying without even knowing how.” A phantom Shadow Throne unfurled behind Ouyang, black as a well. He sat upon it; he wore a cat’s shape, but in Yulithilis’s eyes he was a Demon King who could crack a world like ice.

It didn’t make sense. Her chest ached before thought—she had treated this beast like a little ancestor, fed and housed him for days like a guest beneath lantern light.

She couldn’t make sense of it. She gripped a charred stone until her nails bit; a sharp edge slit her palm, and thin lines of red fell like rain.

“Why? I, Yulithilis, haven’t wronged any of you…”

Tears slid quietly; in her eyes, a fire called hatred took root like thorn-vines.

“You haven’t wronged me… In truth, I was satisfied with your hospitality these days.” His voice was the hush of coals. “So I want to remember you, not let you fade blandly in my memory. With that face full of hate, I think I won’t forget for a long, long time. When the years wash everything pale, the word ‘hatred’ will make me recall this world again.”

On the Shadow Throne, the cat sat above like a cold moon. His eyes looked down on everything as if the land were a chessboard.

In his paw, a fragment of the Philosopher’s Stone floated like a scar in air.

“Sorry…”

The apology carried a deep, tired helplessness, like snow on graves. “This apology is on behalf of the one who planted the root of all this, to you and to this world.”

He stepped to Yulithilis in a blink, a shadow crossing flame.

“Sorry…”

“This second apology is for pulling the Philosopher’s Stone fragment from your body without knowing the full picture.”

He drove his paw toward her chest, but in that instant, someone yanked Yulithilis aside—Mo Rain—saving her like a hand pulling a child from a river.

Ouyang showed no anger. He returned to the Shadow Throne, watching Mo Rain and Yulithilis as still as a mountain.

“Mo Rain, sis… thank you…” Yulithilis shook as if in winter. In that sliver of time she finally understood the terror of the black cat—if he wanted her dead, she had no power even to flinch. That absolute gap in strength pressed despair into her ribs. In that pit with no rope, Mo Rain was a fire in the snow.

Mo Rain ruffled her hair. She’d worn a look like someone who could let the world go, free as a gull. Now her eyes burned like twin torches.

“Senior, I guess… I still can’t accept the kind of death where I don’t even know how I died.” Her gaze was steady as steel. “But, senior—take it seriously. I want a dazzling death. If you’re too casual, you might not beat me.”

Everyone except Saya stared, baffled, as if fog had filled the room. Wasn’t Ouyang Mo Rain’s senior among transmigrators? Why were they talking about a fight?

On the Shadow Throne, Ouyang’s smile held a quiet warmth, like tea in cold hands.

“You’re a lively junior. But you’re underestimating your senior. I’ll show you why your seniors could conquer the vast starsea.”

He didn’t lift a paw. He only watched them go, calm as night. Under everyone’s gaze, Mo Rain left with Yulithilis.

The cats were still lost. Dufei cracked first. He jogged over, tail flicking. “Boss Ouyang, what trick are you pulling? I’m completely in the dark here!”

He meant it. Devila and White Cat hurried over to chime in; they knew nothing. It was all smoke and riddles.

Ouyang didn’t answer Dufei. Maybe this was a knot in his heart he couldn’t untie.

“Just watch.”

He tossed the words like a stone and walked off. He had no intention of explaining. As he left, the one most likely to know—Saya—followed, leaving a cluster of cats with nothing but questions and the smell of ash.

Sarayka, the tagging little lizard, scampered over once her task was done to report with bright eyes.

Ouyang lifted a paw and patted her head in reward, soft as a leaf’s touch. “Kid, you did well. Honestly, you’ve got real promise… pity.”

He didn’t say what he pitied. He changed the subject like flipping a bead.

“Head back to Dragon’s Valley. Humans will likely call a multi-race alliance meeting soon. A lord-class beast like you will be important to the alliance.”

“Eh?” Sarayka blinked rain from her lashes. “Boss, why hold a multi-race meeting? What’s the goal?”

“Who knows… maybe to oppose me.”

Ouyang walked on, waving a paw in farewell like a paper fan. In the end, only Saya stayed with him, watching the sunset’s afterglow pour over the ruins like gold dust. That false sun stretched Ouyang’s silhouette long; he crouched on a broken stone, eyes on the sinking light.

As a senior, Ouyang felt he was a poor one, a lantern with too little oil. The first time was at the dawn of the era—disaster came like black tide; the Night King invaded, and he watched juniors die one by one like candles, powerless.

Long ages passed; his memory frayed like old cloth. But the fact that he couldn’t save them gnawed at him, a thorn that never loosened.

The second time was in the Eighth Epoch. In Starry College’s graduation tasks, one mission was to bring a few rookies to the Other Shore. He led them through a spatial conduit, but they ran into a rare space-time storm. With his meager strength, even keeping himself alive was a struggle—he watched those rookies, who a heartbeat earlier called him “senior,” vanish into that storm like swallows swept from the sky.

And the third time…

“Even if I can’t save you, I can give you a death that burns and thunders. As a transmigrator, none of you would accept that first kind of death. Like a prank by the Creator God—some people didn’t even know they were already dead…”