In ages buried like mountains under mist, Kamen nursed a burning ambition. He was an ancient deity, born alongside the Creator God like a twin star rising in the same dawn. Back then, power lay even as balanced scales. Yet in the end, why did Lingwen alone transcend and sit at the Creator God’s throne like a moon above a dark sea?

He couldn’t grasp it, and the knot in his chest sat like a thorn.

After Lingwen ascended, she swept the world like a storm broom. Gods who stood against her fell into history like shattered statues, old clans turned to ash in a single night like paper in flame, and the vast primal continent split cleanly in two like a cracked blade.

Kamen opposed her then, but he wasn’t a fool. He moved in shadow, giving others support like a hidden hand, and never stood openly against Lingwen, slipping past that calamity like a fish under ice. After witnessing the Creator God’s might, he boxed up his old hunger and hid in a quiet corner like a stone under moss.

Until this era bloomed like a strange flower.

“Lord Kamen, I don’t fully get your meaning,” Lingwen said, voice steady as winter air. “But I have reasons I can’t go back.” She sensed Kamen tightening like a bowstring, and she grew serious. Feeling no ripple of power from Xi, she tugged Xi behind her like a shield pulled close, afraid the storm would cut her.

“Hmph. You dare stand against me?” Kamen’s anger flared like sparks in dry grass. Once, he had planned to boil the frog slow—cultivate Lingwen like a sapling, then at the instant she was to inherit the Genesis Crown, snatch it like a hawk. But a recent anomaly shattered that patience like glass: a supreme existence had peered into the River of Time like an eye over a current.

The sense of danger swelled in his heart like thunderheads. He had to seize the Genesis Crown, become the new Creator God, and only then could he contend with that gaze that skimmed the ages like a blade on water. So he chose to move fast, feet beating like drums. At this critical moment, the shrine’s Mystic Priestess, Lingwen, left the shrine on her own—like a bell struck in his nerve.

On the other side of the horizon like a painted screen…

“Gaia, that guy called Kamen—hasn’t he ever met Lingwen?” Ouyang asked, eyes narrow like a cat watching a stage. “Even if not, how can he not have heard the Creator God’s name?” He watched Kamen move like a blind man in daylight, as if he had no idea who Lingwen was.

A blurred silhouette stepped to Ouyang’s side, voice slow as a deep river. “Only a handful among the gods know Lady Lingwen’s name, and Kamen isn’t among them. Her true form is the same—hidden like moon behind clouds.”

Hearing that, Ouyang’s eyes thinned, amusement flashing like a fox-tail. It was interesting. He wondered—if Lingwen woke to everything and returned to that Creator God she once was, what face would Kamen wear? A good drama, worth a front row.

He fished a folding stool and sunflower seeds from his straw hat like a magician pulling autumn from straw.

“Bai, the seeds are ready. Let’s watch,” he said, grin tilted like a crescent.

“Mm. Watch,” Bai replied, voice soft as falling husks.

Watching the master and servant, Gaia stood silent like a stone stele. If her heart had words, they would be only this—

Gaia: “…”

Yes. Beyond an ellipsis she had no shape for this feeling. As the world’s will, she couldn’t leave her own world, like a root bound to soil. The First Demon King, the Void Messenger—she’d only heard the tales from other gods, drifting like incense. In their words, the First Demon King was mystery and solitude, power and frost, a mountain under night.

Fine. Ouyang truly had no idea that in the eyes of gods he was that figure, a legend wrapped in cold moonlight. If he knew, he’d be delighted like a child with firecrackers.

Gaia’s complicated mood flickered and went, like a cloud torn by wind. Worry for Lingwen rose like dawn, because right now Lingwen wasn’t Kamen’s match. He hadn’t even really moved; he’d only called a rock giant like a hill given legs, and that alone drove Lingwen back in tatters like leaves in gale.

“An ant… so be a good ant, won’t you?” Kamen’s voice fell light as ash. “You want this chaotic age to end. If I pluck the Genesis Crown and become the new Creator God, won’t the chaos end, like night after sunset?”

His words struck Lingwen’s struggle like frost on a blade. She refused to return because she wanted to stay by Xi, meet the true god of legend like finding a star through fog, and end the chaos. If Kamen could become the Creator God, would that not end it? She didn’t trust it, not really, but a thin hope is still a candle in a storm.

Xi felt a wrongness creep like cold water. “Jue, if Lingwen goes back with Kamen, what happens?”

“She dies. Absolutely dies,” Jue answered, certain as iron. “Kamen gets the Genesis Crown, becomes the new Creator God, and as the price—Lingwen dies.”

“Dies…?” Xi’s voice trembled like a string. She’d known the Mystic Priestess less than a day, yet Lingwen’s resolve to end the chaos had moved her like embers under snow. The girl was cold on the surface like winter glass, yet she clung to Xi shamelessly, a stubborn vine that wouldn’t let go.

If Lingwen’s death were the only path to peace, Xi would grieve like rain, but she might not stop it. Everyone’s worldview is a different sky; she wouldn’t force hers on Lingwen like a chain. But she knew another way, a road that could end the chaos without Lingwen’s life laid down like a blade on an altar. With that path in hand, how could she watch Lingwen be taken and killed like a lamb?

“Lingwen, you can’t go with him, because… you’ll die!” Xi shouted, voice ringing like a bell across a bare field.

Her cry snapped Kamen’s attention like a twig. Leaning on his cane, he glared at Xi, cold as iron in winter. Lingwen had been about to yield like a bent reed, but Xi’s shout lit resistance like a spark.

He could drag Lingwen back by force, and use her affinity with the Creator God to summon the Genesis Crown like a name that calls thunder, then become the new Creator God. But willing cooperation would smooth the way like oil on hinges.

“Noisy,” he hissed.

At his snort, the world hushed like a temple at midnight. The wind held its breath, the swept straw hung frozen in air like dust in sunlight, and the falling leaves paused mid-drop like birds forgetting their wings.

It did nothing. A normal human, even a godspawn, would have shattered like thin glass. Xi only stepped back a few paces, then glared, annoyed as a cat flicking its tail.

“Old man, don’t throw your years around like a cudgel. Lingwen wants to end the chaos, even if it costs her everything like ink poured out. But I’ve got a way to end it without her dying,” she said, voice tight as a drawn bow.

In her haze, Lingwen looked at Xi like a traveler seeing a lantern. Yes—whether Kamen could become the Creator God was a coin in fog. But behind Xi stood a being who could end the chaos like dawn breaking. And she’d seen Bai’s strange “equivalent exchange” with her own eyes, a miracle crisp as frost, far more convincing than Kamen’s vague crown.

Kamen didn’t know her inner shift, but shock pricked him like hail. A mere cold snort from him should have scattered a normal soul a thousand times like leaves in a storm; this girl had only stepped back, and nothing else.

Wrong. Deeply wrong.

Kamen trusted his strength like stone trusts its weight. The girl had secrets.

“Who are you?” he asked, forced at last to face her like a hunter eyeing a new beast. An anomaly had wandered into his crucial hour like a stray star, and he was wary like a wolf.

“I’ll see who dares to wreck my plan at a time like this,” he growled, anger clouding the sky like ink. The weather shifted with his mood like tides under a moon—proof of power. His aura swelled, ruinous as a tidal wave.

Xi trembled as the world warped like heated glass. “Jue… will I die?” she whispered, fear crawling like ants.

In that breath, Lingwen rushed over and stood before Xi like a wall of snow. “Sorry. Because of me, you got dragged into this,” she said, voice steady as stone.

Watching Lingwen hold Kamen back like two hands against a flood, Xi froze in place, mouth opening and closing like a fish in shallow water. She wanted to help the Mystic Priestess called Lingwen, but she had no blade, no power, only breath.

“Jue, Bai—can you help her?” she pleaded, eyes lifted like lamps.

Jue and Bai stood silent, heavy as sealed jars. Far off, Kamen caught an opening like a hawk’s shadow, and slammed a palm toward where Xi stood. The air twisted like rope, sky and earth changed color like bruised fruit.

“Don’t—” Lingwen cried, but the strike fell and erased everything like a black tide.

Gone. The girl she had just met vanished like dew at noon. So innocent—why crush her? Once, Lingwen had kept a thin strand of hope for Kamen like silk in sleeve. He had planted in her mind that creed—end the chaos, even at the price of your life—like a needle under skin. Deep down, she respected him like a teacher.

Now that last strand snapped like wire. End the chaos? Save the people? Don’t joke. Xi was innocent, a candle-flame in wind. Why kill her? If he could harm an innocent girl at whim, did Kamen deserve to mouth “salvation” like prayers?

It was her mistake. She shouldn’t have anchored any hope to Kamen, a boat tied to a rotten pier. Beneath the mask of virtue, the face was cruel like a jackal.

“Save this world? End the chaos?” Lingwen’s voice rang cold as winter bells. “If you can slaughter the innocent at will, your math isn’t half as noble as your words, is it?”

For some reason, Lingwen’s calm deepened like frost spreading, her gaze growing colder, a lake under night.

At the side, Kamen—who had just slapped a life away like an ant—stared at Lingwen’s power swelling like mist. Shock tightened in him like a fist. Her strength rose too strangely, like a flame conjured from vacuum, appearing out of nowhere like a phantom.

“You… what are you, exactly?”