A world of ash-gray—no sun, no moon, no stars; no sky, no earth.

In that world, Ouyang traced a line with his right index finger. In an instant, the world split along that watershed, separating above and below.

Time, uncounted, seeped away. The gray cut in two became a dim sky on one side, a black barren land on the other. Lightning cracked the heavens; red magma welled from the ground like boiling blood.

“Teacher, worthy as ever—this is the legendary creation with a single thought!”

Augustine could carve out such a space, too. But he’d need full focus, every drop of strength, and a long, long time. A casual flick like Ouyang’s—he couldn’t do it.

“I wonder how long it’ll take me to reach your realm…” Augustine’s voice held yearning first, then restraint. He knew that height was cruelly far.

Ouyang studied the newborn world and nodded, satisfied. He heard the longing in Augustine’s words; how could he not?

“Work hard. Maybe in a million years, you’ll stand here.”

A million years—right now, that sounded endless to Augustine.

Ouyang kept observing. For some reason, a long sigh climbed out of him. This looked like a fitting harbor for the dead. Underworld or hell—aren’t both heavy with lifeless hush?

“It still feels… forget it. It’s only an experiment. We’ve got plenty of time to revise.”

Neon bled into night; towers cut the sky.

“Teacher, this world’s strange. I’ve never seen anything like it… And why is my projection so flimsy, like it’ll unravel any moment?” In a pitch-black alley, two ghostlike figures drifted.

The other replied, calm strained thin: “This is the edge of the world—an endless distance from our home. Even I can only keep our two projections barely breathing.”

The Edge of the World.

Scholars first named it back on the Other Shore. The star sea is vast, almost without end. Yet surveys found a pattern that felt wrong.

On the Other Shore, in the Divine Realm, the Underworld, the Abyss—high civilizations have birthed Tiered Beings. From spacetime coordinates, these worlds aren’t terribly far apart. Around them, countless other civilizations sprout.

Once, a great one got bored and chased the “end of the universe.” He burned through millions of years with a star chart in hand, flying straight. He met all kinds of civilizations. But after hundreds of thousands of years, he saw fewer and fewer lights in the dark.

Millions of years later, the starfield around him was barren. He hadn’t met life for over a million years. Loneliness chewed at him, so he turned back. His report to the Council of Sages alarmed the Tiered Beings of the Other Shore. After their own expedition, a full briefing came out.

From that, the Council proposed the Center Theory. The Other Shore, the Underworld, the Divine Realm—regions that have birthed Tiered Beings—form a Center. As you extend spacetime out from those coordinates, the farther you go, the lower the odds that a high civilization will arise.

Flawed, yes, but it rang true. In the Center, several top civilizations have birthed not one or two, but cohorts of Tiered Beings. Stretch away along the coordinates, and the chance falls; the level of civilization thins.

Edge worlds sit in that awkward border. Their coordinates lie at the rim; beyond that lies a no-go zone, where life won’t arise—not even Star Spirits.

In those belts, a whole galaxy may lack a single world with sapient life.

The world before them was a coordinate Ouyang had snagged at the edge. Too far, so to bring Augustine along, he could only descend by projection. The signal was atrocious. The projections might vanish any time.

“In edge worlds, low mystery is the norm. So their cultures lean hard toward science.”

Ouyang fed his first disciple more knowledge. By Augustine’s level, he’d earned a glimpse.

“What we need is to link this world to the space we just opened. Then the dead can reach our experimental field. Our snag? We can only descend as weak, bad-signal projections. Linking worlds like this? Forget it—for now.”

Faced with that knot, Augustine kept silent. The gap between them was a gulf. If even Ouyang had no immediate way, what could he offer?

Seeing his disciple quiet, Ouyang said nothing. Even for a true god, some problems take time.

“Teacher, why don’t we pick a closer coordinate?” Augustine hit the mark.

Ouyang’s eyelid twitched. He hadn’t wanted this either. Dropping a projection straight into an edge world—he’d never tried it. He’d assumed a Tiered Being’s strength would make it trivial. But in front of his disciple, this happened. If Augustine hadn’t seen it, Ouyang might have shifted coordinates at once. With Augustine watching? Retreat wasn’t an option.

“Ahem. Kid, this is strategy. We’ll connect the edge first, then push inward toward the Center.” Ouyang put on his solemn face and spun it. Truth was, he’d misjudged the distance, and the projection came out a flickering mess.

Augustine didn’t really grasp his teacher’s plan, but it sounded glorious. He stared with outright worship.

While Ouyang basked, a blaze flickered in the sky. A bolt came down.

“Teacher… did we just get killed by lightning?”

A sullen sky. A land of rushing magma. Ouyang’s finger-born experimental space. Teacher and disciple stood on a boulder, staring at each other. The edge was too far; getting the projections in was success enough. And then a single bolt erased them.

Awkward.

“Don’t rush. In experiments, almost nobody nails it the first try. Come on, let’s stroll that world again.”

Same steel and concrete, but daylight now. As they stepped in, a heavy truck barreled toward them.

“Teacher, that world is terrifying. Without power, we can’t last minutes…” Augustine’s heart still thumped with fear. They’d only lost projections, but death’s chill had bled back to the bodies.

Ouyang’s face went dark. Dead. This time they lasted one second.

“Augustine, don’t lose heart. Failure’s the mother of success.” He clapped Augustine’s shoulder and dragged their projections back in.

The instant they appeared, the world spun.

Well then.

They were on a tornado, tossed like trash beneath a sky gone mad.

“Teacher, this world is awful—how do normal people even live?”

A wooden spar scooped up by the funnel smacked them both.

GAME OVER.

Back in the experimental space, Ouyang’s face was charcoal. Shame burned. If he came in person, a single breath could snuff that planet. Trip after trip, the same humiliation, and he noticed the wrongness. The first time, lightning struck—but the night had been clear, stars crisp. Where did the bolt come from?

The second time, they spawned and a truck arrived head-on.

The third, they appeared on a tornado.

It was like the world itself had marked them.

“Damn it—we’re being targeted by that World Will!” The realization snapped tight. For a mere low-level civilization’s will to push back at him—if it really riled him, he’d spend tens of thousands of years crossing the stars just to crush that world.

“Again!”

With their guard up, they didn’t die so fast this time.

“Son of a—” Ouyang glared at the sky and spat a string of curses. They’d landed in deep mountains and old forest; clouds packed the heavens like iron. He’d barely finished swearing when a storm of lightning poured down.

No more talk—run first.

Ouyang and Augustine couldn’t remember the last time they’d run for their lives. Bolts hammered the trees behind them; struck trunks flared into instant fire.

“This World Will is absurdly xenophobic. We’re using the weakest projections, the kind a normal man could swat—and it still goes all-out to expel us.” Rage climbed Ouyang’s throat. He wanted to leap here in person and teach this will a lesson. This world was throwing a full tantrum over two flimsy ghosts.

“I’m picking a fight with this place. How dare it drive me out…”

Not far away, a white-bearded elder stared, baffled, at the two being chased by thunder. He stroked his beard and muttered in a tongue they didn’t know. Ouyang caught him and read the face.

He didn’t understand the words, but he got the meaning. On Earth, it’d be: Which fellow is crossing a heavenly tribulation?

Lightning snakes whipped closer. Ouyang was about to be overtaken. He glanced at the old man standing there talking easy, and his eyes lit up.

“Old-timer, come help us ‘cross the tribulation’!”

The elder couldn’t parse Ouyang’s speech, but he saw them charging him, and his face went green. Heaven help him—he was just a bystander. Seeing that grin on the “tribulation-crosser,” how could he miss the intent?

If he missed it now, he’d have lived to this age for nothing.