Origin of the [World]—

The fog split again, like a curtain slashed by wind.

The [Hero King] returned home, a comet turning back to its nest.

His speed stunned everyone, like deer freezing under torchlight. They expected a year at least before seeing him again—or never seeing him again at all.

He was too excited, like fire leaping in dry grass. He missed the shadows coiled beneath their surprise, and he rushed to share what he’d seen.

“Outside isn’t an ocean, and it isn’t dangerous,” he said, words tumbling like pebbles in a stream. “Just a few hundred meters out, there’s a calm, quiet continent. Centuries of fear were needless. We can sail there.”

He finished in one breath, joy beating like a drum in his chest. No cheer rose. No praise spilled.

He looked at their faces, and cold crawled over his skin like evening frost.

Those faces filled with doubts that thickened with every word, like ink spreading through water.

“You’re lying.”

They said it like a blade laid across his throat.

...

Violet light kept pouring from the sky like rain.

An ancient castle took that light like a river takes dusk, its walls glimmering purple and more mysterious for it.

Before the castle lay a sea of Purple Blossom, rolling to the horizon like a tide. The breeze moved the branches, and the brilliant blooms danced. The violet shine broke on the petals like fireworks cracking against night.

Through that feast of color, a road wide enough for three carriages cut straight, a silver river parting the purple forest.

At this end stood a black‑haired, black‑eyed youth—he was the 9,679th [Demon King], Ye Weibai.

At the far end stood a silver‑haired, violet‑eyed old man—he was—

“I’m the 8,999th [Hero King]—”

“Augustine.”

He introduced himself like a bell struck once.

Ye Weibai’s pupils tightened, like a bowstring drawn. He didn’t know the name, yet when it fell into his ear, chill raced over his skin like a shadow of snow.

It was memory carved into bone in every [Demon King]’s inheritance.

Danger—this man—danger.

“Oh?” Augustine’s senses were sharp as a hawk’s. He caught Ye’s shift in a heartbeat.

A smile tugged at his mouth, thin as a knife. “You know me?”

He didn’t wait for Ye to speak. “Not surprising. I recall the 9,230th [Demon King] seemed to have some impression of me as well. It’s likely a quirk like the [Hero King]’s inheritance, surfacing now and then in certain [Demon King]s—mm, worth noting.”

Ye’s eyes narrowed, the way a shutter cuts light. This old man appeared out of nowhere, spoke with iron certainty, carried a pressure like a storm front. Was he truly a former [Hero King]?

Why wasn’t he dead? How could he not be dead? And if he wasn’t, how dare he stand here in the open?

“Just now—you mentioned the 9,230th [Demon King],” Ye asked, a knot tightening in his chest before the words left his mouth.

“Yes.”

“How did he end?”

“Dead, of course. I killed him.” The old man slipped on his gloves, then calmly smoothed the creases in his sleeves like a man dusting snow.

“I see.” Ye didn’t ask why he’d killed a [Demon King]. He asked what mattered more, a question odd yet vital. “And after that? Was the [Cycle] broken?”

[Cycle]—a strange word to most. What exactly was this [Cycle] Ye spoke of?

“Oh?” The old man held no confusion, only a pulse of dark violet light in his eyes. “You know the [Cycle] too.”

Ye met his gaze, voice cool as a moonlit river. “The [Hero King] kills the [Demon King]—the [Demon King] dies, the [Hero King] dies—the [Hero King] appears, the [Demon King] appears—the [Hero King] kills the [Demon King]... round and round. Didn’t you kill the 9,230th [Demon King] to break that [Cycle]?”

“Ha—interesting.” Augustine’s grin split like a crack in ice. “I’ve killed so many [Demon King]s. You’re the most interesting of the lot. No wonder your role overlaps with the [Imperial Tutor]. You’re worth the trouble of killing.”

“Yes. I did it to break the [Cycle].” His tone went flat, like a blade laid on a table. “In this [Cycle], the [Hero King], the [Hero King]’s companions, the [Demon King]—these roles keep marching onto the stage, born of the crowd’s hope and hunger. They fight like beasts in a pit, die like candles in wind—and then the [Demon King] returns, and the play begins again.”

It had been many years, and perhaps this was the first time Augustine had met a [Demon King] who saw the [Real] of the [World] so clearly. He’d never found anyone to tell this to; if he spoke, others called it nonsense. Lonely men talk to the night. Even though he’d decided Ye would die, he still spoke, slow and unhurried, of this [World]’s—[Real].

“All of this—the [Cycle].” He spoke without expression, like a judge reading a sentence. “From the first moment I became [Hero King], I felt it—someone watching me, no, staring at me.”

“Elves?” Ye asked, emotion first, thought after, pointing into the wind with a word. He meant those who could see through to where the [Demon King] was.

“Elves?” The old man’s smile turned odd, like a mask cracking. “There are no elves in this [World]. At first I thought it was them too. I climbed peaks and crossed forbidden lands, reached their so‑called home, and I saw—”

“Saw what?”

“Nothing.” His voice was calm as still water. “Then I understood. Elves who point to the [Demon King]’s lair are a fable, birthed by the crowd.”

“Then who foretold the [Demon King]’s location...?”

“Before me, rumor did,” he said, and scorn curled his lips like smoke. “Rumor runs faster than any sword‑light. It spreads through the [World] in a breath, then hardens into—[Truth]. And after I appeared, the source became—”

“You,” Ye said.

“Clever.” Augustine nodded, eyes like coals. “You must know why I fed the news.”

“Yeah.” Ye nodded, a leaf settling on a pond. He knew—Augustine had said it himself—everything he did was to break the [Cycle].

“I’m not ashamed.” After a stretch of silence, the old man spoke again, voice rough as gravel. “I didn’t want to die. Inside the [Cycle], the end is death. I sensed that the moment I became [Hero King]. So I did everything to break it.”

“I was confident. First, I refused [companions], and walked alone under the stars. Second, I refused the resources the crowd piled at my feet. I stayed out of sight, and I stalked the [Demon King]. Third—and most important—I was strong. Absurdly strong. Stronger than any past [Demon King] or [Hero King] by tenfold. In a quarter hour, without a scratch, I took that [Demon King]’s head.”

“I thought that would avert the [Cycle]’s ending. I was strong enough to kill the [Demon King] without bleeding. I would be the [King of Permanence], guarding this [World] like a mountain that never moves. That should be enough, right? The crowd should rest easy, right?” He paused. The smile at his mouth froze, then went cold as iron. “I was wrong. It wasn’t enough. Those people—what they wanted to see wasn’t [Salvation].”

“But [Sacrifice],” Ye said, voice soft as falling ash.

Augustine flinched, then nodded. “[Sacrifice]—perfect word. Yes. They wanted [Sacrifice]. The origin’s lost to fog, but in their eyes, only death can buy peace. Only life paid can scour out darkness. So—”

“When I returned home,” he said, lids lowering like winter clouds, a tremor running through his tone, “my companions—all died—by every reason, every coincidence—at the instant I killed the [Demon King].”

“Can you believe it?” His voice spiked, a lion’s roar shaking the bars. “The continent’s chief holy knight died when a roof collapsed and struck the back of his head. The number‑one assassin died while wiping his blade—he nicked his finger, and his own poison killed him. What a joke is that?! What a rotten [World] is this!! They—none of them had even faced the [Demon King]!!!”

Ye watched the old man rage like a storm‑torn sea. He sighed, a breath small as mist. “There’s no way around it. That’s the [Atmosphere].”

“[Atmosphere]—” Augustine panted, pupils widening like a dawn bloom. “Straight to the heart. It is the [Atmosphere]—the [World]’s [Atmosphere]. When the whole [World] wants you dead, how can you not die? How would you not die? How dare you not die? I knew—after my companions—it would be me.”

“But you didn’t yield.”

“Augustine doesn’t yield.” He stared past Ye, as if at a wind with teeth. “I wouldn’t just lie down and die. So I went to find ‘it’—the [Atmosphere]—and I picked a fight.”

“I lost miserably. My blows did nothing, like fists into fog. It hit me—seven moves—and I was riddled like a sieve. Dead for good.”

...

Origin of the [World]—

“You’re not lying, are you?”

“You just stayed on the boat, and the boat never left shore, did it?”

“You—”

“Betrayed our trust and hope.”

No defense. No words. Only silence like snow.

Forced.

The [Hero King] set out again, feet heavy as anchors.

This time, it felt like exile, a brand burned into skin.

Exiled forever by his own people, like a ship cut loose in black water.

He had to hunt a nebulous [Terror]—a [Terror] spun from the crowd’s dreams like cobweb.

A [Terror] he would never find.

Only by finding that nonexistent [Terror] could he soothe the crowd, prove he’d truly entered the fog’s world, and—

Return home.

That thought broke him, despair spreading like winter over a field.

...

...