"Okay, I’m going to try and hold him back for as long as I can, but I’m basically spent at this point. Try to be quick, or he’ll erase you from existence,” Elder Sheng said.Liuxiang wanted to protest that the Yuan she knew would never do anything like that, but she knew that this was not Yuan. But something else using his body. She gave a small nod.“I can fly,” she replied, noting the elder was holding her hand.“Won’t be enough. Stick to me, and when I say go, rush in,” the man said. Liuxiang looked at him, a concerned expression on her face.“Oh, don’t give me that look. You’ll be fine,” Elder Sheng said.“That was not what I had intended,” Liuxiang replied, but did not banter further as Yuan rushed towards them. Just his movement alone caused the air around him to ripple, and she felt the world itself descending on her.With a warp of the world, they moved through reality itself again, dodging the strike as the man let go of Liuxiang’s arm.“Junior Brother, you’ve been a serious

I walked around my town, as the children gathered around me, calling my name. I laughed, pleased by their presence as I picked one up in my arms, before I took them into the skies.My world had grown with time. First my home, then others, and eventually I had learned how to create people. And so I had. Gu Yuan had left me a while back, and we had lost the Chi our union had formed. But I had not given up.One by one, I filled this barren wasteland with life. I had created a sky, a sun, mountains, and now the valley that surrounded us was our home.My steps were slower now, more paced. I had grown older, though by how much I could not tell. The child in my arm shrieked in joy as clouds flew past him. I smiled, letting him roam through the skies with my arms.But then the boy shouted, and not in joy any longer and I soon realized why. The void drifted beyond this valley, the end of our world that led to the unending dark. I slowed down, turning away but the child had seen the dark, and s

The world changed around me, as I found myself standing in a white expanse, instead of the darkness that had been my world for so long. Already, I found my memories of my time spent in the dark starting to blur, like a dream that was slipping away from my grasp like sand the more I tried to remember it.I felt my spirit, feeling an empty gap in where my cultivation used to be. I had been hoping that since I had been able to use Chi in the void, it had survived somehow, but I suppose I wasn’t going to be that lucky. I looked around, reaching into my spirit, as I tried to feel my body. I was… there, but not quite. Something was holding me in place, preventing my consciousness from joining my body. And I knew who.“Show yourself,” I called out, and felt the Tree’s spirit turn its attention towards me.“I’m back, the rent period is over. Time to hand back my body.”“We had told you, we would take matters in our hand. You lost, your spirit gone to the void. Now it is not your role to chang

As empowering as the moment had been, the torrent of power I controlled did not last, as my body returned to its normal form. Yet, whereas before the peak of the mountain had been invisible, now I could glimpse upon it and understand just how far I had to climb to reach that pinnacle. I would need to reach Divinity myself if I wished to truly be in command, but now, the Path started to seem like something I could achieve. As the Chi faded, the spirit going dormant within me, I slowly lowered myself from the skies to the Lord’s manor. My body ached, my spirit still dealing with the damage done to it, yet I was in one piece, and far more powerful than I had been moments before. All the Qi and Gu the spirit had absorbed had been converted into Chi and slivers of it had filled me, pushing me into the seventh realm. The people around looked at me, some nervously and others with relief. “We are displeased,” I said, as the people flinched around me, and I couldn’t help the laughter that es

Lord Zhou stood at the window of his chamber, looking over the seventh peak. It had been a month since the duel had happened, and winter had settled upon the peak fully. The entire month had been spent in a rush of repairing the damage caused, and explaining to people just what was happening. But now, things had finally begun to settle down. Everything had changed in such a short span of time. Every cultivator on the seventh peak had lost their cultivation within a single moment. And then, they had gained something new in return. Even he had felt the change, his own path subtly shifting, though the effects had altered things less for him than most. The weight of being Lord kept him firmly where he belonged, but for everyone else, it was a brand new world. Every mortal in the city had quickly realized that they suddenly could cultivate and chaos had reigned for some time. But people had adjusted quickly, as cultivators had begun guiding people in preparation for winter. Lives had quic