In some manner of truth he had been. Yuan had simply… outgrown Zhou Fang. That boy would outgrow this entire empire in a decade if simply left to his own devices, those were not reasonable expectations to have of someone and yet the boy did not see it that way and it weighed on him.He could not leave his son behind like that, nor did he have any intention to do so. He was not prepared to die, he had not made his peace with it.And yet, he was ready to stand till his last breath on this peak should it come to that, because it was his path to protect this empire and he had sworn his life on it, even if it meant abandoning things he could not justify abandoning to himself. And so the flame burned in his soul, as Lord Zhou reached within himself, into a part of himself he had not recalled in a long time.The storage ring on his fingers unlocked with a pulse of Qi as a blade appeared in his hand. A jian. It was a gift from his father, and he drew it in front of him with intention as he st

The demon shot forward, blade of rust swinging once more. Lord Zhou let solar Qi and heavenly Qi gather around him, a blinding flash of light gathering as he shot it towards the demon.The beast laughed as the beam burned its body, which then quickly began to repair itself. The demon roared, power surging as the world around them began to crumble. Lord Zhou shot forward, body blazing with light as Qi flowed into him with like a tsunami that would not be barred by anything, he moved light, moving in an instant as his blade struck, cutting through the demon, blasting him backwards as the blade of light cut the dark domain open. The demon cackled, dark blood gushing from its body as it slammed but Lord Zhou did not relent, shooting after the creature immediately.He continued to cycle his Chi. His domain whirred on the horizon, power surging. His aura was focused on the beast and he let the cold flame within him blossom. Surging rage rose within him as he let it all expand outwards into

Something was wrong. I could feel it as a deep certainty down in my very bones. Something was very very wrong and I’d not been able to shake the feeling ever since the connection to the fourth peak had been stopped. The jade slips had cracked and stopped working all of a sudden, which was concerning enough as it is, but then something had changed with the Divine Tree itself.I’d felt it more than seen it, the vast presence that had flared for but a moment over the entire world, and I’d found myself unable to understand just what I was seeing but the cycle itself had shifted, I’d felt a piece of it changing, and I did not understand what it meant.And so now I paced in my own chamber to hear some news, anything, to explain just what was happening.Mercifully, I did not have to wait forever as I sensed Qiao Ying heading my way. I did not way, opening the door as the man looked at me in surprise.“Did you hear anything?” I asked the man in a rush.Qiao Ying recovered quickly, and bowed.

I tried to reason myself into it, tried to think of it in a different light. This place would be fine. My influence and with everything else, they’d be able to hold on. With me in the capital, there was nothing of significance that could be gained by attacking the seventh peak. Except to make me angrier, but even with that, the weapons I’d left behind, the deferences available to me and everything… but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.I shook my head. “No, no I can’t do that. Don’t try to convince me, you won’t. I won’t abandon them and just hope that the demons do not attack any of the other peaks. These are demons. Do you think they will simply walk past if they saw that they could get away with it? No, this will ruin the empire, ruin the majority of it. Even if most people retreat into the Azure city, there’s only so much time and space to do that, and only so many people that can be kept safe like this. No, this is not the the answer. There has to be a better way,” I said, looking at

I followed behind Elder Tian Feng, as we walked out of the chamber he’d been in. It took me a little while to realize where I was, since I had only really arrived here once before.“We’re in the royal palace?” I asked, surprised that this was where I’d arrived out of all the other places.“Indeed. Things have been changing over here. But more importantly, the thing you must do, the thing you must obtain, really, is here,” Elder Tian Feng said.I followed behind him as we began to walk down stairs. The usual ornate displays quickly began to fade as the palace walls soon became unpolished stone that looked like it had been created nearly a thousand years ago. The further we went, the thicker the Qi in the air got, and the darker the world around me got. Which also let me know that I barely needed any light to see now, just another one of those things that had been caused by my rapid surge in power and recent brush with divinity that I still wasn’t so used to.The stairs continued to des