"No life... no stress. Isn't that right?" The leader's voice was soft, almost kind, like he was doing Xiao Jun a favor. He pushed the blade deeper. Xiao Jun felt something snap—his ribs, maybe his heart. His chest caved in. His breath stopped. Warmth spilt down his stomach in waves. His vision tilted, and his legs refused to move.

"Aren't you grateful, Xiao Jun? You don't need to worry about anything. No family tension, no career problems, no need to waste your time helping out every pebble on the streets?!" The leader laughed like a madman.

Xiao Jun's body started to collapse; he fell down without control of his body, with vision slowly blurring down and the scythe of death right around his neck, ready to reap his soul.

Xiao Jun's breath hitched. His eyes flickered down, disbelief gripping him like a vice. Cold steel pierced his chest, warmth spilling down his shirt. His heart thudded in his ears, slow, sluggish, fading...

"No..." Xiao Jun muttered with the very last breath of his, 'I can't die like this... Father already died years ago; Mother barely manages to handle day-to-day expenses working multiple jobs; my sister hasn't even finished high school. How will they survive if I die like this?'

He could see his sister's smile as she waved at him from the school gate. Their mother, face weathered but eyes soft with pride, calling him home for dinner. The image burnt, sharp as the blade now lodged in his chest.

He frowned; even at his last breaths, he was worried about others; his heart was hurting way more with those thoughts than an actual hole inside the heart.

He was losing more and more blood every moment, but as he thought this moment was his last heartbeat, suddenly the time paused for him.

The hole in his heart suddenly closed; it healed back perfectly. The wound over his arm and chest also suddenly closed back up. It was as if his body had never been cut or stabbed by the blade; all blood and energy he lost, all regenerated seemingly in an instant.

His blurry vision intently became clear like some jewel, and he stayed lying on the ground with his eyes blankly staring at white ceilings.

'What the hell just happened here?' The question was constantly ringing inside his mind. He sat back up like some resurrected zombie, and his eyes moved over towards the bunch of people who brought him here.

They were all going crazy, jumping into mountains of gold and grabbing the treasures and whatnot, even their leader, who seemed nonchalant; he was blankly staring at blades floating over the walls of the chamber.

But these people and things weren't the ones who caught his attention; what caught Xiao Jun's attention was one man, one man floating midair near the ceilings of the chamber.

'... Who is that?' The question rang inside his mind; his mind seemed blank and seemingly lost as he watched that man, and that mysterious man was also looking right back into Xiao Jun's eyes.

There was a strange silence; that mysterious man had long black hair tied at the top of his head and slit golden pupils like some dragon, which Xiao Jun can only remember from myths.

The man was wearing some black hoodie, with his face hidden underneath that hoodie, but that gaze alone was enough to shake the laws of the universe and beyond.

Xiao Jun lay still with a blank mind, eyes gazing at the man standing midair in a daze. His body felt weightless, yet every heartbeat echoed like thunder in his ears.

*Thump… Thump… THUMP!*

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A searing heat surged through him, filling his veins with molten fire. His sapphire-blue eyes flickered, the colour twisting unnaturally until his pupils narrowed into sharp, crystalline blue slits. He blinked slowly, unfocused, as if trapped in a dream.

*Crack…*

A dull pressure built on his forehead, then—CRUNCH!—something pierced through his skin. He felt it, but it was distant, like a sensation too far to matter. His gaze shifted lazily to his reflection on a golden plate lying on the ground. A sleek, black horn seemed to have emerged from the left side of his forehead, with a surface smooth like obsidian.

'Is that… me?' He thought his mind felt sluggish and numb. The world around him felt quieter, sharper. Every sound, every breath, every shift of movement echoed like ripples in a pond. He didn't move. He just stared at himself, his golden, dragon-like eyes filled with confusion.

'What... happened to me?' He thought in confusion, but then his eyes unconsciously diverted to that man standing in the air once again.

"What are you doing?" Suddenly the man standing in the air questioned, "Did your parents not teach you to show respect to ancestors?" He questioned Xiao Jun.

"Ancestor?" Xiao Jun muttered in confusion, staring blankly over at that man with a tilted head.

"... I can't believe it." the man in the air stated in disbelief, shaking his head as if he was stressed out, "Can't believe I'm meeting such a fool of a descendant after awakening after centuries." he muttered with a deep sigh

"I will teach you some manners..." With that said, he removed the hoodie covering his face, revealing a handsome, vital face. He was very well what one can address as prime state of a man; his eyes showed wisdom of infinite eras, yet the face, which seemed to have stopped growing old once it reached its prime.

"But before that... I need to have some talk with strangers here," he said, turning his attention towards the people standing on the ground, extremely cautious and startled by his sudden presence.

"I'm surprised—really surprised," the leader suddenly chuckled. "To think there will be another Nascent Soul Stage expert in a countryside like this?" he stated with a chuckle

'What the hell is this guy talking about?' but the person in question just seemed confused; the leader kept talking.

"I'm not wrong, right? You are some expert who has been living out here in the woods, but our presence caught your attention, and you followed us all the way here. Oh well, since you have seen all this. How about you just take a share of this and leave us alone?" the leader offered, but the man standing over the air just chuckled

"With what authority?" He scoffed, "What authority do you have to be making such offers? Do all these treasures belong to your father or what?"

"Not my father; they are mine. So I suggest you not cause trouble; just take a share and leave. I don't want conflicts on joyous occasions," the leader shouted back, getting a bit more enraged as time went by.

But the man in the air, he also didn't have infinite patience; releasing a big sigh in cold breath, he growled in a low voice, "I don't remember transferring my property over to you, mortal."

"So you really don't understand the language of peace, huh..." the leader's voice lost all its patience; he suddenly took out his dagger again, along with all his subordinates, turning towards that man.

Their eyes were ferocious, displaying their united bloodlust for that mysterious guy; they appeared to have already perpetrated all of humanity's sins without hesitation.

The leader's eyes narrowed as a cold gust swept through the chamber. He sneered, "I have lost interest in peace treaties; I have fought way too many people and lived to tell the tale." He raised his hand, his fingers crackling with golden lightning. "You will be no different."

The air buzzed with static as arcs of golden energy danced across his arm. With a roar, he slammed his palm forward, sending a jagged bolt of lightning toward the floating figure. The bolt cut through the air like a divine spear, illuminating the dark chamber in flashes of gold and white.

But the ancestor didn't flinch. He didn't block. He didn't move. He simply... stared.

"Pathetic."

The single word hung in the air like a judge's gavel. The moment it echoed, reality twisted. The golden lightning, once fierce and wild, shuddered mid-flight and just vanished midair.

The leader staggered, eyes wide with disbelief. "Impossible!" he choked, his words cut short as a pressure unlike anything he had ever felt crushed down on him. His knees buckled, his bones creaking like splintering wood. Blood leaked from his nose, his ears, and his eyes. "What...what is this power?"

The ancestor lowered his gaze, the weight of his presence multiplying a hundredfold. His eyes shimmered like molten suns, twin orbs of cold detachment. He raised one hand slow, deliberate, uncaring—and with a flick of his fingers, reality itself answered.

*Crack!*

The leader's arms exploded at the shoulders, flesh and bone disintegrating into a mist of blood and gore. For a moment, he didn't realise it. His mind hadn't caught up with the sudden, absolute loss. Then... the pain arrived.

"AAAAAAAGHH!"

He screamed like a wounded beast, his eyes darting to the. His followers stared, frozen in a mix of terror and disbelief. None of them moved to help.

"A Nascent Soul, you said?" the ancestor murmured, tilting his head slightly. "If this is all it takes to break one, then the standards of this era have fallen far." He exhaled slowly, as if bored. "Kneel."

The word crashed down like a divine decree. It wasn't a command—it was a law. Every person present felt their legs buckle uncontrollably.

Bones cracked as knees met stone, heads bowing as though unseen chains had yanked them down. Some tried to resist, their muscles trembling with futile effort, but resistance only brought sharper pain.

The leader gasped, barely able to breathe under the crushing force. His face was pale, lips trembling as he forced himself to look up. His eyes met the ancestor's gaze, a mistake. Those eyes were endless. Eternal. A storm of stars trapped in a sea of darkness.

Terror bloomed in his chest. "No... no, please—!"

The ancestor's eyes didn't shift. He didn't raise his voice. He only said one word.

"Vanish."

Silence, followed by a loud sound of bones cracking and shuddering, all the people there, including the leader and subordinates, their bodies suddenly started to overflow with blood and exploded, they all just vaporised before their blood could stain the floor.

The ancestor sighed, brushing a speck of dust from his sleeves, making his way down towards Xiao Jun now.

"Children playing war," he muttered. "How dull."