“Are you alright?” asked Bai Xiulan, as she watched the darkened expression on her son’s face.
“I am fine, Mother,” answered Yuelong, his tone and manner of speech having no intention to hide his attempt at brushing off her words of concern.
“Did something happen at the Heaven Overseeing Tower? Was it that girl?” Bai Xiualan pressed on, her worry for her only kin in this world spilling from within.
“I don’t want to discuss it, Mother.”
“Yuelong. My dear son, you can tell me if something is wro–!”
“I DON’T WANT TO DISCUSS IT!” Yuelong snapped, his head turning towards his mother and letting out a roar. “Can you please stop asking me about it!? I have to go on stage any second now and I don’t want to be discussing it now! Please stop bothering me and go back to your seat, Mother.”
Saying as much, Yuelong angrily stormed off, leaving Bai Xiulan all by her lonesome. The latter stood shocked and stunned momentarily, before despondently lowering her head and heading off.
Muffled at a distance, a voice could be heard announcing from the speakers.
[Esteemed guests, the moment that you have all been waiting for has arrived. Please prepare yourself for tonight’s highlight; the presentation from ‘Son of the Heavens’ Mu Yuelong!]
---
Ushered by the staff, Yuelong found himself arriving at the centre of an enormous stage, flinching a little as the blinding stage lights impacted him quite unexpectedly. It took him a moment to adjust to the sudden brightness after having come out from the darkness of the backstage.
As he stood gathering his breath, the Young Master of the Mu Household heard the suppressed and ordered applause come to an end. Silence enveloped him as all ears lent their attention to his speech.
His thoughts were a mess and he wasn’t even fully himself at the moment. A multitude of complicated thoughts and emotions choked his mind and suffocated him. But alas, now wasn’t the time to rue. The world would not wait for him to gather himself.
He was here, representing the face of the Mu Household at the Paths Symposium. He was here as a ‘Star’. Everybody was here for him. Here to hear him speak. To learn what he had learnt.
He could not fail them.
The audience was expecting a ‘Star-worthy’ performance.
And he would not disappoint them.
“Greetings to all esteemed practitioners and dignitaries gathered here today to hear this junior speak. I’m certain most of you already know but to those who don’t, this junior is named Yuelong and wears the surname Mu; the Eldest Young Master of the Mu Household and the ELDEST son of the Golden Sovereign.”
He paused for a moment to allow for his powerful voice aided by the [Speech Path] to sweep across the massive hall.
“Without further ado, let me begin my discourse on the topic: Unattributed World Energy and the Means by Which to Harness Them.”
Tapping his feet, Yuelong sent streams of his internal energy into the formation arrays underneath his feet, bringing them to life. Lights and sounds flashed on stage as translucent screens containing words, numbers, and arcane symbols appeared around Yuelong.
“The most fundamental form of Energy in this world is Heavenly Energy. It is present in every corner of this world and is the very life essence of this planet. Humans, Wild Beasts, plants, animals, ores, even heavens and earth; none of these would exist without the Heavenly Energy.”
“Practitioners from Eras ancient have always theorized that Heavenly Energy possessed the power to shape and manipulate reality according to its will. It has the power to create matter from nothing; forgoing even the fundamental principle of ‘matter can neither be created nor destroyed.’ that was put forward by Rank 7 practitioner Antoine Lavoisier some centuries ago.”
“As practitioners of the Way, it is our sacred duty to understand all mysteries of the Heavens, including the arcane secrets of Heavenly Energy. And indeed, many, many predecessors have attempted to study it… only to ultimately fail.”
“Heavenly Energy cannot be accessed. It cannot be directly observed, cannot be captured, harnessed or stored. In fact, any attempt to access or manipulate Heavenly Energy will be met with the harshest of punishment from the Heavens themselves! Such punishment, unfortunately, resulted in the loss of many brilliant practitioners and ancient geniuses.”
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“Ever since an iron rule was established among practitioners; ‘Heavenly Energy must not be profaned! The ire of Heavens must not be provoked!’”
“Esteemed practitioners, you must all be curious about where I’m going with this. Allow me to tell you now. Heavenly Energy CAN be harnessed! It CAN be manipulated! It CAN be profaned!”
“I, Mu Yuelong, Son of the Golden Sovereign and ‘Star’ of this generation have done it!”
An all-encompassing, breathless silence fell upon his declaration. The silence held for a whole five seconds before giving way to absolute pandemonium.
“IMPOSSIBLE!!”
“IT CANNOT BE! IT CANNOT POSSIBLY BE!!”
“DO NOT SPEAK WITHOUT KNOWING THE WEIGHT OF YOUR WORDS, JUNIOR!!!”
Facing nearly a thousand angry voices and curses, Yuelong merely smiled casually and softly replied.
“Allow me to demonstrate how.” Drawing on the screens, Yuelong began his work.
---
--
-
Morning. 29th Day of the First Month in the Year 736 NCE.
Central Commonwealth Quarters, Heaven Overseeing City.
BANG! BANG! BANG! A middle-aged man with greying temples and scant, loosely hanging hair knocked furiously at a closed door; his face containing an expression of utmost urgency. He held a crumpled sheet of newspaper in his free hand on the cover of which, partially unobscured by his hand, was a picture of ‘Son of the Heavens’ Mu Yuelong.
BANG! BANG BANG! He repeated again. “Solomon! SOLOMON! Open the damn door! This is no time to be sleeping, boy!”
As he raised his hands to repeat the knockings for a third time, the closed door swung open and out opened a blonde, grease-covered head of hair. An unhealthy-looking face wearing a pair of welding goggles peered at the middle-aged man with annoyance and impatience on his face. “What do you want, Uncle? Is it time for my presentation already?”
“Well no, not yet. Your presentation is scheduled to be held on the 30th, and it's still the 29th–” Halfway through his words, the middle-aged man noticed the unhealthy-looking youth attempt to close the door. “Oh no, you don't!!” He wedged his foot into the doorframe in time, stopping the young man’s attempt.
“No, don’t come in!” cried Solomon, attempting to push the middle-aged man out. Unfortunately, he was outmatched in both strength and size, as the middle-aged man easily waded his way inward.
“Oh, stop it,” scolded his uncle. He then curiously sniffed at the air, noticing a peculiar scent in the air. “Is that–?” Turning his head in the direction of the scent’s origin, he quickly found the culprit. “FIRE!!”
“I know!” screamed Solomon, quickly circling around his uncle and reaching for one of the piles of rubbish present inside the room.
“FIRE!!” cried the uncle again.
“I KNOW!” cried Solomon back, hastily searching the piles of rubbish. “And for Heaven’s sake, help me find the damned extinguisher!”
Dropping the newspaper, the middle-aged man lunged toward the piles of rubbish on the other side of the room to search for the fire extinguisher. The two men spent the following few minutes in extreme panic and haste as they searched for a way to combat the growing fire in the janky-looking laboratory.
“Found it!” shouted the uncle, pulling out a red-coloured cylinder. He then spun around, pointing the hose towards the flame and pulled the handle. A few spurts of nothing later, the extinguisher fell quiet. “Oh, f*ck me! It’s empty!!”
“I got it!” cried Solomon, pulling out an unused cylinder. Repeating his uncle’s motions with far too familiar a hand, he successfully fired the extinguisher and put out the dangerous flame.
With sweat pouring down his face and matting his hair and clothes, Solomon tossed aside the now-empty canister and smiled victoriously. “Phew! That was a bit too close for comfort. A few more seconds and the flame would’ve reached the open bottles of explosive reagents by the side.”
“Open bottles!?” shrieked his uncle. His face turned pale with horror. “Why the hell are the explosive reagents open!?”
Solomon sheepishly grinned and scratched the back of his head. “Well… I couldn’t find the lids to close them.”
As he stepped forward while saying those words, the sound of glass cracking echoed from underneath his feet. Lowering his head, he found a glass plate shattered by his weight. “Oh, there they are!” He reached down to pick up the glass fragments. “Useless now though. It’s broken.”
Solomon’s uncle stared at the boy as if he was staring at a complete alien. “One of these days, you are going to die a horrible death. And it will be because of your stupid actions bringing it onto yourself.”
Solomon let out an exasperated sigh and waved his hands. He then continued walking towards his laboratory. “Hopefully, the specimen that I was studying wasn’t damaged too badly. It would really be a pain in the arse if I had to prepare another one from scratch.”
“Before you go!” The middle-aged man stepped in between Solomon and stopped the youth. “There is something that you will have to see.” He then hurriedly searched the floor for the newspaper and shoved it onto his nephew’s hands upon finding it.
“What’s this?” asked the boy, already annoyed at his uncle’s delay of his research.
“Stop being an arse and read the headlines,” barked the uncle.
Rolling his eyes, Solomon raised the papers and began reading, “Revolutionary Research. History’s Brightest Star Shines Light on Mankind’s Future Path.”
Growing impatient at the vainglorious words of introduction, the youth began skimming the article. A few lines in, however, he slowed as a serious look appeared in his eyes.
“An artificial Core that can automatically harness World Energy!? Is this true!?!” The raw feeling of unbounded curiosity and excitement was unhidden in his question.