Light snapped across his vision like lightning through fog.
The collapsing palace vanished.
The grey mist disappeared.
The screams of a dying dynasty faded into silence.
And Long Xingchen felt his body slam back into the familiar weight of his bedroom on Earth.
For a moment, he simply stood there, breathing hard.
The world around him felt… quiet. Too quiet.
The hum of air conditioning.
The soft city noise outside.
The gentle vibration of his phone on his desk.
It was all painfully normal.
Yet inside him—
a fragment of a destroyed heaven pulsed with faint, dangerous light.
The Cause-and-Effect Fragment he retrieved glowed inside his palm before dissolving into golden streams that merged into his soul.
The system chimed sharply.
> [Fragment Absorbed.]
[Heaven Erasure Fragment — Level 1 integrated.]
[System Upgrade: 15% → 30%.]
[New Function Unlocked:]
— Multi-Era Anchoring: Host can travel to any timeline of any vanished dynasty, sect, realm, or era.
No limit to how far back. Tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of years before destruction.
Xingchen froze.
"…Millions?"
> [Affirmative.]
[If energy and anchor data permit, Host may travel to any era in pre-erasure history.]
This changed everything.
He could witness events before a dynasty fell.
Before the Immortal World cracked.
Before the Divine Realm vanished.
Before the original heavens ceased to exist.
He could bypass the destruction and find out what caused it.
His heartbeat accelerated.
"A whole universe of history… locked behind time."
The system continued:
> [But due to extreme cosmic exhaustion from the first jump—]
[Time Travel Cooldown: 10 days.]
[Energy needs to replenish.]
Xingchen nodded.
"Reasonable. I nearly ripped through a collapsing timeline."
> [Note:]
Host's soul can handle unlimited travel.
The limitation is System Energy, not the Host's strength.
He loosened his fist, palms still tingling from the fragment's power.
Right now, he needed to plan.
---
1. The Modern World Isn't Waiting
His bedroom door rattled as someone knocked—softly, urgently.
"Xingchen? Are you awake?"
His mother's voice.
He opened the door. Su Yanyu looked concerned.
"There was… another strange car outside the villa just now."
Xingchen's eyes narrowed.
"Black sedan?" he asked.
His mother blinked. "Yes. How did you—?"
"No plate number?" he added.
Her expression shifted. "…Yes."
Xingchen exhaled slowly.
The Qin family has already begun surveillance.
Even faster than in the previous timeline.
He gently took his mother's hands.
"Mom, please stay with Dad today. Don't go out alone."
She frowned at his serious tone. "Xingchen… is something wrong?"
"Just trust me."
After a hesitating pause, she nodded.
When the door closed, he leaned against the wall.
They were moving too quickly.
His rebirth had caused ripples.
The Qin family sensed something.
This timeline would be more dangerous than the last.
---
2. Lin Yuerou's Message
His phone buzzed.
> [Yuerou]: Did you get home safely? Also… I might be paranoid, but someone was watching me near the bus stop.
Xingchen felt cold fury crackle through him.
The Qin family wasn't just watching the Longs—they were watching her too.
Original timeline:
They only targeted Yuerou much later, when he was already desperate and isolated.
But now?
They were moving earlier.
He texted immediately:
> [Xingchen]: I'll come see you tomorrow. Don't walk alone at night. Stay in well-lit places. And if you see that person again, let me know immediately.
> [Yuerou]: …Xingchen, what's going on?
He stared at the message for a long moment.
He couldn't tell her.
Not yet.
But soon, she had to understand the danger around her.
> [Xingchen]: I'll explain tomorrow. Just be safe. Please.
Her reply was a simple:
> [Okay.]
Short. Worried. Trusting.
He clenched his jaw.
"This time… you won't die."
---
3. The First Dynasty's Warning
The system chimed again, sharper this time.
> [Integrating new data from retrieved fragment…]
[Revealing Partial Truth:]
"The heavens did not collapse naturally."
"They were consumed."
"By a phenomenon older than the Immortal World itself."
"An existence that erases stories, civilisations, and timelines alike."
[Name: Classified until System Upgrade Level 2.]
Xingchen's breath froze.
Something older than the heavens…
Erasing entire worlds…
"System," he said quietly, "was this… thing the reason the Immortal World in my second life was sealed?"
> [Correct.]
[Your universe was already partially devoured when you were reborn into it.]
His heart thudded violently once.
No wonder the Immortal Gate never opened.
No wonder the Divine Realm had vanished.
No wonder every ancient dynasty left no trace.
"It wasn't my talent that failed," he murmured.
> [Correct.]
"It was the heavens themselves that were broken."
> [Correct.]
His pulse steadied.
His eyes sharpened.
"If the heavens were consumed… then something must be controlling that force."
The system replied:
> [Highest-level truth cannot be revealed until more fragments are retrieved.]
[Host's strength insufficient for exposure.]
Xingchen grimaced.
Fine.
He would tear the truth out of history himself.
---
4. The Qin Family Moves Their First Pawn
That evening, he sat alone in his study, planning how to counter the Qin clan's early movements.
He didn't need his second life's cosmic senses to feel the presence lurking outside the villa gate.
But he used them anyway.
A faint pulse.
Too still.
Too disciplined.
A trained operative, not a random observer.
Xingchen spoke without turning.
"You can come out."
A shadow detached itself from behind the trees across the street.
"Good perception," the man said with a cold smirk. "The Qin family is impressed."
Xingchen's gaze lowered, half-lidded.
"And you came here hoping to impress me?"
"No." The operative snapped his fingers.
Another figure appeared beside him.
A woman.
Shivering. Crying.
Bound and gagged.
Xingchen's expression tightened.
His father's secretary.
In his first life, this woman died in a 'car crash' two days before the Long family downfall.
"So we speed things up this time," the man said. "Young Master Qin wants the Long family to feel pressure sooner."
Xingchen's fingers twitched.
He didn't need to use his system power.
He didn't need ancient techniques.
He only needed one step.
He moved—
—too fast for mortal eyes.
The operative's grin froze.
His body trembled.
And then—
Crack.
His spine slammed into the pavement with crushing force.
Xingchen's voice was ice.
"Tell your masters this: You won't touch my family. Not now. Not ever."
The man coughed blood, choking.
"W… who… are you…?"
Xingchen leaned closer, eyes glowing faintly with the pressure of an ancient sovereign.
"I am the one you should fear from now on."
He knocked the man unconscious with a tap.
Freed the secretary.
Called emergency security.
Disappeared before the first sirens arrived.
---
5. The Fragment Awakens
As he walked back into the villa, warmth replaced tension.
But inside his soul—
the fragment pulsed again.
A thread of golden light shot into his vision.
A vision.
A ruin.
A sky filled with cracks.
A city collapsing under grey mist.
A woman standing alone at the center, her eyes closed, her long robes fluttering, whispering:
"Let the heavens forget us… but let those who come after… remember the truth."
He snapped back to reality, breathing harshly.
"Who was she?"
> [Unknown.]
[Fragment too weak for full projection.]
[Collect more fragments to reveal her identity.]
Xingchen rubbed his temples.
His timeline was collapsing in his old life.
History was collapsing in this one.
He needed more time.
"System. When is the next possible jump?"
> [Cooldown: 9 days 23 hours.]
He nodded.
Good.
He had nine days to:
1. Strengthen his mortal body with the Heaven-Defying Technique.
2. Use his 100 billion yuan to protect his family.
3. Crush the Qin family's early schemes.
4. Prepare for a journey millions of years into the past.
He stared at his reflection.
A young face.
Ancient eyes.
"This time," he whispered,
"I won't just survive the erased heavens."
His fingers closed into a fist.
"I will rewrite them."