Chapter 1
"..Within the boundless void, a primordial darkness swallowed and shrouded all things. Yet, the footsteps of that individual were as silent as a dead man and as stable as a monolithic mountain.
With every step he took, impulses to surrender and lose hope attempted to pierce and corrode his soul. But it was in vain. His mind had become as cold and tranquil as a lake that no wave could ever disturb.
With every step he took, echoes of consciousness tried to seduce his soul with the venom of nostalgia. Unfortunately, within this person's heart, not a single trace of longing remained.
His past was like a pile of burnt ashes. There was no old home to miss, no old acquaintance to remember, and no rubbish of sentiment or attachment to yearn for. In this world, nostalgia was but a distant, faded legend to him.
He was as cold as a lamp without fuel. This absence of longing was his greatest weapon, and with those unbindable footsteps, he continued to tread through the infinite darkness with absolute indifference.
With every step he took, the surrounding silence tried to push his soul into the abyss of loneliness. Yet, that loneliness was no longer a bitter pain to him; it had become a weapon he wielded with mastery.
He did not seek to drive the loneliness away; instead, he had conquered it and forced it to kneel as a servant beneath his feet. To others, loneliness was a terrifying catastrophe, but to him, it was merely a forge that tempered his will into steel.
Lonelier than loneliness itself, colder than the biting frost, he continued to walk firmly through the darkness along his own path.
Was it the urge to surrender? The shadows of a melancholic past? The silent isolation? The trembling terror? Or the hopelessness within the dark?
All these miseries could corrode the souls of ordinary men, but to this person, they were merely 'guests' who could only enter with his permission. Unless he summoned them, no emotion could force open the gates of his heart.
He was like a sovereign king who ruled absolutely over his own consciousness. No matter how the Heavenly Way struck him... as long as he did not permit it, no agony could cause him pain. His soul was as hard as cold stone, and he looked upon those 'guests' with an expression of icy indifference.
This person's attire was a simple black robe, devoid of any beauty or decoration. Its design was so plain that if he were placed in a crowd, he would not stand out at all. Using only black, he appeared as nothing more than a moving shadow shifting through the night.
His jet-black hair fell long, reaching down to his waist. Though its beauty could captivate the mind of a beholder, the coldness in his eyes acted as a barrier, repelling all things.
His face was neither exceptionally handsome nor featured any terrifying traits. If cast into a sea of people, he possessed a face that would not warrant a second glance—perhaps only slightly more distinct than a commoner's.
His gaze was sharp, yet his face held no shadow of any emotion. Behind that cold stability, no one could guess what calculations and schemes lay hidden.
At that moment... he suddenly ceased his advance within the infinite darkness. After the surroundings fell into a deathly silence, a voice—flowing beautifully like a river yet heavy and firm as a mountain—broke through the dark and echoed out.
He spoke every word slowly, with a decisiveness sharper than steel:
"I believe... in Eternal Existence."
"I shall defy and rebel against the Heavenly Way."
As those words left his lips, even the darkness seemed to tremble. These were no ordinary words; it was a declaration of war against the entire world—the roar of a soul determined to write its own destiny.
Every single word he uttered shook the very "Heaven's Will," causing the river of time to cease its downward flow and surge backward. The moment he spoke, the "Rules of Samsara" fell into chaos. Life and death, existence and destruction, defied their primal natures and began to revolve in reverse.
All beings across the universe trembled in terror under his authority, their existences blurring into confusion. Only when his voice ceased did his aura stabilize; the River of Time returned to its original course, and the laws of life, death, and causality returned to their destined places.
As soon as his voice faded, countless "Crystal Mirrors" manifested in the air like reflections of the moon upon the water. Within these mirrors, the Wheel of Fate for countless beings flickered brightly. In some mirrors, one could see the peaceful daily lives of mortals; in others, battlefields drenched in blood due to ambition and greed. Some struggled for the future, while others were drowned in the shackles of love.
The past, the present, and the future—three streams of time—were chaotically interwoven within those mirrored reflections. Yet that individual alone stood unmoving among them, like a rock resisting the relentless currents of the river of time. With deep, unfathomable eyes, he gazed steadily at that beautiful yet cruel flow of temporal tides.
From within the mirrors, he listened to the sobs, the laughter, and the cries of battle belonging to countless living beings… and at the corner of his lips, a faint smile—one difficult to decipher—slowly appeared. That smile was not born of compassion or pity, but rather from the awareness of one who observed the world's grand game from a position far above it.
He gently raised his hand, and his waist-length hair swayed softly in the air.
"Time itself is nothing more than an illusion," he seemed to murmur inwardly,
"and samsara is merely an endless cage."
Then, he took a single step forward.
In that very instant… the innumerable mirrors surrounding him shattered into fragments of glass, and all bonds of past, present, and future vanished without a trace. Having already resolved to walk a path that transcended all things, he softly released the deepest sigh.
That sigh carried with it the mockeries of hidden fate he had endured across millions of years, the tangled truths of worldly existence, and every emotion he had long suppressed—releasing them all into the empty air.