CHAPTER 15 (Part 2)
The Road Between Worlds
The golden light swallowed the mountain path.
Zheng Wen Te's breath caught as the world around him unraveled.
Stone became mist.
Mist became stars.
The sect disappeared as if it had never existed.
He was no longer sitting.
He was falling—
through a corridor of endless radiance.
The orb hovered before him now, no longer resting in his palm.
It spun slowly, like an eye opening.
Symbols appeared across its surface.
Ancient.
Unreadable.
Yet his soul understood them.
Karma.
Return.
Resolve.
The air trembled with unseen voices.
Not the voices of disciples.
Not the voices of elders.
But something older.
The River of Time whispered again.
Zheng Wen Te saw fragments as he fell.
A pavilion of white stone beneath blooming peach trees.
A woman standing alone, her robes stained with moonlight.
Her eyes—
furious.
Heartbroken.
Empty.
Then another vision.
That same woman, centuries later, sitting atop a mountain of corpses.
Immortal blood staining her fingers.
A title carved into the heavens:
Heart-Severing Immortal.
Zheng Wen Te's soul shook.
"…What did I create?"
The corridor darkened.
The golden light thinned.
A doorway appeared ahead.
Not a physical gate—
but a tear in reality itself.
Beyond it was another sky.
Violet.
Twin moons.
The immortal world from his vision.
The true origin of his unfinished sin.
The orb pulsed one last time.
A voice echoed faintly.
Not Shangdi.
Not an elder.
But something inside the orb itself.
A whisper like fate:
Do not run again.
Zheng Wen Te's throat tightened.
"I won't."
He did not know if it was truth or desperation.
But he said it anyway.
The doorway expanded.
Wind screamed through it, carrying the scent of spirit herbs and distant thunder.
Zheng Wen Te's body felt weightless.
Then unbearably heavy.
As if the universe itself was pressing him toward judgment.
He thought, suddenly, of Earth.
Of the sealed myths.
Of humanity under a fragile barrier.
He thought of Shangdi fading away.
Let them be.
Their fate will be determined by my last prophet.
His chest tightened.
"So even now…"
"I'm still being used."
But perhaps…
being used was better than being nothing.
The doorway consumed him.
For an instant, Zheng Wen Te felt his soul stretch—
like a thread pulled between worlds.
Pain.
Cold.
Then—
Silence.
He hit the ground hard.
Dirt.
Real dirt.
The smell of grass and rain.
Zheng Wen Te coughed, rolling onto his side.
Above him—
a violet sky.
Two moons hanging like watching eyes.
He lay there shaking.
Not from injury.
From the weight of where he had arrived.
He whispered, barely audible:
"…Heart Pavilion."
The orb, now dim, fell into his palm again.
Warm.
Waiting.
And somewhere far away…
an immortal woman opened her eyes.