PROLOGUE ONE

Wen Xiao finally climbed to the top of the mountain, looking east into the distance. She ran urgently, white-fair cheeks blushing red, black hair soaked with sweat and sticking messily to her cheeks.

Suddenly, Wen Xiao’s breath stopped.

In the eastern Wilderness, the sun and moon hung at the same spot, red light spilling over. Just now that red light was like a slender thread of silk; at this moment, it was like a blood vessel stretching across the horizon.

This sky-born phenomenon certainly meant great calamity.

To think of her master at this moment still caught in a tangle with Li Lun, Wen Xiao’s heart grew even more unsettled. So the slender form of a young woman continued her staggering run toward the sea…

Just then, by the Wilderness sea, the cosmos suddenly changed, making it difficult to tell if it was day or night.

Black clouds blotted out the sun, thunder roared like a great beast, reverberating in all directions, deafening. The black reef rocks tightly bit the shore like the teeth of a huge animal, strong wind brought a surge of mighty waves, heavily pounding the incisors of the hard reef, breaking them with each strike. Foam heaped thickly in the rock crevices.

The sky and the sea were black.

In this oppressive sight, a black silhouette and a white silhouette stood facing one another in battle.

“Li Lun, you refuse to obey the Baize restraint command, selfishly leaving the Wilderness to wantonly slaughter the innocent in the human world. Do you understand your crime?” The woman standing on the reef rocks held a short flute in her hand, features cold, white clothes fluttering in the wind.

The young man called Li Lun hung in the air, ink-stick dark hair and black robes. Demon power covered his whole body like hell’s fire, curling and rising, unbroken by the blowing winds. Willful to the end.

“Zhao Wan’er, you are an ordinary mortal. Why are you meddling in the affairs of the Wilderness?” Li Lun’s breath stirred restlessly.

“I bear the immortal power of the Baize, rightful protector of the Wilderness. Of course I would be in charge.” Zhao Wan’er’s dignified voice, solemn and respectful, echoed between heaven and earth, a boldness unique to the Baize Goddess.

“Then I’ll kill you! Show me how you’re in charge!” The area surrounding Li Lun was suddenly heavy with the aura of death, a breathtakingly cold intent in his eyes.

Wen Xiao hurried to the seaside in a flash, and realized the scent of air was not the way it had been in bygone days. It was dirty; an exhalation of cruelty’s breath, the smell of burning rot surging around her, assailing her nose.

“Master!” She ran towards the reef rocks, calling out to Zhao Wan’er.

Li Lun heard her. He glanced down at the small figure running toward Zhao Wan’er, no more than 16 years old, a frail mortal. Humans were always like this, these infants of mundane flesh, like a mantis trying to obstruct a chariot, overestimating their abilities.

Mole crickets and ants. Nothing more.

Li Lun thought this was an interesting thing. Inside his flamboyant cloud of demon energy, he slowly curled the corner of his mouth and lifted his hand holding a pellet drum—a two-leveled drum, a larger drum atop a small one, decorated with the ancient pattern of a colored drawing. With one finger gripping the drum’s handle, he easily turned it. The pellets struck each side of the drum’s surface, sending out a loud and clear ding-dong.

In a split second, in one deep and resounding hum-hooting of power, overwhelming and all-pervasive, Wen Xiao felt a savage thump on her forehead. One by one, her five senses completely vanished…

Ice, a bone-piercing cold.

A pounding against the skin, slicing like a knife.

On a lifeless, beautiful face, the eyelashes gave a tiny tremble as Wen Xiao regained consciousness. The space between heaven and earth remained a dark and gloomy expanse. She didn’t know how much time had passed. Wen Xiao tried to stand, but her legs had been submerged in the blisteringly cold sea water for so long that she couldn’t stop shivering.

“Master… Master!” She called out urgently between her heavy sobs.

Wen Xiao staggered to run toward that reef rock, unintentionally catching a sight that brought her to a sudden stop: Zhao Wan’er’s clean, white skirt soaked in the foul sea water; a massive, horrible bloodstain at her chest; her body powerless like paper floating in the waves with not even the slightest hint of life. Her face was deathly pale, her lips black; her eyes still open, like heavy, dark clouds; pupils already round, ash-gray voids.

Wen Xiao opened her mouth, hoarse throat unable to form a whole syllable.

Her master possessed the title of Baize Goddess of the Wilderness, able to command countless demons. There was no power that could injure her. How… How could she be dead?

Wen Xiao’s chest rose and fell fiercely, gasping for air, eyes wide, staring fixedly at her master’s corpse. Right before her eyes, that white form was swallowed by an overwhelming darkness until it was nearly gone. Wen Xiao lost consciousness again.

A sky-born phenomenon certainly meant great calamity. Wen Xiao didn’t understand, didn’t know this great calamity that no one had the power to stop.

The sky is constant, the sun and moon rise and fall past the horizon, the four seasons alternate; and the cycle returns to the start. 

END OF PROLOGUE ONE