My mind feels hazy
Strange, my thoughts .....
How can I even think....
It feels warm, I can't see though.
"Ma'am.....push....ma'am....he's.....congra..."
I can only hear distant voices.
Uh...my..... my strength... I can't concentrate....
**********************************************************
"Congratulations Madam Qing, It's a baby boy. "
"Haa, haa my .... boy...haa, Yan Niezhou. "
"Physicians you may leave now, my wife seeks rest. "
"Yes lord Yan! "
The doors shut behind a tall, well built and imposing man with white hair tied up in a pony tail, purple eyes and a vertical scar on his chin. The man, also known as clan patriarch gazed towards his wife on the bed with eyes of overflowing affection despite his overwhelming presence.
The wife had bright blue hair and eyes. Her gaze was tired but full of love as she continued to look at her baby in front of her sleeping peacefully.
The man, lord Yan Bai placed a kiss on his wife's(Lady Yan Qing) forehead as he took the baby carefully from the with his large arms.
"My son, you shall be the leader of the great Yan clan, one day you'll surpass me and continue to rule this clan and become clan patriarch. ", Yan Bai quietly smiled as warm familial pride filled his gaze.
************************
"Urghh where am I, I can't sense or see my surroundings. Was I captured and not killed. No that's impossible after what I did. ", A certain person thought grimly while trying to hold his head.
"..... wait hold, why is my body so disorientated. Am I poisoned as well, oh no. "
"Husband, little Niezhou is awake now. "
"Oh, my child, come to father. "
"Waaaaahhhhhh", the certain person, revealed to be Niezhou cried out loud unexpected.
"Hush now little Niezhou, your father only looks scary, he actually isn't. ", lady Qing teased her husband as she rocked Niezhou to sleep.
"What the, those voices, it can't be, it can't, it can't, it ca-", Niezhou's thoughts spiraled rapidly as he recalled memories of his life.
"Shhhhh Niezhou how will you lead a clan when you cry so much. ", patriarch Bai cut in while smiling warmly at his son.
"Waaaaahhhhh, waahhhhhhhh", Niezhou cried louder. "How, why, my parents.... they are here.... they died. "
"Fufu, Husband you still look scary. ", lady Qing teased again
"Ahem, perhaps Niezhou is hungry, it's been some hours since his birth and he hasn't breast-feed yet. "
"Mhh, ok husband, little Niezhou quiet down now. "
Lady Qing plucked her breast into Niezhou's wailing mouth and he feed relentlessly until he eventually just fell asleep.
******************************************
A week later.
"I definitely regressed to my birth, which means I successfully hijacked the river of time. But now my actions of wailing loudly like that a week ago is haunting me with embarrassment. ", Niezhou thought grimly remembering his 'cringe' burst of tears.
"Niezhou, are you awake, let's go take a walk outside. ", Bai beamed as he stood up slowly as to not bring any discomfort upon the baby Niezhou in his arms.
Bai walked past the door of Niezhou's room into the corridor full of maids, servants and clan members.
"We greet the clan leader. ", all the people in the corridor including the older looking clan members right outside the door acting as guards greeted uniformly.
"Brother Chen and brother Yu, please guard the house I'm taking Niezhou on a walk. "
"Yes clan leader. "
Bai nodded once towards the two men before leaving the servants and clan members in the hallway.
The Yan clan estate was nothing short of an artistic masterpiece of architecture, with multiple floors like a pagoda and being surrounded by 5 tall buildings of deadly marvelous structure.
As Bai continued from one beautiful corridor to another, little Niezhou simply absorbed all the nostalgic scenes from inside the resident.
"I never really noticed how much red, gold and white they keep using. ", Niezhou thought with realization.
"Niezhou, we are here. All of this land you see is a territory you will inherit as my son and heir. ", Bai smiled gently, looking down on the cute little Niezhou, meanwhile Niezhou himself also became serious, though not noticeably so.
"In order to defeat the calamity I need to become strong enough to protect my family. I won't let my master's efforts, and everyone's efforts be in vain in helping me go back in time. ", Niezhou resolved resolutely.
*********************************
Back in the Yan clan estate.
"Little Niezhou falls asleep quickly husband. "
"Mhhh, he looked cute when I took out to see our territory. "
"Already? I guess it's better for him this way. "
"Ok darling let's sleep before we wake him up. "
....
"Are they finally gone. Huuu, why do they always make sure I'm sleeping. ", Niezhou lamented silently.
"I need to cultivate right now but to do that I need to enable my body to be capable of cultivation. Mmmhhh fine, I'll only cultivate my mind. "
Niezhou closed his eyes and fell into deep sleep.
In the empty and dark void like space of Niezhou's consciousness a purely white wisp of almost fading smoke drifted aimlessly.
Eventually the white wisp stopped and began to disperse and reform endlessly in different shapes and forms. The transformations cycles started slow but began to pick up pace quickly until a normal person can't even tell when the cycles occurred.
The white wisp suddenly began to rapidly converge upon itself and becoming a perfectly spherical orb.
Meanwhile Niezhou opened his eyes in the real world as his small baby body began to tremble slightly from sheer excitement.
"Baahhh buh bahhha bbuh. " (what he means to say is: I finally did it )
"Kekeke, with the mind path I can become far more stronger than I ever was in my previous life. "
"For now I can only access the path but not use it directly so I should focus on building my foundation in the mind path. "
For the duration of the following near 12 months Niezhou tempered his mind in any small way he could. He would read a lot of picture books with his mom or cry for his father to take him with whenever he's visiting the scripture hall.
By the time his birthday(June 30) arrived he managed to successfully memorize a spear martial art which his father left in his room by accident.
***********************************************************************
In the dining hall of the Yan estate.
"Today we celebrate the first birthday of the Yan clan heir. "
"CHEERS ! ! ! "
"Happy birthday little Niezhou, my gift to you is this book of herbs since you love books so much. ", Lady Qing smiled sweetly.
"Honey, Niezhou is only 1 why would you give him a book so profound, he can't read yet. ", Bai sighed gently before turning to Niezhou.
"Son, I brought you this mechanical set of toys made by the best alchemist in the continent. ", Bai smugly opened a rather large box which contained a sculpted landscape of a war outpost and many wooden figures holding wooden swords.
Bai began to guide Niezhou gently by taking his still tiny hand and guiding it to the back of one of the soldier figures.
"If you press their back they'll begin to move around. ", he explained excitedly as if it were more of a toy for him and not his son.
"Hahaha, Bai that's a good idea but surely my gift is better. ", Yan Chen appeared from the side holding a box of a smaller size.
"Ho, you think so Chen. ", Bai smirked
Eventually many of the Yan clan members and others outside the clan but allied with them brought gifts endlessly one after another.
Some faces familiar to Niezhou also began to appear and offer their gifts alongside congratulations.
" *sniff sniff*, waaaaah waaah waaah. "
Eventually Niezhou unable to control his emotions as a baby began to wail loudly out of relief at the realization that he truly is back home while everything is peaceful.
"Urghh *sniff* damn baby eyes can't hold back my tears. ", Niezhou thought while sobbing softer now.
"Sorry about the large number of people little Niezhou, did they scare you. ", Lady Qing asked softly.
"Take him to sleep honey, meeting so many strangers up close in one day must have been making him anxious. ", Bai nodded as he gently handed the now sleepy Niezhou to lady Qing.
While lady Qing left the party with Niezhou the rest of the guests continued to dine and talk as if they haven't seen each other for decades.
*********************
Meanwhile in Niezhou's room.
"Mom left, I can finally make my first breakthrough. To enter the mind(creator) path I need to open the mind gates that one normally opens only in qi gathering, nascent soul, soul formation and so on. ", Niezhou muttered quietly to himself to remind himself of every step needed for the mind path.
"Normally this path is only taken by those old, crusty sages but anyone can enter it as long as they know how to remotely enter the 'mind above heavens' state(technically activating enlightenment whenever you want). "
"Ok, let's clear this first hurdle. "
Niezhou accessed his empty consciousness place again but this time the white orb had grown to an orange sized orb that was completely solid and hovered still in the 'center' of the empty space.
Next he began to focus intently on the orb and as he did so the orb emitted faint light which gathered like a ring around it.
"Normally those sages saturate the ring with qi, but I can't absorb qi yet so I'll use my vital energy plus it's more profitable. "
Niezhou inhaled then exhaled deeply as he bit his small teeth hard onto his blankets and began a gruesome process of extracting his own life line and using it as fuel to saturate the ring.
The mind path's first major realm had 5 sub-realms. The major realm is known amongst sages as the 'True Gate Opening' realm, and each sub-realm opens one of the 5 true gates.
The first gate to be opened is the Spiritual Sea gate
The second is the True Intent realm gate
The third is the Divine Soul Palace gate
The fourth is the Existence integration gate
The fifth and final gate is the True life gate.
In order to enter the different gates you need a key which is created by relating energies to each gate type, for example: you need spiritual qi to open the first gate however some people known as martial artists still open this gate unconsciously using true qi instead of spiritual qi.
Right now Niezhou is using the small motes of both true qi and spiritual qi imbued in his vital energy to open the gate.
"Mhhhhhhhmmmmmmm!!!!!!!! ", Niezhou screamed but his blankets he bit into muffled the sound considerably and cause him to clench harder to completely cut the sounds off.
After a full two hour session of torture, Niezhou finally saturated the gate of Spiritual sea and opened it.
A gust of unknown nature blew past his consciousness and lifted a fog that has been blocking much of his memories.
"Haa, I got around 7 percent of my memories, truly my mind is feeling full again so soon after refreshing it. I should probably open the True intent gate since it's the easiest one for someone like me. ", Niezhou grinned as he sat up on his baby bed.
Before he could meditate, the mental exhaustion from directly using his vital energy hit him hard and he fell asleep peacefully, dreaming of the peaceful times he spent in the Yan clan.
The Yan clan is the third most powerful clan in the '4th Earth' of the '8 Earths 5 Heavens' firmament(basically a solar system).
The estate is located in the western continent also known as the continent of fire due to it being a location of constant war between the Yan clan and the Deadly Yin school of demonic cultivators.
Niezhou was dreaming peacefully of his previous life whereby he was lazy to do any combat training, cultivation or missions but still received immense respect from his peers due to his sheer talent.