The sky above Mount Mo-Tian had never truly died; it was merely rotting. Thick purple clouds born from the corrosion of Ba-Huang's aura hung low, dripping thin acid rain that eroded the ancient stones. Beneath the shroud of that dying sky, a teenage girl ran with ragged breaths.
Mu Lan-Xing, commonly called Mu-mu, clutched her woven basket tightly. Inside were several withered medicinal herbs, the only hope to sustain life in the village at the foot of the mountain.
"Fresh meat… Sssst… It smells so sweet…"
The hoarse voice came from within the fog. Mu-mu froze. From the darkness emerged a two-meter-tall creature. Its skin was covered in dark green scales, its forked tongue flicked outward, and its vertical yellow eyes were filled with killing intent. A Lizard Demon, a low-level reptilian fiend, yet powerful enough to slaughter an entire village of ordinary humans.
"Please… don't…" Mu-mu stepped back, but her foot caught on the root of an old tree. She fell backward, landing directly before a massive boulder embedded in the mountain wall.
The stone was strange. Unlike the other mountain rocks corroded by acid, this one was smooth, pitch-black, and covered with golden moss that seemed to breathe.
Slash!
The demon's sharp claws struck, tearing through Mu-mu's small shoulder. Fresh red blood splattered and flowed onto the surface of the black stone.
"AHHH!" Mu-mu screamed, shutting her eyes as the demon's maw opened wide, ready to crush her skull.
Yet death did not arrive.
Instead, Mount Mo-Tian trembled. The tremor was not an ordinary earthquake; it was the heartbeat of something that had ceased for ten thousand eras, suddenly pulsing once more. Mu-mu's blood seeped into the pores of the black stone, and in that instant, the golden moss upon its surface erupted into blinding light.
BOOOOM!!!
The explosion produced no fire, only a wave of pressure so dense that the Lizard Demon was hurled backward, its ribs shattered by the sheer force of sound.
At the center of the blast, ancient dust shrouded a figure slowly rising.
A young man. His skin was as pale as porcelain yet as hard as bronze. His long black hair cascaded down, veiling a face whose jawline was as sharp as if carved by a god. He stood there, naked amid the storm of energy, staring at his own hands with a confused expression.
"Noisy…" the young man's voice was low, yet it echoed throughout the valley. "You… disturbed my sleep of a million years."
The Lizard Demon, though wounded, was driven by its savage instincts. It leapt again, extending its venomous claws. "DIE, HUMAN!"
The young man, Jue Yan, did not even assume a stance. He did not know how to fight. He felt no Qi flowing within his body. The only thing he felt was this: the world felt incredibly, unbearably light. As if a single breath taken too forcefully would flatten this mountain.
When the demon was but an inch from his face, Jue Yan merely swung his right hand casually, like someone brushing away a fly.
PLAK!
The impact was utterly absurd.
Not only did the demon shatter into a mist of blood, but the pressure of wind from Jue Yan's careless swing continued forward, splitting the fog, tearing through hundreds of trees behind it, and carving a hundred-meter trench across the forest floor as though a colossal dragon had just passed through.
The forest that had once been dense now stood bald from a single empty-handed strike.
Jue Yan blinked. He looked at his own palm, then at Mu-mu trembling beneath him.
"Too fragile," Jue Yan muttered with an innate arrogance. "Why does everything in this world feel as though it's made of paper?"
He tried to step forward toward Mu-mu, but the moment his foot touched the ground:
KRAKKK!
The mountain floor cracked a meter deep under the weight of a single uncontrolled step. Jue Yan snorted in annoyance. He had forgotten how to be "light."
In the distance, beyond the purple clouds, nine pairs of colossal eyes at the edge of the world opened briefly. The sovereign of calamity, Ba-Huang, sensed that something which should have remained dead had begun to breathe once more.
Jue Yan looked toward the sky, a faint smirk appearing on his handsome face.
"So, this is the Era of Calamity? Disgusting."