Beastmaster of the Ages

It was a face straight from Tianming’s distant past. She used to be a very pretty girl to him, but as time passed, she faded away to mediocrity. He had gone from the moral world to the world of ascendants, astral gods and cosmic gods, after all.

The so-called story to be continued was one that had already ended as far as Tianming was concerned when the girl called Mu Qingqing hung from the door of Flameyellow Scions Institute. It was not a comma, it was a period. Yet, this cosmic goddess in black had changed the period into a comma.

Tianming blinked nonstop at first before forcing his eyes to stay open as she stared at her. She was a thousand meters in height, matching Tianming’s current size! Her face did emanate a kind of inward glow that suggested she was an advanced cosmic-god lifeform. Every inch of her features looked finely chiseled. Yet, somehow, these features all together added up to resemble the person he used to know, Mu Qingqing. It was just like how Tianming could still recognize Moran despite her having gone from mortal all the way to cosmic god. She looked physically the same, yet grew more beautiful with each advancement.

This woman, however, was slightly different from the one he knew. Mu Qingqing was a fan of white dresses, while this figure was clad in galaxy black, cold and silent. However, her reddened eyes could not mask the powerful feelings that bubbled beneath. Just like that, they looked at each other for a long time.

”Mu Qingqing,” Tianming said in an odd tone of voice.

”That is my real name,” she said, almost choking from her tears.

”Impossible. I’ve already seen your unveiled appearance in the wondersky realm. You didn’t look like this back then.”

She had seemed incredibly normal to the point that it wasn’t a face noteworthy enough to remember. Tianming couldn’t recall how she looked even if he wanted to. Smiling, she shook her head and said in a blame-like tone, ”If I had shown you what I really looked like, would you really come here?”

She did have a point. Tianming would be even less inclined to come had that been the case. This was just too weird!

”Is this really what you look like?” Her looks and name... and a story that was yet to conclude. The pain from his first love had left a scar on his heart, but he would never have fond feelings for Mu Qingqing again, for she was the one who had caused the death of Midas, Tianming’s first lifebound beast all the way back.

”I have always looked like this and been named the way I am,” she said.

”Then, are you related to the Mu Qingqing that I remember?”

”I do, and I don’t.”

”Don’t be cryptic.”

She looked deeply at him. ”Order and chaos, these two realms... universes... are inverted versions of one another. The positive and negative sides are interlinked to some degree. I might not necessarily be related to the me from that other realm, but that doesn’t mean that we completely don’t affect one another. However, our connection to you has never been truly broken.”

Those words were still far too mysterious. Tianming didn’t understand anything about the Realm of Chaos, so he still shook his head, not understanding it all.

Melancholically, she continued, ”If you like this destiny, I shall be the same person as her. If you hate it and reject it, you can treat me like a separate person who shares the same appearance and name. That way, you won’t actually hate me, right?”

Tianming pondered a moment in silence. ”Fine. I won’t hold the past against you and will consider you a different person of your own right. We never had anything to do with each other way back then.”

”But I’ve been waiting for you for a hundred thousand years,” she said, tearing up.

”What if the one you were waiting for wasn’t me?” Tianming asked.

The new Mu Qingqing shook her head as her tears fell. ”While the me’s from the Realms of Chaos and Order might not necessarily be the same, I can be sure that you are you. You are special, unique, the one.”

”Alright, don’t give me all that. I already came all this way like you asked. Fulfill your promise and give me my daughter back. My child is innocent. If you really care about me, don’t ruffle my feathers and make me hate you.”

Mu Qingqing pointed behind him and said, ”But you can no longer return. The pathway is closed.”

Tianming looked back and found that it was really gone, though he wasn’t worried. First, he could wait for Feng. Second, he had been aware of the Welkin plane as he had lived in the mortal world once. As long as he passed through the plane, he could make it to the other side. ”Give me my child. Now.”

”Can we wait until you’re properly back home?”

”Am I not already home?”

”Of course not...” She shot him a flabbergasted look. ”Your grandparents, parents and brother haven’t seen you yet. There’s also the others in the Nullity Starcage.”

”Will you release my child after I see them?”

”Fine. After you meet them, you’ll learn where your true home is. You’ll remember everything.”

”Alright, lead the way and don’t waste words.” Tianming decisively followed her. They were trying to trick him to stay, so he was curious to see how they would do it. Were his so-called family magic or something?

Mu Qingqing finally broke into a smile after hearing him agree. She waved for him to follow. ”I already told everyone in Skyplunder Capital about this. They are awaiting the return of their imperial crown prince. Come with me.”

”Skyplunder Capital?” He recalled that when he asked his father, Li Muyang, about the Realm of Chaos, he had told him not to go there if it was possible. What did ’if it was possible’ even mean? Why did the capital of the Nullity Starcage bear ’sky’ and ’plunder’ in its name?

Cities bearing ’capital’ in their name were among the biggest cities in their respective universes, far bigger than mound and universe cities. Only imperial-class worlds had cities of that scale, all of them protected by maniverse-class defensive formations.

”You’re still not used to chaotic power, so let me lead you.” Mu Qingqing pulled Tianming’s hand. Her hand felt really soft, yet cold. For some reason, he felt rather odd when she held him.

”Destiny...” Why did something so weird exist? He didn’t let her hand go and looked at the odd girl as she led the way. All of a sudden, time seemed to have rolled back a few centuries back to the days where the young boy and girl from a small town joined Flameyellow Scions Institute in the Vermillion Bird Kingdom. She had once held his hand like this in a place where nobody could see, turning back and smiling at him as they sprinted towards their future together. This time around, they were sprinting towards the imperial-class spherical vortex.