With a sudden jolt, he opened his eyes. If he had a mortal's beating heart, the organ would be pumping blood with as much vigor as possible to ease his uneasiness and restore order to his fleshly, finite existence.
But he was an immortal. A beating heart was not a necessity.
And most of all, he was one of the true immortals -- a deity born of nature's forces and spirit contained in the universe, that finally contributed to his physical form.
He was a true immortal that had just experienced his first mortal incarnation's death.
He forced himself to swallow a mouthful of air and any non-existent saliva he urged himself to muster, vaguely remembering the burning excruciating pain his throat last experienced before his death.
The wine.
The poison that his mortal incarnation had chosen to bestow upon himself.
Only after the pain dissipated just a little, he thought something was amiss.
Forgetting the discomfort he was still feeling from his death, he looked around him.
The surroundings were more than familiar.
A calm and peaceful plane extended as far as the eyes could see; a faint melody of the most beautiful tune floated around him -- melody that no mortal would ever be able to hear; an existence of pure tranquility; and myriad of colorful floras that the word 'splendor' could not even begin to remotely describe and do justice.
Heaven. Albeit not in the sense mortals normally knew. However, this was undoubtedly heaven as he had always known. It was his birthplace, the place of the immortals and deities.
In front of him, barely more than ten feet away, he saw an expansive ocean.
Bright lights were swimming in the darkness of the water that was almost as black as the night. The water was always visible in every nook and cranny of heaven - even in front of the Heavenly Palace. It was to enable an immortal - normal or deities alike - to always be able to access it.
The endless water.
The place where the cycle of reincarnations began. As was his last one.
However, he knew that his soul should not have come back to heaven.
He walked towards the edge and sat, his mind still in a daze. The sky above reflected the starry water, or vice-versa -- he no longer knew. After all, the heavenly sky was normally always bright, cloudless, starless.
Perhaps the night sky was there to welcome him back. After all, he was the master of it.
The lights in the water twinkled and swayed along with the current. Some of them were brighter than the others - mortal souls that were close to immortality. Some were the purest of white - deities that were undergoing their mortal tribulations. Some were of different shades of grey, almost blending into the dark water that was lulling their existence - souls that had accumulated too much bad karma.
Hell would be more than happy to embrace those type of souls.
However, although he understood the theory and the technicality of it, he normally was not able to discern the mortal physiques nor the fates those swaying souls had been linked to.
Only two deities in heaven had that ability. One was the Seer . The other was the Scribe of Fate.
He frowned again, this time because of the sudden uneasiness that had just crept into his mind.
He could recognize some of the lights.
He should not be able to.
He saw souls of the mortals that he had called younger brothers in the life before his mortal death.
He saw two mortal souls that were his Imperial Father and Imperial Mother. And another light - quite bright on its own - that was constantly closely congregated with his mortal parents' souls.
It was the soul of the King of the Northern Kingdom, at least before he went missing on purpose.
Nevertheless, he felt no significant attachment to those souls.
Mortals, were temporary.
His mortal life as well, was ephemeral. It was fleeting, nothing more than a brief dream, which soon would be forgotten in the extending eternity that was the norm of his existence.
As soon as he thought of that, he could somehow understand the core of thinking of the other existence that had haunted his mortal life. And why the soul -- that he had cursed and loathed himself for, in his past mortal life -- took so many lives, thinking and feeling nothing of it.
After all, souls were eternal.
"Yue (1)!" A voice interrupted his trail of thought. He heard the name - his real name - being called.
The stars in the sky disappeared. It was but an illusion manifested from his power after all.
A fluttering figure, dressed in purple - the color of royalty - inaudibly landed by his side. The fluidity of the movement added to the person's innate grace and charm.
He nodded politely towards the person - someone that all inhabitants of heaven were all familiar with. After all, this deity - a beautiful female that looked no older than her early twenties - was the person who wove the tales of their mortal tribulations.
The Scribe of Fate.
The female deity's name was Ming(2), surnamed Tian(3). She was the only sister of the Heavenly Emperor. The members of the clan of the Imperial Family were the only immortals or deities who could bear the surname Tian. Everyone else only had one syllable to represent their title, their name, their domain. Just like Yue had.
"Princess." Yue smiled politely towards her.
Although he was a Crown Prince of a significant mortal dynasty in his last life, Tian Ming's status was not one that could warrant him to call her lightly by her direct name.
Tian Ming was hardly a deity who thought highly of formality. She just waved her sleeve casually, pursing her thin lips in slight displeasure at his way of greeting her. However, for once, she did not try to correct him,
"I should welcome you back," she paused, wrinkling the bridge of her nose and squinting her eyes in slight wonder towards him,
"Or the both of you back." This time she sighed, while fixating her eyes on his forehead - the space that encompassed his Shang Dantian.
She lifted her hand and lightly touched the space between his brows. Although he flinched slightly, he did not avoid her touch.
When she withdrew her finger, he could see a faint string of light, almost transparent in its grayish color, extending from his forehead, stretching to the tip of her finger. The Scribe of Fate was pulling a consciousness from inside of him.
He widened his eyes.
That gray light, was not his soul.
Then the gray light became distorted and recoiled from her fingers, seemingly uncomfortable from her touch, before withdrawing to disappear completely in his Shang Dantian once again.
Tian Ming looked at her index finger, where the light had just escaped from her a brief moment ago. There was sadness in her jade-green eyes as she lamented to herself,
"Bian (4)... . You should have always remembered your name. You should have always stayed at the border of the waters. Such is our duty... ."
"All because of your misplaced attachment to a spirit that is neither a mortal nor immortal. The karma for distorting the fates that I have woven - the rotten karma that have accumulated from the hundreds-of-years of trying to make her yours... has reduced you to this state... ."
"Now, you have lost your corporeal body, leaving your soul as nothing more than a being akin to a parasite, latching onto another deity ... ."
She lifted her head to look at him, her expression already reverting to her neutral dignified countenance,
"Yue, you probably have a lot of questions to ask?"
He nodded slowly, keeping his silence to swallow all his bewilderment and queries inside. He was an observer and was never the type to speak a lot, in contrast to his last mortal's incarnation.
More than anything, he wanted to know why he was back in heaven.
He should not have been back in heaven.
Zhang KongJing was only the first mortal tribulation he had lived as.
After his mortal death, his soul should have been reincarnated to his next mortal life, as already ascribed by the Scribe of Fate. There would have been more reincarnations, more tribulations in other kinds of mortal worlds that his soul should have traveled and been reborn into.
The cycle would be repeated for as many times as necessary, until he gained the necessary enlightenment to return to heaven as a deity once again. Only once he successfully lived through all his incarnations, then he could resume his status as the moon deity once more.
Such tribulation was necessary for a true immortal such as himself; to collect karma, to build the necessary emotion and grant him the right to be a guardian of the night for the many worlds.
"That is because Bian is inside you now," she pointed towards his chest.
Tian Bian.
The Seer.
The guardian of the endless water.
"Lei(5) is waiting," she said with a sigh once again, after the hanging silence that represented his confusion,
"Let's meet him. Then we can talk."
-----------------
Lei - the sky immortal.
Another deity, albeit much older than Yue himself.
Nevertheless, he was someone that Yue was also familiar with, both in the mortal and immortal world.
In the immortal world; Yue's domain - the night and the moon - was always dependent on the sky that was Lei's domain and the extension of his power.
In the mortal world - their last existence - Lei's mortal incarnation was supposed to be his subject if Zhang KongJing were to successfully ascend the throne.
Yue's lips curled lightly at the sudden irony he had just thought of.
Lei's standing - just like Tian Ming - was not one that Yue could ever disrespect.
Both Tian Ming and Yue glided with ease, utilizing their flawless light-steps to drift high above ground, passing elegantly-made structures below and the many flower fields in heaven.
The immortals below only cast a brief glance at them, before resuming their attention to whatever tasks or idyllic mundane but happy life they had in this ever peaceful plane of existence.
Before long, they reached a secluded but expansive ground. The endless water was ever apparent.
A tree stood alone by the bank of the water, its trunk pure white in color. There was no flowers blooming.
A part of Yue suddenly experienced a pull of longing towards the dormant white tree.
And towards the lone figure currently standing underneath the tree, there was the slightest of envy and sadness sprouting from within him.
It was not his envy nor sadness to feel, that much Yue knew.
However, he felt it nonetheless.
As both Tian Ming and himself alighted lightly on their toes, their landing merely a foot distance away from the lone figure and the tree, Yue could finally see the person clearly.
Lei - the sky deity - was robed in dark-blue attire, almost purplish in color. He glanced towards Tian Ming and Yue, but for merely a split second, before returning his attention the the white tree. There was a long brown streak on the tree's trunk - the only blemish on its otherwise pure white physique.
Although Zhang KongJing had died - committed suicide - much earlier than Ji SongLi's death, time did not flow quite the same way in the heaven.
In heaven was perpetual eternity. There, everything paused, occurred, and flew indefinitely. The mortal worlds' sense of time did not apply. Hence that explained Lei's current existence that had seemingly arrived before Yue's own. Despite their mortal incarnations' time of deaths.
Lei's lips were pulled slightly. There was a trace of melancholy and tenderness in his azure pupils when he looked at the flowerless white tree.
"Lei," Tian Ming stepped closer,
"Yue has just arrived."
Lei's manifestation of power - a dragon with scale of gold and purple - coiled around the branches of the white tree, gently caressing the corporeal body of the flower spirit that was no longer there. The serpent was behaving like a guardian for the tree.
Lei finally turned to face Tian Ming and Yue. To Yue's surprise, the sky deity bowed lightly towards him,
"Yue. Thank you for your ... soul's conferment during our last mortal lives."
The sky deity was referring to the time Zhang KongJing was battling with his inner demon, and inadvertently imparted a part of his own soul - that contained his immortality - to Ji SongLi.
"Nothing to thank me for," Yue finally spoke, not daring to claim any credit for himself. After all, Zhang KongJing did what he did on his own accord.
"Nevertheless," Tian Ming chimed in,
"If you had not done what you did, Lei would not be here," she let out a small smile at Yue, softening her normal lack of expression,
"His soul is complete, much earlier than expected. For once, I actually feel gratified that my few scribbles of fate intended for his supposed next mortal incarnations will go to waste."
"He does not need to go through anymore mortal incarnations. His karma, and his power, is now as whole as should be, even more powerful than before he started his mortal tribulations."
Lei did not shift his eyes away from Yue, his deep azure eyes boring at him - into him.
"Bian... is with you," Lei said - a matter-of-factly.
Yue held his breath at the other deity's statement. Although there was no anger or any reproach in Lei's voice, dread started to form inside Yue's heart. Furthermore, the slight sadness and envy the other soul - Bian's soul - was feeling inside of him, running rampant.
However, unlike his last mortal incarnation, Yue's current immortal state was more than strong enough to curb whatever was left of the Seer's broken soul.
"Bian... is pitiful," Tian Ming shook her head slightly,
"And foolish. In his state of distortion, he did not even realize that Zhang KongJing and Ji SongLi were your mortal forms. Else, I bet he would not have done what he did,"
She tilted her head to observe the white tree and Lei's dragon who was contentedly floating in between the branches,
"Almost having his soul destroyed to chase after an incomplete insignificant spirit ...,"
Her rambling was halted as the air around them suddenly grew freezing cold. She brought her two hands to close her mouth and looked at Lei. There was wariness in her gaze towards the male deity.
The air around the sky deity grew more distorted, his long hair swaying in the malevolent whirlwind that started to form around him. His deep blue azure eyes turned golden, bright and menacing. Tian Ming cursed her own recklessness to have spoken of her in such way in front of him.
"Lei! Leash your energy, please! Your power is enough to wreak havoc in heaven!" She said, her beautiful green eyes carried a trace of panic.
The static and heavy clouds that suddenly formed just above them caused Tian Ming to be more flustered. The dragon that was initially happily fluttering around the tree's branches now straightened its body. Its gold and purple scales were glistening, its claws were fully extended. Glancing warily at the angry serpent - the manifestation of its master's current mood, Tian Ming quickly blurted,
"You do not want to destroy your precious flower, do you?"
As soon as she finished saying that, the frozen coldness and the crackling of formed lightning quickly dissipated.
The pleasant air and neutrality of their surrounding was as if the previous almost-peril never happened.
Yue sighed,
"Two immortals. Both pinning for the white flower. One is almost destroyed, his existence only a shadow that is being supported by my own soul. One is now fully recovered."
"Your High---," Yue caught the icy glare Lei suddenly threw at him for addressing him formally, "... Lei. You will follow after her, won't you?"
The extent of the sky deity's waiting; of his dedication; of his yearning that spanned throughout hundreds of mortal years. Now that Yue had the Seer - Tian Bian - sleeping dormant and curbed by his own soul, Yue could gain a bit of an insight to Bian's longing, his pursuit of the white magnolia, his loss of reason, and his blackening soul as time passed by. As well as Bian's memory of Lei's devotion towards the same flower spirit.
"The flower spirit is still undergoing her next reincarnation in one of the many mortal worlds. How could the sky deity possibly be idling by, although his power is now complete?"
Seemingly answering his inner thought, Yue saw Lei smiling at him. The smile was almost imperceptible but it told Yue the reply to the question he asked earlier.
Tian Ming's face grew pale when she saw Lei's small smile. She widened her eyes at him,
"Lei! Are you seriously even considering that? You have obtained your full power now. You are a complete immortal. You are a deity who has successfully passed your tribulations."
She gritted her teeth,
"You can just ... wait for her to arrive. One day, she will. Once she attains immortality."
"And we don't know how long that will be." Lei started walking away from them, his back now facing Tian Ming and Yue,
"It may be another few hundred of years... another few thousands... ."
"I... cannot leave her alone. I cannot leave her to suffer alone," he turned slightly to glance at Tian Ming,
"Especially when you are the Scribe of Fate, Ming." He let out a small rueful chuckle that surprised Yue a bit,
"After all, you have a bad hobby... . Weaving the most harrowing and painful of fates for the immortals undergoing tribulations. My mortal selves have gone through so many of your inscribed fates. None of them were pretty."
Tian Ming stomped her foot, pouting her lips slightly,
"That is the shortest way to build karma - good or bad. The more your souls are tempered through difficult situations in mortal worlds throughout many reincarnations, the quicker you will gain enlightenment and return to heaven."
"Precisely why I cannot leave her alone," Lei said, clear and unyielding,
"Yue. Bian... the Seer is now sleeping inside you," Lei spoke further, no longer looking at Tian Ming and Yue, "There is no hate between us. Whatever punishment that Bian has to receive, he has paid it with the scattering of his soul."
"There will be a time when he will need to undergo the most difficult of mortal tribulations, once his soul is awaken and ready to go. That will be another consequence of his past actions that he will have to bear."
Lei kept walking towards the edge of the endless water and stopped short before he reached the gentle waves,
"But for now, as his soul is inside you, please look after him. Please watch over the endless water in his stead for the time being."
The sky deity continued to walk decisively into the water. Once the dark water - as black as the color of the night - enveloped his figure to his waist, his body started to grow translucent.
Soon, it dissipated altogether, leaving only a bright white light -- the core of his existence, his soul -- that caused both Tian Ming and Yue to squint their eyes and turned their heads slightly.
The sky deity soul floated on the surface, and although his physique was no longer apparent, Tian Ming and Yue could feel Lei's penetrating gaze at them.
The echo of Lei's voice resounded in Yue's ears, then the bright light submerged into the water, joining the billions of other stars in their seemingly never-ending journey,
["Please look after Tian Bian. My pitiful brother."]
-------------------------
Tian Ming squatted at the edge of the water, her expression unreadable -- save for the annoyance Yue could feel emanating from every inch of her physique.
Finally, the Scribe of Fate let out a sigh, her voice soft in surrender,
"Tian Lei! Do you know that I am the one who has to report to the Heavenly Emperor - our Imperial Brother?"
"You could have at least met him first before you went on your merry way... ." She finally stood, brushing the non-existent dust off her dress, then lightly frowned towards a direction in the water.
Yue followed her gaze, and he also furrowed his brows at the sight of a familiar soul that was following the bright light - Lei's soul - that had disappeared far beyond the horizon.
The soul was bright as well, although not as blindingly white as Lei's. However, it definitely belonged to a mortal.
A mortal that Yue - or more precisely Zhang KongJing - knew well.
"What a stubborn soul!!" Tian Ming spat, exasperation appearing on her beautiful face.
The soul was Zhen BuFeng's.
"For how many incarnations will he be following Lei?", the Scribe of Fate complained further, but there was nothing she could do other than to see the mortal soul floating away, disappearing into the distant water.
From what she had just said, Yue could deduct that Zhen BuFeng's soul - albeit only a mortal and hence should not have had the ability to - had been trailing behind the sky deity's soul, landing his reincarnation in the same world that Lei ended up in.
Tian Ming groaned, "What a nuisance. Lei is also much too willful for his own good. How could he accidentally impart a sliver of his own soul into a mortal!"
"He has done that to a flower spirit -- too much in fact, that almost caused his soul to vanish. And now a mortal has basically latched on to him as well."
"But...," Yue interjected, frowning at the Scribe's incessant grousing, "Zhen BuFeng had always acted as Ji SongLi's, I mean, Lei's protector. And a mortal could never latch on to a deity, let alone receive a sliver of soul from a deity like Lei's. Not unless if the mortal's own soul is highly compatible and willingly attached to Lei's own."
"Just... like the flower spirit and Lei," he added slowly, and it caused Tian Ming to throw a displeased glare at him.
Both stared at each other in silence. Perhaps it was his past mortal life's lingering attachments towards the subjects mentioned; after all, normally Yue would not have any courage to engage in debate with the Scribe of Fate.
Finally, Tian Ming let out an exasperated sigh, bringing her fingers to knead lightly on her temple,
"Forget it. The mortal can follow Lei as much as he wants. Besides, his mild intervention in his past life did not really wreck my tapestry of fate. Everyone that should die, died in the end. If anything, the mortal's attachment towards Lei, as well as Bian's meddling, has contributed to Lei being awakened much earlier."
Yue deadpanned.
"Does that mean, even if Zhang KongJing were to ascend the throne, he would die soon anyway?"
As if reading his thought, Tian Ming tilted her head slightly, her lips upturned in a playful smirk,
"Do you want to know your mortal life's original fate?"
Yue had not yet thought if he really wanted to know, but Tian Ming drawled on anyway,
"Zhang KongJing ascended the throne in his twenty-seventh year. Chao MeiHua became the Empress, so no major discordance there for her fate."
"In his fifteenth year into his reign as the Emperor of Da Lang, Emperor Zhang KongJing was assassinated by his nephew - Second Prince Zhang JunLi's only son who had set his ambitious eyes on the throne. Said nephew proceeded to exile his own father and banish Empress Chao to a nunnery to cement his hold on the throne."
Yue stood rooted on his spot.
"Should I be happy with my death then? At least, I chose it, not killed by a close kin, nonetheless."
"Ming, you... - ." He was suddenly aggrieved, and he no longer had any further qualms of addressing the Scribe of Fate by her direct name,
"You truly have a bad hobby... ." He parroted the sky deity's earlier sentiment towards the female deity.
Tian Ming only chuckled lightly at his blatant vexation,
"I have mentioned before, tragedy is the best way to accumulate karma. I only think of the best for my fellow deities who undergo their mortal tribulations."
"But this could easily err their powerful souls to the darker side. They could easily succumb to the temptation of evil to break away from their sad mortal fates."
"Then so be it," Tian Ming waved her sleeves unconcernedly,
"If that's the outcome, those type of souls do not have the right nor qualification to return to heaven. Hell would be a better home for them."
Tian Ming's eyes squinted towards the nonexistent line where the dark endless water and the sky purportedly melded their existence with each other despite the contrasting colors. The water was almost as black as the night, the sky was endlessly bright and blue.
Lei's soul and Zhen BuFeng's soul were no longer in sight. Tian Ming sighed, rueful dejection in her voice, speaking at the mortal soul that could not even hear her,
"Truly, what an annoying and stubborn mortal. Now I have to somehow weave your fate into the world Lei has gone to. I just hope that now Bian won't be able to intervene, my hard work won't go to waste anymore."
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Notes:
(1) Yue = moon
(2) Ming = fate
(3) Tian = heaven
(4) Bian = edge/border
(5) Lei = thunder
-------Runexi's notes------
So... we begin... .
Eh. Just a prologue for now. A day early as my utmost-thanks for the 100-votes of the glossary chapter. Haha. @promii882 voted the 100th, so this chapter is dedicated for her.