Chapter 37
Ling Xu fell silent, feeling the pulse at his temples begin to sync with the increasingly rapid beating of his heart, because he knew what the Star Consciousness meant.
He knew that in the darkest corner of his consciousness, for years, he had always kept something hidden, sealing it tightly like a wound he never allowed to heal, fearing that if it did, he would forget why he had to keep moving forward.
So Ling Xu obeyed.
He no longer tried to suppress the disturbing thoughts, no longer tried to calm the waves of anger surging within his chest, but instead let everything flow, allowing old memories to surface one by one like corpses rising to the surface of a river after the flood had subsided, and on his forty-ninth attempt—after forty-eight times of nearly falling, nearly giving up, nearly opening his eyes and telling Huan Zheng that this was too difficult—he saw it.
With his own eyes, as clearly as when he was a child hiding behind silk curtains with his ears covered yet still hearing everything, Ling Xu witnessed the event again.
The depravity of humanity that had just won the Harmony Conflict, which should have stopped once the Gods laid down their weapons and surrendered, but chose not to stop, chose to continue slaughtering, chose to behead Gods who no longer resisted, chose to brutally violate Goddesses who could only cry and scream until their voices were gone and silence remained—one of the victims of that barbarity was Ling Xu's mother, a woman with silver-white hair just like his, a woman who once cradled him while singing lullabies about stars that never faded, a woman who now remained only as a name and a wound that never truly healed.
"I see it again," Ling Xu whispered within his heart, his voice cold like ice that never melts even under the sun.
"I see my mother. I see them. I see everything."
And at the same time, within his heart that burned with an anger that never truly extinguished—only slumbering occasionally, only resting in the darkest corners, but always awakening whenever memories of his mother resurfaced—Ling Xu spoke.
Not to Huan Zheng, not to the Star Consciousness, not to anyone outside himself, but to the world, to the universe, to the fate that had given him this wound when he was still too young to understand why adults could be so cruel to one another.
"If it is true," he said, his voice soft yet clearly echoing in the silent meditation chamber, like droplets falling into a dark cavern pool, reverberating endlessly, "that the beheadings and violations committed by humanity against the Gods and Goddesses who had no intention of continuing the fight were acts of individual initiative—not orders, not war strategies, not actions necessary to win an ongoing battle, but pure depravity born from hearts numbed by victory and blood—then no matter if this world is still overshadowed by humanity's rule as the Second Divine replacing the fleeing Gods, no matter if they possess the Supreme Court of Humanity that punishes anyone who dares resist, no matter if I must stand against the entire universe alone…."
He clenched both his fists.
Not within his consciousness, but in reality, in the silent town hall, until his nails pierced his own palms and blood slowly dripped onto the worn wooden floor.
Haaah!!
"I will burn them all. Without exception. Just as they burned my mother's final nights before beheading her and turning her into a collection."
Along with the vow that left Ling Xu's lips—not mere words, but a vibration that spread from his chest through his entire cultivation axis, from the newly born Bright Sky Longitudes to the oldest roots hidden within the triangle of Star—something that had long slumbered in the darkest corner of his consciousness began to awaken.
Not like a person waking from ordinary sleep, but like a volcano remembering it had once erupted and still held magma deep within its core.
The Cancer Plague, which had quietly resided within Ling Xu since that seaside city, which for months had only pulsed faintly among the Star fragments, which occasionally surfaced when Ling Xu felt anger, fear, or despair but never fully emerged, now enveloped his body entirely.
Not like in the tavern before, when his flesh mutated into grotesque greenish-gray masses, but like a thin mist seeping from his pores, like vapor rising from the earth after heavy rain, like breath escaping in the cold morning air—yet this breath was greenish-gray and pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat.
"You've awakened," Ling Xu whispered, his voice no longer cold like ice nor burning like fire, but flat, empty, like someone who no longer cared whether the world would survive or collapse.
"After all this time, you've finally awakened."
The Cancer Plague did not respond with words.
It merely coiled tighter, wrapping Ling Xu's body from head to toe, creating an aura of existence around him that even Huan Zheng, sitting just three steps away, felt the hairs on his neck stand for the first time in decades.
That aura was neither hot nor cold, neither heavy nor light.
It felt like nothingness, like space between spaces, like time between time, like something that should not exist yet did simply because it chose to exist, and within that silent town hall, in that dead city devoid of laughter, cries, or footsteps, it began to spread.
Not like wind blowing from one point to another, but like water seeping into the ground, into the walls, into the floor, into every crevice ever touched by light or darkness, as if the Cancer Plague was telling the world:
"I am here. I will not leave. I cannot be expelled because I am not a guest—I am part of this house, of this foundation, of the ground beneath this foundation that you never see but always step on."
And along with it, a message.
Not a sound, not words, not a vibration perceivable by ears, skin, or ordinary Qi, but a knowledge that suddenly appeared in the minds of every living being across the universe—from ordinary humans to peak cultivators, from descendants of lesser Gods to the surviving Gods who had fled into the darkest corners—spreading like ripples on water that never ceased even after the stone had long sunk.
"Eternal cancer in eyes that remember," the message whispered, and every being who heard it felt their chest tighten, their throat constrict, something cold crawling along their spine.
"Eternal cancer when all who are infected by this plague perish, and all who have ever scorned—who have ever underestimated the spread of the Cancer Plague that once destroyed civilizations of both humanity and the Gods—shall also perish when Cancer imprisons the world."
To be continued…