In the vast tapestry of existence, where stars served as stepping stones and immortal palaces floated above the clouds, the realms were split into layers of power and providence.
The God Realm—the highest heaven—where divine beings walked like kings, battling eternal foes among shattered stars.
The Upper Realm—where ancient families of profound heritage ruled countless worlds, dreaming of returning to divinity.
And below, among fractured skies and veiled continents, lay the Xuan Realm—a realm of mortals and cultivators, where destiny began... and often ended.
It was to this world that Li Yi was born.
Three Years Before the Present Day
A quiet valley nestled between two mist-cloaked mountain ranges held a secret the heavens dared not speak aloud. Deep within its cradle of spirit trees and silver ponds, a lone woman groaned in labor beneath a celestial moon.
She was beautiful beyond mortal comprehension. Her long silver-black hair shimmered with starlight, and her aura bent the world around her like the gravity of a small sun.
A man knelt beside her, holding her hand. His eyes were sharp like swords but trembled with worry and tenderness.
He was Li Tianlan, once a rising genius of the Li Family from the Upper Realm, a man who had reached the peak of the Xuan Realm by age twenty-six and vanished shortly after, rumored to have chased the limits of the Dao into forbidden zones.
But he had not vanished—he had fallen in love.
She was a runaway. A daughter of a Primordial Lineage from the God Realm. She had descended secretly, fleeing duty and destiny, seeking freedom among mortals. She found him instead.
And now, as their child was born, the heavens themselves trembled.
The infant's first cry echoed through the valley—and far beyond.
In the Upper Realm, high within the celestial city of the Li Clan, a golden ancestral tablet burst into flames.
In the God Realm, in the heart of an ancient battlefield soaked in divine blood, an old man fighting the Abyssal Demons suddenly paused.
He looked toward the lower realms, eyes narrowing.
"So… she really gave birth…"
He was her father—an Eternal Deity—and the commander of one of the last divine forces still fighting to contain the Abyssal Demons beyond the seal. Though he had long accepted his daughter's rebellion, the birth of her child could not be ignored.
He descended.
He arrived not in fury, but with calm that shook mountains.
When he appeared before his daughter and Li Tianlan, the earth bowed and the wind stilled.
"I will not scold you," he said softly. "You chose love. I only wish you had told me."
She wept silently.
"I came to take you back," he said. "The child must remain."
Li Tianlan stood protectively in front of his family. "I will raise him."
The old man looked at him for a long time. "The child bears the mark of both realms. If he returns with us now, my family will not forgive the dishonor. Even the Patriarch cannot shield him."
"They would kill him?" she asked, trembling.
"Yes," he answered. "A child before sacred marriage—of mixed bloodline—will be deemed a stain. It is unjust, but it is our law."
She fell to her knees, clutching her newborn son.
"Give him a chance," her father said. "Hide him in this realm. Let him grow. Let him earn his place."
Tears fell like rain.
They swore a silent oath.
One year. In one year, they would return for him.
They left that very night, vanishing beyond the stars and slipping through the cracks in the sealed divine path.
But one year turned into two.
And two into three.
Present Day – Xuan Realm
Li Yi was a boy of three winters now.
He lived in a small hut on the edge of Green Pine Hamlet, a quiet village on the border of wild lands. He had no parents, no surname, and no past—only a pendant left behind, engraved with a mark no one could understand.
Villagers pitied him, sometimes fed him. But most ignored him, thinking him mute or strange.
He rarely spoke. He rarely cried.
But he always stared at the stars.
On clear nights, he would climb the hill behind the village and gaze at the sky, his pendant glowing faintly in the moonlight. He didn't know why, but a voice within told him:
"One day, they'll come for you."
He didn't know who they were.
Only that he needed to be strong.
In the nearby forest, hunters sometimes found small beasts dead, their spiritual cores missing—drained clean. They blamed wild predators.
But in truth, it was the child.
He didn't understand it yet, but his cultivation had begun.
Not through manuals or sects or pills.
Through instinct.
His bloodline had started pulling in spiritual energy—subconsciously absorbing, refining, and tempering his young body.
At night, when he slept, glowing marks would surface across his back, and the pendant around his neck would hum like a tuning fork of the heavens.
On the spring of his fourth year, everything changed.
A storm swept through the Xuan Realm—unnatural and vast. Cultivators across the region paused in fear. The sky cracked with lightning shaped like divine runes, and thunder echoed with what sounded like a name.
One bolt struck a mountain near Green Pine Hamlet and split it in half.
That night, Li Yi had a dream.
In it, he stood before a vast gate of stars, sealed by chains wrapped in black flame.
From behind the gate, a giant eye opened—violet and vertical, like a serpent god's.
A voice, ancient and genderless, spoke into his soul:
"You are born of two fates. One from heaven. One from shadow."
"When the seal breaks, the heavens will bleed."
"Grow strong, child. Or be devoured."
He woke in a cold sweat.
The pendant on his neck was gone—absorbed into his chest, leaving behind a mark shaped like a broken ring.
And for the first time in his life, he could feel it.
The world was alive.
Qi. Spiritual energy. Flowing around him like invisible rivers. He reached out instinctively—and the energy rushed to him.
Not a trickle.
A torrent.
His body convulsed. His veins glowed faintly. His mind burned with knowledge not learned but inherited.
And then—
Boom!
A pulse of energy burst from his chest, shaking the hut and sending birds fleeing from the forest.
Outside, an elder cultivator passing through sensed it and froze.
"Who… what was that?" he whispered.
Li Yi sat up, panting, eyes glowing gold. His heart beat like thunder.
And so it began.
The child born of heaven and shadow had awakened.
And the realms… would never be the same.