Void Cultivation : Outcast Architect of the Apocalypse

Chapter 12 : Remnants of Light

"Don't touch her!" Han Ye yelled.

He swung the jagged rock with both hands. It was a clumsy, desperate move. The stone caught the Grandmaster's wrist with a dull thud. The red shard spun out of the old man's grip and vanished into the thick, overgrown grass.

"No! My god! My future!" the Grandmaster shrieked. He fell to his knees, his skeletal fingers clawing at the dirt. "It was right there! I could feel the edge of forever!"

Han Ye didn't look for the shard. He crawled toward Mo Ran, his breath coming in short, painful gasps. He put his body between her and the raving old man. "It's done. Look at the sky. There is nothing left for you to take."

"You ruined it!" the Grandmaster screamed. He looked at Han Ye with eyes that were leaking tears of blood. "Five hundred years of preparation! I gave up my soul for that moment! I was supposed to be the new sun!"

"You were going to be a corpse with a parasite inside it," Han Ye said. He felt cold. The air was moving again, but it didn't feel like the static, heavy pressure of the void. It just felt like a cool breeze. "Go away, old man. Find a hole to die in."

"I will find it," the Grandmaster whispered, his voice cracking. He began to crawl into the weeds, his white hair dragging in the mud. "I will find the shard. I will start again. I will..."

His voice faded as he disappeared into the ruins. Han Ye didn't have the strength to follow. He collapsed next to Mo Ran. He reached out and touched her cheek. Her skin felt warm.

"Mo Ran? Can you hear me?" he asked.

Her eyes flickered. She looked at him, her vision blurry. "Is it... is it over?"

"Yes," Han Ye said. He felt a heavy weight lift from his chest. "The parasite is gone. The sky is blue. We are just... we are just here."

"I can't feel my Qi," she whispered.

"I can't feel mine either," Han Ye said. He tried to smile, but it hurt his face. "We are nobodies now. Just a boy and a girl in a very big mess."

"That sounds... okay," she said, and her eyes closed again, this time in a deep sleep.

*

One month later.

"Do your legs hurt today?" Mo Ran asked.

She was sitting on a wooden bench outside a small, half-ruined hut near the edge of the old battlefield. She was wearing a simple gray robe. Her hair was tied back with a piece of string.

Han Ye put down the heavy bucket of water he had carried from the stream. He leaned against the wall, rubbing his thighs. "Yes. They feel like lead. I think I walked too far toward the hills this morning."

"You have to remember that you are a normal person now," she said. She held out a cup of herbal tea. "You can't walk twenty miles and expect to feel like a god."

"I keep forgetting," Han Ye admitted. He took the cup and sat on the dirt ground at her feet. "I reached for my energy this morning to light the fire. I sat there for ten minutes, staring at the wood, waiting for it to burn."

"And?"

"And I had to use the flint," he said. He showed her his thumb. It was red and bruised. "I hit my finger twice before I got a spark. It turns out that starting a fire without magic is very difficult."

Mo Ran laughed. It was a soft, clear sound. "The villagers from the valley came by while you were out."

"Did they recognize us?" Han Ye asked, his voice getting low.

"No," she said. "They just saw two orphans living in a ruin. They brought some dried meat and some seeds. They said the soil is changing. They said things are growing where nothing has grown for a hundred years."

"I saw it too," Han Ye said. He looked toward the horizon. "The gray hills are turning green. There are yellow flowers near the river. I saw a deer this morning. It wasn't a monster. It was just a deer. It looked at me and then it ran away."

"It ran away because it wasn't afraid of your soul," Mo Ran said. She reached down and touched his hair. "How does it feel? Being a human?"

"It's loud," Han Ye said. "I can hear my heart beating. I can feel the wind on my skin. When I'm hungry, it actually hurts. I never knew how much space the void took up inside me until it was gone."

"People in the village are talking about the 'Iblis Ketiadaan'," she said.

"What are they saying?"

"They say he was a giant with a hundred eyes who ate the sun," she said. "They say a group of golden heroes from the Light Sect fought him for three days and three nights to save the world."

Han Ye snorted. "Golden heroes? Most of them are probably still trying to figure out how to live without their pills. Did the villagers mention the Grandmaster?"

"They say he ascended to a higher plane," Mo Ran said. "They built a small shrine for him near the crossroads."

"He's probably starving in a ditch somewhere," Han Ye said. He looked at his hands. They were calloused from carrying wood and water. "Let them have their stories. I like being a ghost. I like being nobody."

"We can't stay here forever," she said. "The scholars will come eventually. They will want to study the ruins. They will want to know what happened to the relics."

"The relics are dust," Han Ye said. "The Emperor is dust. Let them study the dirt. I want to go south."

"South? To the coast?"

"Yes," he said. "I heard there are islands where people don't care about cultivation. They just fish and build boats. I think I could be a good fisherman. Or maybe a carpenter."

"A carpenter who bruises his thumb every time he uses a tool?" she teased.

"I'll get better," he said. He looked up at her. "Will you come with me?"

"I don't have anywhere else to go," she said. Her eyes were soft. "Half of my soul is inside you, remember? If I stay here, I'll feel like I'm missing a limb."

"Then we leave tomorrow," Han Ye said.

He stood up and began to pour the water into the large clay jar. His back ached. His arms felt weak. But for the first time in his life, he didn't feel like he was waiting for the world to end. He was just waiting for dinner.

That night, they sat by a small fire. The air was filled with the sound of crickets. It was a normal, boring night.

"Han Ye?" Mo Ran asked.

"Yes?"

"Do you ever regret it? Losing the power? You could have been the ruler of this world. You could have made everything perfect."

"I tried to make things perfect once," Han Ye said. "I almost erased the world to do it. No. I don't regret it. I like the ache in my legs. It reminds me that I'm standing on my own, not on the back of a monster."

"I'm glad," she whispered.

She leaned her head on his shoulder. They watched the fire burn down to embers.

The next morning, they packed their small bags. They didn't take anything from the ruins. They only took the food the villagers had given them and a few simple tools. They started walking down the mountain path, away from the site of the great battle.

They passed a group of travelers heading up the mountain. The travelers were wearing the white robes of the lower-level Light Sect. They looked tired and confused.

"Excuse me," one of the travelers called out. He was a young man, not much older than Han Ye. "Are you coming from the peaks?"

Han Ye stopped. He pulled his hood a little lower. "Yes."

"Did you see anything? We are looking for the remains of the Grandmaster's palace. We heard there was a great light there."

"It's just rocks," Han Ye said. "The palace fell down. There is nothing there but weeds and old stone."

"And the Architect? Did you see the monster?" the young man asked, his voice shaking.

Han Ye looked at the young man. He saw the same hunger for a story that he used to have for revenge. "The monster is dead. He died a month ago. He was smaller than you think."

"Oh," the traveler said, looking disappointed. "Well, thank you. Safe travels."

"You too," Han Ye said.

He and Mo Ran continued down the path. They didn't look back. They walked until the ruins were hidden by the trees.

Suddenly, Han Ye stopped. He gripped his chest.

"What is it? Is it the pain again?" Mo Ran asked, her face full of worry.

Han Ye didn't answer. He opened his shirt. Right where his heart was, a tiny, glowing point of silver light was pulsing. It wasn't the cold, black energy of the void. It was warm. It was bright.

He looked at his hand. The skin was clear, but the silver light was shining through his palm.

"Mo Ran," Han Ye whispered, his eyes wide. "The world... it didn't just take my power."

"What do you mean?"

Han Ye touched a dead, brown branch on a bush next to the path. The moment his finger touched the wood, a green leaf sprouted. Then another. Then a small, white flower bloomed.

Han Ye stepped back, his hand shaking. "It's not gone. It changed."

From the forest behind them, a deep, rhythmic thumping sound began to echo. It wasn't the sound of footsteps. It sounded like a heartbeat. A heartbeat that was coming from the ground itself.

"Han Ye," Mo Ran whispered, looking back at the mountain. "The light... it's coming back."