Myriad Rivers to the Sea

The temporary small realm was an expanse of absolute silence. It was a place devoid of ambient Qi, air and warmth. It was just a barren canvas of gray stone and still air.

Gongsun Lian stood in the center of this fabricated space. The leader of the Veiled Lotus was not standing still. She paced back and forth across the smooth stone floor. Her dark dragon scale armor shifted with every rigid step.

For a woman who commanded a supreme fighting force of elite soldiers, her current demeanor was entirely out of character. She was agitated. Her fists were clenched so tightly her gauntlets groaned under the pressure. Her dark eyes constantly scanned the empty space around her.

She did not have to wait long.

The spatial boundary distorted. A vortex of twisting purple energy manifested a few yards away. Khaos stepped out of the rift. He wore his usual dark robes. But the moment he saw Lian pacing he knew something must have happened.

"What happened?" Khaos asked. His voice cut through the silent realm like a blade.

Lian stopped her pacing. She turned to face him and closed the distance in two quick strides.

"My intelligence network just delivered a priority report," Lian said. Her voice lacked its usual professionalism. It was laced with a constrained panic. "It concerns the Young Master. It changes everything for him and the current situation. It is about his father."

Khaos narrowed his eyes. The cosmic board was vast and Li Canghai commanded one of the most critical defensive fronts.

"Speak," Khaos commanded.

"They were ambushed," Lian explained. "They have been trapped in that specific quarantine zone for a long time now. We knew communication was dark but we assumed it was standard interference from the ongoing campaign. It was not. Someone from their side finally managed to break through the blockade and escape the zone."

"A survivor?" Khaos asked.

"Yes." Lian confirmed. "He made it back to let the forces know of what happened. He was heavily wounded. His physical vessel was tearing itself apart from extreme temporal scarring. He lived just long enough to deliver the memory crystal before his body turned to dust."

Khaos felt a cold dread settle in his chest. Temporal scarring was not a normal battle wound. It implied laws that very few in the cosmos had access to or even wield.

"Who ambushed them?" Khaos pressed.

"A coalition," Lian answered. "An unprecedented gathering of forces that were not even supposed to be there. The information identified five distinct banners coordinating the strike."

Lian listed them and each name carried a heavy weight.

"The Fiend Sovereign Armada provided the blockade fleets to seal the perimeter of the zone. The Silent Oblivion Sect deployed their arrays to cut off all communication and reinforcement requests. The Shadowfiend Coalition provided elite strike teams to target the command structure and break down command. The Star Eater Brood served as the shock troops. And The Nebula Scythe Vanguard acted as the spearhead."

Khaos crossed his arms. The sheer scale of that alliance was staggering. Those five forces were supreme powers in their own right. For them to stop fighting each other and form a unified coalition meant they had a single terrifying objective. The complete eradication of Li Canghai and the collapse of the defensive line he anchored.

"Li Canghai is powerful and he was commanding an elite force of his own people there," Khaos noted. "Even against those five, he would not fall easily. He would find a way to bleed them and force a stalemate at least."

"He did," Lian agreed. "The memory crystal showed the initial engagement. Li Canghai and his forces fought back flawlessly. They utilized their supreme Qi techniques to break the vanguard and were establishing a counter offensive. They were going to break out and begin a counter offensive."

Lian paused. She looked down at her armored hands.

"But then disaster happened," Lian continued. "The enemy commanders realized they could not win a battle of attrition against him. They brought a relic. They used a Temporal Dao Stone..."

Khaos froze. The ancient warrior felt a genuine shiver run down his spine.

"Are they certain?" Khaos asked.

"The visual evidence is undeniable," Lian confirmed. "It trapped the entire army within its radius. They are frozen. They cannot move at all. They are entirely paralyzed in a bubble of distorted reality."

Khaos closed his eyes and let out a heavy breath. He never thought he would hear about such a scenario.

A Temporal Dao Stone was a cosmic anomaly. As far as the apex leaders of the universe knew, only two such stones had ever existed in the history of creation.

The first stone had been detonated eras ago during an ancient war of extinction. The effects of that first detonation were well documented because the resulting anomaly was still there to this day. The area of space where the first stone was used remained an impassable and frozen bubble.

The terror of the Temporal Dao Stone was its dual nature. To the outside observer, the victims caught within the blast radius appeared perfectly still like statues locked in amber. They were frozen in space. But within the bubble, time did not stop. It was violently accelerated.

For the people trapped inside, years could pass in a matter of seconds, minutes or hours. No one really knew because there has never been a survivor. Their bodies aged at an exponential rate. Their lifespans burned away while they stood entirely paralyzed. Even the powerful entities that were trapped within aged and died much faster than they otherwise would.

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Based on the ongoing existence of the first stone, the stasis effect was estimated to last for tens of thousands of years. No one knew when or if the temporal energy would ever wear off. For anyone caught inside, death was an absolute certainty. They would simply rot to dust within their own frozen armor.

"This is a catastrophe," Khaos stated while thinking hard.

"It is worse than a lost battle," Lian emphasized. "With Li Canghai’s forces trapped in temporal stasis, the war within that zone is shifting fast. His force was the absolute pillar holding that territory. The enemy coalition is already moving past the bubble."

"That zone has to be held," Lian explained. "It is the gateway. If those five forces secure that zone and establish a permanent foothold, they will flood the inner realms. It will be utter chaos. The defensive lines will collapse from the inside out."

Khaos stared out into the empty gray expanse. The strategic implications were dire but his mind kept circling back to the personal tragedy. Li Canghai was going to die frozen and helpless while his enemies marched over his domain.

"What do we do?" Lian asked. She looked at Khaos with intense focus. "Do we tell the Young Master?"

Khaos did not answer immediately. He turned away from Lian and looked away. He pondered the question. He weighed the history, the promises and the current reality of the boy cultivating in the dirt of Silkwood.

In the past Khaos would have said no. Zhan Tielan and Li Canghai had made unimaginable sacrifices to keep their son away from this exact burden. They left him behind in a lower realm so he could grow up safe and ignorant of the cosmic war that consumed their lives. Telling him his father was dying in a temporal trap would violate their deepest wishes. It would drag the boy directly into the center of the storm.

There were also other forces that were watching them constantly. Probing for weaknesses and scheming against them. It would also cause unprecedented trouble to reveal that they have a son now. The external and internal implications would ruin their laid out plans. Li Yu was also currently a wandering rogue. He had no army, no political backing and no formal protection outside of Khaos and Lian’s secret interventions.

However, Khaos viewed things differently now.

He remembered the conversation they shared over tea in the quiet courtyard. More importantly, Khaos thought about the Koi Soul that he has seen in action a few times now. The soul possessed a direct and innate connection to temporal laws. Li Yu had told him that he could walk freely within the Law River for Time. He didn’t gain any insights from it but he could walk through it. Khaos had seemed to go through the temporal rift that he couldn’t.

‘Was the Koi powerful enough to impact a Temporal Dao Stone?’ Khaos did not know. The Dao Stone was a relic of natural cosmic power. Li Yu was still stepping into the divine realms. It was like asking a single drop of water to extinguish the sun.

But it was a chance. It was the only chance they had. He couldn’t even think of anyone or anything that could impact such a treasure. If the stone remained active Li Canghai and his elite army were dead. The zone would fall. Maybe even more importantly, at least to Li Yu, was that his dad would be dead.

It was a massive risk.

If Li Yu agreed to go, they could not just teleport him to the edge of the bubble. The zone was now heavily occupied by the five enemy factions. They would have to carve a path through elite armadas and supreme arrays just to get Li Yu close enough to attempt a disruption.

Furthermore, bringing Li Yu onto that specific battlefield risked his identity being exposed. If any of the forces realized who the boy was, he would become one of the most hunted entities in the cosmos. His peaceful life in Silkwood would end forever.

The Khaos weighed the risk and the reward.

risk was the death of Li Yu and the exposure of his lineage. The reward was the salvation of his father and the preservation of the cosmic defensive line.

"We need him," Khaos finally spoke while turning back to face Lian. "His Koi Soul possesses temporal properties. It is the only variable that I know of that might be able to do something against the Dao Stone but the chances are extremely slim."

Lian’s eyes widened. "You want to bring him to the front line? Lord VoidClaw, if he dies there..."

"I know the stakes," Khaos interrupted smoothly. "But I also know the boy. We will let him decide. It is his life and his power."

Lian nodded slowly and accepted the logic. "I will prepare the Veiled Lotus. We will tell him his father is trapped."

"No," Khaos corrected sharply.

Lian blinked in surprise. "No?"

"We cannot tell him it is his father," Khaos explained. His tone was absolute. "If we tell him his flesh and blood is dying inside that bubble, it changes too much. He will lose too much of how he is currently. He will become frantic, reckless and desperate. He has gotten to where he is because of how he is. If we change too much now, it will be catastrophic and only hurt us in the long run. It might be even worse than losing Li Canghai."

"Then how do we convince him to walk into a war zone and do all the things that are needed to possibly save his father?" Lian asked.

"We use the truth, just not the whole truth," Khaos said. "You will call in your favor. You will tell him that forces loyal to you, allies who are crucial to the stability of the realms, are trapped. You will ask for his help."

Lian understood. It was a manipulation but it was a necessary one to hide certain things. Revealing the truth to him now would change far too much. It would disrupt far too many things.

"Understood," Lian agreed. "Shall we go?"

"Yes," Khaos nodded. "The clock is ticking for those inside the stone."

The transition from the cold temporary realm to the warm vibrant air of Silkwood was jarring.

The three suns hung high in the sky and cast a bright cheerful light over Li Yu’s ten acre estate. The river babbled quietly along the edge of the property. The birds chirped in the pale silver trees.

Li Yu stood in the center of his enclosed field. He wore simple earth stained pants and a loose linen shirt. The sleeves were rolled up past his elbows. He held a wooden watering can and was carefully pouring fresh river water over the base of the climbing Void Pod Peas.

He was entirely at peace. His recent breakthrough to the sixth level of Divine Transformation had settled perfectly into his foundation. He felt grounded, connected to the soil and content with the quiet rhythm of his daily life.

He moved to the next row and inspected the broad leaves of the Azure Cloud Cabbage.

A sudden distortion in the ambient Qi caused him to pause. It was the same subtle ripple he had felt not long ago when Khaos visited for tea. Li Yu set the watering can down on the dark dirt. He turned around.

Khaos and Gongsun Lian stepped out of the spatial distortion. Their boots touched down on the soft grass near the edge of the field.

Li Yu recognized Lian instantly. She wore the same dark dragon scale armor she had worn in the Demon Realm. She did not wear her faceless visor and allowed her striking features to show. But her expression was vastly different from the professional controlled leader who had eaten roasted fish by his campfire. She looked tense.

Khaos looked equally grim. The warrior stood beside Lian. His dark eyes locked onto Li Yu with an intensity that carried the weight of impending violence and a sadness that he had never seen within Khaos before.

Li Yu wiped the dirt from his hands using a cloth tucked into his belt. He did not smile. The peaceful aura of the farm evaporated in an instant and was replaced by the cold sharp reality of the cultivation world. When high level beings arrived at a humble farm looking tense, it meant a storm was coming.

Li Yu walked out of the enclosed field and closed the wooden gate behind him. He approached the two warriors. His posture shifted naturally from a relaxed farmer to a seasoned cultivator ready for battle.

"Khaos. Lian," Li Yu greeted them. His voice was even and calm. He looked between the two of them. "You are not here for tea are you?"