A past.
"..."
A small room lit up by bright lights glimmered in a strange atmosphere. Two people, both wearing white robes, sat opposite each other as they played chess.
Their eyes contained a strange profundity and their bodies a bizarre etherealness. It was as if they weren't really there; like they could simply fade away from time and reality...
They had young appearances, young like youths. But, it was clear that they had lived far longer than any youth.
"..."
No voice broke the peculiar silence in this room, even the chess pieces invoked no dull thud when they moved. Nevertheless, in a certain second, the both of them paused.
Their white pupils shone with a glint of something inexplicable, then without a word, they dissipated out of existence from the simple seats their figures sat on.
The table and everything around them also faded away like fog, and within a slow but startling time frame, the whole room dispersed as well.
A couple of white trees and a tranquil pond unveiled from the now absent building, and in an alarming array of whites, massive clouds blazed past the scenery at a constant rate.
They were clouds!
...
...
"Form the dispersing array!"
With a mighty roar, a tired man bellowed outwards toward a large crowd of 3rd circle mages in front of him. A cave and a small forest stood far in the distance, and whenever the man looked at such a place, he would frown.
"Quick!"
Everyone around him looked rather confused, but they continued without question due to the intense waves of energy that rolled out of this man. It was terrifying to the degree that anyone who dared look at him would go weak in the knees.
These cultivators ran around with surreal movements on a plain piece of ground a hundred meters wide where a frightening array began to form. It took the shape of a simple figure, one who held an orb of blinding white light.
This figure had only been partially formed, yet the ground was already quivering and the sky already thrumming.
The sky was already drowned in dark clouds that stretched far in the distance. Some with a keen eye even saw a dense collection of such clouds above that small cave a couple of kilometres away.
*CRACKLE* *CATCHAAA*
The atmosphere was unusually tense but nobody knew why. They already had their guessed, and most pinpointed that the target was in that cave far away.
"Sir."
With a sudden whoosh of cold wind, a blue-haired black-robed man formed behind the solemn eyes of that tired man. He bowed, then looking on, he frowned.
"You reported it aswell, sir?"
He had a questioning gaze, but the tired man only sighed.
"When you reach the 5th, you begin to see things most can't see. And what I saw..."
His eyes narrowed as his vision pierced right onto that cave that silently stood there, but he quickly removed it.
"This thing that has broken in, it is something near the level of that... King."
As he spoke such words, especially at the end, he seemed to growl them out. It was a tremble, a fearfulness; a fury.
"You don't mean..."
The blue haired figure took a step back as he went wide-eyed, but the sheer pressure that was being emitted out of the white-eyed man displayed a seriousness he hasn't seen for a long time.
"Although I was only weak back then, even now, I feel like an ant before that beast."
His eyes glimmered with a subtle ancientness as he looked in the far past. In fact, he couldn't help but get lost in such a... frightful past.
...
...
*MMMMMM*
With a strange shockwave, a sudden wind tinged with gold swept through the atmosphere and into the horizon. The rubble of broken down houses and strewn wood thumped and disintegrated like dust, and in this pile of limitless rubble, a single boy stood.
"M-Master?"
His eyes shined with a magnificent white, but they were teary. He was frozen in place, and his face as pale as paper.
*MMMMMM*
Another shockwave swept by him, but it instigated no reaction to his listless eyes. He just stared ahead, ahead and ahead.
*MMMMMM*
The scattered whistling of golden air continued, but he only kneeled down and grabbed a broken piece of wood. Yet, before he could even hold it up, it dissipated into fine dust and merged with the endless wind.
The boy trembled, but he didn't even utter a single groan as he stood back up and stared at the sky. This sky was different from what the boy remembered. It contained a colour he had never seen before, but to his dismay, it felt like he was born to see such a colour.
"Gold..."
It formed a beautiful nebula in the sky. It fluttered and would sometimes shake, sometimes expand. It was everchanging, and it was absolute.
This colour covered the whole heavens for as far as the kid could see, it was as if that colour would now be there forever. It felt that way anyway.
Yet, within the kid's dark eyes, a faint shockwave suddenly erupted in the distance and flew straight towards him. Its speed surpassed and reached an incomprehensible measure as the shockwave covered the air for kilometres. It formed and slapped the atmosphere like a massive godly hand that disrupted the very source of life.
*WHISTLE*
The boy's eyes widened as he felt unable to move, and with this, a silent but eery voice tumbled into his ears.
"Death..."
*SSSS*
It carried a bloody killing intent. One that made the boys insides cringe to no end. His eyes despaired and his body went limp. He knew that he couldn't even contend with this overwhelming force that was about to thrash him to paste. He knew that his life was about to end.
"I hope you're okay, Master..."
His lips whispered out a single sentence as he let the overwhelming fear of death usher him into a realm of despair and morality. Though...
*CRACK*
Within his whistling hearing, a sudden crackle blitzed to the side of him as a rough hand patted his frail back. Warm energy covered him, and in that split second, a gasp could be heard.
"Heaven's Wind."
A voice that seemed to contain the world swept in a simple gush wind. It faced the massive palm without fear, and forming a white array of forcefields that ranged in the hundreds, it wrapped around the boy.
*BANGGGGG*
"Stillness."
*SSSSSSSS*
The huge palm crackled and flashed with a blinding light as it attempted to crush that boy. However, in a surreal whoosh, the numerous forcefields expanded to cover the horizon.
They wrapped around that palm, and before it even knew it, the whole thing was stuttering to a halt.
"Guh!"
The boy's eyes trembled as he heard an abrupt cough echo behind him, where he turned around and saw a pale-faced man with proud eyes. A white robe was draped on his body, but it was stained and ripped.
"Master?"
*CATCHAAA*
The sky shook and the ground tumbled, but the man stood firm as he pressed the air and forced that gigantic palm to a stop. A sliver of glowing white blood dripped out of his mouth, but he didn't seem concerned at all.
"You should get out of here."
He patted the boys shivery head with a slight smile. The boy shook, but the man's firm eyes portrayed no ounce of playfulness, only a firmness that commanded him!
"O-ok!"
The boy rubbed his eyes as he gritted his teeth and ran past the man's straight figure. It was this figure that seemed to be able to hold the heavens in the kid's eyes. It was one that contained a powerful shoulder and a profound knowledge in the world of cultivation.
However, with a startling gold that erupted out of nowhere, a sudden intense might descended from the sky and formed a glowing man. He wore a golden crown atop his head that shined. A red cape also fluttered beneath the shrill winds, causing the sky to darken and the winds to pause.
His eyes glowed with a bright gold as he stared at them. He spoke no words, but the man with the white robes shook as his face quivered with panic.
"Quick!"
The boy's face went even more pale as he took a glimpse at the golden man. With this alone he felt his whole body quiver; his heart scream and his breathing quicken.
"..."
The crowned man looked at the two of them without emotion, but with his gaze, the whole world shook. The sky brightened, and with a flash of everlasting gold, a powerful glow lit itself in the man's eyes.
"I guess this is going to be my last... Hey, king, would you mind sparing this little kid for me if I put up a good enough fight?"
With a strangely calm voice, the white-robed elder dismissed the panic arising in his face. He then patted his robes and stretched his back. The kid who had already ran a couple hundred meters stammered to a stop as he heard this.
The glowing man didn't even react. He grabbed space, where with a sudden booming smack, a trident formed in his grasp. It glowed with a powerful aura. It was as if it could pierce the heavens and split the earth in its entirety.
The man gripped it with a ghastly strength and lifted it up. Everything shuddered in response as a dense unending ancientness shrouded the entire valley and wafted into the trident.
"Well, I'll still try. Kid, keep going!"
The white-robed man only sighed as he walked a couple steps back and tensed his hands. The kid's eyes shone with unwillingness, but as he watched that ancient man stretch the trident to his side, he felt weak.
Then, in front of this kids very eyes, a strange orb of white light formed above that white-robed man.
"Face a technique inspired from the higher races..."