The war between immortals and gods that lasted five thousand years began from this.

At first, naturally the heavenly gods held absolute advantage. The cultivators suffered heavy losses and quickly showed submission. The heavenly gods stopped their punishment.

But as the human race multiplied endlessly, there were more and more cultivators, and more and more people feared the heavenly gods. Living in fear would naturally breed resistance.

Thus, this “divine punishment” became a prolonged confrontation, eventually becoming an all-out war between immortals and gods.

The world’s spiritual energy became increasingly scarce amid the warfare. Vegetation withered, and all things grew desolate.

Heavenly gods also needed spiritual energy to sustain their existence. So the struggle for spiritual energy made this war even more impossible to stop.

The heavenly gods seemed to hold the advantage, but as the world’s spiritual energy gradually diminished, the scales of victory were quietly tilting.

The reason was simple: every few years, nourished by heaven and earth’s spiritual energy, the Divine Platform would birth new gods. All deities from ancient times to the present originated from there. However, now heaven and earth’s spiritual energy was insufficient to nurture deities, and no new gods were born on the Divine Platform.

Yet the human race continued to multiply and prosper.

Even under enormous crisis pressure, the human population reached unprecedented numbers.

With more people came more extraordinary individuals.

By the fourth millennium of war, heavenly god losses mounted. Finally, tens of thousands of cultivators used a strategy to trap Lord Tianling, battling him to death and exhausting all his spiritual power.

The cold divine lord died in conspiracy, entering the “cycle of all things” he had spoken of.

After his divine fall, heaven and earth’s spiritual energy seemed to revive somewhat.

The cultivators seized the spiritual energy that spilled forth from his death, boosting their cultivation. Many broke through their bottlenecks, and thus the cultivators became even more determined that the gods should be slain.

When news of Lord Tianling’s divine fall reached the divine realm, all gods grieved.

Mu Sui knelt before the empty monument on the Divine Platform for seven days and seven nights.

Within his body, Meng Ruji sensed Mu Sui’s grief, unwillingness, and hatred. This divine body carried emotions just like humans.

Meng Ruji’s consciousness was pulled by this body’s pain, and she felt almost the same righteous indignation.

The moment the memorial ceremony ended, Mu Sui went to the lower realm.

He brought down his first divine punishment in life, then personally took the lives of dozens of cultivators—they were all “victors” who had survived the siege against Lord Tianling, who had all taken shares of the spiritual energy after Lord Tianling’s death.

When Mu Sui stood in the mortal world’s mountains and rivers, watching his kinsmen’s spiritual energy float from the corpses, Meng Ruji felt his eyes grow warm.

The spiritual energy drifted and swayed, circling him.

In a world lacking spiritual energy, whether human or god, all craved spiritual energy. He should have absorbed all the energy into his own body, but instead he waved his hand, guiding this precious essence into the soil, lakes, and forests.

This spiritual energy was like the eyes of those deities from years past—ruthless yet gentle, silently comforting all things.

…Just as they had comforted the self-blaming Mu Sui back then.

Meng Ruji saw withered trees revive before her, muddy lake water become clear, earth sprout tender green shoots, and life rekindle.

But at the same time, she also saw that Mu Sui could no longer support his spine. He slowly bent down, kneeling before the new shoots breaking through the soil, weeping uncontrollably.

Meng Ruji could find no words or verses describing grief to express her feelings at this moment. She only thought that if she had been there then, she would have wanted to embrace this sorrowful deity.

But if she had truly been there then.

She and this sorrowful deity would probably have fought to the death in the hatred between their opposing races.

After Mu Sui’s battle with cultivators in the lower realm, the title of God of Catastrophic Destruction spread among the cultivators once more.

Mu Sui was forcibly brought back to the divine realm by Lord Changning and confined in the divine realm’s imprisonment.

Lord Changning was the God of Order. In the gods’ order, incompletely grown heavenly gods were not permitted to bring down divine punishment.

Heavenly gods required a very long time to mature.

Having been born four thousand years ago, Mu Sui was still in his divine childhood.

He was not allowed to punish, could not descend to battle, and could not leave the divine realm.

Even though everyone now realized—this war between immortals and gods had torn a huge chasm between immortals and gods. A thousand years of deep hatred filled this chasm like a sea of blood, and they could only stand on opposite sides until death.

But no heavenly god wanted to push Mu Sui out to fight to the death with the lower realm’s cultivators.

They still believed in the old rules.

Mu Sui had descended privately to punish mortals. His incompletely grown body suffered power backlash, so to prevent him from acting impulsively again, the gods confined him.

Lord Changning personally locked him up.

The day Mu Sui was imprisoned, he calmly told Lord Changning through the cage, “I am the God of Catastrophic Destruction. Having me bring punishment to the human race is most appropriate.”

Lord Changning only coldly rejected: “You have not fully matured. One punishment has already damaged your divine status. The pain of ten thousand ants gnawing on bone seems not to have taught you a lesson.”

“I don’t care.”

As he spoke, he truly didn’t care.

Lord Changning was slightly stunned outside the cage. When he looked up at Xinghuo, his eyes wavered with what seemed like guilt: “With Lord Tianling’s divine fall, I know you’re heartbroken. I’m heartbroken too. At this point, every deity is precious. Lord Xinghuo, don’t disregard yourself for revenge against them. These matters are ours to handle.”

“I can too! I should, too!” Mu Sui gripped the cage, his expression rarely agitated. “This started because of me—I should go!”

“Xinghuo…” Lord Changning sighed deeply. “Why don’t you understand yet? Even if it weren’t you, other deities would be feared by cultivators. This war determines who rules the world.”

After Lord Changning left, Mu Sui was confined in prison. He read, cultivated, slowly grew, but knew not the years.

When heavenly light broke through darkness again, what Meng Ruji saw through Mu Sui’s eyes was the divine realm outside already burned flame-red.

A goddess with dimmed radiance ran toward Mu Sui.

Meng Ruji recognized this goddess—she was the one who had received Mu Sui on the Divine Platform the day he was born. Her robes that should have been spotless were now stained with blood and fire, looking defeated and disheveled.

She cast a spell, releasing Mu Sui’s restraints, then grabbed his hand and led him running outside.

“What happened?” Mu Sui asked. “Where is Lord Changning?”

The goddess leading him in flight looked back at Mu Sui, her eyes already full of tears: “Xinghuo, the heavenly gods have been defeated. Among the cultivators, someone killed Changning and then ascended to become a god.”

Mu Sui froze in place.

At this moment, Meng Ruji’s consciousness within this body also froze.

Meng Ruji suddenly recalled seeing Mo Yi’s past in Madam Lin’s small courtyard earlier. The dying deity Mo Yi had killed was…

Lord Changning.

So… that’s why Mu Sui beside her had suddenly become so sad then.

Meng Ruji hadn’t known at the time. Now knowing, she only regretted not holding Mu Sui’s hand more tightly.

“The human race has their deity…” the goddess said sorrowfully. “We’re losing ground steadily. The human deity proposed peace talks, and we agreed, but the cultivators took the opportunity to launch a sneak attack on the divine realm… We can’t leave anymore. But you still can.”

As the goddess spoke, regardless of Mu Sui’s stunned state, she almost dragged him forward.

“You haven’t fully matured, and your divine status was previously damaged. We can gather our last divine power to strip away your divine status. We’ll send you to the lower realm, then we’ll perish in heavenly fire. No one will know your whereabouts. From then on, there will be no more heavenly gods in the world.”

With each sentence she spoke, Mu Sui’s face seemed to pale another degree.

Until she pulled him onto the Divine Platform.

The Divine Platform was already ruined, no longer as sacred as before. The surrounding cloud stairs were also stained with dust from fires attacking from the lower realm.

The gods stood on their respective cloud stairs as they had the day Mu Sui was born, but their numbers had dwindled. Each heavenly god was also stained with dust. Firelight dyed the sky red like an apocalyptic sunset.

“Xinghuo.” The goddess pushed Mu Sui onto the Divine Platform. With tears in her eyes, she firmly told him: “You must live.”

The moment Mu Sui fell onto the Divine Platform, the gods chanted incantations. Instantly, light rose from the Divine Platform like vines binding his limbs. He reached out, wanting to grab the goddess who had brought him.

But the goddess only flew to her cloud stair, looked back at him, and began chanting incantations. Her eyes held tears throughout.

The light gripped Mu Sui’s limbs, making him lie on the Divine Platform unable to struggle at all.

Stripping away divine status was originally the greatest punishment for heavenly gods.

But now it has become the last method to save a heavenly god.

As the chanting grew louder, ice needles condensed from the air’s mist.

The ice needles pierced Mu Sui’s flesh. Intense pain instantly transmitted to every nerve in his body.

At this moment, Meng Ruji truly empathized with his pain and struggle.

Ice needles broke through skin and pierced muscle, reaching bone, then traveled along the bone, scraping away the golden threads wrapped around his bone marrow. This torture seemed designed to flay him alive, scraping open every inch of his flesh.

Some needles entered through the gaps under his fingernails, scraping away the golden threads wound around his fingertip bone marrow.

Blood flowed on the Divine Platform. All the deities seemed to have tears in their eyes.

But the incantations in their mouths did not stop.

The golden threads from the Divine Platform were stripped away inch by inch. Meng Ruji felt Mu Sui’s vision no longer clear—he could no longer see distant cranes, could no longer hear the world’s rhythm.

She watched helplessly as this body’s connection to the world was taken away bit by bit.

Meng Ruji, existing within his body, could barely endure this extreme torture.

But from beginning to end, Mu Sui gritted his teeth, forcibly enduring this bone-scraping agony.

In just moments, Meng Ruji was already in such pain her ears rang, her soul trembling. In her daze, she heard the gods’ chanting, yet seemed to hear them beyond their chanting, with blood and tears, with unwillingness, repeating again and again:

“Kill them!”

“Kill them!”

“Kill them all!”

Hatred burned in their hearts, burning out an abyss that could only be filled with blood and corpses.

“Bang!”

In the whirlpool of pain, Meng Ruji seemed to suddenly spring from Mu Sui’s body. She seemed to float in the air, with Mu Sui lying below. Meng Ruji floated parallel to him, above him.

They faced each other. She saw every drop of blood spilling from his body, every inch of pain on his face.

She also saw that after the “torture” ended, his divine status was completely stripped away. The Divine Platform disappeared, and Mu Sui fell powerlessly from the air.

He plummeted into a shattered starry sky, then fell faster and faster through the stars, like a meteor in the sky.

Not one part of his body was uninjured. Blood flowed like inverted rain from his body, through Meng Ruji’s transparent form, then scattered in the wind.

Mu Sui opened his eyes in the air, looking at the increasingly distant divine realm—the “homeland” he could never return to, with the gods he could never see again. In his black pupils, all emotions faded, leaving only malice and hatred.

He was no longer a cold, compassionate god, but a human filled with hatred.

Finally, with another “bang,” he plummeted into a body of water…

He slept in the ice lake. At the bottom where no light could reach, his broken wounds slowly healed. His wounds healed very slowly, but fortunately, nothing at the lake bottom disturbed him.

It took a thousand years for him to heal his flesh wounds in his dreams.

Another thousand years passed, and he almost became stone at the lake bottom.

In the next millennium, the malicious energy in his body began circulating regularly, reviving his organs and reconnecting his meridians.

In the final millennium, the malicious energy in his body began spilling out uncontrollably…

Until one day, a ray of light—light like divine radiance—penetrated the ice lake’s frozen surface, piercing the deep lake bottom, as if coming solely to awaken him.

Mu Sui opened his eyes.

Meng Ruji floated beside him, following his gaze upward.

Above the ice lake, casting spells, was a woman’s figure. The light on her body seemed to come from divine radiance of the past.

She was saving someone. She seemed to be…

Herself.

Meng Ruji’s heart suddenly tightened. In her daze, she heard the sound of flowing water.

Before her, Mu Sui was rising from the lake bottom.

Her body also seemed uncontrollably pulled by some irresistible force, likewise rising.

When Mu Sui broke through the ice surface and stepped onto mortal land again, Meng Ruji felt herself also pulled up by some force, leaving the water surface.

“Splash!”

All scenes instantly receded.

After a brief darkness, Meng Ruji suddenly opened her eyes.

The sky was the same night sky as before. For a moment, Meng Ruji couldn’t tell where she was or what time it was, until she saw the massive upward-flowing Nai River beside her and realized…

She was now in the soft-tailed grass shade.

She had been brought out of the Nai River. She had emerged from that memory…

Then…

Meng Ruji turned to look. Mu Sui was indeed sitting beside her.

His breathing was somewhat rapid, as if bringing her out of the Nai River hadn’t been easy.

“Mu Sui.” Meng Ruji called out, but her voice was extremely hoarse, as if she hadn’t yet emerged from past pain. Her voice was so small it was like breath, barely audible.

Mu Sui was soaking wet, water still dripping from his hair from the Nai River. He didn’t hear Meng Ruji’s voice, but saw her mouth move, so he turned to look at her. Before his gaze could focus on her, before he could see her clearly, he was tackled by a warm body.

Meng Ruji embraced him, knocking him backward to the ground. She lay on top of him, holding him, her body trembling slightly.

After brief shock and stunned silence, Mu Sui understood why she was trembling…

The clothes soaked by Nai River water pressed coldly against his chest, while Meng Ruji’s tears scalded that patch of wet, cold clothing.

The warmth reached his skin and crept into his heart.

She held him with all her strength.

She made no sound but shed many tears, as if shedding all the tears he hadn’t cried in the past.

The hand at his side wanted to fall on Meng Ruji’s back, but finally, he placed his hands on her shoulders, arms slightly exerted. He…

Pushed Meng Ruji away.

Meng Ruji didn’t struggle. Following his force, she sat up, then suppressed her emotions and slowly calmed herself.

Mu Sui also sat up, but having left Meng Ruji’s warmth, the spot on his chest scalded by her tears became even colder.

“I’m sorry…” Meng Ruji wiped her tears and spoke first. She looked at Mu Sui, her eyes washed by tears brighter than jewels. “I was presumptuous. The love I can give you cannot fill this sea of blood and deep hatred.”

Mu Sui was silent for a moment, then nodded: “Hide Xinghuo in Qianshan, follow the gods’ last will. From the day I left the ice lake, this is the only thing I must do for the rest of my life.”

After a brief silence, Meng Ruji also nodded: “Bearing all that, if I were you, I would make the same choice.” She said, “Perhaps today… You shouldn’t have come to the Nai River to save me.”

“I know.”

“But you still came to save me.”

Mu Sui looked at the Nai River. After a long moment, he smiled self-mockingly, somewhat helplessly:

“Same as last time.”

The last time he mentioned, Meng Ruji understood clearly.

It was that time with Zhan Ye, when she was in danger, and he exposed his identity as a heavenly god to save her.

He shouldn’t have, but he came.

The reason was—”I don’t know why either. When I came to my senses, I was already by your side.”

This time was the same as last time.

Under the night sky, Meng Ruji looked at Mu Sui. She had never felt so clearly that they were so close, that they were mutually attracted…

They could even die for each other…

Yet they couldn’t live for each other.

The divide had stretched between them millions of years ago.

“I have revenge to seek.”

“I have people to protect.”

These were both the meanings of life that they could not abandon.