After advancing to Divine Transformation, Song Qian Ji set up a grand formation to gather cloud energy, creating a palace in the clouds.

The halls floated suspended in the ninth heaven, drifting slowly, piercing through clouds and mist, passing over mountains and rivers.

Traveling across the Four Great Continents and Five Great Seas, looking down upon the mountain gates of various sects and schools.

Daily, people came to the palace offering treasures. The celestial palace had everything one could desire, except for a name.

The cultivation world called it “Beyond Heaven.”

This manner of address seemed extremely respectful on the surface, but inside it conveyed a tricky insinuation and unspoken expectation.

—Beyond Heaven. Above all men.

Song Qian Ji, a humble peasant of lowly birth, had become a man above all others through unscrupulous means, and sooner or later would fall from the highest heaven.

Just waiting to see when he would die.

Song Qian Ji always repaid grudges and debts.

So besides offering treasures, there was another shortcut to curry favor with him: “offering people.” Cultivators often captured former enemies who had grudges against them and presented them for his disposal.

But after his engagement, the number of times he drew his sword gradually decreased.

Natural disasters occurred frequently, the world grew restless, the World Tree’s vitality waned, and a great calamity loomed before their eyes.

Song Qian Ji had no heart to settle personal grudges, only wanting to extend life for heaven and earth.

People mistakenly believed that Immortal Lady Miao Yan had transformed Song Qian Ji, so everyone praised the immortal lady’s virtue and kindness.

In truth, after Miao Yan moved into “Beyond Heaven,” she rarely saw Song Qian Ji.

She feared encountering her future Dao companion drawing his sword to kill, and also feared that after long association, Song Qian Ji would tire of her unchanging countenance.

In today’s cultivation world, the elders and powerful figures of prestigious orthodox sects often killed without bloodshed. They were more skilled at using verbal criticism, complex systems, rituals and regulations, as well as many invisible knives and swords.

Only Song Qian Ji maintained a rogue cultivator’s habits, always making scenes bloody and glaringly crimson.

Just like the blood-red clam before them now.

“For you,” Song Qian Ji said.

The clam was as tall as a person, its shell crystalline, with threads of blood flowing over the shell like the giant clam’s blood vessels, the pale pink clam meat faintly visible inside.

The setting sun shone obliquely, its light glittering.

“A thousand-year immortal clam from the Southern Sea?” Miao Yan moved with light lotus steps, examining the clamshell. “It’s said this clam produces only one spirit pearl each year. If the essence blood of two cultivators, male and female, is placed in the clam and nourished with spiritual energy for ten years, one can obtain an immortal fetus. Is that true?”

“Yes,” Song Qian Ji nodded.

He believed he could save the world, and he believed in the future.

Miao Yan smiled, shallow dimples forming: “Not bad.”

Yet she thought, although this Southern Sea immortal clam was rare, whatever Song Qian Ji wanted, other cultivators would eagerly offer it.

There was no need for him to personally seek it.

Seeing a trace of weariness between Song Qian Ji’s brows, Miao Yan considered briefly, then said with a graceful smile:

“This immortal fetus nurtured in the clam, born from a thousand years of spiritual energy gathered within, will naturally have extraordinary bone structure, strong spiritual veins—a born cultivator. When he grows up, he will surely be like you, able to become the world’s number one!”

She knew what to say and when to say it; just a few words could make others happy.

“No,” Song Qian Ji shook his head. “Whether boy or girl, I don’t want them to be the world’s number one.”

Miao Yan was slightly startled: “What?”

“They don’t need to learn my sword, nor must they play your zither. Their father is the world’s number one, who will naturally hold up the sky to shield them from wind and rain.

They can sleep until high noon every day, drink themselves into a stupor, raise a few spirit beasts, and make a group of friends. Do whatever they want to do. Lie down as long as they wish.

No worldly shackles will bind them; I want to let them live the freest, happiest life.”

Miao Yan stared wide-eyed in shock: “Wouldn’t that make them an unruly demon?”

“An unruly demon, so what?” Song Qian Ji replied with a smile.

Layers of sunset glow and cloud shadows overlaid his profile, blurring orange and red light intertwined, slowly drifting with the wind.

In an instant, the winds dispersed and clouds scattered; Miao Yan realized she had never seen this person.

She wanted to say if you have no family clan, no disciples, no ambition to establish a sect or become a master of a generation.

Your strength is just one person’s, not a power faction’s; your reputation is destined to suffer.

Song Qian Ji might not care about reputation, but she couldn’t afford not to.

“Having obtained this immortal clam, if the immortal fetus produced doesn’t follow the path of cultivation, wouldn’t that be a waste of heaven’s gifts?” Miao Yan advised.

Song Qian Ji looked at her: “A cultivator bearing a child is still arduous. Finding the immortal clam was to spare you from hardship.”

Miao Yan opened her mouth, suddenly speechless.

She smiled faintly, her gaze fixed, as two clear tears fell.

Song Qian Ji raised his hand, then hastily lowered it, awkwardly comforting her: “If I’ve done something wrong, you can tell me directly.”

Miao Yan only shook her head, softly murmuring to herself: “It’s too late.”

Before his death, Song Qian Ji suddenly realized that even back then, she had already harbored killing intent.

After his rebirth, he still feared people crying before him.

Too many people had cried to him—first Meng He Ze and He Qingqing, then Ji Chen and Chen Hongzhu…

And who knew who would come after?

Yet he had never cried before others, nor did anyone make him want to cry to them.

“Shedding tears is the most useless thing,” Song Qian Ji always understood this principle.

He spent his childhood in a small town at the foot of a mountain, poor but happy, with a view of the mountains in all four seasons from his window.

Although his parents died early, leaving him without support, kind-hearted neighbors often helped him. Only children who cried and made trouble got no candy; being diligent was what made people like you.

The day the young man boarded Huawei Sect’s great ship, the whole town saw him off, slaughtering chickens and sheep in celebration.

Song Qian Ji boastfully declared he would climb the immortal ladder straight to the clouds, to personally see the infinite wonders of the world beyond the mountains.

Later, in Huawei Sect’s outer sect, he worked harder than anyone each day. Some people were born in the heavens, some people were born to labor.

He came and went alone, dull and uninteresting, abnormally hardworking, meticulously saving money—enough to make every peer genuinely dislike him.

Only the bottomless abyss of Broken Mountain Cliff could barely tolerate his unspoken ambition and frustrated resentment.

There, he pushed an innocent young man off the cliff, and from then on, deservedly walked a path of no return.

His sword grew faster, and his enemies more numerous.

When poor, ambitions shrink; sometimes fighting over unclaimed treasures, engaged in life-and-death struggles over a few spirit stones.

Lin Feiyuan once advised him to become a guest elder at a small sect overseas, cultivating steadily and safely.

“This line of work brings money quickly, but if you do it too long, there’s no turning back.”

Song Qian Ji wanted to strike him on the head with one sword: I’ve made enemies with major sects, which small sect would dare accept me?

I’ve long passed the point of no return.

Midnight Manjusri once asked him why he always had to push things to extremes. The Dead Sea Secret Realm was filled with evil demons and dangerous environments; righteous cultivators should help each other, not scheme against one another.

Song Qian Ji cursed him for talking without understanding the pain.

You are Qingya Academy’s Supervisor, a deity untainted by worldly smoke or personal desires; righteous cultivators naturally listen to you when you speak.

What can I do? I can only speak with my sword.

At that time, his arrogance blazed, a fierce fire burning in his heart that could ignite the heavens.

He didn’t cherish his life, didn’t trust people, and didn’t value others’ precious goodwill.

Many years later, when Song Qian Ji revisited old places, tracing his path, the small town at the mountain’s foot had disappeared, broken walls and ruins covered by wind and sand.

The old tree he had climbed as a child was dead, the stream where he caught fish had dried up, and swallows no longer flew past the gray-blue eaves.

And he had flown to the clouds, built a “Beyond Heaven,” only to see that beyond mountains were still mountains.

Although the green mountains remained similar, Song Qian Ji still consoled himself: my life is just beginning.

I will live in the highest heaven, marry the most beautiful Dao companion, save the World Tree that supports heaven and earth, and live gloriously once more.

He desperately ran toward the edge of the continent, only to be trapped in a snow plain. He fought alone across the world, only to be betrayed by those close to him.

When heavy snow fell, he finally understood that even winning every battle couldn’t win all hearts.

He had made too many mistakes, and countless guilty consciences when examining his heart.

He was not a qualified “savior,” nor the “protagonist” of the story.

He was originally an ordinary person, born in Pingning Town at the foot of the mountain. Surviving hundreds of battles only because he had no other choice.