Prologue

Sixty thousand years ago, the Tribulation of Chaos descended. The True God Shang Gu sacrificed herself to save the Three Realms, vanishing like smoke into thin air.

Even then, someone asked: When the people of the Mortal Realm face calamity and disaster, they can pray to the gods in the heavens for protection. But when a god is driven to the end of the road, what remains but destruction?

Mortals can turn to gods. To whom can gods turn?

That question hung before all the living beings of the Nine Provinces. By the time one looked back, seas had become fields, all things had changed, and tens of thousands of years had passed once more.

Still, along the long road to immortality, a small diversion did arise amid the endlessly monotonous years of the Three Realms.

Sixty-three thousand years ago, on Mount Kunlun, the Heavenly Emperor was to be wed.

That day, joy filled the skies over the Nine Provinces and Eight Wildernesses, and the gods of the heavens gathered to celebrate. Unfortunately, a subdued uneasiness had crept into the otherwise magnificent wedding.

There was only one reason: before becoming Heavenly Empress, High God Wu Huan had held another, rather particular status.

When heaven and earth first emerged from chaos, the primordial gods were immortal. The Ancestral God Qing Tian shattered the void and created the Primordial Realm above all living beings of the Three Realms. Commanding the Four Great True Gods under him, the Ancestral God opened heaven and earth, spending ten thousand years bringing into being what would become the Three Realms and Nine Provinces.

On the day the Three Realms took shape, the Ancestral God's work was complete. He dissolved into nothingness, his existence becoming one with the Three Realms. Thereafter, the four True Gods who had served him—Shang Gu, Zhi Yang, Tian Qi, and Bai Jue—became the rulers of the Primordial God Realm. Though Shang Gu was a goddess, she had inherited the Ancestral God's mantle and thus held the most exalted position among them.

The Four Great True Gods possessed profound divine power. Commanding the Divine Beasts and governing the Three Realms, they brought the Nine Wildernesses and Eight Expanses into their earliest form within a few thousand years. Yet a thousand years after humans and demons appeared in the world, the Tribulation of Chaos descended, and the Four Great True Gods and a host of High Gods perished in the catastrophe... To protect the Three Realms, the four True Gods were destroyed in both spirit and form, dissolving into nothingness as the Ancestral God had before them. Only their weapons remained, scattered across the Mortal World. Of the many primordial deities caught in the tribulation, only three survived.

From then on, the primordial gods vanished, and the Primordial God Realm was sealed above the Three Realms, never to open again. Thus ended the Primordial Era, and the Three Realms and Nine Provinces entered the Post-Primordial Era.

The three High Gods who escaped the catastrophe were the Heavenly Emperor above the Nine Heavens, High God Wu Huan, and High God Gu Jun of Qingchi Palace on Mount Qilian. The Heavenly Emperor's true form was a Five-Clawed Golden Dragon, High God Wu Huan descended from the Phoenix lineage, and High God Gu Jun was a Primordial Jiao Dragon. All three had taken their present forms from Primordial Divine Beasts.

Such ancient, enduring deities, surviving from the distant primordial age, were naturally revered and worshipped by all living beings of the Three Realms.

High God Gu Jun and High God Wu Huan had originally been divine consorts. Unconcerned with worldly affairs, they built Qingchi Palace in the Qilian Mountains and withdrew from the world, living as freely as they pleased. They had once been the envy of the gods.

A thousand years ago, the two High Gods conceived a child. This should have been a great joy for the Three Realms, but the child, still unhatched, had possessed scarcely a trace of divine aura from birth. Over a thousand years passed, yet the child still lacked even the strength to break out of the shell, growing ever weaker and drawing close to death. That a child born to the most exalted Divine Lords in existence should be so frail was truly unexpected. Afraid of provoking the two High Gods, none of the immortals dared speak lightly of this Little Divine Lord.

Ever since the Little Divine Lord came into the world, High God Gu Jun had thought of nothing but how to strengthen the child's divine power. Carrying the round egg in his arms, he traveled far and wide in search of ancient texts and ruins, often remaining away from Qingchi Palace for years at a time. Whether because the child was absurdly weak or because she did not believe the girl could survive, High God Wu Huan treated the egg with utter indifference. She even refused to accompany High God Gu Jun on his searches, remaining alone at Qingchi Palace.

Worried that High God Wu Huan would be bored at the palace, High God Gu Jun asked his good friend the Heavenly Emperor to visit Qingchi Palace more often whenever he had time. Several thousand more years passed in this way. When High God Gu Jun returned to Mount Qilian, full of worry and cradling the still-unhatched egg, he found Qingchi Palace long abandoned, desolate and fallen into disrepair. High God Wu Huan was nowhere to be found.

Just then, joyous news of the Heavenly Emperor's impending marriage spread throughout the Three Realms and Nine Provinces.

His bride was none other than High God Wu Huan.

Had any other High Immortal done such a thing, they might well have found it impossible to retain a place in the Three Realms. After all, taking a friend's wife was hardly virtuous, however justified one might feel. But the Heavenly Emperor was the Sovereign of the Three Realms. Though the immortals felt it improper, their pride deserted them, and none dared utter a word.

The loves, hatreds, and grievances of High Gods were not matters for lowly immortals like them to judge...

And so now, as the assembled High Immortals sat upon the Kunlun Cloud Terrace, their apprehension reached its peak when seven-colored auspicious clouds appeared above the summit of Mount Kunlun.

High God Gu Jun stood in the sky, dressed in blue-green robes. In contrast to the Heavenly Emperor's imposing majesty, he possessed a gentler, more cultivated air, handsome and ethereally graceful.

High God Wu Huan's gaze, however, was rather unsteady. Quite a few Immortal Ladies stared, then began murmuring among themselves.

Whatever their private thoughts, the immortals hastened to fall to their knees, paying homage to the exalted High God Gu Jun.

And bracing themselves for the fierce battle about to erupt on Mount Kunlun...

Who could have guessed that High God Gu Jun would pay no attention whatsoever to the Heavenly Emperor and Heavenly Empress, poised to face him? Stepping down from his cloud, he went straight to High Lord Ling Juan, who oversaw the destinies of Immortal Lords, took an egg from inside his robes, and eagerly held it out for a reading of its fate.

All the Three Realms knew how High God Gu Jun treasured this egg. But no one had expected that, on such a momentous day, he would descend upon Mount Kunlun in all his overwhelming might merely to have the Little Divine Lord's destiny read and its future fortunes divined.

It was no different from delivering a resounding slap to the faces of the Heavenly Emperor and Heavenly Empress before everyone present—yet it left them no grounds to lash out.

High God Wu Huan's expression changed, and she immediately made to sweep away in anger. Fortunately, the Heavenly Emperor was skilled at swallowing his feelings; he soothed her, keeping the wedding from falling apart.

Beneath the immortals' incredulous gazes, High Lord Ling Juan mustered his old bones, utterly terrified under the oppressive presence of three High Gods. He knew well enough the egg's origins and dared not refuse. Trembling, he accepted it from High God Gu Jun and carefully began his divination.

Who could have foreseen that the reading would take hours? Though a hundred years was no more than an instant to an immortal, under those circumstances, the time was exceedingly difficult to endure.

And so, bizarrely, the wedding on Mount Kunlun stalled halfway through because of an egg. The immortals stared fixedly at that round little egg, all hoping High Lord Ling Juan would have the sense to say something flattering. Perhaps, if High God Gu Jun was pleased, the situation would become a little less awkward. After all, Kunlun was a blessed sanctuary of the Nine Heavens; no one wanted a sacred mountain handed down from primordial times destroyed over the melodramatic, tangled affairs of a few High Gods.

Only after even the Heavenly Emperor could not help coughing several times did High Lord Ling Juan remove his hand from that precious egg. After a moment's hesitation, under the incredulous gazes of the assembled immortals, he tremulously uttered a sentence that would change the destiny of the Three Realms.

"This Little Divine Lord... may well... be destined to be a High God."

Everyone present was stunned. The immortals stared dumbfounded... Born thousands of years ago and still without the strength to break out of its shell, it fell short of even an ordinary immortal child. With spiritual power like that, it was actually destined to be a High God?

However intimidating High God Gu Jun might be, High Lord Ling Juan certainly had some nerve spouting such nonsense!

Naturally, not a single Immortal Lord dared voice that thought. Even the Heavenly Emperor wisely chose to play deaf and dumb.

The immortals thought that however much resentment High God Gu Jun still harbored, he ought to understand that High Lord Ling Juan was merely offering a polite remark for the occasion. The exalted rank of High God was no trivial matter. He could listen and enjoy the compliment, but to take it seriously... that was absolutely out of the question.

Who could have expected a long peal of laughter to ring out while the immortals were still reeling? High God Gu Jun stepped onto an auspicious seven-colored cloud and headed east, giving High Lord Ling Juan no chance whatsoever to speak again.

"I thank you, my Immortal Friends, for bearing witness. From this day forth, my child Hou Chi shall hold the rank of High God. Let heaven and earth bear witness."

From beginning to end, High God Gu Jun never spared so much as a proper glance for the Heavenly Emperor and Heavenly Empress seated on their lofty thrones.

The immortals exchanged looks. With a single, casually spoken sentence, a little Jiao Dragon that had yet to hatch had been placed above all living beings in the Three Realms and granted the rank of High God. It was truly absurd. Yet, given the occasion—and the fact that High God Gu Jun himself had spoken—none could voice an objection.

In that brief delay, High God Gu Jun vanished without a trace, and the Little Divine Lord's rank as a High God was thus, inexplicably, settled.

Of all the outlandish tales in the Post-Primordial Realm, none could rival this one.

Deep within the sea of clouds, above Kunlun's summit, a white-robed man held a block of wood and slowly carved it, looking down upon the immortals as though they were ants. Only after hearing Gu Jun establish that egg's rank as a High God did he leisurely depart.

From beginning to end, none of the High Gods, the Heavenly Emperor included, ever discovered that such a man had been there.

Naturally, over the tens of thousands of years that followed, the most frequently repeated remark in the Three Realms was this:

That Little High God Hou Chi of Qingchi Palace really had stumbled into some damned good luck, being born into the right family.