The universe darkened.
It wasn't night.
Clouds didn't form—the vacuum had nothing to condense—but darkness gathered anyway. Starlight bent away from a single point in the endless void, as if the heavens themselves were flinching back.
Around Ren, the star river warped.
Distant suns stretched into pale smears. Planetary orbits twisted as invisible tides dragged at them. Between those drifting lights, bands of tribulation lightning flickered into being without any medium to carry them—thick, silver-violet bolts that coiled on the spot like furious dragons pinned in place.
Ren opened his eyes.
Darkness above him seethed.
The corner of his mouth tilted up in a small, amused curve. His gaze flicked once to the distant blue-white dot of Sky Spill Planet, wrapped in its thin veil of formations.
Good thing he'd moved this far out.
The mere shockwaves leaking from those lightning bands were enough to crush stars. Planets in the outer reaches of some unlucky systems cracked like eggshells, their fragments quietly drifting apart.
In that moment, thunder answered.
A roar tore through the void, a sound with nothing to do with air. Heavenly Dao pressure descended—not the oppressive will of a Divine Realm World King, not the cold majesty of an ordinary Empyrean.
It felt… older.
Like the will behind the entire 33 Heavens had turned its gaze this way. A probing, offended intent: someone on that tiny lower world, at a realm the Heavenly Dao labeled "Xiantian", was daring to birth something at the level of a transcendent divine might… and then push past even that.
Lightning gathered into a sea.
Sheets of light layered over one another, forming a churning ocean of heavenly punishment. Phantom lotus blossoms of thunder opened and closed within it, each petal etched with dense Dao lines of retribution. This was the kind of tribulation that only the most outstanding Empyreans amongst Empyreans would ever see when they composed a transcendent divine might that touched the core of the Heavenly Dao itself.
Ren's expression didn't change.
He laughed once, softly.
"This is good," he said, tone relaxed, almost pleased. "A nice test for us."
...
Inside the Magic Cube, Mo Eversnow's fingers tightened unconsciously in her robe.
The projection in front of her was nothing but light, yet her soul still wanted to kneel.
"Ren… you…"
Even filtered through countless ancient formations, the might of the Heavenly Tribulation made the Magic Cube's inner space shudder. That boundless thunder sea overhead, the pressure that wanted to crush not just flesh but Dao—if such a tribulation descended upon a World King in the Divine Realm, they would be annihilated before they even unfolded their divine sea. Even ordinary Empyreans would have to rouse their transcendent divine might in full, burning lifespan, luck, and future to withstand it.
And he stood there outside the atmosphere, coat hanging quietly, hands at his sides, eyes calm.
Ren lifted his right hand.
He didn't summon Fire.
He didn't summon Thunder.
He didn't reach for any single Law.
He opened Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven.
A slice of his new Heaven unfolded above his palm—a circular field only a few hundred feet across. Within that disc, gray grandmist rolled and boiled. Rivers of blood whispered as they flowed through the haze. Feathers black as night drifted up, only to dissolve into mist as they rose.
At the edge of that small Heaven, a faint ring of red lotus petals turned slowly. Their shadows dimmed even the thunder sea's savage brilliance.
The Heavenly Tribulation responded instantly.
Bolts crashed down.
They didn't "travel". One moment the lightning existed in that roiling ocean overhead; the next, it appeared within striking distance, wrapped in Heavenly Dao decree, smashing down toward him with all the weight of judgment for daring to step beyond prescribed limits.
From Mo Eversnow's perspective, it looked like the end of a world.
Thunder light filled her vision, washing out the Magic Cube's projection. The entire inner space hummed, ancient arrays blazing as they shielded her soul from leftover shockwaves. For a brief, heart-stopping instant, she truly thought the Cube might crack.
Ren simply breathed in.
"First move," he said softly. "Sit."
Grandmist surged.
The slice of Heaven in his palm didn't expand outward. It deepened inward. Its "interior" thickened, layers folding over one another. The bolts of Heavenly Tribulation that had been descending in a straight line suddenly found their path stretching.
Momentum dragged them forward, but the "space" they moved through had turned viscous, like tar.
Gray mist reached up.
It didn't block. It didn't clash head-on.
It embraced.
Lightning slammed into grandmist.
In that instant, every Law woven into the tribulation—punishment, destruction, purification, the Heavenly Dao's own cold authority—was forced to remember that before they had names, before they had forms, they had been nothing but possibilities inside primordial chaos.
Under that reminder, their identities blurred.
The brilliant silver-violet bolts lost their razor edges. The sharp arcs softened. Blazing thunder became heavy, reluctant light.
They sank into the grandmist like spears hurled into a bottomless sea.
Boom.
The first wave of Heavenly Tribulation, which should have blasted whole layers of space apart, became a muffled rumble. Its ferocity vanished into gray depths, its light dimming to a struggling glow buried within the field.
Ren's coat fluttered once.
His hair didn't move.
Mo Eversnow's lungs burned.
She only realized she'd been holding her breath when she finally exhaled, chest aching. Shock warred with something like horrified admiration inside her.
"He used… his own martial intent…" she whispered, voice shaking. "…to meet Heavenly Tribulation head-on…"
No. Not just martial intent.
More specifically, the transcendent divine might he had just birthed.
And yet even that description felt too small.
The Heavenly Dao was not pleased.
The thunder sea overhead roared again. The first wave had been a probe, a question. The second fell like an execution.
Flames bloomed within the lightning.
Golden lotuses of karmic fire spun into existence, each petal carrying the weight of burned lifetimes. Dragon-shaped bolts coiled around them, fangs bared, each scale etched with dense Law patterns of annihilation. Their bodies were wrapped in authority that could sever Dao paths—erasing a cultivator's future, uprooting their very meaning.
This second wave did not just aim to smash Ren's body.
It aimed to burn his Dao.
To sever his connection to whatever Heaven he had dared to build.
To reduce Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven to a scar in the skies.
Ren's eyes brightened, the way a hunter's might when he saw a worthy beast.
"This one looks better," he murmured. "Second move, then."
He stepped forward in the void.
The slice of Heaven in his palm shifted.
It didn't simply deepen this time.
It inverted.
For a heartbeat, the little field turned itself inside-out. The "ground" of blood rivers and feathers flipped up to become a hungering sky. The swirling grandmist above fell down, becoming a heavy ocean.
Within that inversion, twelve phantom palaces emerged and aligned, their positions mirroring the locations of his true Fate Palaces in the depths of his being.
As they matched, the link between this small field and his full Heaven snapped taut.
"Come down," Ren said softly.
Not to the lightning.
To his own Heaven.
Deep within his soul, Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven turned.
A fraction of its real weight descended into the slice in his palm.
The field darkened.
The second wave of Heavenly Tribulation slammed into that tiny Heaven like stars crashing into a black sea.
This time, there wasn't even a muffled explosion.
There was only… folding.
The golden karma lotuses' petals twisted inward. Dragon-bolts elongated, their proud bodies bending, then stretching thin. They sank deeper and deeper, scales scraping against invisible Dao lines.
Every Law-line carved into those lotus petals and dragon bodies met deeper, older lines birthed by his Heaven. For a moment, the tribulation fought back, Heavenly Dao power raging, trying to assert its own authority.
Then it broke.
Punishment, destruction, karmic fire, thunder—under the pressure of grandmist, they lost their forms. What remained was pure essence: raw Dao fragments stripped of identity.
Those fragments sank into gray depths.
Some were burned away.
Some were refined into new patterns.
His Immortal Soul Bone captured them all—cold, efficient, merciless. Facets of immortal crystal glowed in the depths of his soul as it charted their flow, etching new insights into Grandmist and Heavenly Demon Dao onto its surface.
Two moves.
Ren lowered his hand.
The slice of Heaven closed, folding down until it was nothing more than a faint mark on his palm—a tiny ring of gray edged in dim blood-red and black.
Silence returned.
The star river brightened again, as if nothing had ever happened.
Inside the Magic Cube, Mo Eversnow stared, lips parted.
Her heart pounded so violently she almost wondered if a soul form could suffer palpitations.
"That… that Heavenly Tribulation…" she whispered. "At least the level of an Empyrean composing a transcendent divine might…"
She knew.
In ancient history, there had been Empyreans who shook the vast universe when they summoned tribulations of this scale to give birth to their transcendent divine mights. A cultivation art of that rank was a violation against the Heavenly Dao itself; its birth naturally provoked heaven's fury. Only the most extraordinary Empyreans could hope to withstand such a test.
And Ren Ming had met such a tribulation.
With his newly created Heaven.
With a martial intent on the level of a transcendent divine might.
Two moves.
He hadn't even unfolded his Heaven completely.
Mo Eversnow's vision swayed. White fingers pressed against her forehead as she steadied herself, pale lashes trembling.
"Monster…" she breathed, a strained, incredulous laugh escaping her. "You… you really are a monster, Ren Ming…"
Her eyes drifted back to the hovering figure in the void, to the star river slowly knitting itself back together around him.
The Magic Cube floated silently before her, its facets dark and steady like an ancient eye watching a younger, wilder heaven assert itself.
...
Ren flexed his fingers.
Fine lightning scars flickered across his skin, pale silver lines that crawled over the back of his hand… then sank inward, vanishing without a trace.
His meridians were calm.
His True Essence flowed like a placid, deep river. Only in the depths—where his Heaven rested—did new Dao lines glow faintly, places where the tribulation's Laws had been refined, stripped, and re-purposed.
He rolled his wrist, watching the faint ring on his palm fade.
"Empyrean-level tribulation," he mused aloud. "And you still came at me like that, huh."
His tone was light.
Not mocking.
Not reverent.
Just entertained.
He lifted his gaze.
The last traces of Heavenly Dao will were already withdrawing, but threads of that presence still lingered in the bones of the world, in the quiet trembling of destroyed stars and shocked heavens.
"Guess that means you recognized it," he said, voice low. "Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven… as something you need to test personally."
He smiled.
Slow.
Bright.
Utterly unafraid.
"That's flattering."
He lowered his hand.
The new Heaven settled fully within him—roots sinking into his twelve Fate Palaces, branches stretching toward his Dao Heart. Its weight pressed against his soul, heavy yet comfortable, like a cloak tailored perfectly to his bones.
"Beyond Empyrean, huh…" he murmured.
There was no neat realm name to stick that into. No convenient "half-step" label.
He only knew this much:
An Empyrean would have to rouse their full strength, draw upon the heavenly tribulation they had survived, and stake their everything to withstand that thunder sea.
He had used a fragment of a newborn Heaven and two casual moves.
How much higher?
Ren's eyes gleamed, black irises reflecting distant stars.
"Let's find out," he said softly.
The void calmed.
The last echoes of Heavenly Tribulation had vanished. The star river once more flowed in quiet, glittering arcs.
Up here, there was no wind.
No sound.
Only distant suns blinking in and out, and the faint shimmer of protective arrays wrapped around Sky Spill Planet like a second, translucent shell.
Ren floated in the vast darkness, coat hanging quietly from his shoulders. For a long breath, he simply looked across the universe.
Then he closed his eyes.
"Alright," he said under his breath. "One more round."
He folded his legs and sat in midair.
He didn't need a stone.
He didn't need any support.
His body was a pillar; his Dao was the ground.
In the silent darkness of space, a man in black sat cross-legged above a world, hands resting lightly on his knees, spine straight, breaths slow and even.
Inside, his Heaven opened.
Within his Spiritual Sea, Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven stirred.
The "sea" that had once been a vast inner ocean had long since moved past that simple form. It was a layered vista of Heavens.
A gray grandmist sky swirled endlessly, threaded with slow arcs of black and violet thunder. Rivers of blood wound through fields of shadow feathers and crushed bone, flowing and reforming, birthing and devouring all at once.
Twelve Fate Palaces turned in the firmament like distant suns, each one a world, each one shining with the Law colors he'd grasped—crimson Fire, deep Earth, razor Metal, flowing Water, roaring Thunder, cutting Wind, distorted Space, flowing Time, annihilating gray…
At the center of everything, a lotus revolved.
It was red at its core, edges dipped in grandmist darkness. With every turn, its petals shed faint ripples that brushed across his Laws, his Anima, his Dao Heart.
The newborn Heaven watched everything beneath it in silence.
Ren's consciousness settled at its core.
"Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven," he murmured inwardly. "Good name. Good weight. But for daily use…"
A slow, wry smile touched his mouth.
"…you're a little big."
He didn't need his full Heaven every time he threw a punch.
If he unfolded the complete Heaven in this fragile corner of the 33 Heavens, more than one starfield would shatter into dust.
So he breathed in.
The Immortal Soul Bone woke.
In the depths of his soul, ancient crystal flared to life, lines of immortal light circling along its facets. Its unique talent—turning complexity into simplicity—awakened fully.
Dao lines that would have taken other powerhouses thousands of years to slowly untangle flowed before him like threads between fingers.
Layers of Heaven.
Grandmist suppression.
Heavenly Demon judgment.
Asura slaughter.
Death God inevitability.
Prime Emperor's sovereign suppression.
The faint echo of chaotic source.
Ren's consciousness moved through them patiently, like a craftsman testing each string on a zither.
"What I need," he thought calmly, "is the shadow of the Heaven. A shape the body can wear."
He reached toward the lotus at the center of his Heaven.
Its petals shivered.
In response, the grandmist sky above thickened, rivers of blood slowed, thunder dimmed. Layers of Heaven folded down, compressing into smaller and smaller circles, each one refined under the Immortal Soul Bone's cold clarity.
A lotus was already a condensed world.
Now he was condensing the lotus.
"Start from the body," he decided. "From the battlefield."
His thoughts turned.
"First layer…"
Gray grandmist peeled from the Heaven's depths and descended.
Heavenly Demon killing intent threaded through it like black wind. Asura's battlefield slaughter, Death God's silent judgment, the inevitability of annihilation—all of it sank into that mist, not as separate pieces, but as a single, unified oppression.
Colors bled into it.
Not bright, gaudy hues.
Deep, soaked-through shades of Dao—blood-red Fire, violet-gold Thunder, the dim blue of distant starlight, the faint green of life's last breath, the dusk-gold of his creative flame, the earth-brown of unshakable ground.
Grandmist swallowed everything.
Then it gave them back.
Within the lotus, petals darkened. Their bright red cooled to almost black. When they turned, bands of muted color slid along their surfaces—blood-red, thunder-violet, abyssal blue, dusk-gold, faint earth-brown—like reflections from a world that had not yet been born.
A lotus of dark rainbow.
"…Good," Ren thought. "Now… to the body."
He willed.
The lotus flickered.
In the next instant, one of its phantom reflections appeared on his physical body.
A lotus bloomed on his shoulder blades.
It wasn't something ordinary eyes could easily see. Rather, existence itself shifted around Ren.
To any being capable of perceiving Dao lines, a dark-rainbow lotus had opened between his shoulders.
Its petals were ink-dark, each rimmed with faint bands of blood-red, violet, dim gold, deep blue. Grandmist seeped from it, wrapping his body in an invisible, heavy aura. Around him, space thickened. Light from distant stars bent ever so slightly, curving toward the lotus, as if the void itself were remembering an older Heaven.
Ren exhaled once, quietly.
He could feel the weight this layer provided. The way it pressed down on his own power, not as shackles, but as a sheath—keeping sharpness close to the body, preventing waste, tightening his existence instead of letting it leak.
"First layer," he murmured. "With this… anyone could fight four great realms above."
For anyone else, such words would be madness.
For him—with twelve Fate Palaces, fifty to sixty percent comprehension of Grandmist, and several sixth-level Laws engraved into his Dao Heart—it felt almost conservative.
The Immortal Soul Bone calmly accepted that thought.
The lotus obeyed.
The aura settled against his skin like a second coat. It didn't explode outward. It lay close, suppression turned inward, binding his power tighter, honing it without letting excess spill.
He casually flexed a tiny portion of strength.
The void around him trembled.
A cluster of wandering meteorites quietly disintegrated into dust, their stones unmade without even a ripple of light. In the distance, a nameless star's crust cracked, then knit itself back together under its own gravity, never knowing why it had almost failed.
Ren's smile deepened, eyes narrowing in satisfaction.
"Good."
He lifted his right hand.
"Second layer."
The lotus on his body moved.
It slid from between his shoulders like a shadow changing angles, gliding down his arm and emerging on the back of his hand. Petals folded around his wrist, hugging his knuckles.
Wherever it appeared, the aura followed.
Grandmist gathered around that hand in thick layers, obedient and heavy.
Ren poured in a bit more power.
The lotus brightened.
Dark petals gained depth; the muted colors along their edges became clearer. A faint halo spread around his hand—a dark-rainbow sheen that didn't shine outward like ordinary light, but made everything near it look dull, as if the void itself was being compared and found wanting.
He clenched his fist lightly.
Space squealed.
Not loudly. Just a faint, strange sound, like glass under too much pressure.
A hairline fracture appeared in the void ahead, an ink-black line that ran through the star river. A distant cluster of stars in that direction flickered, then quietly collapsed into gray motes. The energy they released when they died turned to grandmist before it could even radiate.
Ren studied the scene, amused.
"All that from a light squeeze," he murmured. "Yeah. I like this."
He opened his hand again.
The fracture in space slowly closed. The lotus dimmed, returning to a simple, dark outline hugging his knuckles.
"Third layer," he said. "Full burn."
He didn't unleash it immediately.
He let the concept settle.
Within his Heaven, the Immortal Soul Bone moved first.
It set conditions.
Threshold of threat.
Degree of release.
Safeguards to keep his own Heaven from tearing his body and the surrounding lower world apart when he truly used everything. Stress would be dispersed, pressure moderated, Heaven's descent shaped instead of simply crashing down.
Only when all of that was in place did he let his Dao Heart stir.
"Full power," he said softly. "Grandmist Heavenly Demon Heaven Intent… open."
The lotus erupted.
From Ren's senses, it felt like inviting a sleeping universe to wake up on his skin.
Lotus petals bloomed across his body.
The single bloom on his back split into many—smaller, sharper lotuses unfolding along his shoulders, arms, chest, spine, legs, throat. They didn't form armor. They became living Dao tattoos, each petal a node where Heaven and flesh met.
Dark petals lay flat over his skin, their edges shining with a dim, layered rainbow.
Grandmist surged.
The aura that had wrapped tightly around him suddenly expanded at blinding speed.
Starlight entering the field slowed.
Particles of cosmic dust at the edge of his presence lost their paths, drifting, then sinking.
Ren's eyes opened.
His pupils split.
Subtle rings of color bloomed in his gaze, circling a gray core that swallowed light—blood-red, dusk-gold, thunder-violet, deep abyssal blue, earth-brown, all spinning in slow, terrifying harmony.
He lifted his hand again.
With the lotus at full bloom, the simple act of raising his palm felt like an entire Heaven turning.
A wandering star drifted into the edge of his field.
It didn't explode.
It didn't shatter.
It simply… forgot.
Its existence as "a star" dissolved. Its layers—crust, mantle, core—unwound into loose particles. Those particles lost the rules that bound them, bonds erased. Within a few breaths, a small sphere of gray, heavy mist floated where the star had been, quietly rotating as its last traces of form fell apart.
The sphere drifted inward.
It merged into the grandmist currents that now faintly suffused the space around him, becoming one more indistinguishable part of that primordial haze.
Ren watched it with calm eyes.
Measured.
Compared.
His lips curved.
"Yeah," he said lightly. "This works."
He let the lotus petals dim.
Full burn retreated.
The field shrank, grandmist withdrawing until it once more lay close to his skin. The dark-rainbow patterns on his body sank inward, becoming faint, hidden lines beneath his flesh.
His eyes returned to their usual deep black, the rainbow light folding into a single, quiet gleam.
The Heavenly Dao's vigilance eased.
No new tribulation formed.
Ren rolled his neck once, a small, relaxed motion, like a man loosening muscles after trying on new clothes.
"Three layers…" he murmured. "With this, dealing with Empyreans will be relatively simple."
The Immortal Soul Bone etched that conclusion into the core of his Dao.
First layer: a cloak. Enough to crush those four great realms above, to bind power without waste.
Second layer: a weapon. A hand that enhances power even more to dramatic degrees could casually shatter space and erase star clusters.
Third layer: a walking Heaven. A full bloom that evolves one power and could turn a region of reality into grandmist.
Done.
He didn't linger.
Ren's consciousness sank deeper into his Spiritual Sea.