The Guardian gods-Chapter 686

Now, Chen stood at his current peak, fifth stage mastery, elevated so close to the sixth that he could feel the barrier thinning beneath his fingertips. The next realm was not a distant aspiration. It hovered just within reach, a fragile window separating mortal from transcendent.

So thin.

So infuriatingly thin.

And yet no matter how he pushed, he could not pierce it.

His breath stalled. A cold tremor crawled up his spine.

Because he felt it again.

That presence.

Chen slowly tilted his head, and there it was. The familiar, horrific visage twisted by centuries of resentment: the cursed spirit that had haunted him for so long. Its shape flickered at the edge of vision, its face a grotesque mirror of the fear he once held.

It watched him with hollow, knowing eyes.

Chen's jaw tightened.

He already understood, at least vaguely, that his stagnation had something to do with this spirit. That it anchored him, just as the nightmare had. That something in his soul remained chained to the terror he once felt.

And as the cursed spirit leaned closer, its breath cold. Chen felt the boundary of the sixth stage mock him like a thin sheet of ice, present, fragile, and unbreakable.

For now.

Chen scoffed as a wave of energy emerged from him with his at the center, the cursed spirit sensing the energy howled as its figure blurred as it went back to its constant, everpresent state.

Chen sat down on his throne, his hand tracing the design of the throne. He had long accepted his fate as a puppet king, his crown little more than an ornament, his throne a stage upon which others moved him as they pleased.

For years, he had played his role obediently, bound by invisible strings woven by his father, Murmur, and the Four Great Clans, ancient families whose loyalty to his father stretched back to an age before the empire itself had even drawn breath.

They were not simply nobles; they were the pillars of Murmur's design, entrusted with secrets and power that transcended mortal comprehension. Each clan had once been blessed Murmur himself, bound by a vow of eternal service.

And so it was no suprise these so-called loyalists had hidden things from Chen.

When rumors first reached him of his father's disappearance, the Four Clans acted as though nothing had changed. They continued their duties, issued decrees in Murmur's name, and whispered his praises in the temple halls. To them, the absence of his father who ruled behind the throne was a matter not to be spoken of.

It took every resource Chen possessed, every bribe, threat, and secret channel within the imperial court to uncover the truth. The Four Clans knew, and they had chosen to keep it from him.

That was when Chen finally confirmed what no one dared to say aloud: Murmur was truly gone.

The discovery should have terrified him. Instead, it brought a strange, fleeting joy.

For the first time in his life, the suffocating pressure that had hovered over him, the invisible gaze of his father, the demon who owns everone and everything was gone.

In the quiet of his chambers, Chen had even smiled.

"So you finally met your end," he had whispered to the shadows. "Perhaps one of the Origin Gods grew tired of your games."

He knew of Murmur's obsession with these beings that preceded divinity, the Origin Gods. His father's fascination with them bordered on madness; he had spent centuries seeking to reach them, to understand them, even to surpass and supress them.

But the joy did not last.

As the days passed, logic clawed at his fragile hope. Murmur would never vanish quietly. He was too proud, too cunning, too theatrical. If he were to die, the heavens themselves would shatter. The skies would bleed. The world would know.

Chen knew. His father was not dead.

He was merely silent. 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

Even so, as dread whispered at the edges of his mind, another feeling began to grow within him, one he could neither ignore nor fully embrace.

Freedom.

Each morning he awoke, feeling lighter. The chains he had worn all his life, chains of fear, of obedience, of expectation seemed to fade a little more. The imperial palace, once a gilded cage, felt vast and open. The air he breathed tasted different.

At first, he dismissed it as delusion, a trick of hope. But the feeling only grew stronger with each sunrise.

That constant pressure that had haunted him for centuries, the awareness that he was never alone, that every thought, every emotion was watched was gone.

Gone completely.

And in that emptiness, something else began to bloom.

The thought that had long lurked at the edges of his mind now began to take shape, bold and intoxicating. "What if I never return to the shadow? What if I rebel? What if I am free?"

Chen could not silence it. He did not want to.

Each day, he found himself lingering longer by the windows, watching his wander through the empire, laughing freely, unbound by some command. And deep inside, he envied them.

The fear of Murmur's return still lingered in his heart like a ghost but for the first time, the Emperor began to imagine a life where that fear no longer ruled him.

A life where Chen, not Murmur's son, not the puppet Emperor, but Chen himself, would decide his fate.

His only supposed problem of this coming true now was the Four Great Clans.

Unlike his father, Murmur, who had treated them as his closest instruments, extensions of his will. Chen viewed them as obstacles wearing the guise of allies. They were formidable, yes, each with generations of his father's favor and influence flowing through their bloodlines. But to Chen, they were mortal, not divine.

And mortals, no matter how powerful, could bleed.

He saw no great hope in defeating his father, but the clans? They were another matter. In them, he saw arrogance, complacency, and a blind devotion to something who views them as something less.

Yet things were never so simple.

For even as the thought of breaking his shackles thrilled him, peace remained beyond his reach.

Each year that passed without word of Murmur's whereabouts only deepened the pit within his chest. The silence that had once felt liberating grew heavy, oppressive. Was he dead? Or watching from somewhere unseen?

The uncertainty gnawed at him. Every whisper in the halls, every shadow in the corners of his throne room could have been his father's gaze.

His despair grew, and with it, his mind grew heavier. E

very day he sat upon that throne, he fought a quiet war between sanity and ambition.

To the empire, Emperor Chen was a distant, elegant ruler, a man of strange temper, given to moments of laughter followed by chilling silence. To his officials and subjects, he was the embodiment of imperial dignity.

They feared the Four Great Clans, yes, but they still bowed before him. They still called him Your Majesty, still trembled when he spoke, still sought his favor.

And that tiny fragment of reverence, that sliver of genuine power, poisoned him with desire.

He wanted more.

He wanted to see the Four Great Clans kneel, not in feigned loyalty, but in submission. He wanted to see them stripped of their inherited power, forced to serve him.

Each time he issued a decree, each time his word sent a ripple through the empire, he felt it, the thrill of control. A taste of what true power might feel like if it were fully his.

And that thought, that beautiful, terrible thought, ate at him day and night.

"The day will come", he would whisper to himself. But deep down, even as he dreamed of dominion, fear lingered.

For decades, Chen had been trapped in a stagnant reality. Unable to move against the Four Great Clans, unable to escape the invisible grasp of his father's will. His ambitions simmered beneath the surface, but the weight of Murmur's legacy smothered every spark before it could ignite.

That was, until word reached him, the godlings are on their way to his land.

It was the first moment in years that made his pulse quicken.

His father's voice echoed in his memory, as clear as if Murmur stood beside him even now:

"Never interfere with the godlings, Chen. They are the echoes of the Origin Gods. Their affairs should never cross with ours."

For most of his reign, Chen had obeyed that command, just as he had obeyed all the others. Even when the vampire godlings built their rising domain near the empire's borders, he had remained still, swallowing his anger and pretending it was wisdom. But not this time.

This time, he saw an opening. A chance to strike, not at the godlings, but at the shadow that still ruled his life.

By sending his order for the empire's forces to block the godling's passage, Chen was doing something far greater than an act of defiance. He was baiting a trap.

He wanted to see if his father would respond.