Against the Gods

The Dragon Monarch growled and enveloped the entire Forbidden Land of Samsara with his impossibly vast consciousness instantly. In that moment, the wind had stopped moving, space had frozen in place, the plants had stopped swaying, and even the birds, the insects and the dust had stopped flying in the air.

“...” Shen Xi lowered her gaze and muttered “disobedient child” in her mind, but she couldn’t really bring herself to scold her own daughter. She sighed, “There is no one else here.”

“No, there is someone else here.” Dragon Monarch frowned, “Who is this!? How dare you intrude the Forbidden Land of Samsara!? This crime alone deserves a nine familial exterminations!”

“You don’t have to search any longer,” Shen Xi said slowly, “there is no one in the Forbidden Land of Samsara. What you’ve detected is the child in my stomach.”

The Dragon Monarch was a formidable person. Any time he was at the Forbidden Land of Samsara, he was at his most relaxed and defenseless state. He normally didn’t release his consciousness here without a good reason either. On the other hand, if he were to release his consciousness at full force, it meant that there was nothing that could hide from his spiritual perception. That was why Shen Xi hadn’t tried to hide the truth from him any longer.

“...” The Dragon Monarch felt like someone had swung a million tonne hammer at his head. There was a buzz in his head, and for the first time he was one hundred percent certain that he had misheard something, “What… did you just say?”

“The presence you sensed is the child in my stomach,” Shen Xi repeated calmly before shooting him a glance. She said slowly, “With your abilities, you should’ve noticed since the very beginning. Why are you disbelieving yourself?”

“……”

“………”

“…………”

The world fell ominously silent. The consciousness that wrapped the entire Forbidden Land of Samsara started shaking violently as if a tornado had suddenly entered the place. The Dragon Monarch wasn’t moving at all, but his pupils were expanding and contracting like a pair of balloons that were being inflated and released repeatedly.

His reaction caused Shen Xi to wrinkle her eyebrows and shake her head in disappointment, “Dragon Monarch, I have told you many times that you are the emperor of the Dragon Race, and the supreme ruler of the entire world. You are the one person who cannot lose yourself no matter the circumstances, place or time. You cannot forget that you are the ‘Dragon Monarch’.”

“...” The Dragon Monarch was still unmoving. He looked like someone had stolen his very soul. Shen Xi’s words might have pulled him back to earth a little, but his pupils were still overflowing with mania. No one would’ve believed that a pair of eyes like this would ever appear on the Dragon Monarch’s person. He took a shaky step forward and asked, “Who… who was it!? Whose child… is it!?”

His voice sounded like someone was rubbing two pieces of sandpaper together. Every word he uttered was followed by a deep crack beneath his feet.

“...” Shen Xi sighed quietly, but didn’t say anything. This was exactly why she hadn’t wanted Dragon Monarch to know about this… and thus far his reactions had been worse than what she had imagined.

I suppose I brought this upon myself… She shook her head in secret.

The Dragon Monarch felt like the very sky was crumbling inside his head, but he hadn’t lost the most basic level of his reason. Shen Xi was an incredibly apathetic person, and she had never been willing to be the first to initiate contact. Not even he had ever had stayed long in the Forbidden Land of the Samsara. In fact, for the past few years stretching all the way back a couple hundred millennia, there was only one other person who had ever entered the Forbidden Land of Samsara besides him.

It was Yun Che!

“Yun… Che… Yun Che!?”

When the name finally jumped out of his mouth in a roar, his pupils froze for a second before widening to their largest. “Im… impossible… impossible… absolutely impossible… no… it’s him… it has to be him… no, no… it can’t… no…”

Yun Che was the only male besides himself who had ever visited the Forbidden Land of Samsara. In fact, he had stayed here for an entire year, which meant that he was the only person who could possibly be the child’s father… but how could he believe it!? How could he possibly accept this!?

Back then, he was surprised to hear that Shen Xi had decided to offer Yun Che shelter, but he had accepted the fact and moved on just as quickly. After all, Yun Che was an extraordinary person, and the Dragon God aura on his body was unusual to say the least. It wasn’t unthinkable that Shen Xi was willing to extend him a helping hand.

But he could never... never imagine that… She was Shen Xi. She was the one and only goddess in the world, the Dragon God Race’s eternal benefactor, the supreme being that not even god emperors dared dream to meet, and the woman that even he, the Dragon Monarch didn’t deserve to touch.

But Yun Che… was just a slightly special junior among juniors… it wasn’t possible… it just wasn’t possible!!

“She is my child and Yun Che’s.” Shen Xi turned away so that she wouldn’t need to see his embarrassing appearance. Then, she continued directly, “She came to Yun Che and I thirty months ago, but I wasn’t able to leave or give birth to her because I was bound to this place by fate. In seven years, my shackles will fall away, and I will be able to leave this place and give birth to her.”

Buzz...

Dragon Monarch’s entire body trembled… Shen Xi herself had admitted the truth.

His gaze faltered completely as countless blood vessels burst across his eyes. His normally ancient and dignified face became as distorted as a wraith’s in an instant, “Im… impossible… it can’t be true… how can this be… how can this possibly be…”

“Shen Xi… You are Shen Xi… How could Yun Che possibly… how could he possibly!?”

“Dragon Monarch!” Shen Xi finally wrinkled her eyebrows again, “You’ve forgotten yourself.”

In the past, Shen Xi’s quiet scolding would immediately inspire a semblance of self-control in him, but this time the Dragon Monarch only grew more and more deranged, “It’s fake… it’s all fake, how can you and Yun Che possibly…”

“Long Bai!” Shen Xi’s disappointment was growing greater and greater. The fact that she had addressed him by his name—an extremely rare occurrence—was proof of her disappointment, “Is this how the Dragon Monarch appears? Is this where you’ve arrived after three hundred thousand years of cultivation?”

“Listen to me carefully,” Shen Xi’s voice was still gentle, but it was also colored with deep indifference, “I am Shen Xi. I am the one who will decide what I wish to do, where I want to go, who I will give my body to, and whose child I will give birth to! It has nothing to do with anyone else, and it definitely has nothing to do with you!”

The Dragon Monarch froze after hearing this.

“A hundred millennia ago, two hundred millennia ago, three hundred millennia ago… Since the first year you’d felt something that will never come true, I’d already told you to sever your delusion for me for eternity! In my eyes, you are just another junior I must watch over just like any other child of the Dragon God… I know that you weren’t willing to severe that delusion of yours, and it is the main reason why I hadn’t been willing to tell you the truth, but I would never imagine that you would lose yourself this much!”

“Remember this, you are the emperor of the Dragon God’s children, and you are the supreme ruler of Primal Chaos! You simply don’t have the right to lose yourself this much!” Shen Xi paused for a moment before sighing, “I suppose this isn’t a bad outcome either. With this revelation, you’ll be able to sever your delusion completely, seek out your true Dragon Queen and continue the Dragon God’s bloodline.”

“No… no, no…” But Shen Xi’s words didn’t clear the Dragon Monarch’s head. On the contrary, the blood vessels in his eyes wer growing by the second, and his aura was growing more and more chaotic, “Delusion, you say… I lost my delusion a long time ago… it is because I don’t deserve you… I still don’t deserve you even after I’ve become the Dragon Monarch… just the fact that I was able to stay near to you and listen to your voice is a gift from the heavens to me alone…”

Shen Xi, “...”

“I’d never hoped… I’d never even dared to hope to touch a corner of your clothes… it is because I don’t deserve to… and the same goes for everyone else in the world as well!” The Dragon Monarch’s voice devolved from trembling to completely hoarse, “But Yun Che… how… how… how… no… it’s all fake… it’s all fake!!”

No one could’ve imagined that the Dragon Monarch would lose himself to such a state.

What he said was the truth. He had never dared to have any delusions regarding Shen Xi. Even after he had become the Dragon Monarch, Shen Xi was still someone he could only look up to in his dreams. He had known Shen Xi for three hundred millennia, and he had been the Dragon Monarch for over two hundred. That was also how long their titles, “Dragon Monarch” and “Dragon Queen” had existed… but he had never touched her hair or her a corner of her clothes even once throughout this time.

It was because he was infinitely satisfied with just being the only person in the world who could enter the Forbidden Land of Samsara and speak with her.

He had never dreamed of winning Shen Xi’s heart… and he was aware that Shen Xi would never fall in love with him, much less anyone else.

But why...

Why had she… with a man she barely knew, a youngster who wasn’t even one ten thousandth of his age… a person who couldn’t compare to him in terms of cultivation, background, status, or reputation at all...

She even had a child with him...

Shen Xi turned her back towards the Dragon Monarch and said indifferently, “I told you before that I am the one who will decide what I wish to do. It has nothing to do with you. What happened between Yun Che and I is a product of my own choice, and just like how my decision has nothing to do with you, he doesn’t have the right to change my mind either. This is all out of my own free will.”

“No… How can it possibly be unrelated…” The Dragon Monarch stumbled and actually came close to collapsing to his knees, “You are… the Dragon Queen… You are my Dragon Queen! The entire Western Divine Region, the entire world knows that you are my Dragon Queen!!”

Shen Xi closed her eyes slightly. The fact that the Dragon Monarch would say this proved that he had completely lost his mind. She shook her head and replied softly and disappointedly, “Have you forgotten how the title ‘Dragon Queen’ came to be? The reason I didn’t reject your suggestion back then was because I wanted to be free of all worldly matters. More importantly, the title is completely meaningless to me… You should know this better than anyone. Why must you lie to yourself and others?”

That being said, if she had known that someone like Yun Che would come to exist in this world, she might have made a different choice.

The Dragon Monarch did know better than anyone how the title “Dragon Queen” had come to be. He was only more aware that the title—literally the greatest title any woman could ever hope to have in this world—was completely meaningless to Shen Xi. The only reason she hadn’t rejected it was because it would prevent everyone from disturbing her life in the Forbidden Land of Samsara.

However, meaningless to Shen Xi it might be, it was something that meant so much to the Dragon Monarch that he had done his utmost to spread the news across the entire Western Divine Region, and then to the entire God Realm. He had wanted the entire world to know that Shen Xi was his Dragon Queen… Even though he knew that it was an impossible dream. He might not have held any delusions towards Shen Xi from the beginning, but he had hungrily lapped up this tiny favor, this tiny permission Shen Xi had given him and weaved himself a petty, lowly dream.

But even that dream was about to end.

It had been three hundred millennia since the day Shen Xi had rescued him from the brink of death… He wasn’t even sure who to blame for this three hundred millennia long obsession that simply refused to die; himself, the heavens, or...

Yun Che.

“I don’t wish to talk about this any longer.” Shen Xi closed her eyes and spoke quietly, “You will not head to the Eastern Divine Region or come here for the next period of time to come. Meditation is the thing you need the most right now, and this may just be the opportunity you need.”

“If I was able to know that someone like Yun Che would come to exist in the world, I wouldn’t have agreed to accept the title “Dragon Queen”. In the future I’ll be leaving Dragon God Realm, and I’m aware that it may damage your reputation when the time arrives. I promise to repay the Dragon God Race several times over to make up for it.”

She had never been one to owe others anything.

The Dragon Monarch’s pupils were still shrunken, and his lips were still shaking uncontrollably. Shen Xi’s back was clearly one of abject disappointment… a disappointment that was reserved for a junior and a junior only. No words had been able to escape his lips since.

Even if Yun Che didn’t exist, he wouldn’t have won even a loving glance from Shen Xi until the day he died. He knew that.

But the only reason he had never had any delusions was because he was certain that no one in the world was deserving of her.

Jealousy-induced hatred was a snake that could devour the most resilient reason, willpower, pride, or even goodwill.

It was because it was the scariest devil in the entire world, especially this one… since it was born out of three hundred millennia of obsession.

The Dragon Monarch finally started walking, but he didn’t take off into the sky. The earth trembled beneath his feet with every step he took… It was without a doubt the heaviest series of footsteps the Dragon Monarch had ever taken in his life.

The Dragon Monarch was the supreme ruler of Primal Chaos, so his willpower and mental strength were without a doubt the strongest in the entire world. But right now, a devil was struggling, rampaging, roaring, and howling inside his heart and soul, all the while devouring every last bit of willpower he had…

In the end, even his eyes were reflecting a pair of devils… until his reason was completely gone.

Suddenly, he turned around and let out a twisted, despairing roar throughout the Forbidden Land of Samsara…. And a wave of profound light surged towards Shen Xi’s stomach like a howling dragon that came from a shattered abyss.