Outside Of Time

Chapter 1831: I Am Zi QingEditor: Atlas Studios

The thousand-year reign of the Purple Green Kingdom shattered like glass under the siege of countless races.

I watched with my own eyes as my father was torn apart by enemies, my wife’s skull pierced by a magical artifact, and my young son grow cold as he curled up in the shadows.

I couldn’t save them...

I didn’t have the power to save them...

The moment this war began, the myriad races cast curses upon me, sealing my cultivation and reducing me to a mere mortal.

In my grief and rage, my younger brother charged toward the pursuing enemies, detonating the last remnants of the Purple Green Kingdom’s fortune.

And he poured that fortune into me.

As I drowned in that surge of fortune, I saw countless pairs of eyes—

The gazes of my dead kin, my subjects, all watching me from beyond the river of time.

I will have my vengeance!

...

The thousand-year-old Purple Green Kingdom shattered more easily than a glass cup.

The once-majestic purple auspicious aura had long been torn apart by the foul winds of the myriad races’ spells, leaving no trace behind.

Inside and outside the imperial city, the grand jade pillars that once symbolized eternity were now nothing more than a graveyard of colossal wreckage, trembling under the deafening clashes of battle and the sickening cracks of breaking bones.

I stood upon the shattered steps of the imperial dais, my feet sinking into the sticky mud of blood. The pungent metallic scent of iron seemed to congeal in every breath I took.

My father—that towering figure who had once seemed as unshakable as the heavens—was seized before my very eyes by a shadow that tore through space.

I didn’t even hear his final cry. I only saw his dragon robes, embroidered with purple and gold, the symbol of supreme authority, along with his mighty body, ripped apart in an instant by an invisible, monstrous force!

A rain of blood and bone shards, sharp as shattered jade, poured from the sky, scalding my face.

The drops of my father’s blood fell into my eyes, staining my vision crimson.

The Purple Green Sky collapsed completely in that crimson downpour.

And I... was powerless.

My cultivation, my divine abilities, even the strength of my flesh—all had been cursed by the combined might of the myriad races the moment the war began. My power was sealed, my strength gone.

I was reduced to a mortal.

And in that moment, I realized I was not as unbreakable as the legends claimed.

My fragility was no less than anyone else’s.

”Your Highness! This way!” The hoarse shouts of my remaining guards pierced through the suffocating roar of battle.

As if pulled by invisible strings, I numbly followed their retreat.

Just as we passed through the crumbling palace gates, a blinding flash of light caught the corner of my eye.

Hall

There—a sea of flames!

My heart trembled as I stumbled forward. Through the thick smoke and fire, I saw her—my wife.

She leaned against a charred pillar, a bloodstained silver hairpin embedded deep in her temple. Her delicate hands, which had once adorned my hair with flowers, now hung limp at her sides.

Her eyes were open, staring blankly at the smoke-choked sky, as if still holding onto some unfulfilled longing.

My outstretched hand froze midair, my fingertips icy. Something in my chest shattered with a soundless scream.

The ancient lotus mark on my palm, symbolizing the imperial power of the Purple Green bloodline, suddenly burned like a branding iron, searing my soul.

”Father...” A voice as faint as a kitten’s whimper, trembling on the edge of death, came from beneath a collapsed beam.

Under the heavy wreckage, a small figure curled up—my seven-year-old son.

His tiny body was already cold. Only the rough wooden sword I had carved for him, still clutched tightly in his small hand, retained a faint trace of warmth.

I cradled him in my arms, but even that meager warmth quickly faded, leaving only stiff coldness behind.

The wooden sword slipped from his lifeless fingers and clattered onto the stone tiles. That soft tap, mingling with the roars of the enemy cultivators, pierced my eardrums and my heart.

My father, my wife, my son, my kingdom—all turned to ice.

”Go! Your Highness!” The last of my armored guards formed a broken dam with their bodies, desperately holding back the terrifying tide of enemies surging from all directions. Their twisted faces were etched with despair and resolve.

Like a puppet with its strings cut, I was swept up by an unyielding force and hurled through the crumbling palace gates, fleeing into the unknown darkness.

Behind me lay my ruined world.

The gates groaned under their own weight before collapsing with a thunderous crash.

A razor-sharp, annihilating divine sense locked onto my back like a clinging parasite, its deathly chill threatening to freeze my marrow.

”Crown Prince Purple Green1, you’re not so high and mighty now, are you?”

The voice dripped with the cruel amusement of a cat toying with its prey, slithering into my ears.

Just as that destructive power was about to strike, a familiar yet resolute figure—a meteor diving into flames—charged against the fleeing crowd and threw himself between me and that terrifying divine sense!

My younger brother!

The one our father had never favored, the silent and withdrawn sibling who had always lived in my shadow, the one I had rarely interacted with!

Clutching the imperial jade seal, his tattered robes whipped violently in the storm of spiritual pressure, his hair disheveled by the gale.

He turned his head and looked at me one last time.

His eyes burned with the madness of a man with nothing left to lose!

In the next instant, his gaunt body swelled like an overinflated bladder. Blinding purple light erupted violently from the jade seal and every pore of his being!

That radiance was so pure, so tragic—as if he had compressed and ignited the last remnants of the Purple Green Kingdom’s fortune, along with his own life and soul!

BOOM!

An indescribable explosion shook the world.

For a moment, heaven and earth seemed to go deaf.

The force of that detonation, infused with the kingdom’s destiny, surged into me like an invisible hammer, shattering the meticulously crafted curses the myriad races had branded upon me.

It shattered the seals they had placed on my cultivation.

The long-lost power, the slumbering strength, burst forth like frozen earth giving way to spring, reviving this withered husk of a body.

Yet, amid that eruption of power, a churning crimson mist filled my mind. Within it, countless pairs of eyes suddenly appeared—

My father, my brother, my wife, my son... and countless familiar faces, the soldiers and subjects who had shed their last drop of blood for the Purple Green Kingdom...

Their gazes, filled with farewell, seemed to peer at me from beyond the river of time, from a shore I could never reach.

As I looked back at them, a viscous tear of blood spilled from the corner of my eye, breaking free from my cheek and falling silently into the endless void.

It fell toward the ruins of my homeland, now consumed by blood and fire, falling into the abyss of eternal silence.

Behind me lay the ruins of my past, the wreckage of time.

Ahead stretched only an empty road of darkness, waiting to be stained anew with blood.

I will have my vengeance!

It has been mentioned before but Zi Qing is Purple Green.