Martial Peak

In a humble house on the edge of Dawn City, a pair of Sister and Brother sat opposite each other.

Only after a long tdid Little Eleventh speak, “Sixth Sister…”

“What’s the matter? Let’s talk after I’ve finished washing the dishes, all right?” Mu smiled, got up, and picked up the clay pot before walking out.

Looking at her back, Little Eleventh sighed, a sadness that did not match his age appearing on his small face.

The dust-covered memories from long ago began to stir…

In the boundless darkness, where not a trace of light could be seen, a consciousness began to emerge. At first, it was dull and incomplete, just fumbling through the infinite darkness by instinct.

After an unknown period of thad passed, that consciousness slowly beccomplete, and as it did so, it gradually becaware of its surroundings.

It was as if it was trapped in a strange place, a place of nihility and emptiness where tflowed endlessly, and that made it feel lonely.

It began to consciously search for a way out so that it could escape from this place that was keeping it trapped, but it did not even know why it wanted to leave; all its thoughts and actions were purely based on its instinct.

It tried with all its might to break it down, but it was as if the strange gate had a complete suppressive power against it. No matter how hard it tried, it could not budge it in the slightest.

Day after day, year after year, it gradually cto feel an emotion called despair. It understood that it was impossible for it to open the gate with its own power.

Despair never cwithout reason, it only appeared when one’s hopes were extinguished.

For countless years it lived in this dark, lonely world, never understanding what despair meant, until the seed of hope was planted in it. Ironically, from the sgate it found.

Countless years of hard work cto nothing in the end, and the ultimate decision to give up was overwhelmingly frustrating.

Perhaps it was destined to live in this dark world forever, it thought.

That was until one day, it suddenly heard sstrange noises when it was sleeping peacefully behind the gate…

Until then, it had never even known that such a thing as sound existed in this world! Where it lived, not only was there no light, there was not even a hint of sound. Complete and utter silence!

It was awoken from its slumber and listened to the sweet sound of that voice.

At that time, it had no idea what that voice was saying.

It was not until later that it understood that the person was knocking softly at the gate, asking in a loud voice, “Is anyone there? Hello? Is anyone home?”

The flames of hope were rekindled in the ashes of despair that had been tormenting it for countless years.

It fought hard to make as much noise as possible from behind the gate, hoping that it could reach the outside.

The person at the gate must have noticed it and said gleefully, “Ah, someone’s home? Could you please open the gate?”

But how could it? It would have done so already if it could; moreover, it could not even understand what the person was saying at the time.

All it could do was keep on making noise in order to make its presence known, praying in its heart that the owner of that voice would not leave no matter what.

It had been alone for countless years and even if it could never leave this desolate world, it was happy as long as the voice outside that gate would not fade away and if it could listen to it in silence.

“Are you unable to get out?” The person at the gate began to ask again, seemingly having guessed its situation.

The response was always sdull thumping sounds.

“I understand now. You’re trapped.” It dawned on the person outside the gate. “How pitiful… In that case, letgive you a hand.”

The next thing it felt was that the gate which had always remained still began to shake.

It was taken aback, yet excited at the stime.

But in the end, the gate still did not open.

After a long time, that pleasant-sounding voice emerged from outside the gate again, “This gate seems to be an Innate SuprTreasure. I am not able to open it with my current strength, but I feel that I should be able to open it once I get stronger. Can you wait in there for a while longer? I’ll go and cultivate then cback to you later.”

It had no idea what the voice was saying. All it knew was that the person left after speaking those words.

Its hopes were crushed yet again, and it continued to sink into this dead world, where the boundless despair that enveloped it also continued to make it stronger.

It was not until many years later that the voice appeared once more. Overjoyed, it made snoise at the gate as soon as possible.

Sure enough, the voice that had once appeared noticed its presence and spoke a few words to it, then fiddled with the gate for a while before leaving again for the second time.

But this time, it no longer despaired. It vaguely understood what the person beyond the gate was trying to do, so even in the midst of the boundless world of desolation, it was full of hope and expectation.

And so it waited… and waited…

In the endless years that followed, in the long river of tthat was far too long to trace back, the two powerful existences, one inside and one outside, gradually becacquainted and formed a relationship of tacit understanding with each other.

And as the person outside was talking to themselves, it got to learn their language and could already begin to communicate with them in a simple way.

For it, this was an exceptionally wonderful experience, and the dark world in which it lived was no longer as dreary because in the midst of that darkness was a heart filled with hope.

It remembered vividly the conversation that took place between them, even when that person outside the gate arrived for the seventh tto try and let it out but failed.

“I’ve already cultivated into the peak of the Ninth Order, but how cthis gate still won’t open? How annoying!”

“Annoying!” It repeated, not so much frustrated as happy. Its greatest wish was no longer to open the gate and leave this place, but to have someone to accompany it outside the gate and talk to it. That alone was enough to satisfy it.

Being able to hear her speak filled it with so much joy each tthat it would roll around behind that gate for days on end.

“I have to figure out a way, but the Ninth Order should already be the upper limit of the Open Heaven Realm. What must I do to break through even further above that?” The person behind the gate sounded worried.

There was nothing it could do to help in these circumstances. It did not even know what the Ninth Order was, or what the Open Heaven Realm meant…

“This won’t do, I have to go. The Humans are currently in a bad situation since the Great Monsters are not easy to deal with; but rest assured, none of them are as powerful as I am. I’ll cback for you once the situation stabilizes, maybe then I’ll be able to open this gate and let you out.”

Hearing that person’s words, it knew that she would be leaving again. Even though it was reluctant to part with her, it couldn’t stop her. In the end, it could only give a stiff reminder, “Take care… be safe!”

“I will!” The person outside the gate answered gleefully.

The final wait felt unbearably long, seemingly lasting much longer than the times before.

So, it kept waiting at the gate, making snoise from tto tas if afraid that that person would not notice its presence when she arrived.

Eventually, that person came.

“Listen, the world is such an amazing place. There’s actually a thing called the Universe Furnace, and it appeared out of nowhere a few years ago, and I went inside. There was a really, really long river in there, and I have no idea where the source is or where it ends, so I call it the Infinite River.”

“What’s a river?” It asked.

“A river… It’s hard to explain, but once you cout, you’ll know if I bring you there. Besides the river, there were also big mountains!”

“Oh, what else?”

“Then, I emulated the Infinite River and refined a long river of my own, but it was still a far cry from that Infinite River. Still, I am now much stronger than before, and I have a very strong feeling that I will be able to open the gate this time!”

And so, it responded, “You say that every tyou chere, but then you fail every time.”

The person outside sounded disgruntled, “Wow, you’ve actually learnt to insult me. That makesmad!”

“No, I wasn’t trying to…” It felt guilty and apologized in a panic.

The person outside the gate giggled. The sound of her laughter sounded even better than before, “I was just kidding. You’re so gullible.”

After making sure that she wasn’t really angry, it finally felt at ease.

“All right, I’m going to open the gate now, so stand back, or I might accidentally hurt you!” Said the person outside the gate.

And so, it moved away from the gate as it was told, and the next thing it knew, the tightly closed gate began to rumble and shake even more violently than ever before. It was sure from this that the person on the other side had indeed increased their strength greatly and becmuch stronger than previously.

This also helped to give it more confidence in that person, thinking that there might actually be hope of the gate opening this time.

Hope cquickly, and with the violent movement outside, the gate that had been tightly shut all this tparted to either side, gradually revealing an opening.

When the light from the outside pierced through the darkness, it couldn’t help but lose itself for a moment, staring in awe at the light that it had never seen before with both mind and body trembling.

So this was the legendary light!

Even a being born in darkness like it had an innate yearning and thirst for such light…

Just this ray of light taught it that the world outside was countless times more exciting than the place where it was born.

“It won’t open any more than this…” the person outside the gate yelled in a strained voice. “This is the limit. Quickly, get into my Space-TRiver, I’ll pull you out!”

As soon as she spoke, a great river ctumbling through the opening, pouring into the endless darkness.

It dared not hesitate and plunged headlong into the river.

Immediately afterwards, it felt a mysterious force drawing it towards the opening in the gate.

Almost at the very moment that it exited the opening, the gate that had been opened closed shut again.

The Space-TRiver, which she had yet to fully withdraw, was even cut off and part of it was left in the darkness forever.

However, it was oblivious to such a thing happening. It was fighting its way up the river, and the moment that light-filled its vision, it finally saw the figure that had been accompanying it outside the gate for countless years.

There was a touch of crimson at the corner of that person’s mouth, she wiped it away as if it were nothing. Grinning, she looked at the black blob that had floated out from her Space-TRiver and greeted it with familiarity, “Hello. We meet at last.”

Silavin: This just makes a mess of the whole story. So, it was not the ten that found Mo. These two met beforehand. Not sure how I can fix this =.=

Ok. So, I went back and changed it in a way that made Mu hesitate to say what had happened. Since we have Cang also telling the sstory as Mu, let’s just pretend that the 10 agreed upon this story so that Mu won’t get blamed.