¶ The Crown Prince of Xionle
Amongst all the gods and Buddhas of Heaven there was one famous laughing stock of the three realms. Legends have it that 800 years ago there was an ancient kingdom in the Midlands called the Kingdom of Xionle. The kingdom of Shenla was vast in land and bountiful in reason. There were four treasures within the kingdom cloud like beauties, vibrant music and marvelous literature, golden gems, and they were an infamous crown prince.
What would be the best way to describe this conference? Well, he was a unique man. He was beloved by the king and queen, extremely dull. They would often say, My son will become a great ruler in future. His renown will echo throughout history.
¶ Defying Heaven to Save
However, the Crown Prince was not interested in imperial power or wealth in the common world in the least. What he was interested in, in his own words, was I will save the common people, When he was young, the Crown Prince focused only on his cultivation, and there were two little stories that were widespread of his path of cultivation. The first story happened when he was seventeen years old. That year, a grand Xian Yuan heavenly ceremonial procession took place in the kingdom of Xiang.
Although the custom of conducting these divine ceremonies has since fallen out of fashion for a few centuries, it is still possible to deduce what a grand occasion of jubilation it must have been from remnants of ancient books and oral tradition. The wondrous Shengyuan Festival upon the Great Marshall Avenue. Seas of people gathered on either side of the Grand Street. There were royals and nobles talking and laughing in merriment atop the high platforms.
The glorious royal warriors, donned in armour, opened the pods while the maidens danced elegantly, their fair hands scattering flowers. Who was to say whether the flowers or the maidens were the more beautiful? From within the golden carriage came melodious music that drifted in the air across the entire imperial city. And coming last of the procession was a grand stage pulled by sixteen white horses in golden bridles, and upon this towering grand stage was the god pleasing warrior.
On whom all focused their attention. At the heavenly ceremonial procession, the god pleasing warrior wore golden monks. On in glamorous attire, and with a sacred sword in hand, he played the role of a number one martial god of a thousand years, who subdued evil, the heavenly martial emperor Jun Wu. It was the greatest of honors to be chosen to play the God-pleasing warrior. Thus, the selection criteria were exceedingly. The one chosen this year was that crown prince.
Everyone from all over the kingdom believed that he would bring about the most thrilling performance of the god pleasing warrior. However, an accident happened that day. During the third tour of the procession, it passed by a city wall that was dozens of meters tall. At the time, the martial guard upon the grand stage was just about to slay the demon with a striker. It was the climax scene of the performance. Both sides of the street were at the height of excitement.
The top of the city wall was also swarming with people, fighting to watch the show, pushing and shoving each other. Right then a small child fell from the edge of the wall. The screams reached the heavens. Just when everyone thought that the small child would stay in the great marshall avenue with blood, the crown prince looked up, leapt into flight, and caught the boy.
The people only caught a glimpse of a white silhouette that flew like a soaring bird before the crown prince already landed with that small child in his arms. The golden mosque fell and revealed that young and handsome face behind the mosque. In the next second, cheers arrived. The people were thrilled and joyous, but the Gorcia of the Royal Cultivation Hall were troubled. They had never imagined such a huge problem would occur. This was ominous luck, the gravest of misfortunes.
The Gorosho were so distraught that they were losing their hair as fast as the rain fell. After much contemplation, they called over the Crumb. They very courteously requested him thus Your Highness, might you be willing to face the wall in reflection for a month? It doesn't really need to be a month, as long as the intention is good.
The Crown Prince smiled and replied as such, No. This was how he said it. Saving people is not anything bad. Why would the heavens convict me for something that I've done right? Uh, but what if the heavens did convict you? Then it is the heavens who are wrong. Why would I apologize to those who are wrong? To this the Gorcher could not argue. This crown prince was thus such a person.
He had never run into anything that he couldn't do, nor had he ever met anyone who didn't love him. He was the justice of the mortal realm. He was the center of the world. So even though the Gorcho were frustrated, What the hell do you know? It wasn't their place to say much. And they didn't dare say too much regardless. His Highness wouldn't listen either way.
¶ Battle on Yinion Bridge
The second story also happened in the year that the crown prince was seventeen. Legends have it that in the south of the Yellow River there was a bridge called Yinion. Upon this bridge there was a ghost that had been lingering for years. This ghost was exceedingly fearsome. It was donned in broken armor, the flames of karma burned beneath its feet, and its body was covered in blood and pierced by all manner of sharp wings. Every step it took, it would leave behind a footprint of blood and fire.
Every few years it would suddenly appear at night, and wander back and forth at the head of the bridge, blocking travellers to ask them three What is this place? Who am I? What is to be done? The ghost would then devour whoever answered incorrectly. However, no one knew what the correct answers were. As the years went by, this ghost devoured countless travelers.
During his errand wandering, the crown prince caught word of this, so he went and found Yinyan Bridge, guarding it night after night, until finally, one night he met the haunting city. When that ghost appeared, it was indeed as horrifying as the legend said. It asked the crown prince the first question, and the crown prince answered with a smile. This place is the human place. However, the ghost replied, This place is the abyss. An auspicious start. The first answer was already incorrect.
Well, all three answers are going to be wrong anyway, the Crown Prince thought. So why should I wait till you're done? And so he pulled out his weapon and lunged. This fight was complete chaos. The Crown Prince was skilled in martial arts, but that ghost was terrifying and dauntless. The one man and the one ghost fought so hard that the sun and the moon were toppling. In the end, the ghost was finally defeated.
After the ghost vanished, the crown prince planted a flowering tree at the head of the bridge. Just then a cultivator passed by, and happened to see him sprinkle a handful of dirt to send the ghost over. And thus the crown prince said the famous words Body in Abyss, heart in Paris. When the cultivator heard, he gave a light smile. He then transformed into a divine warrior donned in white armor, with auspicious clouds beneath his feet, and rode off in wind and holy light.
¶ A Darling's First Ascension
Only then did the crown prince realize that he had accidentally met the heavenly martial emperor, who had personally descended the mortal realm to defeat Eve. All the gods and celestial beings had already noticed this exceedingly outstanding, god pleasing warrior when he did that leap during the Shang Yuan Heavenly Presentation. So after this meeting at Yinyan Bridge, the deities asked the Emperor How does my lord find this Royal Highness? The Emperor answered This child's future is not.
That night a celestial phenomenon manifested in the skies above the palace, and storms raged. Amidst the flashes of lightning and roars of thunder, the crown prince ascended. Every time a mortal ascended, the heavenly realm would always shake. When this crown prince ascended, the entire heavenly realm shook with three times the normal tremor.
To achieve a fruitful cultivation truly was much too difficult. It required talent, training, and chance. It was often a long road of a hundred years in order for a god to be born. It wasn't that there weren't any fortunate souls who became deities at a young age. But there largely existed those who exhausted themselves for their entire lives and trained for a hundred years, and still there'd be no heavenly calamities to dawn upon them.
Even if they did come to face a heavenly calamity, they would die if they couldn't pass such a trial. Even if they didn't die, they'd be ruined. Their numbers were as numerous as the sands of the Ganges, but most were simply ignorant mortals who had spend their entire lives as nothing more than ordinary, never finding their own path.
was no doubt the darling of the heavens. Whatever he wanted, he got. Whatever he wanted to do, he succeeded. He wanted to ascend and become a god. So at the age of seventeen, he actually ascended and became a god. He had always followed the will of the And the king and queen loved their son and missed him dearly. So the king ordered for great temples and shrines to be built all across the land, and for the crown prince's statues to be erected and worshipped by all.
The more believers there were, the more temples there be, and thus the longer his life and the stronger his spiritual power. Thus, in a few short years, the Xiongir Palace of the Crown Prince became incomparably glorious, and for a time its prosperity and splendor reached the Until three years later, when Xianle fell into chaos.
¶ Disastrous Divine Intervention
The cause of this chaos was tyranny, and the rebels rose in revolt. However, while the flames of war were set ablaze all over the mortal world, the deities of the heavenly realm couldn't easily intervene. Unless it was ghosts, monsters, and demons encroaching on the border. Otherwise, whatever was, what? Imagine, conflicts were everywhere in the mortal realm, and everyone believed that they had a resource.
So if anyone were to stick a foot in, today you would back your former kingdom. Tomorrow another would avenge its descendants. Thus, wouldn't there be gods who would want to fight each other all the time, and fall into a life of disgrace? A situation like this for the crown prince meant that he must keep his distance, but he didn't care at all. He said to the heavenly emperor, I will save the common people.
The heavenly emperor was in possession of a thousand years of divine power, but even he didn't dare hang those words of his life. When he heard this, it was easy to imagine how he felt, yet he could not do anything about the crossing. So he said You can't save everyone. I can, the crown prince declared. Thus he descended to the mortal realm without looking back.
Naturally, the people of Shanla rejoiced. However, ever since ancient times, there had been one truth that the people had always spoken of in the human world. When gods descended to the mortal realm without permission, there was never a good outfit. Thus, not only were the flames of war not extinguished, they blazed even wilder. It wasn't that the crown prince didn't work hard, but it would have been better had he not tried at all.
The harder he worked, the more of a mess the war became. The people of Shenle were devastatingly battered and crippled. The number of wounded and casualties were severe, and in the end a plague swept throughout the entire Imperial City. The rebel army broke through to the palace, and so ended the war. If it was said that Xinhua was originally hanging by a thread, then the Crown Prince came and cut that thread directly.
After the kingdom had fallen, the people finally came to realize one thing. The crown prince that they had worshipped as a god was never as perfect or as strong as they had imagined. More harshly, wasn't he just some useless trash who couldn't do anything right? Without anywhere to vent the anguish and pain of losing homes and families, the battered people furiously poured into the palaces of the crown prince, and toppled his divine statues, and burned down the divine temples.
Eight thousand temples burned for seven days and seven nights, and burned until there was nothing left. From that moment on, the martial god who guarded peace and safety vanished, and a god of misfortune who brought disasters was
¶ From Divinity to Despair
When the people call you a god, then you are a god. If they call you crap, then you are crap. You are whatever they say you are. It has always been that. The crown prince could not accept this reality, no matter what, and what he couldn't accept even more was the punishment he was sentenced. Banishment. His spiritual powers were sealed, and his person knocked back down to the mortal realm.
He grew up endlessly coddled and pampered. He had never tasted the suffering of the human world before, and yet this punishment threw him from the clouds down into the mud. And in this mud, for the first time He understood the taste of hunger, poverty, and fullness. This was also the first time that he did things that he never thought he would do willingly stealing, robbing, loudly cursing, and giving up on himself.
He'd lost all dignity, there was no self esteem left, and he was as unkempt as one could be. Even his most loyal servant could not accept this change in him, and chose to leave. Body in a bus. Heart in paradise. This phrase was engraved on the stone monuments and plaques everywhere in Shian. If it wasn't for that war that burned most of the kingdom to the ground, if the crown prince were to see the remnants of those words, he would probably be the first to rush up to destroy what remained.
The person who had said those words had personally proven that when the body was in the abyss, the heart could not be in paradise. He had ascended to the heavens quickly, but he fell from grace, even fallen. That awe inspiring glance upon the great Marshall Avenue, having met evil at Yinyon Bridge, it was as if it was only yesterday.
¶ The Two Farces of Ascension
However, after the heavenly realm whispered for a while, what was past was Until after many years, one day, a huge rumble thundered from the sky. This Royal Highness had ascended for the second time. Throughout history, heavenly officials who were banished either never regained themselves or fell into the ghost realm. There had never been many who were able to turn a new leaf after having been banished.
The second ascension was fully grand and spectacular. What was even more spectacular was that after he ascended, he charged all the way into the heavenly realm and rampaged in full fury. Thus he had only been ascended for the spans of one incense time before he was knocked back down again. One incense time, This could be considered the swiftest and the shortest ascension in history. If the first ascension could be considered a beautiful tale, then the second ascension was a farce.
Having been banished twice, the heavenly realm looked upon this crown prince with full contempt. And in this contempt there was also caution. After all, he was already threatening and on edge after the first banishment. Now that he was banished twice, wasn't he going to go berserk and avenge himself against the wall? Yet who knew after getting banished this time he didn't go berserk, and was even adjusting to the banished life on the side.
There were no issues at all. The only problem was maybe he was taking things a little too seriously. Sometimes he'd bask at the end of the street, expertly playing an instrument and singing any songs, and even shattering boulders on his chest was not beyond him. While there had long been word that this Royal Highness could sing and dance and was a master of many talents, unbelievably all of his talents were being witnessed in such a fashion, truly making one feel completely.
Sometimes he would diligently and humbly collect junk. All the deities were shocked to the core. Unthinkable that things would reach this point. The point where now, if any one was to say, The son you gave birth to is the crown prince of Shenle, it would be a curse more malicious than may you die without son. He was once the noble and gracious Crown Prince, a heavenly official who made part of the divine realm.
But to have screwed up to this point, there really was no one else, and so this was the story of a man who was known as the laughing stock of the three realms. After laughing, those who are more sentimental might also sigh. That darling of the heavens, who once stood at such a height, had truly and thoroughly disappeared. Divine statues collapsed, native kingdom destroyed, not a single believer remained. Gradually he was forgotten by the world, and thus no one knew where he drifted afterwards.
¶ The Shocking Third Ascension
Another many years passed. Suddenly one day, there was another huge rumble in the sky. The heaven fell and the earth cracked, the ground trembled, and the mountains shook. The lanterns of everlasting light shuddered, the firelights danced in fury, and all the heavenly officials jolted awake inside their own golden palaces, every one of them running out to ask you something.
Which new dignitary ascended such a grandiose entrance? Yet who knew they had only exclaimed in wonder the first second, when in the next second all the gods and Buddhas of heaven were thunder. Weren't you done? That infamous weirdo, the laughing stock of the three realms, the legendary Royal Highness, the crown prince. He fucking ascended again.