Another Life

Chapter 1

70,000 years later Mo Yuan woke to the sound of thunder.

As he sat up slowly - all his movements were sluggish and strange - there was a gasp next to him. He opened his eyes.

Beside him was a girl with a delicately pretty face. But he had never seen her before.

"You're- you're alive!" She looked faintly terrified of him. In her hands she clutched a bound bamboo book and beside her was a lamp. It was simple in design, almost plain, but there was a power that came deep from within it. It too felt very familiar.

In the last thousand years of his sleep he had felt the speed of his soul reconnecting quicken ten no, almost hundred-fold. Was it because of this lamp?

The thunder sounded again, loud and ominous.

"Who are you and where am I?" He asked the girl.

She hurried to bow her head. "High God Mo Yuan, my name is Bai Feng Jiu. And this is the realm of Qing Qiu, my home."

Qing Qiu, the home of Seventeen. The beat of his heart quickened with the memory of her face. But if this was truly her home, where was she?

"What am I doing here and how long have I been asleep?"

"Exactly 70,000 years and oh," The girl put down the lamp and clutched her chest, seemingly overcome with emotion. "Oh there's no time to explain! Gu gu will tell you everything but you have to go to her. You have to save her!"

"Calm down," He told her. "Who is your gugu and why must I have her?"

"She is the ruler Qing Qiu, High Goddess Bai Qian! And she is at this moment fighting Qin Cang the Ghost King-"

She didn't even get to finish before he had stood up. The next moment he was stumbling out of the cave, staring up with dismay at the red colors spilling over the night sky. Another belt of thunder rumbled through the sky. Feng Jiu came running out behind him.

"Gugu went an hour ago. She told me I wasn't to tell anyone but I'm so scared for her. She told me I had to protect your body and that I couldn't leave you for a minute because you might be waking up soon. So I was praying that you would wake and you have. Please go, go quickly. I'm scared it might be too late-"

Again she didn't get to finish before he'd disappeared.

***

He got to the riverbank several steps before a host of Heavenly warriors appeared behind him. With them was a white-bearded old man - clearly some kind of earth demigod. Above them the sky was on fire.

The leader of the warriors, wearing white armor, started to see him.

"High God Mo Yuan! Is it really you?" He was holding his sword in front of him in a gesture of supplication. "Then that means that must really be Qing Cang, can he be escaping from the bell?"

"Mo Yuan, this old immortal thought he would never again see you-"

"No time for that," Mo Yuan said. "What is happening?"

"A few hours ago the river ran red and the sky rang with thunder. This old immortal barely had time to react before a female high immortal appeared. She disappeared inside the bell and since then I don't know-"

They were speaking to empty air. After a moment, the leader of the warriors discovered his sword also was missing.

***

The first time Mo Yuan saw Bai Qian again she was enveloped in fire. Her hair flew around her slender body and her delicate, heart-shaped face was filled with steely determination. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.