"Yuan'er."
Jiaying rose from her seat, her eyes softening as Fang Yuan descended the stairs.
Fang Yuan met her gaze, a faint smile touching his lips.
"Let's eat, Mother."
Jiaying's expression eased into a gentle smile, and she returned to her place at the table.
Step by step, Fang Yuan approached — each movement steady and deliberate. When he reached the dining table, he pulled out his chair.
For a brief instant, his fingers trembled as he seated himself beside Jiaying, though his composure remained unbroken.
Jiaying studied him — and her body faltered.
Her eyes widened slightly, surprise and warmth flickering in them. "Yuan'er, I can't even sense your cultivation... You've reached Rank One Peak Stage."
Fang Yuan gave a calm nod. "Aren't you curious how?"
Jiaying's smile deepened, though her gaze drifted to her bowl. "Why should I ask?
If Heaven grants you fortune, that chance is yours alone.
A mother wouldn't pry into her son's fortune."
For a heartbeat, silence settled.
The faint click of chopsticks broke it — a crisp sound as Fang Yuan lifted his meal.
His tone was light, detached. "The food's gone cold, Mother."
He set the bowl down, eyes calm but distant. "You should take care of your health."
Then, his voice turned sharp — an edge of command. "Maids!"
Three servants rushed into the hall, heads bowed.
"Reheat all the dishes," Fang Yuan said, his tone cutting through the still air like a blade. "Serve them again."
The maids nodded and quietly started clearing the dishes. Jiaying didn't say a word, only gave Fang Yuan a gentle, loving look.
Fang Yuan met her gaze directly.
"Tell me, Mother," he said evenly. "What's bothering you?"
Jiaying hesitated for a moment, then began to speak.
She told him about Fang Zheng — how Shen Cui had seduced him, how Fang Zheng now holed himself up in the tavern.
Then she mentioned the clan academy. Surprisingly, they'd expelled Fang Yuan after he'd stopped showing up for over a month.
She hadn't informed the academy that Fang Yuan had chosen to drop out. She'd believed he would come out when the time was right — that he had his reasons.
But after nearly two months of silence, the clan had given up waiting.
Fang Yuan listened quietly, his expression unreadable. When she finished, he nodded once.
"Don't worry about Fang Zheng," he said calmly. "I'll talk to him."
A few moments later, the maids returned with the reheated dishes, steam rising between them.
They began eating again.
Jiaying couldn't stop smiling — seeing her son finally out of his room, stronger than before, filled her with relief and pride.
She wanted to tell everyone in the clan, to share how much he'd grown. But when Fang Yuan told her to keep it quiet, she simply nodded and kept the joy to herself.
Fang Yuan ate slowly, quietly.
When the meal ended, he set his chopsticks down and closed his eyes for a moment. A quiet sigh passed through him — brief, almost hidden.
Then he opened his eyes again, calm and collected. He looked at Jiaying and gave her a small, easy smile — one that seemed natural, though it didn't quite reach his eyes.
...
After lunch, Fang Yuan stepped out of his house — the first time in two months.
The afternoon sun was sharp, glaring, almost hostile. Its brightness stung his eyes, forcing him to squint.
He lifted his gaze toward the sky, the golden light washing over his face. For a fleeting moment, a single tear slid down from his left eye.
"I'm being influenced," he murmured under his breath.
He closed his eyes, his expression tightening.
With a slow shake of his head, he forced the softness away.
When he opened his eyes again, all warmth had vanished — his gaze was calm, cold, and clear as glass.
Heaven's Will.
The words echoed in his mind, heavy and sharp.
An otherworldly demon isn't allowed peace, he thought, his eyes fixed on the blazing sky.
Is that why my first life was filled with hardship?
Why others like me — those born outside your design — were crushed, their paths twisted into misery, even when their fate should have led them to greatness?
He exhaled slowly, his face expressionless.
Just because you despise us, you turn our lives into suffering.
And now, without the Spring Autumn Cicada, you see me as one of them again — an intruder living a life that was never meant to exist.
A faint, humorless smile crossed his lips.
"But this time," he whispered, voice low and steady, "you'll regret it."
What if it were Heaven's Will?
It isn't some omnipotent god.
It's merely a force that hides behind its own rules — shaping life and death with whispers, pretending to be great while the world bleeds for it.
It can influence everyone: twist hearts, steer destinies, crush empires.
Yet it cannot touch a single soul directly.
It cannot hold the knife.
It cannot feel the sting of blood on its hands.
That is its weakness — its truth.
It is only a remnant will, a fragment of thought clinging to a world that no longer needs it.
A hollow force that survives by making others do its dirty work, by watching the world tear itself apart in its name.
And when it meets one who refuses to kneel — one it cannot bend, cannot rewrite — it calls them otherworldly demon.
It is afraid. Afraid of the inevitability it cannot control. Afraid of the chaos it cannot contain.
After the destruction of Fate Gu, Fang Yuan had seen it once — the so-called Heaven's Will — standing above, untouchable, confident.
But he also saw that it was just the blade, not the hand.
It had always waited for others to wield it.
Fang Yuan once stepped forward to hold it. But instead of pointing the blade at its enemies, he turned it upon its allies.
The first one fell with a scream, the blade cleanly severing tendon and sinew, the smell of iron filling the air.
It recoiled — invisible, yet present — tasting the panic in every nerve.
But Fang Yuan did not hesitate.
He let the blood run hot in his hands, the bodies of those who obeyed its law piling at his feet.
He tore their flesh. He cracked their bones.
He spilled their organs like open books.
Even then, it couldn't intervene. It couldn't stop him.
It was nothing.
Nothing, but a knife — and Fang Yuan wielded it.
And when the last body fell, when the grotto heaven was soaked in crimson, when the scent of mortality hung heavy in the air… Fang Yuan understood.
Heaven's Will, for all its influence, all its control and all its whispered threats — they were meaningless.
Because influence means nothing without the power to wield it.