Part I — The Cry of Heaven
Before his cry was heard, the sky had already begun to mourn.
Thunder rolled across the horizon, not in peals but in words too old for mortal tongues. Every strike of lightning tore the sky like script rewritten — Heaven's order fraying.
Over Chentang Pass, the sea heaved like a living beast. Clouds — heavy and bruised — rolled down from the mountains, smothering the sun in their wake. Even the waves seemed to tremble, whispering to the shore in tongues that no mortal wind could form.
Inside the Li family manor, a woman lay on her side beneath silken sheets, her face pale as moonlight. For three years and six months, Madam Yin had carried her unborn child — a burden whispered about by monks, feared by gods, and pitied by mortals.
No midwife dared stay in her house; no prayer soothed her pain. Even Li Jing, commander of Chentang Pass, who had faced armies and demons alike, feared what might emerge from that womb of unending light.
That night, the heavens themselves came to watch.
Lightning struck the ridge behind the manor, splitting an ancient pine. The midwives screamed. The incense shriveled in its dish. A pulse of golden light began to bleed from Madam Yin's body — faint at first, then blinding, like dawn forced into a single breath.
And then, it happened.
The thunder roared like an opening gate, and from the radiance rolled out a sphere of pure fire, humming with divine rhythm. Curtains burned to ash; shadows fled to the corners.
"Is it… a demon?" gasped one midwife, shielding her face.
But General Li Jing did not tremble. He stepped forward, blade drawn, the tip reflecting the stormlight as though it had awaited this moment for eons.
"If Heaven sends me a demon," he said, voice steady, "then I shall face it as a man."
The sphere cracked.
Light poured forth like molten gold — and from within, a small figure emerged.
A child.
He was small, perfect, impossibly still. Light clung to him like a second skin, and the air bowed in quiet reverence.
He opened his eyes, and the lamps went out.
He floated an inch above the ground, his eyes glimmering like twin suns. Around his shoulders coiled a faint red cord, alive and pulsing like a serpent of light. When he smiled, the storm outside shuddered — as if Heaven itself had heard a sound it could not bear.
From somewhere beyond the clouds, a whisper rolled down with the rain:
"Nezha."
The name lingered — soft, thunderous, eternal.
And thus, the storm child was born.
Madam Yin reached for him, whispering through tears:
"Born strange, but born mine."
Outside, the storm bent its knee.