12th January, 10 o'clock in the morning.

Shanghai mornings were usually crisp and gray in winter, sunlight breaking only in fractured beams through the smog. Today was no exception, except for what greeted Wang Xiao as he stepped into his gated villa.

He stopped dead in his tracks.

"…The hell?"

Beside him, Wang Jiarong froze too, clutching her light-beige colored scarf tighter. Her voice was small. "…Is this really our house?"

The driveway looked like some billionaire's private auction lot. A white Pagani shinning like polished ivory, next to it an emerald green Lamborghini that looked like it had been dipped in liquid green jade. A blood-red Ferrari, two McLarens, even a Koenigsegg casually nosed against the hedge. Seven, maybe eight hypercars in total, parked without a shred of care.

Wang Xiao's Porsche, the one his mother gifted him, now looked like a hatchback parked at the wrong party.

He snorted, rubbing his forehead. "Well. Either we walked into the wrong house, or someone mistook my place for a car museum."

Wang Jiarong shot him a side-glance, fair cheeks slightly red. "Let's just go inside…" she mumbled, clutching her bag, trailing after him with the shy, obedient air of a little wife.

The foyer was warm, smelling faintly of citrus and heated marble.

The house was quiet.

Too quiet... Then, footsteps.

Mary appeared, balancing a tray of chilled drinks in one hand and towels folded over the other. She was barefoot, her silk black dress looking eeirly tempting as usual, hair tied loosely with strands falling against her cheek. She froze at the sight of them, blinking once before bowing low.

"Master, welcome back."

Her voice was smooth, careful.

Wang Xiao plucked a glass from her tray, downed half of it in one gulp. "Where's everyone? And the circus outside, what's with the cars?"

Mary's lashes fluttered. For a second, silence stretched. "…They're in the pool. The cars are…" she trailed off, as if even saying it aloud would get her in trouble.

Wang Xiao rolled his eyes, waving her away. "Forget it. Go."

She slipped past, hips swaying unconsciously, heading toward the backyard.

From where he stood, Wang Xiao could already hear the splashing.

Splash!

Splash!

Female voices rose, laughter carrying over water.

His brows tightened, somewhere between amusement and irritation. "So… everyone in the house decided to bathe early? In the pool?"

He strode toward the glass doors, only to find them locked from the inside.

"Seriously?" He laughed under his breath, rubbing his temple. "They blocked me out? As if there's a woman in this world I can't see through with a glance?"

From the corner of his eye, Wang Jiarong set down the gift boxes she had carried all morning, lips pressed tight. Then, without a word, she darted upstairs, her steps light, almost eager.

A minute later, from his room, he caught sight of her silhouette from the balcony above.

She was already unbuttoning her blouse, tossing it aside carelessly as if the shy "little wife" act downstairs had been a lie.

She wanted to join them.

Wang Xiao stood at the window of his room, upstairs, one hand braced against the frame. His room had the perfect angle, lean forward just a little, and he could see straight down into the backyard pool.

Of course, anyone looking up would spot him too, but that hardly mattered.

Let them.

From below came the sound of splashing water, muffled laughter, women's voices carried faint through the glass. Everyone was gone, lost in their morning indulgence.

He exhaled slowly, gaze drifting. What now?

By all logic, he should be preparing for the fight. Stockpiling energy, sharpening intent, wrapping himself in the calm before the storm. But last night's conversation with Xue Hanqin kept echoing in his skull, pulling him away from his usual instinct to crush first and question later.

Slash!

The space tore open with a sharp hiss.

A blade materialized in his hand, its edge so dark it seemed to eat the morning light. He swung it lazily, and whatever it touched, air, space, the thin membrane of reality itself, split clean apart, threads of blackness rippling before knitting back together.

He stared at it, tilting his head like it was some strange toy. "Che. Pretty sure this thing could even cut me."

It wasn't steel. It wasn't metal. It was condensed dark energy itself, primordial and refined. The same ever-expanding force that served as dough for creation, everything, every atom, every soul was shaped from this base matter.

And yet, this was different.

Sharper, and hungrier.

His daughter Yanyan could wield dark energy too, weaving it into storms and chains, but none of hers had ever threatened to slice his soul.

This thing? One misstep, and it would.

He frowned at the blade, the tendrils along its edge shifting like smoke licking a wound.

"What a weird little thing…"

This was no ordinary weapon.

This was the Enforcer's sword.

Could it be pushed further? Refined until it could kill not just bodies, but the core of existence itself? Was that the secret behind the Executioners, that they didn't just use dark energy, they sharpened it, forged it into the one shape that even a Supreme had to fear?

Or was it simply that Yanyan hadn't yet learned how to hone her own darkness to this edge?

The thought stayed, bitter. He rolled the hilt in his palm, "Should I really let her keep playing with this power?" Wang Xiao muttered, twirling the blade in his grip. "If she sharpens it enough to cut me… tch. That wouldn't end well."

"Then how about putting a collar on me instead?"

The voice came from nowhere, sultry, playful, dripping with sarcasm.

A ripple of shadow tore open beside his ear. A slim face poked through, framed by midnight hair, crimson eyes glinting like bloodied glass.

Yanyan.

Wang Xiao didn't flinch. He turned his head, nodding faintly. "…That's a good idea."

Her gaze, however, wasn't on him. It was on the sword. She leaned further out of the portal, chin propped on her hand, staring like a cat eyeing prey.

But her expression twisted with confusion.

"That blade…" she whispered, "…it never awakens for me. Not properly. Just turns into some rusted scrap. Same for Aunt Aurora. Even Yuriko... None of us can pull its fangs out... How did you even do it?"

Wang Xiao's eyes narrowed. The truth was, he didn't know.

In anyone else's hands, the blade was nothing but rust. But in his, it revived, its power roaring back to life.

He remembered. When he returned to the place where Yang Yuhuan had been trapped in absorbing the flames, the Enforcer was gone, but traces of his aura around her. He had been guarding her.

And when Wang Xiao tried using her soul as the key, pressing it against the blade, nothing.

Dead steel.

So it wasn't just about strength. The sword wasn't some beast you tamed with force.

"Is it connected to that damned well?" he murmured, half to himself.

Memory pulled him back like a hook. The Graveyard of Gods.

The ordinary looking broken fountain...

That cursed water...

He hadn't even stepped, it had dragged him down. Drowning, choking, eyes torn from his skull.

Yin Yue had tried to hold death back for him, stalling, straining, until her power shattered. In the end, he still died there. The most helpless moment of his existence.

Even now, he lifted a hand unconsciously, touching his face. His sockets ached. The eyes he wore were nothing but placeholders, illusions he crafted so others wouldn't flinch. He could see, yes, but only because his power bent reality for him. The truth was uglier: those eyes were gone forever.

And that place? He had tried to return. Again and again. Each attempt to step into the portal to the Graveyard of Gods spat him somewhere else, like the place had vanished, or perhaps refused to let him back in.

He exhaled slowly, grip tightening on the hilt.