'It retreated. So as I progress, the fog will keep retreating until every part of the palace is revealed. That's okay-ish.'
Although Xu Kai sounded lukewarm, he anticipated what was behind both doors.
"Face Your Past! What a name?" He opened the door and saw a familiar chamber. Reacting to his instinct, he shut the door.
That chamber was the one that took him to face the Skylark. He died 99 times in that chamber but kept reviving until he transformed from fearful to fearless.
Yet he still had a lingering fear for the chamber.
The name etched atop the second door, which was five meters away from the first, was Home of Primordial Ones!
This time around, Xu Kai felt apprehensive about what was behind the door. He retrieved his hand and stretched it out again. After repeating this for an unknown amount of time, he decided to take a peek.
The moment he touched the door, his vision blurred. 'Not again!'
****
Looking around, all he saw were tall bamboo trees rustling as the cold wind blew eastward. A large moon hung above the clouds, but there was no star in the sky.
'The air is moist, and, wait, there's a sea ahead!' After a short while, Xu Kai ran and came out of the forest.
The moment he emerged, his gaze fixed on the back of a woman. The wind carrying the waves blew her skirt and made her jet black hair flutter like a billowing wave of black ink.
Her clothing, nicely wrapped around her body, brought out a certain soothing charm that enveloped Xu Kai.
There was something about the woman that tugged at his heartstrings.
He touched his face, and as he expected, tears were streaming down his cheeks.
"W… What's going on?"
Right as he said those words, memories he thought had faded flooded his mind. He could remember seeing monstrous, hideous creatures billowing with ghastly flames, causing havoc.
An image of a man, whom his consciousness identified as his father, yelling at a woman to take the kid away reverberated in his ears.
"Little Kai." Hearing that beautiful voice broke his immersion in his past memories. He lifted his head and saw that the woman had turned toward him.
She wore the most gentle and loving smile he had ever seen.
"M… Mother?"
Xu Kai didn't even know when or why that word left his lips. He was still confused. For a long time, his memories of the past, especially of the demon attack, became foggy, but seeing this woman began to clear them up.
"Kai!" The woman's hands covered her mouth as she gazed at the fourteen-year-old boy with wide eyes.
Those red eyes. They were the same as his father's.
"M… Mother, is that really you?" Before Xu Kai could ask more, Xu Lingyue appeared and embraced him. Though he had grown, she knew he was her son.
His appearance here confirmed it.
Uncontrollably, tears ran down Xu Kai's cheeks. He held the woman tight. "Why do you live here and where's father?"
Xu Lingyue shuddered the second those words left Xu Kai's mouth.
"He, he…"
****
Some time later, Xu Kai sat close to a cliff beside his mother, looking at the vast sea, his eyes red and puffy.
Xu Lingyue stroked Xu Kai's hair while looking at him worriedly. After hearing about his father's death and knowing lots about him, Xu Kai remained silent for a considerable period.
"But the lineage families could have stopped this!"
"The demons came because of me; you can't blame the lineage families for not being able to protect us," Xu Lingyue said.
Xu Kai snapped his head toward her, extremely shocked.
Xu Lingyue smiled bitterly. "Little Kai, I wasn't always a commoner, nor was I always the housewife you grew up seeing me as. I came from a faraway place and from a very prestigious faction," she said.
"T… How did you come to be here? And even married to a sleeper?" From the little he heard, Xu Kai knew his father was merely a commoner without a talent. He was the island's best blacksmith, according to his mother.
"Your father is a decent man. How dare you speak about him in such a tone?!" Xu Lingyue pinched Xu Kai's cheek.
"Mother, I'm not a baby anymore."
"You'll always be my baby," she retorted and chuckled as Xu Kai's nose wrinkled.
After derailing for a short while, Xu Kai dragged her back to the topic. Glancing at her inquisitive son, she sighed softly.
"I am the last and was supposed to be the last Primordial One. I was pleased to think you never had to become what I was. My faction's devotion to the Primordials and their power turned us into enemies of both our kind and the demons we faced. Those whom we believed to be our allies undermined the faction, as they no longer desired Primordial dominance. We humans are a very greedy race. The demons used their betrayal to overpower us, and only I, the Primordial One, survived. However, I sustained severe injuries and lost my cultivation while roaming the seas."
Xu Lingyue blinks slowly. "I remember how it took me twenty years before I saw your father. He was the one who brought me to this island."
'Twenty years! Is the mainland that far?' Xu Kai's brows knit together.
"I can sense a beast soul within you; you must have bonded with the Soul Palace," Xu Lingyue said, smiling.
"Maybe. Eh, Mother, what do you mean by you were supposed to be the last Primordial One and these Primordial Ones, how many were there before you were left?"
"Little Xu, there have only been ten Primordial Ones since the fall of the Primordial Guardians and all of us died before a hundred years. This is the reason I was pleased about losing my powers so that you don't inherit anything from me."
She clasped his cheeks. "Moreover, Primordial Ones must undergo a simulated death ritual before resurrecting with the Soul Palace, making you unfit to be in our group. You did not experience a fake death."
'Primordial Ones should have ended with my death.' She said it inwardly.
Xu Kai scratched the back of his head. He wasn't sure his mother would take the news of him dying at seventeen and regressing to the past lightly.