Tushita

Twilight was like blood, and drifting clouds scattered across the sky. Huang Tian's spirit sank into an ethereal void, oblivious to the world around him. Suddenly, a gust of wind swept down from high above, catching the wide sleeves of his robe and tossing his dark hair into a wild frenzy, like a thrashing dragon. At the base of the wall, a purple flower trembled in the wind. In an instant, a translucent petal broke free from the stem. The moment that petal began its descent, he seemed to sense something. His eyes snapped open, his gaze blazing like fire—as if a blood-red sun had burst into brilliance within his eyes! Whoosh! Whoosh! He pushed out gently with his left palm. A surge of true qi billowed forth, rolling from shoulder to elbow, elbow to wrist, and wrist to palm. With the strike completed, he halted his body and stood in place, lost in thought for several moments. Then he thrust out another palm strike. Each strike grew swifter than the last, an aerial blur of overlapping palm shadows. His figure shifted with them. At times, he was like an ancient pine with roots coiled deep in the earth, anchored firmly to the ground; at times, he was like willow catkins drifting upon the breeze; at other times, he was like a roc spreading its wings and soaring straight up to the clouds. Every step, every twist of his torso, every thrust of his palm resonated with manifold transformations. Tap! He came to an abrupt halt, freezing on the spot. At that precise moment, a vision surfaced within his mind: Purple qi surged vast as mountains and seas, and amid that rolling sea of purple clouds, an imposing, ethereal sky gradually revealed itself. Within that sky stood countless palaces and celestial terraces. And at the very center of all those palaces, an ancient, boundless hall emerged with crystalline clarity. Its octagonal eaves resonated with the eight trigrams of heaven and earth, while glazed tiles reflected the starlight of the heavens. Above the main gates of the hall hung a plaque neither of gold nor jade. Three grand characters, imbued with the true script of the Great Dao, shone with radiant splendor: Tushita Palace! The palace gates hung half-open, half-shut, offering a hazy glimpse within. A colossal octagonal cauldron stood majestically inside, its body neither of metal nor stone, inscribed with ancient seal script. The primordial forms of heaven, earth, mountains, marshes, wind, thunder, water, and fire evolved ceaselessly across its surface. Inside the cauldron raged a blazing fire that could melt all creation! "Myriad phenomena as firewood, spirit as fire!" Enlightenment struck Huang Tian like a divine gift. He raised a palm once more. This strike seemed slow but was remarkably swift. Seemingly unremarkable, it actually encompassed a full twelve hundred variations! Among them: Stars ignited and faded along mysterious trajectories—the three hundred and sixty strikes of the heavenly circuit. Flowers blossomed and withered through the cycles of spring and autumn—the two hundred and forty variations of flourishing and decay, life and death. Drifting clouds curled and unrolled as wind and thunder clashed—the three hundred shifts of stirring wind and rolling thunder. Mountains fractured and craggy terrain snaked outward—the two hundred forms of churning earth veins. The final hundred variations converged completely into a single spark in the palm of his hand. That spark trembled faintly, as if it might be snuffed out at any moment. Yet when he pushed the strike fully outward, the spark was like fire meeting oil. It flared up with an explosive roar and burst into the sky, scorching the heavens overhead into a sea of blazing crimson that nearly rivaled the blood-red twilight sun! Slowly withdrawing his palm, his eyes shone bright and a faint smile touched his lips. "This palm smelts myriad phenomena. Let it be called Tushita Heaven!" Tushita's cauldron fire refines the great chiliocosm! "After the Five Elements Cloud Dragon Sanshou, I have finally derived another stance. "No, to be precise, this Tushita Heaven stance is actually an evolution built upon the Fire element of the Five Elements Cloud Dragon Sanshou." His current plan was to use the Five Elements Cloud Dragon Sanshou as a framework, deriving an individual technique for each separate element before merging them all once more, hoping to forge a supreme divine ability fit for immortals and gods! Now, the Fire element had been derived. "The might of this Tushita Heaven is not inferior to the combined strike of the five true qi cloud dragons from before, yet it consumes far less energy. I can just about treat it as a regular technique in my repertoire. "In other words, I now have the strength to confront a Grandmaster head-on, rather than merely maneuvering around them as I did before!" With his strength having taken another stride forward, Huang Tian felt elated. At the same time, he harbored even greater anticipation for the martial arts preserved within the Book Pavilions of the Commandery Yamen and the Black Armor Army. Several days slipped past in the blink of an eye. One evening, as Huang Tian stepped out from the Commandery Yamen's Book Pavilion and prepared to head home, a middle-aged man in brocade robes standing outside the gates stepped forward and bowed politely. "Would your honor be Battalion Commander Huang Tian?" "And you are?" Huang Tian paused. "This lowly one is a servant of the Xiao family from the provincial capital." The brocade-clad servant smiled warmly, withdrawing a gold-leaf invitation from his sleeve. "Tomorrow during the snake hour, my family's Third Miss will be hosting a garden gathering at Yueyun Garden in Zhenhua Ward. We sincerely invite Battalion Commander Huang to spare the time to attend." "The Xiao family of the provincial capital?" Affixing the words "provincial capital" before a family name meant they were undoubtedly a prominent clan renowned throughout Qin Province. With only a moment's thought, Huang Tian realized where this Third Miss Xiao came from. Her father was a second-rank Grandmaster, a famed Divine General of the Black Armor Army in Qin Province! Still, what did that have to do with him? "My apologies, but I have pressing business to attend to these days. I cannot go." With that, Huang Tian turned to leave. The brocade-clad servant's eyes went wide as saucers. "Battalion Commander Huang, my master is the Third Miss of the Xiao family! The Xiao family of Qin Province!" Huang Tian glanced at him in mild surprise. "I know. And so?" Just because the Third Miss of the Xiao family invited him, did he have to go? He already felt he lacked sufficient time to study martial arts; where would he find the inclination to attend banquets? It was not just the Xiao family. Many prominent clans in the commandery city had invited him to various gatherings, and he had turned them all down without exception. The brocade-clad servant was stunned. Since entering the service of the Xiao family, he had never seen anyone show so little regard for them. Others flattered and curried favor even with a mere servant of the Xiao family like himself, let alone Third Miss Xiao. Who did not treat Third Miss Xiao like a goddess to be placed on a pedestal? If one caught Third Miss Xiao's eye and became the son-in-law of a second-rank Grandmaster, that person would instantly rise to the very pinnacle among the tens of millions of people in Qin Province! Such a man could summon wind and rain at will, enjoying boundless wealth and glory, with everyone groveling before him! Yet this Battalion Commander Huang did not care in the slightest. *He is still too young...* The brocade-clad servant sighed inwardly with pity, but he ultimately decided to give Huang Tian another chance. Patiently, he said, "Our Third Miss is deeply beloved by the master—hey! Hey! Don't walk away!" Huang Tian had already strode off briskly. The brocade-clad servant instinctively tried to give chase, but with only a few paces, Huang Tian vanished at the end of the street, completely beyond his reach. Standing frozen for a long while, the brocade-clad servant looked down at the gold-leaf invitation in his hand, nursing a headache. "Ah, forget it. It's not that I failed to deliver the invitation; he simply refused to take it. Third Miss can't blame me for that..." Shaking his head helplessly, he turned back toward Yueyun Garden in Zhenhua Ward. Inside the garden, two gorgeous young women sat beneath a gazebo, enjoying the blossoms while sipping tea. One was Third Miss Xiao herself, Xiao Qing. The other was her close friend Zhou Miaosu, niece of Zhou Tu—a Divine Constable of the provincial Six Doors and a second-rank Grandmaster. "When that Huang Tian arrives tomorrow, I'll take a good look at what he looks like and what sort of character he possesses—" The corners of Xiao Qing's mouth curled upward slightly as she giggled. "If he doesn't suit my tastes, I'll return to the provincial capital after seeing him just once. Kunyun really is a backwater; it isn't lively at all. Staying here is so terribly dull." She took hold of Zhou Miaosu's fair wrist. "Miaosu, why hasn't your family pressured you into an arranged marriage? I envy you so much..." Knowing full well how averse she was to matchmakers forcing a match, Zhou Miaosu smiled faintly and was about to offer a few comforting words when the brocade-clad servant approached with a mournful expression. Seeing his downcast look, Xiao Qing raised a slender brow. "I sent you to deliver an invitation to that man. Why do you look like this now?" The brocade-clad servant replied with utter trepidation: "Battalion Commander Huang... Battalion Commander Huang said he has pressing business to attend to and has no time to attend—" "What? He refused?!" A shrill cry rang out across Yueyun Garden.