Chapter 63 · The Absence of God
There was nothing—
only darkness.
YiChen drifted in it for what might have been a heartbeat,
or a century.
Floating.
Sinking.
Weightless.
His body held no strength.
His mind, no thought.
He was tired.
So deeply, utterly tired.
Perhaps… staying like this wouldn’t be so bad.
?
The Liminal Space
Gradually, the dark began to thin.
Warmth gathered—
a soft, golden radiance blooming through the void,
like starlight suspended in a quiet sea.
No pain.
No pressure.
Only a gentle current, cradling what remained of his weary soul.
Then—
A warm, damp touch pressed against his left palm.
Shixi was there.
The silver-furred fox spirit—small, luminous—was carefully licking along his split meridian,
each pass of his tongue brushing the shattered threads of Spirit Energy.
Where he touched, the broken lines shimmered,
as though porcelain cracks were being filled with molten moonlight.
“God… how did you end up hurt this badly?”
Shixi lifted his head.
His starlit eyes glimmered with fear—real, unmasked.
“Your divine meridian is torn wide open…”
YiChen raised a hand and stroked the soft fur between his ears.
“Don’t call me that,” he murmured.
“Say my name.”
Shixi blinked.
Once.
Twice.
Slowly.
“…YiChen?”
His nine tails flicked in agitation—puffed with worry.
“But the divinity is there,” he insisted softly.
“I can see the star-points… here.”
He nudged YiChen’s Shanzhong point with his nose.
“These prayers… they’re like knives. Too sharp.”
“Can you remove them?”
At once, Shixi’s ears drooped.
“They’re offerings,” he whispered.
“To a god. I can’t touch them…”
He buried his head against YiChen’s neck—
small, warm, trembling.
“But I can mend your divine meridian.”
A warm current seeped into YiChen wherever Shixi touched him—
slow, steady, impossibly gentle.
He watched the golden pathways inside his body begin to shift:
fractured lines rejoining,
like constellations welded back together by unseen hands.
The cracks brightened—
then faded,
leaving behind a clean, radiant mainline.
“…Sorry,” Shixi whispered.
“I had to borrow some of your god-light to do it.
I… I won’t be able to give you Starhalt for a while…”
YiChen exhaled—
half a sigh, half a laugh.
“The three golden sparks you gave me last time?”
“This is far more than enough.”
At that, Shixi shoved his head under YiChen’s chin in flustered panic—
all nine tails puffing out like a startled dandelion.
“You’re hurting so much… and you’re still trying to comfort me…”
His voice shook where it pressed against YiChen’s collarbone.
“Meeting you…
was the greatest blessing of my life.”
?
Reality · Morning
Sunlight filtered through the seams of the tent,
drawing a thin golden line across the mat.
YiChen’s eyes opened.
The pink, rabbit-eared Light beast perked up instantly—
ears twitching, nose brushing gently against his cheek.
Outside, footsteps approached—quiet, hesitant.
A blanket had slipped from his shoulders.
A clean cotton shirt had been laid over him.
No trace of blood remained.
The air held a faint scent of soapberry and morning grass.
YiChen reached inward, testing his Spirit Flow.
A warm, steady current pulsed through his repaired meridians—
smooth and clear, like spring water gliding over stone.
Then—
The pressure returned.
That faint tightness at the center of his chest:
new strands of faith
already weaving into him like silk threads soaked in longing.
YiChen pressed a finger lightly against his Shanzhong point.
But this time—
He didn’t resist.
His eyes were calm.
And at the corner of his lips—
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a small, knowing smile.
?
The Awakening
The tent flap flew open.
“CAPTAIN—!”
Ryan’s voice cracked as the washbasin slipped from his hands.
“You’re finally—!”
Golden light spilled across YiChen’s face.
And in his gaze—
entire galaxies shifted.
Stars turned quietly behind his pupils,
burning slow
and eternal.
—————
Outskirts of Aurora City · Grand Plaza of the Church of Radiant Grace
Day 16 — 11:00 A.M.
A gray-white sky sagged low over the city—
the half-lidded gaze of an absent god,
turning sunlight cold and metallic.
The plaza was already overflowing.
Crowds surged in from slums, border towns, refugee belts—
a human tide packing every step, every gutter, every strip of stone.
Church attendants wove through with ladles and baskets,
distributing broth and coarse bread.
“Saintess—please, my daughter’s fever—”
“My leg—she cured it, I swear—look!”
“The veil moved! I saw it move!”
The sixtieth bell tolled.
A silver-white veil descended like liquid light.
Cecilia stepped onto the platform.
Her pale-gold hair spilled down like ripened wheat,
catching the wind in an almost celestial ripple.
Her face was too perfect—
beauty carved for worship,
made human only by the faint, trembling quiver of her lips.
Her vestments—white and gold—billowed in measured grace,
each step unfolding like a lotus blooming in slow motion.
She lifted her gaze—gemstone blue—
Silence.
Twenty thousand people fell to their knees,
their foreheads pressed to the freezing stone.
“May light descend,”
her voice rang—cool, crystalline, like melting snow.
“May suffering be purified.”
The holy sigil in her hands flared—
a tri-star halo blooming with immaculate white fire.
People wept.
Some convulsed, foam gathering at their mouths—
yet still crawled toward the stage,
desperate for even the brush of her robe.
?
Perimeter · Inside a Black Sedan
Mayor Carter’s knuckles tapped his knee—
slow, dull, rhythmic.
A clock with seconds running out.
His reflection in the window showed hollowed eyes,
a jaw locked in iron.
“Attendance just cleared twenty thousand,”
Leo rasped—voice sandpapered from sleepless nights.
“Episode Five of Footsteps of the God is still in post…
But YiChen needs at least ten more days before—”
“Before he returns to City Hall,”
Carter finished.
A sweep of white divine light passed over the plaza
and rippled across the sedan’s windshield.
Carter’s pupils constricted.
Cecilia was smiling.
Barely—
but unmistakably.
A victor’s smile.
?
City Hall · Emergency Faith Crisis Meeting
The air conditioner buzzed overhead—
too weak to soothe,
too inconsistent to ignore.
Carter stood before the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Outside, an enormous new banner rippled—
Cecilia’s cloak rendered in luminous white-gold,
the blue jewel at her brow catching sunlight like a crown.
He didn’t turn.
“Where did she preach yesterday?”
Leo flipped through his binder.
“West Orphanage Plaza. Seven thousand in person,
ten thousand livestream.
The children lifted the ‘blessing crystals’ she gifted them.”
The Agriculture Minister paled.
“Those crystals were rerouted from the Moonshadow Wheat vaults.
They’re calling it ‘grain sanctified by holy light.’”
Carter finally turned.
His eyes were steel.
“And did we approve that?”
Silence.
Heavy.
Guilty.
?
Deputy Commissioner James cleared his throat.
“Her Faith Influence Index now covers thirty-two percent of city blocks
and six public schools.
Behaviors are shifting—street preaching, dawn prayer circles,
children drawing her sigils on schoolyard pavement—”
Someone whispered:
“This isn’t support.
This is a takeover.”
—
Leo snapped his binder shut.
His voice was clinical—
but his hands trembled.
“Our documentary numbers are collapsing.
Episode Four dropped by half in two days.
Episode Five can’t be completed—
we have zero new footage of YiChen.”
His eyes lifted—hollow, red.
“We’re broadcasting the image of a missing god.”
“You can’t call him that,”
Deputy Mayor Elvin whispered.
“Of course I can’t,” Leo hissed—
voice cracking under strain.
“But it’s Day Sixteen.
And the city is waiting on a man
we cannot prove is alive.”
Carter moved back to his seat.
He stared at his notes as his fingers tapped the table—
tick, tick, tick—
like a match striking over and over, refusing to catch flame.
“He saved us,” Carter murmured.
“But faith cannot survive on past tense alone.”
The room held its breath.
“You tell me,” Carter said, eyes narrowing.
“Can the Saintess perform miracles in his place?”
Silence.
Longer than before.
Dangerous.
Then—
a young internal affairs assistant whispered:
“…Perhaps we could designate her as a temporary faith symbol?
Just for morale.
Just until…”
The room froze.
Absolute stillness—
the kind that tasted like treason.
Seconds crawled by.
Then Carter laughed—low, humorless.
“And who decides how long temporary lasts?”
“A month?”
“A year?”
“Or until this city forgets YiChen ever existed?”
Leo didn’t look up.
But his knuckles were white.
Carter rose.
“If he returns tomorrow—we hold.
If he returns in three days—we improvise.
If he returns in ten…”
A pause.
Cold.
Fatal.
“This city will belong to her.”
No one disagreed.
The meeting adjourned—
not with decisions,
but with surrender.
?
Outside the Walls
Under the bright mid-morning sun,
a sea of believers raised their hands toward Cecilia’s sigil,
their lips moving in fervent, trembling prayer.
And behind the heavy curtains of the City Hall office,
Carter sat alone, watching the radiant figure in the plaza.
But in his mind—
he saw another.
A dark-clad youth
walking wordlessly into disaster,
shattering it with his bare hands.
Where are you?
——————
Aurora City · Secretary-General’s Office, City Hall
The door clicked shut behind him.
Only then did Leo let go of the posture he’d worn like armor.
His back hit the wood.
His knees buckled.
He slid down until he sat on the cold marble floor, the Influence Spread Map: Saintess Sector Expansion crushed in his fist.
The paper was damp with sweat.
His knuckles were bone-white—
as if he were trying to grind the map into his own hands.
Sunlight filtered through the blinds in thin, slanted bars, catching on the grey at his temples.
He wasn’t even fifty.
But in that moment, his eyes were hollow—
the eyes of a man who had just watched the last piece of his faith slip out of reach.
He stayed there a long time.
Minutes.
Hours.
No one knocked.
At last, moving like a man wading through deep water,
Leo pushed himself upright and crossed the room.
He unlocked the small safe beneath his desk.
Inside were only two objects:
A black-and-white photograph.
And a brass insignia engraved with a name—
YiChen Caelestis.
The photograph showed YiChen from behind—
at the hydroelectric plant, moments after the Fiend had fallen.
Light cut through the dispersing Spirit Force, framing him in a halo of fractured radiance.
A god walking out of the wreckage of the world.
Leo set the photo upright on the desk—
carefully, precisely—
as though arranging an altar.
Only then did he speak.
“They’re saying you’re not coming back.”
“They’re saying you abandoned this city.”
“They’re saying I’m delusional…
for believing one man could hold us together.”
His voice was barely more than the hum of the air vent—
thin, frayed, a thread drifting in a beam of dust-thick sunlight.
“But you know something?”
His jaw tightened.
A tremor shivered through his fingertips.
“That day… at the power station…
when I saw you standing there…”
He inhaled—shallow, unsteady, as if the memory itself hurt.
“For the first time, I believed we might live through this.”
He lowered his head, pressing his forehead to the cool wood of the desk.
A sound escaped him—
small, hoarse, scraped raw at the edges.
Something that had no business coming from the city’s second-most powerful man.
“They’re forgetting your face.”
The light shifted.
Shadows crawled across the desk, creeping up the edges of the photograph—
slowly swallowing it whole.
Leo jerked upright.
His eyes were bloodshot.
His jaw locked in a line of steel.
Something fierce and molten broke through the cracks in his composure.
“What the hell am I supposed to do?”
“How do I keep telling them you’re coming back?”
“You’re not a god.
You’re human.”
His voice cracked—quiet, sharp.
“But if you fall…”
A breath.
A pause heavy as stone.
“…then we’re finished.
All of us.”
He seized the Influence Map—
and tore it clean in half.
The pieces drifted down like pale petals—
or like paper prayers unraveling under a sky too bright for mercy.
Leo bowed his head.
He brought his hands together, forehead pressed against the desk—
not as Secretary-General,
not as the strategist tasked with holding Aurora together,
but as a man—
grief-heavy, soul-tired,
clinging to the fading echo of a name.
“YiChen…”
His voice broke on the last word.
“Please…
come back soon.”
