I Really Am A Villain

The enormous altar towered into the sky, surrounded by flickering lights of many colors. On top of it, countless streams of power flowed together like a river surging through the void. The focal point of this torrent was not far away, four crystals glowing with divine radiance.

These four crystals represented the power of the Four Symbols. Azure for the Azure Dragon, white for the White Tiger, crimson for the Vermilion Bird, and blue for the Black Tortoise. Their combined power converged into a single humanoid figure that was resisting the raging current erupting from the altar.

When the Iron Gate saw that the figure was formed from the energy of the Four Symbols Flame Crystals, it cried out in shock, “The Four Symbols Fire Progenitor!”

Only then did everyone turn their eyes toward that figure. The grand vision left behind by the Four Symbols Fire Progenitor had already astounded them, and now they were seeing the man himself, or rather, the image of what he once was.

He looked to be around thirty years old, dressed in a cyan robe embroidered with the images of the four mythical beasts. He exuded the air of an immortal, majestic, transcendent, his very presence capable of overturning heaven and earth. His bearing was upright, his expression filled with the calm of one who had seen ages rise and fall. Yet his eyes burned with ferocity, like those of a wild beast barely restrained. It was easy to imagine how madly powerful he must have been in life.

His nose was high and sharp, his long hair half red and half black. He stood there with flames swirling all around him, yet every spark of fire seemed to bow before him in reverence.

“Incredible,” Xu Zimo said with genuine admiration. “As one born of the Fire God Race, he actually separated himself from the flame. He has transcended the limits of his race.”

Members of the Fire God Race could not live without flame. Their entire existence depended on it. Just look at the Inferno Crucible Heaven, the environment they needed was always scorching hot. But the Four Symbols Fire Progenitor was different. He had divided his essence from the fire itself. He could still command all flames, but his being was no longer bound by them. He was both part of the Fire God Race and something far beyond it.

“If that’s the case,” Xu Zimo thought aloud, “then the inherent flaws of the Fire God Race wouldn’t affect him anymore.”

Long ago, the Water God Gongtu had tried to correct those same flaws through sheer force, ultimately creating the Myriad Streams. But now Xu Zimo was seeing a second path, escaping the flaw by transcending it altogether. The two methods were fundamentally different. Gongtu’s approach was a permanent solution for the entire race, while the Fire Progenitor’s was personal, a path only he could walk. Still, to reach such a state, “peerless through the ages” was no exaggeration.

“He looks right, but the aura’s not the same,” the Iron Gate sighed. “That’s only a likeness.”

The Four Symbols Flame Crystals had belonged to the Fire Progenitor himself. When threatened, they could manifest his image to fight back. But no matter how perfectly the form was replicated, they could never reproduce the true essence of his presence, that kind of overwhelming aura could only belong to the man himself.

Some were tyrannical beyond compare; others were ethereal and untouchable. True power had its own signature.

The four pillars of light connecting heaven and earth joined together, struggling against the force of the altar. But on closer inspection, it was clear the altar’s purpose wasn’t to destroy the crystals, it was to restrain them, to keep them occupied, to trap them in a stalemate.

Beside the crystals, something black was slowly siphoning away their power. It looked like a dark, pulsing tube, none of them recognized it. Because the altar demanded their attention, the crystals couldn’t spare any energy to resist this thing, and so it continued to feed. For now, it was slow, but eventually, as the crystals weakened, they would no longer be able to hold the balance. When that happened, they would shatter.

“Damn it, good thing we got here in time,” the Iron Gate snarled. “Otherwise they’d have succeeded already.”

“Didn’t you just try to run away?” Xu Zimo asked with a faint smirk.

“That was a strategic withdrawal, all right?” the Iron Gate protested. “I was going to find reinforcements. No point dying for nothing!”

“Do you know what that thing is?” Xu Zimo asked.

The Iron Gate shook its head. “No idea. I don’t even know when it appeared here.”

Xu Zimo stepped closer to the altar, studying it carefully. It was massive, radiating an ancient, formidable energy. The surface was cracked and pitted from the passage of time, but in the lower right corner he could still make out two faint characters, ‘Refine Heaven.’

He murmured the words aloud.

The others didn’t recognize the name, but the Iron Gate suddenly froze, its tone trembling. “Refine Heaven… Fire Progenitor? Impossible… that’s impossible!”

It stumbled back several steps, muttering incoherently. “The Heaven-Refining Fire Progenitor is dead. He’s been dead for ages! Why would he need the Four Symbols Flame Crystals?”

“No… not the Fire Progenitor himself,” it said suddenly. “It’s the Heaven-Refining Cauldron. That explains everything. No wonder it slipped past me without detection.”

“What are you talking about?” Xiao Anshan asked, frowning.

“That altar’s true name is the Heaven-Refining Cauldron,” the Iron Gate explained. “It belonged to one of the oldest Fire Progenitors in history, known as the Heaven-Refining Fire Progenitor. His existence predates even the Four Symbols Fire Progenitor. We’re talking about the Primordial Era, an ancient, ancient being.”

The Iron Gate sighed, recalling the fragments of history it knew. “But he was slain long ago. Since then, the Heaven-Refining Cauldron vanished. Now it seems someone has obtained it and is using it to steal the Four Symbols Flame Crystals. The Cauldron was said to be able to refine anything, nothing could withstand it. It must have refined part of this world itself, which is why I couldn’t sense it.”

“If he was that powerful, how did he die?” Xiao Anshan asked.

“I only know what the Four Symbols Fire Progenitor once mentioned,” the Iron Gate replied. “In the Primordial Era, there was a great war. The Heaven-Refining Fire Progenitor chose the wrong side, and he was torn apart by his enemies, dying a terrible death.”

“You mean… the Demon Descent Era?” Xiao Anshan’s expression hardened.

As the future Fire Ancestor of the Chaos Fire God Realm, he knew some of the old histories. Most said the Primordial Era was followed by the Ancient Era, but the truth known only to the great beings was that what came after the Primordial Age was the Demon Descent Era.

The demons had ended the Primordial Age. The Heaven-Refining Fire Progenitor must have sided with the old world, and when the demons triumphed, he perished with it.

But the Demon Descent Era didn’t last long. After the Infernal Lord’s third attempt to wage war on Heaven ended in failure, the Nine Heavens rose in rebellion. The demons were defeated and banished, marking the beginning of the Ancient Era.

“These are all ancient tales,” the Iron Gate said at last, shaking its head. “Who can say what really happened back then?”