Do You Want This Old Man to Bow to You

Before the first ray of dawn could pierce the hazy clouds over Azure Firmament Academy, Lin Hao was fast asleep on the bed in a side hall of Sword Emperor Pavilion.

Days of rushing from place to place, fighting, and emotional upheaval, along with his late-night conversation with his parents the night before, had finally plunged the newly crowned Sword Emperor of the Human Race into a deep sleep. His brow had relaxed, no longer weighed down by the gravity of someone who seemed to bear the whole world on his shoulders. Even the faintest hint of ease touched his lips, as though he had set down a thousand-jin burden and returned to the peace a twenty-year-old ought to know. His snow-white hair spilled across the pillow, a striking contrast to his youthful face, yet somehow perfectly harmonious.

But that peace did not last long.

In his sleep, Lin Hao suddenly felt a tightness in his chest. His breathing grew difficult, as if an invisible hill were pressing down on his heart. He frowned instinctively and tried to turn over in his dream, only to find that he could not move. The pressure grew more and more real, more and more crushing, until it broke through the barrier of his dream and dragged him bodily from sleep.

Lin Hao's eyes flew open, his mind still clouded with sleep, his vision blurred.

The first thing he saw was an enormous old face, lined with wrinkles yet glowing with health. A pair of shifty eyes peered down at him, gleaming with undisguised amusement and mischief, barely three inches from his nose. Worse still, a bony but remarkably powerful hand was pressing down on his chest. That "sinful hand" was the source of the suffocating "pressure" he had just felt.

Lin Hao woke