Forgotten Space-Time 2

Qi Heng stood where he was, closed his eyes, and took another deep breath.

It was as though he wanted to take all the crushing pressure, all the mysteries, and all the silent dangers within this lonely stretch of time and space into his heart, weighing them over and over.

The hall was deathly silent. Only the congealed air remained, along with five million years of silence and emptiness.

This place had become ruins abandoned by time.

There were no whispers from Gods of Destruction, no descending wings of angels, nor any news from other universes.

There was only boundless void and the wreckage of planets floating in the darkness, like the bones of enormous beasts—silent, pale, and bathed in cold starlight.

"Then how am I supposed to get back?" Qi Heng's voice was not loud, but it was cold, like an icy blade that cleaved straight through the dead silence of the ruins.

He turned around, his golden eyes fixed on Old Kai with such sharpness that they seemed capable of seeing through him.

He stepped forward. With every step, the dust on the ground curled into tiny whirlwinds.

The aura radiating from his body made fragments of stone on the broken walls and ruins begin to rattle and tumble down.

Old Kai's Adam's apple bobbed. He avoided Qi Heng's gaze, his staff scratching chaotic lines across the stone floor.

"You... you were swept into a temporal rift by the energy during battle and ended up here." Old Kai's throat was as dry as rusted iron scraping together. "Theoretically, a collision between energies of the same level might... might be able to tear open a rift in time and space again..."

"Might?" Qi Heng repeated coldly.

The temperature around them suddenly plummeted.

The dust in the ruins abruptly froze in midair, while a layer of white frost began forming over the surfaces of distant planetary fragments.

He tilted his head slightly. A lock of black hair slid across his forehead, covering half an eye, while the golden light in the other grew even more scorching.

Cold sweat covered Old Kai's back. He lowered his head, nearly unable to hold onto his staff.

"I... I'm not sure." His voice was so low it was almost inaudible. "Knowledge concerning parallel time and space is a field handled by the angels. For five million years, all I could do was watch this time and space wither away, die bit by bit... yet I could do nothing..."

Qi Heng simply stared at him for a long time.

Wind swept out from the depths of the ruins, carrying the stench of decay.

He could see the worn corners of Old Kai's robes, the bulging knuckles of Shin's clenched fists, and the broken planet in the distance, where what had once been an ocean was now nothing but a dried salt crust.

Five million years—this number was suffocating. It bent the backs of gods and utterly crushed all hope for this time and space.

The so-called Supreme Kai had guarded ruins and memories, guarded mysteries that could never be solved.

Other than grief and self-reproach, he had been left with nothing.

"Forget it." Qi Heng finally looked away.

He walked toward the edge of the ruins, the shattered end of the Supreme Kai Realm. Beyond it lay endless void and floating dead planets.

His back looked particularly lonely in the dimness, like a sword thrust into the ruins.

"Who is the strongest warrior in this time and space?" he asked without turning back.

Old Kai froze.

Shin suddenly raised his head.

"The strongest warrior?" Confusion filled Old Kai's voice before realization dawned on him. "You want to..."

Qi Heng slowly raised his right hand, spread his five fingers, then gradually clenched them into a fist.

His knuckles cracked. The air around his palm began to distort, rippling like water.

An invisible pressure spread outward from him. Spiderweb cracks silently crept across the remaining stone slabs in the ruins.

"I need an opponent strong enough." He spoke calmly, yet every word seemed forged in blazing fire, heavy and scorching. "Strong enough to tear apart time and space."

Old Kai and Shin exchanged a glance. Their eyes held too many things—hesitation, fear, and that faint hope that was almost extinguished.

Shin took a deep breath and stepped forward, loose stones crunching softly beneath his feet.

"Son Goku." When he spoke the name, his voice carried a strange weight. "The Saiyan on Earth, Son Goku. He is the strongest warrior in this time and space."

Qi Heng finally turned around. His golden pupils shone in the darkness like two stars that had fallen into the ruins.

The corner of his lips lifted into an exceedingly faint, exceedingly cold curve.

"Take me to him."

His deep eyes lit up again, as though stars were flowing within them.

He narrowed his eyes slightly, and an indescribable sharpness flashed through the depths of his pupils—shock, excitement, and a sense of destiny.

Son Goku.

The name exploded in his mind like a bolt of thunder.

Even before he had crossed over, back in that ordinary world, he had long heard that name.

The protagonist of Dragon Ball, the Saiyan hero who repeatedly erupted in desperate situations to protect Earth, a legend of battle... All sorts of images surged through his mind: the blue light of the Kamehameha, the golden hair of a Super Saiyan, that pure and brilliant fighting stance.

His Adam's apple moved, and his voice became lower and more urgent than before. "Where is he?"

Shin, the Supreme Kai, was forced half a step back by Qi Heng's suddenly taut aura before steadying himself and answering, "Earth. But he left over eight months ago."

As Shin spoke, he lifted his head toward the boundless starry sky beyond the temple, as if he could see that departing figure through the vastness of space. "His return date is still uncertain."

Qi Heng said nothing.

Eight months.

The depths of the universe.

No set date of return.

Those words kept pounding through his mind.

He lowered his eyes, his thick lashes casting small shadows across his face.

Only dead silence remained in the divine temple. Far away, the cosmic wind brushed past the edge of the Supreme Kai Realm, carrying a faint sound like a sigh.

He could clearly feel a power within him stirring restlessly, as though that name had awakened some deep resonance.

After a while, he raised his head, his gaze calm once more.

If he could not see Son Goku for the time being, then he would look for other clues first.

He had to piece together this world's structure, rules, and hidden truths bit by bit.

"I understand."

Qi Heng did not waste any more words.

He slowly raised his right hand, pressing his index and middle fingers together steadily against his forehead.

He performed the motion with extraordinary ease, as though he had practiced it countless times.

The instant his fingertips touched his skin, an invisible energy began gathering around him.

Even the air trembled slightly, emitting a deep hum.

"Farewell."

As soon as he spoke, blinding white light erupted!

The light did not spread outward. Instead, it exploded from within his body, enveloping him in a pillar of radiance.

Within the pillar, Qi Heng's figure gradually blurred, turned transparent, and finally became countless flickering motes of light. Like stars flowing upstream, they instantly converged into a single point—

Qi Heng vanished from the Supreme Kai Realm.