“Afraid?” Hua Fuchen muttered, “Afraid…”2

Hua Qingying continued, “Brother, it’s been ten thousand years since you inherited the throne. You may not have noticed your own changes for the past millennia, but I am well aware of them.”0

“Yun Che is right about one thing. You… are becoming more and more like the previous divine regent.”0

Hua Fuchen did not deny it. He sagged deeper into his seat and said softly, “I once thought that I would still be me even if I inherited the throne and became the divine regent. However, ‘identity’ turned out to be a more powerful word than I could possibly imagine. It was never just a simple title. It's a guillotine blade that, once suspended above your head, will change you in ways you cannot detect for eternity.”2

“I still loathe the previous divine regent to this day, but as time passes, I've come to loathe myself even more. I loathe how naive, foolish, impulsive, childish, inflexible, and self-conceited I was. In fact, the more I am faced with decisions that may change the fate of the entire Kingdom of God, the more I grow to empathize with the previous divine regent…”1

“Once, I believed that the previous divine regent was the root of all wrongs. Now, I've come to realize that the one who truly killed Wanxin… was me.”0

“That's why you became scared,” Hua Qingying said. “That's why you did everything in your power—even if you knew that you were limiting her cognition as a result—to sever any wave, any possibility of a wave that may impact her life.”0

“How… can I not be scared?” Hua Fuchen murmured.0

Hua Qingying knew. From the beginning, she knew that the one who would...0