Celestials were never truly understood from the scraps Lind had pieced together. They were born similar to aether children or manifested beasts, yet they only appeared in the Celestial Fields, the home of the Immortals.

Even the Divine Lands did not have them, they always ascended. They could be killed as easily as anyone else on the premise you could get past their Qi. Celestial Qi, like Fiend Qi, seemed to break all the rules.

Natural and demonic Qi was little more than an insect facing a stone. Lind knew why, because Celestial Qi was like the fulcrum between the 2. It could convert natural to demonic and vice versa.

It was only when all 3 worked in concert that Origin Qi could be discovered. That was just Qi, however.

The beings themselves were rather unique. Reincarnation existed for other races, even an aether child could be reborn with their memories partially intact but no longer as an aether child.

Celestials, however, were souls from myriad worlds without cultivation. Lind suspected powerful souls were sent out into the greater cosmos to compensate or keep some kind of cycle balanced.

The Celestials were at once naively innocent and incredibly powerful. They grew stronger by directly interacting with the world. He had already studied it but he suddenly realized none of the current Celestials had their old memories.

Not one.

Their numbers were severely reduced, even as they seemed to be increasing, but throw a stone and even a human with no cultivation potential might have latent memories awaiting inside them.

Were Celestials not allowed to grow at all? Were they stuck with the perspective they were born with? He did not think so. The ones that had died in the war and the stark memory of the greatest sacrifice to end the Realm Refiner stuck out to him.

Yet, that was native personalities. Given the odd way they cultivate, could a reborn person be stuck at the age they died?

Lind highly doubted it, but it was possible that being a Celestial came with an overload of information. The power they showed seemed instinctual which meant even a reborn person would have it.

They would allow Heaven and Earth to explore from an angle no other cultivator could. It gave an avenue for the Dao to be explored for all in that sense as well.

Lind never considered what would happen to a reincarnation in such a state. They would be stuck between old memories and the strange new existence they had been thrust into.

He had years to adjust and accept his new world, but Celestials would be surrounded by Immortals, mythical beasts, and treasures of all kinds.

For reincarnated beings, it would be sensory overload. Why would Heaven and Earth do that without some kind of compensation?

Lind looked at the Bastard but before he could confirm his theory, they both felt the insane power of the tribulation focusing on them. Lind realized it was now far beyond anything either of them could survive!

He was about to summon all the artifacts he had saved for defense when he saw the Bastard do something strange.

His shadowy aura appeared and he became similar to how many knew him to look with a vaguely humanoid shape and white eyes.

The instant he did that. The tribulation went wild! The lightning slammed out in all directions! The only spot it did not strike was at them!

Thankfully, since it dispersed, it was nowhere near as strong.

A dark thought came to Lind at that point. He felt like the Bastard had died as a child but how he had died was important.

The actions had been so selfish and whatever the shroud did that saved him clearly cost him just as much. The Bastard stumbled and Lind walked toward him. His staff was at the ready but he did not think the thrice cursed Fiend was defenseless

"I was right, you were a child." The unremarkable face snapped up in snarl.

"I AM NOT A CHILD! I AM A GOD! YOU SHOULD ALL KNEEL TO ME!" The knee jerk reaction made Lind’s eyes narrow. He stayed calm and simply looked down on the Bastard.

"How old?" The flinch but Lind’s aura was pressing down. His emerald eyes narrowed as 3 separate smoke trails curled up from around the prone Fiend. He had been right, there were traps.

His passive aura carried enough of his harmony to break them down. The Bastard vanished and appeared farther away. The pale look showed it was not a planned move.

Lind was about to let it go when a pensive look came to the Bastard’s face.

"I was 15." A teenager. The sudden volunteering of information was to buy time but it clicked some things into place.

"Why did you die?" Lind played into it and noticed the flicker of a sneer but the Bastard never considered he was lining his coffin.

"I died much like you! I saved a life! I am a hero!" If he was going to lie, he could have done it far better. Lind snorted and the air suddenly lit up with a weaving behind his back. The Bastard started choking.

"Try again." The vile eyes glared but he needed more time.

"I was killed because they were jealous of me! She liked me, she was just being playful! I would not have hurt her! I wouldn’t!" The Bastard suddenly seemed to slip away mentally.

Lind had been right.

Celestials were too direct that they could not experience one aspect of cultivation. The nature of their path would not allow it.

A heart demon. The Fiend had been losing to his heart demon when he died as a Celestial.

That placed him at the low end of the Immortal Realm or the Heaven Realm. They would be the bare minimum to preserve their soul after death.

He suddenly broke free of the cycle but his ashen face was covered in sweat.

"Lies! You are all liars! I am not meant to die! I am never meant to die!" Real madness finally seemed to possess him. Celestials, reborn or not, could advance and stabilize, but the Bastard never did.

His old ego could not accept he had died. He could not accept that his old life was over.

"You were going to show them?" The stone tossed in the pond hit its target. The Bastard began to cackle as if he had waited for that question for so long.

"OF COURSE! I WILL CONSUME EVERYTHING! I WILL SHOW THEM THE TRUE GOD THEY REFUSED TO KNEEL TO!" The issue with heart demons, even partial ones, were that they were still you.

They were just twisted and magnified based on what created them. Obsessions were not good for anyone, but for a cultivator, they were lethal.

Even if they were overcome, it was easy to fall back into the pattern that created them. The Bastard had become so obsessed with his self centered view of the world, it had just barely not consumed him.

It had fueled his madness until he broke Heaven and Earth. No one had ever considered madness in a Celestial. Likely, it was very difficult to cause in the first place but the fairness of Heaven and Earth left the possibility.

If he was to give it a name, it was madness of denial. The boy, whatever he had truly been, had been in the transformative stage of human life. Teenage years were dramatic even without other issues.

What would happen if that point of view, that could not even conceive of dying and piled on top of a personality that saw his life as all that mattered, and a recipe for disaster comes to be.

In a barren world, he could be corrected, but it seemed things had gotten extreme. Accidental or intentional no longer mattered. The fact his life was cut short and saw a very powerful force saying it would happen again, caused a seed to be planted.

All the suffering of epochs had been born because a teenager refused to grow up. He refused to accept death comes for everyone.

Lind came up short at that. Divine Realm and below that was true, the name of the next major realm, however called that into question.

Eternal Realm would be pointless if it had an end. How had the Bastard found out about it? Even Lind, with a lot of help, pieced it together and learned the truth.

How had a lowly Heaven Realm or Immortal Realm in the Celestial Fields stumbled across it.

"The Celestials know about all the realms?" His words brought the Bastard up short. Shock was on his face before it twisted into pure rage!

"THAT’S RIGHT! That petty bastard lording over everyone taunts the most powerful race with all that knowledge and then tells us how far we can go! How dare it?! How dare it dictate my life?! I AM A GOD! I WILL LIVE FOR–" Both of them had forgotten.

The tribulation had been dispersing but Lind had broken whatever was around the Bastard. The rumble of thunder was followed by a flash of light.

Both men screamed as they were seared by the lightning. Lind barely held on as his Mystery Weapon flared to defend him.

His ring burned as he summoned everything he had!

Was he going to die with the Bastard at the end?