Eternal Grey River

The sound of water coursing from a river roused a grey-haired boy from his sleep. Standing up groggily, Yao rubbed his eyes and when he removed his hands he froze from where he sat.

All around him existed nothing. A blank dark void which threatened to consume all.

"Shit..." Alarmed he took a step back. Water splashed, grey water drenching his legs and the boy looked down. He was bare as a baby, cloth-less like the day he was first conceived.

Mouth agape, Yao's mind kept on stopping and rebooting itself. Everything was too strange. So strange that it troubled him to adjust.

Soon enough the man regained his bearing. Years of life experience helped him calm himself one more and fall into an analytical mindset.

"Let's see..." Yao tapped his chin. Monochrome eyes peering at his surroundings.

"An inky black void all around me. Something wet but not wet submerging my feet up to just below the knees. And I'm alone again."

All around him were nothing, an absence of existence as the only thing in the area was him and a pool of surging water underneath him. Flowing endlessly into the distance.

The man carefully examined it all. He crouched, palms scooping up some water from the grey river that kept on surging forwards.

In his palms the water behaved strangely. It twisted, flowed and ebbed, similar to a living slime it bounced up and down on his palms but never left.

Inside the foreign grey water seemed to be voices.

Voices... So many voices talking inside his head.

Voices echoing and incoherent as if billions of billions of humans conversed, their voices layering against each other.

Yao narrowed his eyes at the water. Aside from the deafening noise reverberating in the annals of his mind, his eyes could barely make out figures.

Yao saw an average looking child with brown hair. The boy seemed happy but after he blinked the boy turned into an angsty teenager. And another second passed and the teenager turned into a bitter adult.

The adult spewed curses. Complaining how difficult their life was and wishing they were born with soul power.

As noisy as the adult was, he was but one of the thousands of humans Yao could see in the water.

Yao frowned and dropped the water in his hands. The living slime water bounced up and down before melting into the flowing grey river.

"..." The man kept mum as he stared at the river.

Following the direction it flowed to with his eyes, the grey river vanished into the horizon. Yao turned around and saw where the river came from.

The river came from nothing. It came from another horizon whose end he could not view.

"What the hell is happening to me?" With a groan, Yao massaged his temples. "Martial soul. Martial soul. I just wanted to awaken mine and see what it was and if I had soul power but what the hell is this???" Yao grew frustrated.

He was quite the curious individual.

The more he stood in this strange world that had nothing but him and the river, the more questions he gained. Questions whose answers he couldn't find out easily.

Yao scooped up some more water on his palms.

The water still had people. No... The water was like multiple screens. Screens playing the lives of people in fast forward.

His mind buzzed with noise again and Yao cringed.

He dropped the water in his palms and just laid on his back.

The water submerged his face. An invisible riverbed existed behind him.

"Out of all the martial souls I can awaken. I awakened something like this." Yao murmured underwater. Holding out an arm, he called forth the weird stuffy feeling inside of his chest and a pocket watch with a chain appeared. On its body laid numerous cracks and its color seemed dull and aged.

Tic... Tic... Tic....

Yao stared at the pocket watch. He then focused on the feeling of the river coursing past his body. It evaded him how much time he spent watching the hands on the clock spin forwards and backwards resembling a broken compass until he grew tired.

"Stop." Yao growled. The pocket watch trembled in his hand. His glare deepened and he willed the hands to cease movement.

And the hands slowed down to a halt.

The river that he laid in stopped its movement. For a moment everything grew still.

Yao blinked his eyes and stared at the pocket watch. His mind imagined a switch he could turn off and on. And he kept fiddling with it.

The hands would move and stop depending on his command. While the river encasing him would follow.

"This power..." Bits of pieces of knowledge started appearing. Like flashes they disturbed Yao's mind.

"The power to rule over everything. An esoteric force that cannot be easily tampered with."

"Time is the ruler of all..."

"Without time there would be no change. Without change there won't be life. Everything would be frozen still in one repeating moment." Everything clicked. Information about his martial soul flew into Yao's mind and educated him.

His martial soul had no name. But it was extremely powerful. It could bend time to Yao's whim. To stop it. Reverse it or even destroy timelines completely.

He also existed outside of time. Something he didn't understand at the moment.

But currently his martial soul's power is weakened. The pocket watch was broken. Something broke it. Something Yao didn't know.

Thinking about what broke the watch sent down chills in the boy's spine. Yao felt uneasy and soon he felt fear.

Why was he afraid? What was he afraid of?

Yao shook his head and immersed himself in the grey river again. The river was the river of time. A river eternally surging forward.

Yao dared not to tamper with the river of time. He could walk forward into the future or sink back into the past once he was strong enough. But even if he could, Yao didn't see himself doing it.

"I can change something in the past and possibly erase something precious to me." Yao relaxed.

He wouldn't travel into the past or future. It was far too risky. Doing so would lead into time paradoxes which cannot be solved so easily.

He didn't want to lose the present.

The boy focused himself and he soon melted into the river of time.

-----

Worry gave way to anxiety, and anxiety created dread.

Guang Long paced back and forth in a room. The room was spacious. White walls and a ceiling separated the room from the outside world. On the walls of the room were words, symbols and equations written in black permanent marker.

On a corner of the room lay a white bed that had grey clouds on it. A bedside cabinet and a wardrobe.

"Goddangit what should I do?" Guang Long slapped his palm onto his forehead. It has been days already but the child nestled on the bed with grey clouds as a design still didn't wake up nor shift in his sleep.

They've done everything already. Called a lot of doctors and even some high-level healing soul masters Guang Biao had connections with to look at Yao's condition. All results pointed to the boy being exceptionally healthy.

Sadly, he seemed to be in a coma.

Hands balling up into fists and brown eyes murderously emitting light. His muscles twitched, his foot felt restless with his steps turning into heavy ones as irritation clawed away at the man.

He was never one good enough with dealing against stress or anger. All the times he lost his temper led to him breaking things or crippling people.

A violent thug. A cynical bully. Aside from being a decent brother, those were the main flaws in Guang Long's disposition.

Guang Long wanted to lash out. But at whom?

There was no foul play. And breaking stuff in the family house wasn't something he wanted. There was none to blame and none to do but wait.

He could also blame himself. But he wasn't at fault. No one expected this outcome, even the old man Tai Yun in charge of the awakening ceremony.

"Ah..." Guang Long took a step back. His blood roiling in his veins made his head hurt.

What should he be doing right now? Guang Long was lost. Once again the man grumbled, cursing himself for being a moron for not knowing what to do.

"unnn…" A weak groan silenced the room. Freezing up, Guang Long craned his head towards the bed at a breakneck speed.

Arising from his slumber was Guang Yao. Guang Long nearly jumped in glee and nearly rushed to the boy's side but he stopped.

The boy's eyes changed. A worrying sight to behold as the black pupils on the boy's monochrome iris mixed together and they formed a strange shape. It was as if the boy's pupils and iris were made of circular glass and they shattered outwards.

"Yao Yao!" Guang Long cried out. The recently awakened boy centered his gaze at him and the older brother stopped.

"Brother? Is something wrong?" Yao inquired, tilting his head confused.

Guang Long gulped. The way those broken eyes stared at him made him feel restless. An archaic air surrounded the child and gave him an aura of dominance.

Those eyes seemed to have seen the beginning of the world and its end.

Guang Long regained his bearings "Nothing. We were just waiting for you to wake up." Taking a closer look at his little brother, nothing seemed wrong. Yao yawned and left the bed. Wearing cotton pajamas that had sheep printed on the textile.

Soon enough a shirtless man stormed into the room much to Yao's surprise. Dark bags lined Guang Biao's eyes and overall the man seemed to be tired.

"Xiao Yao… Your eyes…"

The eldest brought it up. Guang Long rubbed a ring on his finger and a mirror popped out from the air.

Yao stared at his reflection and noticed the change.

His stare was eerie. Broken monochrome eyes like shattered glass mixed with some inky black to fill in the cracks. Those eyes of him remained dull as if light couldn't enter it.

Staring at his self, Yao felt like he was staring into his own soul.

He looked dead and bored.

"This is going to be troublesome." Guang Biao sucked in a deep breath. Already having pulled out a phone to dial more numbers.

Feeling the mood sink low, Guang Long shook his head then smiled.

"Oh yeah, Yao you need friends."

"So you're going to elementary!"

The boy shuddered. Those words shook Yao awake from his trance as they bounced and echoed in his ears.

Elementary…

School for kids.

There's going to be a lot of young kids with the youngest at six years old surrounding him.

Boring lessons.

For the man trapped in a child's body, it was terrifying to go back to elementary.

Yao never really had the patience to deal with kids. The only kids he would deal with should be his own.

Pleading eyes cast a quick look at Guang Long. "Brother, I don't want to go to elementary."

"I'll buy you a mecha if you go to elementary." Guang Biao interjected slightly smirking. Bribing the kid with a promise of a bipedal military war machine. From how quick the eldest brother spouted such a deal out it seems that they had already thought about things for a long time.

'Shit." Guang Yao was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Don't go through elementary and have a lot more free time to self study.

Or go to elementary, lose a major portion of his time thanks to being taught kiddie stuff. But he could get a mecha.

A ginormous fucking robot that can walk and punch buildings. Though doing the latter act would lead to other mechas rushing at him for arrest.

Yao sighed.