Thirty years after the gods descended, I finally saw the cracks in them.
They said this was the Age of the Gods' Attendants.
They said it was supreme grace.
And so, incense ash became our air, and kneeling became our breath.
Spiritual root tests decided who would be sent to the Immortal Seedling Camp to be "cultivated," and who would come to the Ash-Sweeping Office to clean up.
I had seen childhood friends frozen in amber, and sent off lovers "used up" by the Matchmaking Office.
My name is Chen Jin. I'm a mortal in the Ash-Sweeping Office, where I've swept incense ash for ten years, coughed up blood for five, and built up thick calluses on my knees.
I'm good at lowering my head, kneeling, and pressing my forehead into the cold dust when immortals pass by.
Until one day, the statue beneath the Lingxiao Tower suddenly opened its eyes and looked at me.
Everyone was kneeling. I was the only one standing.
It wasn't courage.
It was because I saw it: a faint golden line extending from the stone statue's brow, trembling as it shot straight into the heavens.
A voice that seemed to seep from between my bones, tinged with the taste of rust and blood, spoke in my mind:
"A needle."
"Drive it into that crack."
I saw the rot beneath the immortals' silken robes, the loopholes in the laws of Heaven, and the truth that all the gods and buddhas in the sky were merely parasites surviving on the power of belief.
They fed on our fear, sucked away our years, and sipped the wails of our souls as we scattered after death.
Now, it was my turn.
