The Best Under Heaven

The day she returned to the Immortal Realm was an assembly the likes of which had not been seen in a thousand years.

Immortal Lords from the Thirty-Third Heaven, along with gods, demons, spirits, and sprites from all three realms, were gathered there. Immortal aura swirled through the Ziwei Palace, its splendor like a painting.

At the center of the immortal throne, surrounded by gods arrayed like stars, sat the supreme Emperor who ruled over all the heavens.

Clad in layered feathered robes, his eyes lowered slightly, he wore a face more beautiful than anything in the mortal world, yet showed neither joy nor sorrow.

He spoke softly: "I confer upon the Red Lotus of the Purifying Pool the immortal name Hongwu, and charge her with all wars and calamities."

She curled her lips, bowed in the distance, and wore an expression as inscrutable as the gods in the palace.

Only after the investiture ceremony had ended, at the Yao Terrace banquet held to celebrate her return, did she hear someone casually remark, "Three thousand years ago, when I first came from the mortal realm to serve in the Celestial Court as a minor immortal, His Majesty the Heavenly Emperor looked just as he does now..."

She had raised a cup of nectar to her lips. At those words, she looked up toward the imperial seat. Across the evening mist over the Jade Lake, that perfect face remained composed and indifferent, as remote as the Milky Way.

She smiled softly and lifted her hand, letting the sweet wine slide down her throat.

She had known for centuries that the gods' beauty was no more than an illusory shadow. What was there to be infatuated with in that face?

It was all as fleeting as dew and lightning, one long dream.

This novel was first published on Jinjiang in 2010 and first published in print in 2012.

Theme: Love through the long ages.