# 571
Chapter 572: Heroic Spirits
“A human?”
Amun sensed the six auras that had suddenly emerged from the sea of national fate, and his brows knitted tightly.
He knew this was no material world; it was a void woven purely from destiny. Within that river of fate, nothing could exist except fate itself. Even Amun had to transform his body into fate before he could continue gnawing away at Great Xia’s destiny.
Yet now he watched, incredulous, as six human figures walked slowly out of the river of fate.
Strangest of all, each was dressed in clothes from a completely different era.
One wore a crisp Zhongshan suit and had his hair slicked back, steady as a mountain—clearly from the Republican period.
One was in Ming-dynasty court attire: a deep-blue jacket and skirt, a hairpin in her coiffure, gentle and virtuous.
Another sported flared trousers and a loud floral shirt straight out of the 1980s, mirrored sunglasses shaped like toad eyes—he looked like he’d just slipped out of a dance hall.
Two more wore modern hoodies and shirts, though a closer look betrayed their respective decades. The girl’s hoodie was fleece-lined, her feet in little white shoes—items popular only in the last couple of years. The boy wore a white shirt, black tapered pants, and a bulky pair of over-ear headphones discontinued fifteen years ago.
Last, and at the very center, stood a figure in battered ancient armor stained with great dark-red blotches of dried blood. He carried a long spear equally blood-caked and savage, like a general fresh from the battlefield.
Yet his face was startlingly young—barely twenty-four or twenty-five—his eyes as sharp as swords, murderous aura thick around him.
The six, people of completely different eras, stood together in a scene both jarringly incongruous and eerily harmonious.
They trod upon the surging river of fate and advanced step by step toward the black colossus that was Amun.
Amun’s gaze locked on them, full of bewilderment.
They… seemed to be like himself—bodies gone, transformed into fate.
But who were they? Why were they hiding within Great Xia’s destiny?
“You are the one Ye Fan spoke of—the intruder disturbing our Great Xia’s fate?”
The young general at their head spoke slowly. His ice-cold eyes met Amun’s; though the aura rolling off the black giant was vast and terrifying, not a trace of fear showed on the general’s face.
“Impossible. How can humans exist inside fate?” Amun frowned.
“Strange, huh?” The trendy youth in floral shirt and flared pants pushed up his toad sunglasses and smiled. “That’s because we ourselves are part of Great Xia’s fate.”
Part of fate?
Amun’s frown deepened. He understood the words, yet comprehension eluded him—how could humans become a portion of fate?
His gaze swept over them, and realization flickered. “You’re the souls of humans who have already died?”
“More precisely,” the middle-aged man in the Zhongshan suit said gravely, “we are Heroic Spirits—Human Apexes who once lived in Great Xia’s history and, for various reasons, fell into eternal slumber within the torrent of national fate.”
Amun’s eyes narrowed.
Human Apex—on the same level as that sword-wielding human. And here there were six more?
“No. Human souls can’t withstand the impact of such mighty national fate. Even if you’re stronger than most, you couldn’t endure this long, let alone slumber within it,” Amun said, shaking his head.
“Relying on the soul alone truly wouldn’t work,” the young general replied calmly.
He stretched out a hand toward the source of the fate torrent and gripped the air. A phantom whistled out of the void with a shrill shriek and slammed into the ground before him!
It was a broken spear—only half remained—yet bloodstained and bristling with killing intent.
“But if one shatters one’s own realm, forges bone and blood into a weapon, merges body with armament, one can create a vessel for the divine soul. Seal the spirit within, place it into the torrent of fate to nourish, fuse self with destiny, and thus become a Heroic Spirit—guarding Great Xia’s fate for all generations.”
His voice was calm yet rang like steel; those keen eyes blazed like stars.
At the same moment the other five raised their hands toward the far end of the fate river. Five different broken weapons shot to their sides, humming loudly:
halberd, spear, staff, fan, whip.
In life these weapons had been comrades-in-arms, bathed in blood as they rose; in death they became vessels of flesh and soul, fate-forged divine arms that guarded Great Xia’s destiny.
Amun’s brows drew together. “Shatter your own realm, forge bone and blood into weapons? Are all of Great Xia’s Human Apexes this insane?”
“You’re mistaken,” the woman in Ming court dress said serenely. “Besides being Human Apex, each of us has another identity…”
At the group’s edge, the girl in the fleece hoodie regarded Amun and stated quietly:
“I am Great Xia Night Watch’s fourth commander-in-chief, Human Apex—Wang Qing.”
Beside her, the clean-cut boy in the white shirt and bulky headphones gripped his broken Sky-Piercer Halberd and spoke slowly:
“Great Xia Night Watch’s third commander-in-chief, Human Apex—Tang Yusheng.”
Next, the trendy man in floral shirt and flared pants smiled. “Great Xia Night Watch’s second commander-in-chief, Human Apex—Li Kengqiang.”
“Great Xia Night Watch’s first commander-in-chief, and before that, head of Special Biological Response Team 139, Human Apex—Nie Jinshan,” intoned the middle-aged man in the Zhongshan suit.
The woman in Ming attire said calmly, “Head of the second-generation Bureau of Evil Suppression, predecessor to Team 139, Human Apex—Gongyang Wan.”
At the very center, the young general with the broken spear spoke last:
“I am the founding head of the Bureau of Evil Suppression, the first Human Apex, a Han-dynasty general, Marquis Jinghuan—Huo Qubing.”
When their words faded, an unprecedented aura erupted around them. The surging river of fate heaved violently, and from its currents a golden dragon of condensed destiny slowly rose behind them.
Formless and vast as mist, it coiled among invisible mountains, its body stretching thousands of miles without end. Every scale shimmered with pale-gold fate; a single wisp could quell all evil beneath heaven.
This majestic, millennia-thick national destiny now revealed a terrifying corner of itself to the world.
At the dragon’s feet, behind the six broken divine weapons, stood six humans from six different eras.
They were the guardians of fate.
They were the very first special team in history.
Their name—【Heroic Spirits】.