Chapter 27: Parting Clouds to Reveal the Blue Sky

"Did you notice? Then it’s time to begin."

Inside the convenience store, Kamikawa Mitsu gazed into the distance, his eyes deep as if stars had sunk and sun and moon revolved within them, revealing all illusions.

His words echoed through the convenience store.

No one heard them.

…

Japan, Arakawa Ward.

"Mom, I’ve arrived in Japan. I’m out shopping right now."

A young American exchange student walked down the street, holding her phone, video-calling her mother back in America.

To reassure her mother and prove that her study-abroad environment in Japan was fine.

She raised her phone, filming herself while also capturing the surroundings.

As she filmed…

She accidentally included the sky behind her.

"OMG!!"

In the video, the American mother and daughter were chatting when the mother’s peripheral vision caught sight of the sky—she gasped in shock, eyes wide.

"My God! Daughter, look at the sky! Behind you—the sky!!"

The American mother screamed in wild excitement.

As if possessed.

At that moment, she kept pointing through the phone screen toward the sky above her daughter’s location.

What’s wrong with Mom?

The sky behind me?

What’s wrong with it?

The American exchange student stared blankly, turning to look at the sky behind her.

In an instant!

She gasped, clapped both hands over her mouth, and screamed incoherently.

"OMG!! Fuck! Is God born?!"

At the same moment.

Similar cries erupted across Arakawa Ward, and in the neighboring wards.

Above Arakawa Ward.

The night sky, once black, churned with clouds—dense and piled like before a storm.

But these were not dark clouds, nor was rain coming.

The clouds were pure white, vast and radiant.

Suddenly!

In the center of the rolling white ocean of clouds, one cloud burst forth with a light like the primordial radiance of heaven and earth’s first opening.

The Light of Primordial Chaos—sacred and ineffable.

From that cloud as center, holy divine radiance spread outward, engulfing the surrounding clouds.

Within moments, every cloud glowed, pure and sacred as the legendary nine-heaven auspicious clouds, existing only in the age of the gods.

The sea of clouds blazed brilliantly.

Like a cosmic galaxy descending above Arakawa Ward.

The light was too bright.

At that moment, Arakawa Ward was bathed in daylight, as bright as noon.

Then, like a stone cast into a lake.

The holy radiant sea of clouds rippled, surging like waves.

Cloud waves churned.

Their height threatened to overturn heaven and earth.

The light of the cloud sea flickered—sometimes blazing with brilliance, sometimes transparent as a film, alternating between light and dark, as if virtual and reality intertwined.

Each time it dimmed and turned transparent.

A vast force surged outward.

The earth trembled faintly; the heavens swayed—as if some terrifying power threatened to collapse the sky and sink the earth.

"What is that! Are aliens landing?!"

A salaryman who had just finished dinner and was heading back to the office for overtime stared upward, dumbfounded, watching the impossible scene above—his briefcase slipped from his hand.

"Wife! Wife, come quick! Stop putting on makeup—come look! The sky! There’s a door in the sky!"

In a Japanese apartment, a husband sat in a chair by the window, waiting for his wife to finish her makeup before going out, when he suddenly screamed in terror, as if seeing a ghost.

"What are you yelling about? Are you having a seizure? How could there be… Oh my God! Oh my God! Husband, look at the sky!"

His wife stormed out, annoyed—but the moment she looked up, her makeup cracked from shock.

"My God, am I seeing things?"

"Look at the sky!"

"What is that?!"

The astonishing anomaly above Arakawa Ward drove everyone mad.

Hearts trembled; souls shook.

The scene in the sky was vast and turbulent, unlike anything ever seen.

Gazing upon the boundless sea of clouds radiating divine celestial light, people felt as if they had stepped into a dream.

"Quick! Quick, film what’s in the sky!"

Someone shouted this.

Everyone pulled out their phones and frantically filmed, faces alight with unparalleled excitement.

At this moment.

The night sky, illuminated by the holy radiant cloud sea, shone as bright as day.

Below, in Arakawa Ward, tens of thousands of lights flashed densely—like stars twinkling.

They were phone camera flashes.

Emotions—excitement, exhilaration, wonder—filled every heart.

They wanted to capture this heart-stopping moment, one that might well be recorded in history.

"Quick! Report this situation to Tokyo…"

The chief of the Arakawa Ward police station, overwhelmed with emotion, nearly bit his tongue.

"Chief Nakamura! Look!"

Hearing his subordinate’s shout, the chief looked up.

"Holy shit!!"

The heavens.

The vast sea of holy light flickered, reaching its limit—after one final flash, the blazing radiance suddenly retracted inward.

In an instant.

The center of the cloud sea exploded.

A deafening roar echoed for ten thousand li; the entire Tokyo could hear it.

Those unaware might have thought a nuclear bomb had detonated in Arakawa Ward.

In the center of the cloud sea, the clouds remained—but the dazzling divine light had transformed into a misty vapor.

The scene resembled a celestial lake in the heavens.

Clouds gathered around its edges; the water was not water, but composed of misty vapor.

Faint streams of light flowed and glided within the vapor.

The mist glowed softly, suffused with spiritual energy—so delicate, it seemed a single touch would make it ripple like water.

The thought arose.

As if an invisible divine hand, vast enough to cover ancient mountains and obscure sun and moon, descended.

The hand touched the celestial lake and cloud sea.

A gentle ripple.

The cloud sea changed—truly, as if “parting clouds to reveal the blue sky.”

The celestial lake rippled, petals of light scattered in all directions, radiance shimmering in five hues—the mist parted, revealing what lay within.

"What is that?!!"

"Gasp!!"

The scene within the lake held no water, no fish—only…

Towering skyscrapers.

Streets wound through them, silent and desolate.

Beyond that, the lake held a sky—dusk, the setting sun hanging high.

It was a scene of twilight, desolation, a city in decline.

"Isn’t this our Arakawa Ward?"

Someone recognized that the Cloud Lake scene was none other than Arakawa Ward.

In the image, every building, every street, matched Arakawa Ward exactly.

They looked up at the Cloud Lake view.

Everyone felt something inexplicable.

It felt as if they weren’t tilting their heads to gaze at the sky, but were hovering above Arakawa Ward, looking down upon it.

The scenery lay fully within view.

If not for the fact that the image was composed of clouds, and its edges still pulsed with surging light, like streaking meteors.

It truly seemed as if a vast mirror hung in the heavens, reflecting everything on the ground within it.

But…

Reflection or not,

the mirror reflected no people—only buildings and the environment.

And the reflected sky had turned to the golden hues of dusk.

“Could this be a mirage?”

The thought of a mirage arose, then was immediately discarded.

If the image in the sky truly showed Arakawa Ward’s streets,

it could not possibly be a mirage.

A mirage is a natural phenomenon caused by refraction and total internal reflection of light, usually distorting distant scenes—how could it possibly reflect a local scene?

Moreover, the image clearly showed twilight.

It was currently night—no, a night as bright as day, utterly unrelated to dusk.

Most crucially, the image contained a setting sun.

At that moment,

as everyone stared in astonishment at the Cloud Lake, speculating whether it was a mirage,

the scene within the Cloud Lake shifted.

The lake’s mist glowed, radiating brilliant light across the nine heavens.

The mist and clouds rippled; each expanding ring drew the image closer, magnifying it.

It seemed as if a divine being gazed down from the nine heavens, through the Immortal Lake and cloud sea, upon this region.

The image was moving??

This definitely wasn’t a mirage!

As the scene within the lake changed, everyone affirmed: this was not a mirage—so then, what was it?!

A few blinks.

The lake’s waves rippled outward, and the image expanded further, becoming a panoramic view pulled even farther back.

“Hurry!! Damn it, report this to the Metropolitan Police!”

The chief of the Arakawa Ward police station roared, then stared upward in utter shock.

At that moment, everyone was stunned, gazing at the Cloud Lake image in the sky.

“Is this really a reflection of Arakawa Ward?”

“T-the city—it’s a floating city!!”

Above, the vast, boundless Cloud Lake image no longer lingered on Arakawa Ward—it rose higher still.

And this time, as it rose,

the entire expanse of the twilight sky came fully into view.

Among it, a colossal, ancient city suspended in the heavens also came into everyone’s sight.

…

(Sorry for the late update; to make up for it, I’ll add extra chapters these days.)