At five years old, Yu Shinpai had failed in Cultivating his family's ancient Cultivation Technique, failing again and again until the age of ten when he was already too old for that specific Technique.
He was ostracized by his family members, even ridiculed in some cases, but he never gave up. He continued searching for another way to gain the approval of his father, but it was never enough. As long as Yu Shinpai wasn't a successful Cultivator, his father could care less about his well-being.
Yu Shinpai spent years seeking out an unparalleled Cultivation Technique that suited his family, eventually discovering hints to a powerful Technique from within his own library, ironically. It was a Technique that his own parents had discovered many years before, but it was unfinished and had since been abandoned.
Now that he was about to be let out of the prison his father had sentenced him to, seeing his family was probably the last thing on Shinpai's mind.
"Regardless of what you want, I'll follow you." Yoshiki said seriously, casting a fine dust across the arena to clean up and signal the end of their battle.
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Shinpai nodded, "Then you'll join me?"
"Someone has to protect you, don't they?" Yoshiki laughed.
Thirty-one years later.
"Brother Shinpai, he was still your father. We may have aged, but it's okay to be sad. I know that deep down he still cared about you."
From next to a recently closed coffin that was lowered into the stump of a tree, Yu Yoshiki reached out to comfort the blonde youth at his side. While Yoshiki had continued to age until he was roughly thirty, Shinpai still looked the same as he did when he was twenty years old.
"My father was the head of the Yu Royal Family, and now I am the rightful leader, although only in name for now. That means I have the authority to order my servants around as I please, and no one can defy them.
And I've decided that I want to give you a chance to live your own life. You have a long one ahead of you, and I don't need to be in all of it."
Yoshiki's eyes widened in surprise as Shinpai unfurled the scroll and imprinted his Mana into it, removing Yoshiki's name from the contract and granting his freedom.
It was all done in one swift motion, hardly granting Yoshiki time to react. He remained speechless for a long time, until he took a deep breath and asked, "Are you sure about this?"
Shinpai nodded, "I'm sure. Enjoy life without being forced, for once. I only hope that you'll still come when I need you most."
Yoshiki kneeled on the ground and bowed his head respectfully, "Thank you, Master Shinpai, for this opportunity. I promise you won't regret it."
"We've been together for fifty years and I've told you not to call me that many times." Shinpai shook his head as he looked at Yoshiki with a smile.
"You're right. Thank you, Brother Shin." Yoshiki smiled and looked at his hands, feeling his actions no longer bound by the contract that held him for fifty-three years. He had been taken as a servant by the Yu Royal Family at the age of eight, so Yoshiki hardly remembered the feeling of freedom anymore.
Regardless, he knew exactly what to do first, as he had thought about it for quite some time now.
Unbreakable Right's memories flashed dozens of times in quick succession, from his free exploration of the World to the end of the Elemental Beast Tides, to his first lover, to his child, and their child, to eventually the day he would return to Yu Shinpai.
In the hundred years since their separation had progressed to the middle stages of the Soul Formation Realm and attained the title "Supreme Left". His strength had grown immensely, and his reign over the Yu Royal Family was almost unchallenged, despite his Cultivation not even at the Peak of the World yet.
But when Yu Yoshiki saw Supreme Left, thus started one of the saddest memories of his entire life.