Heavenly tribulation raged across the sky.
A sea of lightning pressed down over the realm, tearing floating ranges from their roots and shattering the sun and moon. At the center of this ruin, Shen Yuxuan sat cross-legged upon a slab of star-iron. His body was straight as a spear, his Dao Palace resounding like a bronze bell, while the laws of heaven and earth gathered in vast tides above his crown.
This was the moment of his breakthrough—an Immortal Sovereign prepared to step into the Dao Ancestor Realm.
The thunder that descended carried cause and effect, karma and fate. Each bolt was not merely destruction, but a test from Heaven itself. The first ten strikes probed his Dao, seeking flaws.
Shen Yuxuan thrust his blade into the air.Golden light erupted from his body—wild, fierce, unrestrained. It tore through the clouds, split the heavens, and in that blinding instant, he became something beyond mortal comprehension—a force that burned itself to defy the world.
Lightning rained down like divine spears. The earth shattered under the weight of judgment. His sword screamed, unable to bear the power coursing through it, yet he held it firm, eyes unblinking even as his body creaked under the pressure.
"My Dao is the sword," he whispered. "And the sword bows to none."
Then came the eleventh.
Hidden within that bolt was a needle—fine, insidious, utterly foreign. It pierced straight into his Dao Palace and pried. It was too deliberate to be natural thunder, and too petty to be Heaven's impartial will. Someone had planted it.
His pores opened; essence boiled out in waves. His aura surged like a broken tide. He fought to stabilize the split Dao Palace with sheer will, honed insight, and the experience of countless battles carved into his soul.
The tribulation raged on, but its balance was broken. When the final bolt fell and the storm at last scattered, half the sky was left in ashes.
Heavenly fire faded, leaving only ruin in its wake.
Shen Yuxuan sat amid the wreckage of the tribulation clouds, smoke curling from his skin, blood dripping from the corners of his lips. The immortal glow around him flickered like a dying star. His Dao Palace trembled; fractures ran across the spiritual sea that had once been flawless.
He felt it immediately—the foreign will burrowed deep within him, coiling through his meridians like a viper. Whoever had interfered had done so at the instant he stood before ascension. That timing… it could only come from someone who knew him well. Someone waiting for this exact moment.
He stared into the clear heavens. His thoughts twisted like blades.He had concealed his preparations from every gaze beneath Heaven, yet still they struck—not Heaven's will, but a traitor's hand.
Betrayal.
His chest heaved, and at last he threw back his head and roared. The sound was torn between rage and disbelief, rolling across the ruined realm like a dying dragon's cry.
"No! I cannot accept this! My path cannot end here!"
Yet the truth gnawed at him. His Dao foundation was broken, his life force withered. There would be no further advancement. This was a dead end—the withering of a great tree before it could pierce the clouds.
But resignation had never been his way.
His eyes blazed like twin suns. Killing intent boiled out, distorting the fabric of space.
"If Heaven has denied me the next step, then so be it," he growled, his voice full of murderous heat. "Even if I can no longer ascend, I will drag those responsible into the abyss! Even if it's the last thing I do—"
He clenched his fists until his knuckles cracked like stone.
"—I will make them pay!"
The world fell silent again—but not for long.
He rose slowly, sword in hand, stepping forward to pierce the void and hunt those responsible.
That was when the killing intent surged.
He twisted aside, evading at the last instant. A blade without an edge severed the void where he had stood, followed by shadows unhooking themselves from nothing. Their auras pressed down like tombstones.
"An ambush…" he hissed, then laughed—hoarse, edged with scorn.
Figures emerged, masked and robed in black. Their faces were hidden, their strikes merciless—no wasted words, no empty posturing. They had let Heaven bloody him, and now they came to finish the work.
The attacks fell all at once—precise, cruel, inescapable.
Shen Yuxuan fought back with everything he had. Injured and weakened, he refused to fall quietly. With a flick of his sleeve, sword-light howled into the void. The air split into a thousand layers, each folding and collapsing as the first clash erupted. Stars detonated in silence as battle surged across the void.
But every movement drew on strength he no longer possessed. His Dao Palace shuddered with each heartbeat, that hidden needle gnawing deeper, unraveling the foundation he'd forged over ten thousand years.
He cut down seven immortals before the sky turned crimson—yet his aura dimmed with every strike.
He tore open the void again and again, carving paths of escape, but each time another masked figure was already there to block his way.
Still, he observed. Their techniques, their weapons, their coordination—he could not pierce their masks, but their methods carried clues. Clues he would carry to the grave, if nothing else.
Blood slicked his robes, his breathing grew heavy.
"No wonder you cowards hide behind masks," Shen Yuxuan laughed, voice rough as grinding stone. "Even a mortal child's slap would sting more than yours."
Their pursuit drove them into a turbulent region of the void, where spatial tears drifted like wounds.
"Not good," he muttered. "If I'm dragged into one of these tears, the turbulence will shred even my body apart."
A jade-armored man's palm descended like a collapsing world.
"Even dying," the man said, "you're still so full of arrogance."
Shen Yuxuan blocked—the shockwave ripped his arm apart from the shoulder down. Bone fragments scattered into the void.
"Arrogance?" Shen Yuxuan's lips curled into a bloodied smile. "No. Confidence. Confidence that even if I die here today, I'll drag the lot of you with me."
He severed his own arm to escape the grasping strike, pouring the last of his essence into the sword. It howled like a dragon's death cry, the void shuddering as his Dao manifested in full.
The blade flashed—one stroke split the jade-armored man clean in half. Three more shadows turned to mist before they could even scream.
In that same breath, Shen Yuxuan tore open a path through the layers of space. Without hesitation, he leapt into the rift—bleeding, broken, but unbent.
The pursuers followed, but the rift was unstable. Space twisted, cracked, and folded upon itself like shattered glass. Shen Yuxuan's consciousness flickered as he fell through endless void—past dying stars, forgotten worlds, and the drifting bones of ancient gods.
The pain of his collapsing Dao was unbearable. Even so, he smiled faintly.
"If Heaven rejects me… then let me fall beyond its reach."
His soul splintered as the spatial tide consumed him.Fragments scattered like embers across eternity—each one a seed of memory waiting to awaken.
And somewhere far beyond the shattered realms, in a forgotten corner of the mortal world, a star streaked across the night sky—its light falling upon a new born child, crying beneath a blood-red moon.