"When Heaven closes its eyes, the Void remembers."
— Ancient Proverb of the Lost Realms
The Birth Under a Shattered Star
Three thousand years passed since the Song Beneath Heaven.
The world rebuilt itself upon the ashes of silence. The names Shen Wei and Lian Yue faded into myth, and their deeds became whispers sung by bards who didn't believe their own songs.
The Void Codex had vanished — or so the heavens declared.
Yet, deep within the mortal lands of Yanluo Province, on the night when a crimson comet burned across the horizon, a child was born beneath a broken sky.
The storm that followed tore the heavens asunder — thunder like war drums, lightning like divine tears. Villagers cowered, praying to gods long silent.
Only one old monk dared to look up.
He was blind, dressed in a robe so tattered it looked woven from years themselves. His staff glowed faintly with inscriptions from forgotten scriptures.
"The cycle begins again," he murmured. "The void has chosen its vessel."
Inside a small bamboo hut, a baby cried — not like a mortal child, but like a whisper cutting through eternity.
The mother, pale and weak, cradled the infant to her chest. "His eyes…" she gasped.
The monk leaned forward. Within the child's gaze swirled two universes — one of light, one of shadow, locked in endless dance.
He bowed his head. "You shall be called Wei Yun, the Child of the Forgotten Sky."
Lightning struck nearby. The baby laughed.
The Sect of the Falling Dawn
Fifteen years later, the boy called Wei Yun had grown into a quiet yet defiant youth within the Falling Dawn Sect, a remote martial school built upon the ruins of an ancient battlefield.
The Sect was small, barely surviving against the larger sects of the empire, but it possessed one treasure — an ancient stele said to have survived the Divine Cataclysm.
Wei Yun had never seen it. No disciple was allowed near. But he often dreamed of it.
In his dreams, the stone whispered.
"I am not scripture. I am memory."
III. The Dream of the Silver-Haired Woman
That night, as moonlight fell over the sect courtyard, Wei Yun sat in meditation beside the lotus pond. He closed his eyes and entered the flow of his qi — a current both familiar and foreign.
The world blurred. His breath deepened.
When he opened his eyes again, he stood not in the courtyard but upon a sea of stars.
A woman floated before him — silver-haired, her robes glimmering like the edge of dawn. Her face was calm, but her eyes… her eyes knew him.
"You should not exist," she said gently.
"Who are you?" Wei Yun asked, his voice echoing across the void.
"I am the echo of the one who sang beneath heaven," she said. "And you… you are his return."
Before he could answer, the stars collapsed into darkness.
A single voice — neither hers nor his — spoke within his mind:
"The Codex sleeps in your soul. When Heaven awakens, so too will war."
Wei Yun gasped and jolted awake. The pond water rippled with black qi — a faint, swirling shadow that vanished as quickly as it appeared.
His heart pounded. "What… was that?"
In the distance, thunder rolled — yet no storm touched the sky.
The Imperial Tournament
Months passed. The Great Tournament of the Nine Provinces approached — a martial contest held every twenty years to decide which sect would gain entry into the Heavenly Gate Pavilion, the empire's most powerful cultivation order.
The Falling Dawn Sect was too small to compete — until Wei Yun stepped forward.
"I'll represent the Sect," he declared before the elders. His master, Elder Han, scowled.
"You? You haven't even formed your Golden Core! The tournament will devour you alive!"
Wei Yun bowed. "Then let it."
His words carried something beyond arrogance — conviction.
Elder Han hesitated. "And if you die?"
Wei Yun's lips curved faintly. "Then at least the heavens will remember I tried."
The elders laughed — but a single old monk at the edge of the hall remained silent. His blind eyes turned toward Wei Yun.
"Let the child go," he murmured. "Fate already walks with him."
The Tournament of Swords
The capital, Yingtian, was a city of marble and qi. Floating pavilions hung above the skyline, and divine inscriptions shimmered across the Imperial Arena's sky dome.
Disciples from the mightiest sects gathered — the Azure Cloud Pavilion, Nine Flame Hall, Moon Lotus Temple, and the feared Crimson Veil Sect.
Wei Yun walked among them wearing plain robes and no emblem.
Laughter followed him.
"Which sect sends a beggar to the tournament?"
"Look at his aura — so faint it could barely light a lamp!"
But when the duels began, laughter turned to silence.
Wei Yun's first opponent — a Golden Core cultivator — charged with a flaming spear. Wei Yun didn't move. He simply raised his hand.
For an instant, the world bent.
The spear shattered into motes of nothingness. The arena's barrier cracked. The opponent fell unconscious before realizing what had happened.
The judges murmured in disbelief.
"That wasn't qi… it was absence."
The Crimson Veil Duel
On the seventh day, Wei Yun faced Lady Mingxue, the prodigy of the Crimson Veil Sect — elegant, lethal, her sword known for cutting souls.
"You're interesting," she said, smiling as her crimson veil fluttered. "But you don't belong here, nameless boy."
Wei Yun met her gaze calmly. "Maybe not. But neither do the gods."
The crowd gasped. Insulting Heaven was blasphemy.
Mingxue laughed. "Then let's see if Heaven favors you."
Her sword blurred — ten thousand afterimages slashing through the air. Wei Yun stepped once, then vanished. When he reappeared, he stood behind her.
Her blade fell to the ground in two clean halves.
But as he turned to leave, her hand brushed his arm — and for a moment, she saw it.
Inside him: a void swirling with galaxies, whispering of forgotten gods.
Her voice trembled. "You're not human, are you?"
Wei Yun's eyes softened. "Neither are you. None of us are, anymore."
VII. The Emperor's Shadow
After the tournament, rumors spread like wildfire. The nameless boy who wielded nothingness drew the attention of the Heavenly Pavilion and even the Imperial Throne itself.
One night, an imperial envoy came to the Falling Dawn Sect — cloaked in gold, bearing the seal of the Emperor.
Wei Yun was summoned to the Jade Court.
The Emperor was young, his gaze sharp. But when he saw Wei Yun, he stood in silence for a long time.
"You bear an aura older than Heaven," he said finally. "Do you know what you carry?"
Wei Yun bowed. "Only what it allows me to remember."
The Emperor smiled faintly. "Then remember this: the last man who spoke those words tore the sky apart."
Wei Yun's heart froze.
"His name was Shen Wei."
VIII. The Echo of the Past
That night, unable to sleep, Wei Yun wandered the imperial gardens. The moon hung low, reflecting silver light on lotus leaves.
Suddenly, a familiar voice echoed from behind a tree.
"You shouldn't walk alone, little void."
It was Lady Mingxue. She stepped into the moonlight, her veil gone, revealing eyes the color of old sorrow.
"What do you want?" Wei Yun asked.
"To see if the stories were true," she said. "They say you carry a power that once destroyed gods."
He looked away. "And if I do?"
"Then maybe you're the one the world's been waiting for."
Before he could answer, the sky rumbled — deep, ancient, like a giant exhaling. Both turned as the Heavenly Gate began to shimmer faintly over the capital.
Mingxue whispered, "It's opening… after three thousand years…"
Wei Yun felt it too — a pulse in his chest, like a forgotten heart awakening.
"The Codex stirs."
The Awakening
The following dawn, chaos swept the empire. Celestial beasts descended, sects turned upon each other, and heavenly omens erupted across the sky.
Wei Yun stood on the palace balcony, staring at the Gate as it tore open completely. Within its blinding light, he saw a silhouette — a man wrapped in ancient voidlight, carrying a sword that shimmered between existence and nothingness.
The voice that followed shattered the air:
"Child of the Forgotten Sky… return what was never yours."
The Codex inside him answered.
The ground split. Rivers rose into the air. The palace itself began to dissolve.
Mingxue shouted, "What are you?!"
Wei Yun's eyes turned black and gold. His voice echoed with two tones — his own and another's.
"I am what remains of the one who defied Heaven."
Lightning fell, and a thousand divine seals erupted across the sky.
The Return of Shen Wei
From the light stepped the figure — ancient, regal, sorrowful.
Shen Wei had returned, not as man, but as memory incarnate — the last echo of the first Void Lord.
He looked upon Wei Yun, his own reincarnation.
"Your birth was my final mistake," Shen Wei said. "You are the Codex's seed — meant to bloom when Heaven falls."
Wei Yun gritted his teeth. "Then I'll bloom in my own way."
Their eyes met. The world trembled.
For an instant, all time stopped — two versions of the same soul facing each other, one past, one present.
Lian Yue's voice whispered through the wind.
"He who remembers too much, forgets to live."
Shen Wei closed his eyes. "Then let us see which of us deserves to remain."
Heaven Trembles
The duel that followed tore the sky apart once more.
Every blade of grass, every breath of wind, became a note in their song of destruction.
The Codex's verses echoed in the fabric of reality, each clash rewriting the laws of qi.
Cultivators across the world knelt, unable to breathe.
The Emperor's golden crown cracked. The mountains bowed.
And from the heart of the storm, two voices roared in unison:
"The Void does not serve Heaven!"
"The Void is Heaven!"
The explosion that followed was not light — it was memory. The world forgot itself for a heartbeat.
When silence returned, only one figure stood upon the ruined sky bridge — Wei Yun.
Shen Wei was gone, dissolved into motes of starlight.
In his hand, the Codex pulsed once — then turned to ash.
XII. The New Dawn
Morning broke.
Wei Yun looked at the rising sun — the first light after the storm. For the first time, he felt something deeper than power.
Peace.
Mingxue approached quietly, her robe torn, her face pale but determined. "So it ends."
He smiled faintly. "No. It begins."
She tilted her head. "What will you do now?"
Wei Yun gazed toward the horizon where the sky met the sea. "Rebuild what Heaven forgot."
As he walked away, a faint melody drifted through the wind — the same song that once echoed beneath heaven.
"The void remembers what creation forgets…"
And so began the Age of the Silent Dawn.
End of Chapter 10 — "The Child of the Forgotten Sky"