The training grounds smelled of burnt air. Morning mist clung to the stones, torn apart by flashes of lightning each time blade met blade. Ye Lan's hands were blistered, his sleeves blackened at the edges. The iron sword in his grip shook violently, unstable arcs racing along his arm before sinking beneath his skin.
"Seventy-three percent purity means nothing if the output isn't stable," he thought, forcing his grip to steady. The weapon was crude, no spirit imprint, no resonance, just dull iron, but that was the point. If he could channel lightning through lifeless metal without burning himself to ash, then anything else, a staff, a bone, even a single hair charged with intent, would obey him.
A man stood at the edge of the field, arms folded. Wei Shen, thin, sharp-eyed, a faint scar cutting beneath his left eye, watched in silence until Ye Lan's blade finally burst apart, scattering molten shards across the ground.
"Enough," he said, stepping forward. "You're frying yourself faster than you're learning."
Wei Shen looked nothing like the refined cultivators Ye Lan had imagined from the inner sect. His robes were half-tied, streaked with burn marks and stains from old duels. A thin scar traced from the corner of his left eye down to his jaw, giving his face a permanent edge of weariness rather than menace. His eyes were sharp but unfocused, the kind that saw too much and cared too little. Strands of dark hair hung loose over his forehead.
He raised his hand. A faint green light pulsed from his palm, seeping into Ye Lan's burned forearm. The pain retreated instantly, the charred skin knitting together as if time itself rewound. The air smelled faintly of herbs and rain.
Ye Lan's gaze flicked to the light. "What kind of qi is that?"
"Healing qi," Wei said. "Rare, inefficient in combat, but useful for keeping reckless disciples alive."
Ye Lan stayed silent, watching as the glow faded and his skin turned whole again. "Healing qi… it restores cellular integrity, but what's the resource base?" He flexed his fingers slowly, tracing the faint warmth under his skin. "Energy alone can't create matter. Cells need amino acids, lipids, nucleotides—raw materials. So where does the qi obtain them?"
He frowned, eyes narrowing on the faint green residue in the air. "Does it extract trace elements from the atmosphere? Decompose ambient matter into usable form? Or does it convert pure energy into biological mass directly? That would imply qi can manipulate matter at a subatomic level—violate conservation, or redefine it."
He exhaled quietly, the curiosity tightening into focus. "Glucose fuels growth in the body. Qi does the same here, but it seems to carry both energy and matter potential. If that's true, then cultivation isn't just physiology—it's bioengineering written into the laws of this world."
Wei's voice broke his train of thought. "I was sent by Yong Mo Han," he said, tone flat. "My job is to make sure you learn control before you tear yourself apart. You burn again, I'll heal you again, but don't expect mercy if you waste my time."
Ye Lan reached for another blade, eyes still fixed on the faint trace of green fading from his skin.
"I won't."
Now, after weeks of training, he looked only slightly less battered—and just as uninterested.
Wei Shen stood a few paces away, arms crossed, a blade of grass idly hanging from his mouth. "Again."
Ye Lan lifted the sword. Lightning crawled unevenly along its surface, flickering before snapping forward in a weak, crooked line that vanished halfway through the air.
"Too slow," Wei said.
"I noticed."
"Then fix it."
"I am."
Wei let out a sharp breath. "You talk like an old man and move like one."
Ye Lan's tone was dry. "Maybe your teaching's outdated."
That earned him a sideways look. "You've got nerve for someone who can barely keep his sword from stuttering."
"I'm not here to impress you."
"No," Wei said, "you're here because your Elder thinks you'll be useful someday. I'm still waiting to see how."
Ye Lan didn't answer. He reset his stance—hips aligned, shoulders lowered, eyes steady on the tip of the blade. The air around him hummed faintly.
Wei circled him. "You're forcing the current. Stop fighting it. Lightning doesn't need your permission, it needs direction."
Ye Lan adjusted his grip and tried again. This time, the spark came smoother, thinner, steady enough to slice the mist apart.
Wei watched, unimpressed but not dismissive. "Better. At least it doesn't look like a dying firefly."
Ye Lan lowered the sword, wiping the sweat from his brow. "You're hard to please."
"That's how people stop dying under my training," Wei replied. Then, after a pause, "You keep this up for another week, and I might start calling you a student instead of a hazard."
Ye Lan let out a quiet, humorless breath. "I'll take that as progress."
Wei smirked faintly. "Don't. You're still terrible."
He inhaled. Exhaled. Drew qi from his dantian, not all of it—just a thin thread to test resonance.
The air began to hum. His forearm tingled as the current crawled up the blade, flickering brighter with each breath. The Veil Pulse formed, narrow but steady. He thrust.
A bolt of lightning cracked out, straighter this time, sharper, but it thinned and vanished before hitting the mark.
His wrist throbbed. The muscles in his arm burned with a dull ache, and his grip faltered for half a second. "Qi flow broke near the wrist. Too much tension. The pulse scattered before release. He flexed his fingers, the joints stiff, skin hot from the discharge. The nerves are still overloaded from the last few strikes. No wonder it won't stabilize."
He lowered the sword. "Need water."
Wei tossed a clay cup without looking up. "Drink fast. You rest too long, your control will cool off before your body does."
Ye Lan caught it, drank, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "You ever heard of letting a person breathe?"
Wei smirked faintly. "You can breathe after the next explosion."
Ye Lan drank in three steady gulps, letting the water sit on his tongue before swallowing. It was a little warm—not ideal, but enough to cool his throat. His chest still felt hot from the strain, though his breathing stayed even. The heat wasn't from exhaustion; it was focused, controlled. His body wasn't breaking down—it was adapting.
Every spark that left him, every ache that followed, felt deliberate. The pain wasn't waste. It was proof that his control was tightening, bit by bit, each burn teaching his body how to handle the next surge without tearing itself apart.
The sound of steel and thunder carried through the training grounds, echoing off the stone walls like an endless storm that refused to fade. Days bled into each other, morning mist, the sharp scent of ozone, the rhythm of blade meeting air. For three weeks, this was all there was: strike, correction, silence.
When Ye Lan stumbled, he rose without a word. When his arms trembled from exhaustion, he forced them still. Blisters tore and healed, skin hardened, breath shortened, but his rhythm never broke. Every movement became habit, every mistake memorized through repetition.
Wei Shen's patience wore thin long before Ye Lan's did. He barked orders, adjusted stances, corrected breathing patterns until his voice grew hoarse. Yet Ye Lan never complained, never asked to stop. He simply moved.
By the end of each day, only two sounds filled the grounds: the faint crackle of residual lightning and the dull scrape of Ye Lan's sword returning to its sheath, ready to begin again at dawn.
"Pain's fine," he told himself quietly. "It just means the nerves are still talking."
The ache in his arms had stopped bothering him days ago. It wasn't comfort—it was familiarity. The body adjusts to what it can't escape. Every strike carved that lesson deeper into muscle and bone until the movements no longer needed thought.
By the end of the third week, the lightning no longer stuttered. It coursed cleanly down the blade, bursting through the air with a sharp, effortless crack. His stance stayed grounded, his breathing even, his control absolute. Each motion felt pared down to its essence, no waste, no flare, no emotion. Just function.
He no longer thought of the Veil Pulse. It formed the moment intent sparked through his motor cortex, before awareness, before breath. Like blinking. Like heartbeat. Automatic.
Wei tossed him a towel. "You've learned the basics."
Ye Lan caught it, wiped the sweat from his face, and said simply, "Thanks."
Wei blinked, surprised by the bluntness. "Didn't expect you to say that."
"No reason not to," Ye Lan replied, tone flat. "You taught me something useful. That's worth acknowledgment."
Wei studied him for a moment, then gave a short nod. "Han was right. You're not like the others."
"That's why I'm still alive."
The others broke under pressure. Some lost focus, some grew arrogant, others stopped paying attention the moment they felt safe.
He'd seen it before, disciples who passed the Awakening Ceremony, got their robes and meals, and thought that meant they'd made it. They forgot that safety was temporary.
He never did. Safety wasn't comfort. It was just the space between one danger and the next.
Later that day, Elder Han called for him.
The old man stood beneath the plum tree, robe sleeves folded, expression halfway between deep thought and half-asleep. He didn't greet Ye Lan, just motioned toward a small table beside him. A sealed scroll sat there.
Elder Han looked like someone who'd long since stopped pretending to care about appearances. His hair was mostly gray, bound into a loose knot that looked like it was tied out of obligation, not vanity. Deep lines carved his face, not from smiling, but from frowning at disciples and paperwork alike. His eyes, sharp even when half-lidded, carried that particular fatigue of a man who'd seen too many promising students turn into corpses.
His robe was clean but wrinkled, one sleeve always slightly rolled as if he never bothered to fix it. A faint scent of medicinal herbs lingered around him, bitter, grounding, the smell of someone who stayed up too late brewing tonics he didn't drink. His posture wasn't regal like the elders in the inner halls; it was slouched, efficient, the stance of a man who found standing upright to be a waste of energy.
Yet despite the worn look, there was something unsettling about him, an effortless pressure in the air.
"Deliver this to the Sect Library," Han said.
Ye Lan stared at it, then at him. "Do you think I'm your errand boy?"
Han didn't even blink. "If I did, you'd be carrying more scrolls."
Ye Lan frowned. "Then why me? You've got disciples running around like ants."
Han sighed, rubbing his temple. "Because calling someone else would mean explaining what to do, and that sounds exhausting."
Ye Lan blinked. "So you're sending me because you're… lazy?"
"Efficient," Han corrected.
"Right," Ye Lan muttered. "You're not fucking with me? Right?"
Han opened one eye. "Are you going to deliver it, or should I teach you a new movement technique? It's called 'Running While Beaten.'"
Ye Lan picked up the scroll without another word. The seal pulsed faintly, heavier than it looked. "You sure this isn't something dangerous?"
"If it were, I'd send Wei. He's disposable."
From a distance, a faint "I heard that!" echoed.
Han didn't react. "See? Still disposable."
Ye Lan snorted, half amused, half resigned. "You really make terrible use of your disciples."
Han smirked. "And yet somehow, you're still here."
Ye Lan turned away. "That's because every time I try to leave, you find new ways to waste my time."
"Good," Han said, leaning back against the tree. "Means my methods work."
Ye Lan shook his head, muttering under his breath, "Old man's running half of the sect like a retirement home."
Han's voice followed lazily, "And you're the caretaker."
Ye Lan sighed. "Unpaid caretaker."
The path to the library cut through the inner courtyards. The stones beneath his feet were uneven—grooved and dulled from years of carts grinding over them. Even the air smelled faintly of dust and incense, the scent of effort wasted in routine. Ahead, a few inner disciples strained to push heavy wooden carts uphill, each crate within pulsing faintly with sealed light.
"Spirit stones. Low-grade ones, judging from the weak luminescence."
So they drag these things through the open courtyards? "Brilliant." Ye Lan's gaze followed the worn trail cutting straight to the lower tunnels. "If someone ever wanted to rob them, they'd only need to follow the path like breadcrumbs."
The thought almost amused him. "They really think no one would dare? The arrogance of safety breeds stupidity."
"Even a half-blind robber spinning twice with a sack over his head could find this trail."
Inside his mind, Arin sifted through Ye Lan's memories—dusty corners of the Outer Sect library, half-faded scrolls written by scholars who probably never touched a spirit stone in their lives. Yet the knowledge was there: low, mid, and high grades. Crystallized qi, condensed until it shimmered like glass and cost more than a year of an outer disciple's life.
"Low-grade stones—the sect's definition of generosity. One issued per month, but only to those who'd already survived their first year in the inner sect. A convenient rule, ensuring that anyone too weak to reach that point never became a financial inconvenience. My turn would come next month."
He walked past the disciples dragging carts piled high with sealed crates, the wheels cutting deeper into the same grooved path carved over years. The stone slabs were worn smooth, almost polished, from endless trips between storage and tunnel. Even the grooves glimmered faintly from the qi residue leaking through imperfect seals.
"Obvious, sloppy, and loud," he thought. "If someone wanted to rob them, they'd only need to spin twice blindfolded and follow the sound of stupidity scraping against stone."
The disciples strained under the weight, oblivious. To them, it was routine, just another day serving the sect's "grand design."
Ye Lan's lips twitched, not quite a smile. "And I'm supposed to wait politely for my single low-grade rock next month. Truly, the path to enlightenment and research begins with learning to beg."
The library towered over the square, its walls carved from the same gray stone as the mountain itself, unyielding, ancient, and indifferent. The great doors creaked open with the weight of age, revealing aisles upon aisles of scrolls and tomes stacked like monuments to forgotten thoughts. The air inside was still and cold, thick with dust, candle soot, and the faint metallic tang of preservation oil.
Behind the counter sat Elder Rui, a relic among relics. His frame was thin enough to seem carved from paper, his spine bowed like an old bow unstrung. Half-closed lids hid eyes that seemed neither asleep nor awake, only waiting for time to finish its work.
Ye Lan stepped forward and placed the scroll on the desk. "Delivery from Elder Han."
Rui didn't lift his gaze, only pressed a wooden seal onto the ledger. The stamp's thud echoed faintly through the shelves. "You may wait," he said, voice rasping like dry parchment. "Or read. Stay clear of the red boundary. It's forbidden."
Forbidden = valuable. Or dangerous. Or both.
Ye Lan inclined his head slightly. "Understood."
He didn't move immediately. His eyes traced the faint crimson line across the marble floor, thin, deliberate, and old enough that the color had bled into the stone. He filed it away. "The sect doesn't waste pigment. If they paint warnings instead of building walls, it means fear does the guarding for them."
He walked deeper, each step measured, soundless. The library swallowed noise like a beast, no echo of footfall, no whisper of cloth. Shelves rose on either side, high and narrow, filled with scrolls so ancient their seals had fused with time. Dust lay undisturbed, thick enough to show every intrusion, yet no footprints but his own broke the layer.
As he passed, the air grew denser—charged, almost metallic. The oil lamps flickered less from wind than from something unseen shifting around him. The deeper he went, the more it felt like the world outside had been cut away entirely.
Then, the red boundary appeared. A single line of faded pigment stretched across the marble, straight as a blade's edge. The floor beyond was darker, cleaner—someone had erased the dust.
Ye Lan stopped a step short. His gaze lingered on the other side, tracing the faint shimmer of inscriptions burned into the floor, barely visible under the dim light.
"Rules exist to protect ignorance, he thought. And ignorance protects comfort."
He weighed the options, not with fear, but precision.
"If I don't cross, I stay blind. If I do, I might see something worth the trouble."
His foot shifted forward, just enough for the sole to brush the crimson edge.
He stepped across.
The air shifted. The faint hum beneath his skin deepened into vibration—not painful, but resonant, like a tuning fork struck against bone. His meridians stirred. Not in alarm. In recognition.
A light flickered in the dark ahead—golden, pulsing. Then it moved.
A floating shape drifted between the shelves, its form almost liquid, a single circular eye glowing at its center. It scanned the rows in silence, the light passing slowly across the floor.
The air shifted—soft at first, then deep enough to vibrate through his ribs. It wasn't painful, just strange, like standing too close to a live power line. His meridians stirred on their own, as if something in the air had brushed against them.
Then came the light. A faint gold flicker between shelves. It pulsed once… twice… then moved.
Ye Lan froze. The shape drifted into view—half-liquid, half-smoke, a single round eye glowing in its center.
He watched it for a few seconds, head tilted slightly. "No heat, no breathing, no qi of its own," he muttered under his breath. "So not alive. And it's not mechanical either… it's floating too evenly."
The thing passed by an old reading stand, and the glow flared briefly as it crossed a lantern's reflection. "So it reacts to change," he thought. "Movement or qi spikes."
It wasn't hunting—it was scanning. A watchdog, not a predator.
He slipped behind a column, forcing his breathing to slow. Heart rate dropped, blood cooled. It was the same trick he used back in surgery when his hands wouldn't stop shaking—slow the pulse, keep the nerves from firing too loud. The body can hide if it stays quiet enough.
The floating eye paused in the aisle. The glow intensified, sweeping left and right.
"Not vision," Ye Lan thought. "If it could see, it would've found me already. It's sensing energy flow. Like those old machines that track magnetic fields."
His hand brushed the bronze clasp at his belt. Smooth surface. Bit of shine left. He glanced up at the lantern above. "If it's drawn to fluctuations, maybe I can give it one."
He tilted the clasp just slightly, catching the lantern light and bouncing it off the far wall. A quick flash—sharp and out of place.
The thing froze. Then drifted toward the light, following it like an insect chasing a flame.
Ye Lan waited one heartbeat, then another, before moving. Quiet, steady, his steps careful enough not to stir dust.
As he slipped past the boundary, he glanced back once. The ward was still chasing the reflection, aimless, drifting toward the false glint like it meant something.
He exhaled softly through his nose. "Not stupid," he thought. "Just literal. It follows rules too strictly to question what it sees."
He looked ahead again, the shelves swallowing him in shadow. "That's the problem with perfect systems, they don't know when they're being tricked."
He didn't run. He moved like water through cracks, each step measured, deliberate, silent. The floor spoke in tiny tremors, and he listened. Every plank had a voice: where the grain split, where pressure would betray him. Left foot, third plank from the seam. Right foot, near the iron bracket. Never the center—it sagged.
At the end of the aisle, half-swallowed by fallen timber and dust, a cracked scroll case glimmered faintly beneath the dim light.
He crouched. Brushed the dust aside—not with his hand, but a steady exhale. Contact leaves evidence. Air doesn't.
He unrolled the parchment just enough to read.
"Qi Condensation Realm To Soul Formation Method"
His pulse didn't rise, but his brain coiled tight, as if something inside him recognized what his mind had just found.
"This is it."
Not a theory. A design. The passage from Qi Condensation to Foundation Establishment.
He read line by line, memorizing as he went.
No philosophy. Just raw, procedural clarity.
"Combine dawn dew gathered before first light with powdered mid-grade spirit stone. Heat over Azureleaf flame for ninety breaths..."
Each instruction burned itself into his memory.
Then came the line that tightened his jaw. Mid-grade spirit stone.
He knew what that meant. One was worth more than three years of an outer disciple's labor. Even inner disciples received them sparingly—and only with explicit sanction.
He wouldn't be sanctioned. Not yet. Not ever.
But rejection wasn't defeat. It was just another constraint.
He rolled the scroll back, precise to the millimeter—same dust alignment, same crack, same fold. Not because he feared discovery, but because good work deserved invisibility.
The golden ward's glow flickered faintly between the aisles again, floating in lazy arcs. Patrol complete, still blind.
Ye Lan stepped across the red line without pause. Walking slowly wasn't caution—it was confidence. Only thieves hurry.
By the time he reached the front hall, Elder Rui hadn't even looked up.
Rui's quill scratched paper. "Leave."
He did.
Outside, dusk had thinned the light into copper streaks along the tiles. The courtyard was nearly empty now. Far below, wooden wheels clattered—the same carts as before, rumbling toward the lower tunnels. Sealed crates.
Spirit stones. Not distributed. Stockpiled.
He watched them vanish into nothingness.
"A grand ritual? A sect-wide breakthrough? Or something the elders preferred unseen? It didn't matter. Whatever it was, they hoarded while others scraped."
The sect had sent him to deliver a scroll. He'd delivered it and stolen an education in return.
"Seventy-three percent purity won't save me if I starve the current, he thought. If they won't feed it, I'll find a way myself."
He turned from the courtyard, eyes calculating as he walked.
Routes. Guard rotations. Timing intervals. He'd start there. Every system had its fracture point—the guard who blinked too long, the gate that didn't quite close, the one night when vigilance turned routine.
Cultivation wasn't about enlightenment. It was logistics. Resource management disguised as philosophy.
And in this sect, access wasn't granted. It was taken.
He walked away without looking back. Behind him, the library exhaled dust into silence.