I woke before dawn, breath steaming in the cold mountain air, because that's what talented young cultivators of the Starblaze Sect were supposed to do.
And because my little sister kicked me in the ribs.
Again.
"Mnnh…" she mumbled, rolling over in her sleep. Tiny, warm, drooling on my only spare robe, adorable, infuriating, and absolute proof that the heavens had a sense of humor.
She was not mentioned in the novel.
Not in the novel I read back on Earth.
Not in the story I died in my shitty apartment reading at three a.m.
Not in the fate I woke up inside, as an extra whose name didn't even make it into the cast list.
I ran a hand through my hair and exhaled slowly, letting the thin spiritual energy seep into my lungs. Even half-asleep, it hummed around me like warm metal. My talent wasn't trash. Far from it.
Once in a hundred years, the elders said.
Impressive. Coveted. Rare.
Just… not here.
Not in this era.
Not when the protagonists of Heaven's Rise: Chronicle of the Golden Age walked around with once-in-a-thousand-years talent like it was a birthday coupon.
Compared to them, I was a glorified footnote with decent bone marrow.
Still, I cultivated. Hard. Every day. Because talent wasn't my problem, proximity to the main characters was.
The closer you got, the faster you died.
I stretched, cracked my spine, and pushed myself up from the straw mattress on the floor. Our room was small, painfully small, but warm enough, and sturdy enough, and hers.
She shifted again, hair sticking everywhere.
My bratty, loud, stubborn little sister.
Eight years old and already giving me gray hairs.
I stepped outside into the chill morning. The sect was already awake, disciples running laps, the clang of weapons, the distant roar of someone too talented for their own good. The sky was still dark, the horizon barely pricked with light.
Spiritual energy gathered naturally in the cold hours.
A perfect time to cultivate.
So I sat cross-legged on a flat stone and sank into meditation, pulling that thin, sharp qi into my meridians. It burned a little, always did, but that burn felt like progress.
Talent wasn't my bottleneck.
It was everyone else's talent that made me small.
I cultivated until the sun finally touched the mountains, until my breathing slowed and the ache in my limbs settled into something familiar and almost comforting.
Then a sleepy voice squeaked behind me:
"Breakfast?"
I turned.
There she was, hugging herself against the cold, hair messy, eyes still foggy. My sister. My liability. My anchor. My reason for not sprinting off into the woods to avoid all main characters forever.
"Yeah," I said, dusting myself off. "Go wash up. I'll grab something from the kitchens."
She brightened at once, like her world was simple, safe, gentle.
I envied her for that.
She ran back inside, bare feet thumping against the floorboards.
And I stood there for a while, staring at the rising sun with a pit in my stomach.
Because in the novel, the one I read on Earth, the Starblaze Sect would hold strong for a few years before the Golden Age truly began. Before geniuses rose. Before monsters awakened. Before ancient treasures resurfaced.
Before blood ran like water.
I died once already.
I wasn't planning to die again.
But this time, I wasn't alone.
This time, I had someone I needed to protect.
The world of the novel didn't care.
The protagonists wouldn't care.
Heaven definitely wouldn't care.
Fine.
If fate wanted to ignore me, good. Let it.
I'd live quietly.
Keep my head down.
Cultivate just enough to live well.
Avoid every protagonist, rival, villain, and destiny, bearing idiot.
Simple.
Safe.