The wind screamed like a dying beast.
Li Chenyu felt it first in his bones—a cold that had nothing to do with the autumn air. It seeped through his thin disciple robes, through his skin, into the marrow where his dwindling warmth pooled like water in a cracked vessel.
Thump.
His knees hit rocky ground. The impact shot up his thighs, but he barely registered it. Pain had become an old friend these past months—a companion that sat with him during lonely meals, that walked beside him to the menial labor assignments, that lay down with him at night on his thin straw mat.
But this pain was different.
This pain came with laughter.
"Look at him. Kneeling already. Didn't even need to break his legs first."
Wei Kun's voice. Smooth as poisoned honey. The young master of a minor branch family, clothed in silk that cost more than Li Chenyu's entire village, stood with his arms crossed. Behind him, two lackeys—Fang Biao and Hei San—snickered like trained dogs.
Li Chenyu raised his head. Blood trickled from his split lip, tracing a warm path down his chin. He'd lost count of the blows. Five? Ten? It didn't matter.
"What crime have I committed, Senior Brother Wei?" His voice came out rough, scraped raw from the beating. But it did not tremble. That was important. That was all he had left.
Wei Kun's smile widened. He crouched, bringing his face level with Li Chenyu's. Up close, his cultivation pressure washed over Li Chenyu like a wave—third level Qi Condensation against a mere first level who hadn't even fully stabilized his foundation. The difference was a chasm.
"Crime?" Wei Kun tilted his head, feigning thought. "Let me see... you exist. You breathe the same air as Lady Liu. Your shadow falls where her eyes might wander. Shall I continue?"
Fang Biao, the taller lackey, snorted. "Senior Brother is too merciful. The crime is defiling her reputation with his presence."
Defiling. Such a grand word for giving a flower to a girl who looked sad.
Li Chenyu remembered that day clearly. Three months ago, he'd been gathering herbs on the lower slopes when he saw Liu Xuefang sitting alone by a stream, her shoulders shaking with silent sobs. He didn't know who she was - only later did he learn she was Elder Liu's daughter, the jewel of Blazing Sun Peak. He only saw someone hurting.
So he'd picked a wild orchid - a small thing, blue as the morning sky - and placed it silently beside her. Then he'd left.
He never spoke to her again. He never even learned why she cried.
But Wei Kun had seen. Wei Kun, who had staked his claim on Liu Xuefang like a dog marking territory. And Wei Kun had waited. Watched. Planned.
"Please." Li Chenyu's voice was quiet. "I have never spoken to her. I have never looked at her with disrespect. If I have offended, I will kneel before her father and beg forgiveness."
"Beg?" Wei Kun laughed. "Oh, you'll beg. But not to Elder Liu." He stood, brushing dust from his robes. "You'll beg to me. You'll beg to the wind. You'll beg to whatever gods still remember your worthless name."
He gestured.
The lackeys grabbed Li Chenyu's arms.
They dragged him toward the edge.
And Li Chenyu finally understood.
Sorrowful Wind Cliff.
Every disciple of the Pavilion Above the Clouds knew the name. It was a legend, a warning, a shadow that fell across every conversation about the school's dark history. Disciples who failed too spectacularly. Disciples who crossed the right people. Disciples who simply... disappeared.
They said the winds at the bottom tore cultivators apart. They said demonic beasts feasted on the fallen. They said no one had ever survived the fall.
Li Chenyu's heart hammered against his ribs. His cultivation — pathetic as it was — surgd uselessly against their grip. First level Qi Condensation couldn't break free of two disciples at the second level.
"No—wait—please—"
"Please?" Wei Kun appeared at the cliff's edge, wind whipping his silken robes dramatically. "You used that word already. Find a new one."
"For my mother—she has no one else—please, Senior Brother, I'll leave the school, I'll disappear, I'll—"
"Your mother?" Wei Kun's eyes flickered with something that might have been amusement. Or disgust. "Tell me, garbage, do you think Liu Xuefang's father cares about your mother future? Do you think anyone cares about anyone's mother?" He stepped closer. "The cultivation world doesn't run on mothers. It runs on power. And you have none."
He pushed.
Not a dramatic shove. Not a grand gesture. Just a single finger against Li Chenyu's chest— enough to tip the balance.
Li Chenyu fell.
The wind roared.
And the last thing he saw, as the cliff edge vanished above him, was Wei Kun's face.
Smiling.