The system did not let Lin Yuan grow too comfortable with the idea of progress.
At dawn on the fifth day upon the mountain, a new notification appeared.
Founder Mission completed:
— Basic resources gathered at minimum level.
Reward:
— 15 contribution points
— Incomplete blueprint of a simple storage room
— Expanded talent evaluation (short range)
New main mission:
— Recruit the sect's first disciple.
Lin Yuan read the last line several times.
"Now?"
"Yes."
"I don't have a repaired hall, decent food, an active defensive formation, or any real authority."
"Correction: you possess basic founder authority."
"That does not impress anyone."
"Impressing is not required. Recruiting is."
Gu Tian, who was drinking water and pretending to miss wine, raised an eyebrow.
"That face of yours always means new trouble."
Lin Yuan showed him the mission.
The old man read it in silence, which in itself was notable.
"It makes sense," he said at last.
"That's rare. I was expecting another cruel remark."
"It will come later. First, listen to me. No sect truly exists while everything depends on a single back. If you call yourself founder, sooner or later you need someone to follow you."
Lin Yuan knew he was right. The problem was simpler and harsher.
"And who do I recruit? I'm nobody. This mountain has no appeal. I don't even have real sect techniques to offer."
Gu Tian looked at him with unexpected calm.
"Then look for the same thing the world despises. That is all a place like this can attract in the beginning."
The sentence remained in Lin Yuan's mind long after the old man turned away.
Look for what the world despises.
It fit him so well it almost hurt.
That same day, he descended toward a small village at the foot of the mountain. It was not Piedra Seca, but it resembled it in poverty: low houses, crooked fences, thin animals, and people more concerned with winter and grain than with cultivation. Even so, in places like that there were always two kinds of people who might matter to a sect just beginning:
the desperate
and the broken.
He wore no emblem, no ceremonial robe, no entourage.
Only poor clothes, a better knife than before, and a gaze that had grown harder since the night of the rift.
He spent much of the afternoon observing.
He saw sturdy but empty youths.
Arrogant boys propped up by small families.
Girls with discipline, but lives already bent toward marriage or field labor.
Nothing the system marked as especially valuable.
The expanded talent evaluation worked in an odd way. It gave no names and no full explanations. It only produced an impression when someone stood out even slightly in body, mind, elemental affinity, or hidden potential. For most people, it did nothing at all.
At dusk, as he passed along the poorest part of the village, he heard shouting.
Not the noise of an open fight.
The noise of pursuit.
Turning between two low houses, he saw a boy of no more than twelve running barefoot, a sack of bread clutched against his chest and an expression so wild he looked less like a child and more like a cornered animal. Behind him came two broad men with short sticks and a woman shrieking that he was a thief.
The system reacted the instant Lin Yuan set eyes on the boy.
Compatible target detected.
Disciple potential: very high.
Specific affinity: sword / intent / lethal focus.
Lin Yuan did not move at first.
He watched.
The boy stumbled on a stone, got up without dropping the bread, and kept running. One of the men caught him from behind and slammed him to the ground. The bread rolled into the mud.
"Rat!" the man roared. "I'll teach you what happens when you steal!"
The boy did not beg.
That was the first thing that truly drew Lin Yuan's attention.
He did not cry.
He did not apologize.
He did not try to explain hunger or desperation.
He only looked up with pure hatred in his eyes.
A kind of gaze that should not be so concentrated in someone that young.
The man raised the stick.
Lin Yuan moved.
He caught the man's wrist before the blow could fall. The man cursed and tried to wrench free, startled by the interruption.
"You don't need to break his bones over stale bread," Lin Yuan said.
The man, large and sour with the smell of wine, scowled.
"And who in hell are you?"
"Someone who doesn't think three adults need clubs to teach a starving child morality."
The second man stepped forward, hostile.
"That brat has been stealing for weeks."
"Then he's probably been hungry for weeks," Lin Yuan replied.
The woman pointed at the boy from behind them.
"He doesn't just steal! He bites, spits, and looks at you like he wants to kill you!"
Lin Yuan looked back at the boy in the mud.
The description was not entirely wrong.
There was something fiercely hostile in him. Something broken and sharp.
The first man tried to tear free again. Lin Yuan twisted his wrist just enough to remind him that the exchange could become painful.
"How much is the bread?" he asked.
The man hesitated.
Then named a price.
Lin Yuan paid with one of the few ordinary coins he still carried from before the rift. It was not much, but more than he wanted to spend. Even so, when the man saw the money, his anger cooled enough for Lin Yuan to let go.
The three adults retreated amid curses and complaints, warning that the boy was "bad seed."
Lin Yuan did not answer.
He crouched, picked up the sack of bread from the mud, and held it out.
The boy did not take it immediately.
"I don't need your pity," he spat.
Lin Yuan studied him.
Dark eyes.
Sharp cheekbones.
Too thin.
Too tense.
And an old scar near the temple, half hidden by dirty hair.
"I'm not offering it out of pity," Lin Yuan said. "I'm offering it because I still prefer seeing you eat to seeing you dead."
The boy hesitated.
Then snatched the bread from his hand.
No thanks.
No lowered gaze.
Not one sign of trust.
Lin Yuan understood at once.
The world had already taught him that every form of help comes with a price.
"What's your name?" he asked.
The boy stayed silent.
"If you don't want to say it, that's fine. But I'll tell you this much: the system thinks you might be useful."
The boy narrowed his eyes.
"I don't know what that means."
"Neither did I, not long ago. It changed my life anyway."
He drew a breath.
"My name is Lin Yuan. I founded a sect on the mountain. I don't have much to offer yet. But I can give you food, a broken roof that is still a roof, and a road different from stealing bread until someone kills you for it."
The boy looked at him as though measuring the madness of the offer.
"And why would you do that?"
Lin Yuan answered without ornament.
"Because I see something in you that others don't."
"What?"
"Someone who does not break easily."
A long silence followed.
The boy clutched the sack of bread against his chest with the same fierce desperation with which he had protected it while running.
"Jian Mu," he said at last.
The system confirmed:
Name registered: Jian Mu.
Sect compatibility: very high.
Lin Yuan nodded.
"Good. Jian Mu. I won't demand an answer now. But if you climb the northern path at dawn tomorrow, you'll find the Primordial Firmament Sect."
He turned away.
He did not press.
He did not corner him.
He had learned too young that some people bite hardest when they feel trapped.
As he walked away, he heard the boy's dry voice behind him.
"And if I don't come?"
Lin Yuan did not turn.
"Then you'll keep walking alone."
"And if I do?"
"Then you won't."
He kept moving until he vanished around the corner of the poor street.
He did not know whether Jian Mu kept watching him.
He did not know whether the boy would come at dawn.
But as he climbed the mountain again beneath the darkening sky, he felt something close to certainty.
Perhaps his sect would never attract those blessed by the world.
Perhaps it never would.
But the discarded…
the ones who had learned to bare their teeth before they showed a wound…
those might still hear his call.
And for Lin Yuan, for some reason, that felt better.