The Duan Clan's ancestral realm stretched like a boundless sea of mountains, their peaks wrapped in clouds of pale jade light.
Verdant qi poured endlessly from the earth itself, flowing like rivers of mist into the sky. Towering pines whose trunks gleamed with faint golden veins grew along sheer cliffs, each tree suffused with a pulse like a living heart. The entire realm throbbed faintly, as if heaven and earth themselves breathed in rhythm with the blood of the clan.
In the heart of this realm stood the Heaven-Root Pavilion, an ancient hall carved from a single slab of stone that jutted up from the world like the spine of a titan. Its surface was etched with archaic runes that shimmered faintly, merging into the qi currents around it.
Within the hall, three figures sat in silence.
