As Jin Long descended the skyward stairway spiraling into the clouds, he could feel the atmosphere shift. The winds thickened, not with air, but with pressure—as if gravity itself was testing him, bending around his body like a coiled serpent.
At the bottom was no floor, no sanctuary—only a sky turned upside down, where land floated in fragments, waterfalls fell upward, and the laws of nature collapsed upon themselves. This was the Gravity Veil, the true training ground of the Skyward Monks.
A voice echoed across the warped space.
> "Here, the mind shapes the ground, and the spirit shapes the self. Only those who master themselves may stand without falling."
Jin Long landed on a shard of floating stone, instantly forced to one knee as unseen weight crushed his body. The Genesis Core flared in resistance, but he restrained it—he had come to learn, not to overpower.
Suddenly, he wasn't alone.
A monk in tattered robes stepped forward—face hidden behind a swirling mask of vapor.
"I am Master Lingxu," he said. "I will be your guide… and your judge."
With a simple gesture, he flicked a pebble at Jin.
The rock moved with the weight of a meteor, shattering the stone platform Jin stood upon.
Jin leapt just in time, shifting his balance mid-air, landing on a spiraling column of gravity-inverted wind. Every movement here had to be calculated—not by force, but by harmony with the space.
"Lesson one," Lingxu said, appearing beside him, "You do not command the Flow. You surrender to it."
And thus began the true training.
—
Three Days Later
Jin stood, suspended mid-air, surrounded by floating orbs of reverse gravity, each moving at different speeds. His task: move through them without disturbing the flow—without resisting their pull.
Sweat drenched his brow. Each orb was a miniature world of pressure and tension. One wrong move, and he would be thrown into a voidfold where time unraveled.
Yue Lan and Elder Ji watched from a safe perch above, both awed and concerned.
"He's adapting faster than expected," Elder Ji said quietly.
"He always does," Yue Lan murmured. But in her heart, she feared the cost.
Jin Long, inside the storm of gravity, moved… not as a warrior, but as a whisper in the wind. His body bent and twisted, aligning with the orbs' flow, becoming part of the motion.
Master Lingxu nodded.
"Very well. Let him face the final gravity."
—
The Final Trial: The Inversion Core
Beneath the Veil lay the Inversion Core, a gravity well so powerful that even light bent around it. Here, Jin would face the final challenge—not physical, but existential.
Within the Core, he found himself in a void of starlight… and memories.
Yue Lan's face.
The fall of his village.
Zhan Wuhen's fire.
The Genesis Core pulsed within his soul, its whispers louder than ever. But now, Jin saw something deeper—the threads connecting everything. The Flow was not just energy or technique.
It was destiny, expressed through motion.
A path only he could walk.
He opened his eyes.
And rose—not flying, not falling—but standing upright in the center of impossible gravity.
Master Lingxu bowed deeply.
"You are ready."
—
Elsewhere – On a Dying Moon
Zhan Wuhen stood over a massive pit, dark energy swirling upward. Around him, a circle of void cultists chanted.
"The Skyward Child awakens," Zhan growled. "Then so shall we."
From the pit, a clawed hand of pure entropy emerged.
Another ancient had stirred.
And it hungered for the Genesis Core.