The morning after the Awakening, Lin Fei stood before the gates of the Emberleaf Sect's Outer Court. The jade tiles gleamed in the rising sun, but behind their beauty loomed countless challenges. Talent was a flame, but the world of cultivation was a forest—dry, cold, and waiting to consume the careless.
"Lin Fei, report to Outer Disciple Pavilion for assignment," a voice called.
He turned to see a tall girl with sharp eyes and a silver badge: an Inner Disciple. She didn't introduce herself.
"Senior Sister," Lin Fei bowed.
She nodded, glanced at him once, then walked off, robes fluttering like falling petals.
At the pavilion, a stooped old man handed him a token marked with a single leaf and a number—Room 47. "You've drawn attention," the elder muttered. "Don't die early."
Lin Fei didn't reply. He was already learning: in the world of cultivation, silence was safer than boasting.
His room was sparse: a straw bed, a meditation mat, and a chipped basin for water. Yet he smiled—this was his sanctuary, his starting ground. He sat on the mat and began to circulate spiritual energy as taught in the initiation scrolls.
He could feel it now—the world's qi, drifting like invisible threads through the air. He drew it in, slowly, gently, guiding it into his dantian. The energy met resistance, but his Heavenroot Constitution absorbed it like dry earth drinking rain.
After an hour, he opened his eyes. A thin wisp of steam rose from his skin. He had broken through—Qi Gathering Stage, First Layer.
In a single night.
Outside, others struggled for weeks to reach the same point.
But power did not go unnoticed.
Across the sect, in a chamber veiled by spirit wards, two elders sat facing a mirror of bronze flame.
"That boy… he has the Heavenroot, but something else is buried within," said Elder Mo.
The second figure, masked and ancient, nodded. "A sealed inheritance. Perhaps a remnant of the Primordial Era."
Elder Mo frowned. "Shall we watch?"
"No," the figure said. "Let the heavens decide. Either he ascends… or he dies like the rest."