"I have no spiritual root, no cultivation arts,
but I have pain, I have will, and I have enemies."
—
The darkness faded.
The sky began to pale.
Outside the ruined temple, half-melted snow still clung to the earth.
Cold wind swept through the ash and rotting leaves.
Shen stood barefoot before the temple, unmoving.
His body was still weak.
He hadn't slept the night before.
Dark circles hung heavily under his eyes.
But in this moment, his gaze was clearer—and sharper—than that of many cultivators.
He stared at a massive slab of green stone in front of him.
It had once been the base of an incense burner.
Now it was cracked and broken.
He was going to lift it.
Not for any particular reason.
Only to prove to himself—
> "This body is mine. And it's not trash."
—
Shen took a deep breath, crouched, wrapped his arms tightly around the edge of the stone, and pushed with all his leg strength.
Crack—
He felt his spine nearly snap.
Pain exploded in his chest.
His elbows split open instantly.
The stone didn't move an inch.
His face turned crimson.
Blood seeped from his forehead.
Then he collapsed to the ground, panting violently.
He didn't curse.
He didn't scream.
He just lay there, silently watching the sky turn from black to gray, and from gray to blue.
—
> "This is the starting point."
Shen stood up again.
His legs trembled.
He leaned on the wall and staggered back into the temple.
He lit the firepit, scooped a bowl of the bitter tonic he'd boiled the night before using wild grass and venomous vines, and drank it, one mouthful at a time.
The taste was unbearable.
Like swallowing rusted metal mixed with rotting flesh.
His throat burned.
His stomach twisted.
But he didn't waste a drop.
This was his way of strengthening his body—
To shock the immune system.
Stimulate his organs.
Force his blood to circulate faster.
He had no system.
No spiritual root.
No resources.
He could only rely on his previous life's battlefield medicine and extreme human training theories,
To turn this broken flesh into a living weapon.
—
Thus began a path of cultivation—
That had nothing to do with immortality.
At dawn, behind the temple among dead trees, he ran laps with weighted stones tied to his bare body, dragging the load like a beast.
At noon, under the scorching sun, he stood on his hands against the wall, falling again and again,
until his palms tore open and his elbows bled.
At dusk, he soaked his feet in icy water,
then pierced his wounds to drain the pus,
and applied crushed wild herbs to force regeneration.
At night, he sat by the fire, sketching.
Stroke by stroke, he reproduced assassination techniques from his past life:
Vital targets on the human body.
Footwork for close combat.
Poison formulas.
Blast construction theories.
He engraved them into his bones.
—
But the days were painful.
Excruciatingly painful.
Once, he fractured his ankle.
His lower leg swelled like a loaf of bread.
He leaned against the temple pillar,
splinted the bone with wood,
and tightly bound it with cloth.
He didn't make a sound.
Cold sweat soaked his back.
He bit down on wood to keep from passing out.
He didn't scream—
Because no one would come.
No one cared.
—
That night, he lay beside the fire,
his whole body aching like it had been dismantled.
Eyes hollow, he stared at the roof as starlight flickered beyond.
> "A cultivator would have taken a healing pill and begun meditation by now."
"But me—I'm using pain to force my body into shape."
His throat was dry.
He sat up with difficulty and looked at the drawing spread out before him.
A crude schematic of a wooden throwing device—
A Bone Spike Launcher.
He would craft his first assassination weapon.
Even with shoddy materials, he would make it himself.
He had no master.
No teacher.
But he had memory.
Hands.
And hatred.
—
The tenth day.
Shen finally pushed the green stone half a foot.
That moment—
He threw his head back and laughed.
He laughed until his lungs burned,
tears welling at the corners of his eyes.
Not because he was happy—
But because in those ten days—
He nearly died twice,
fainted three times,
and burned with fever for two nights.
He survived.
And not just survived—
He grew stronger.
His back began to show muscle definition.
His arms carried real, scarred strength.
His eyes were no longer hollow, but cold, focused—like blades.
—
That night, he conducted his first poison test.
He gathered Bloodvine, Soulpierce Grass, and Wailing Flower, three low-grade toxic plants.
He mashed them with rotten meat, soaked the mixture in alcohol, and sun-dried it.
What remained was a small amount of gray-brown powder.
He scraped a bit onto bark and fed it to a rat-beast.
Moments later, the creature twitched violently,
its pupils dilated,
and it bit off its own tongue before dying.
Shen's eyes narrowed.
> "Effective."
He was no immortal.
He didn't control spiritual energy.
But he knew poison.
He knew symptoms.
He could deduce dosages from the slightest signs.
He was an assassin.
His goal wasn't to defeat enemies in open battle—
But to take lives when they least expected it.
—
He continued to sketch, designing—
Sleeve-dart launchers
Poison powder bombs
Simple tear gas dispersal bags
Every item replicated the principles of modern weapons using the cheapest materials he could find.
He wasn't in a rush.
This was all just preparation.
—
One evening—
He stood outside the temple,
gazing at a flying vessel streaking across the distant sky—
A patrolling cultivator from Lingyun Sect.
He said nothing.
Unmoving, like a statue.
After a long moment, he whispered—
> "One year. No more."
"In one year,
my blade will be sharp enough to cut your throats."