FALLEN HEAVEN: RISE OF FAIZI TIAN
Episode 2: The Flame Soul Stone – A Power Forgotten by the Heavens
The sun never rose on the village of Yunfeng that morning.
Smoke curled into the sky like the cries of the dead, as ashes rained softly over burned ruins. Where once laughter and life filled the valley, now there was only silence and death.
Among the rubble, a boy knelt.
Faizi Tian's knees bled against the shattered stones. His hands were blackened with ash and blood. In his lap lay the last remnants of his mother's robe, her scent already fading in the wind.
He did not cry.
His tears had run dry.
He looked at the sky. No gods answered. No stars gave light.
Then his chest pulsed.
A faint red glow emerged from beneath his torn shirt. The same glowing mark that had saved his life — the Flame Soul Stone — now beat in rhythm with his heartbeat. It was warm, alive, and ancient.
Suddenly, a voice echoed inside his mind. Not spoken, but felt.
"You are chosen... Child of fire... In your hatred, awaken."
Faizi gasped. The pain shot through his body like lightning. His limbs went stiff. His back arched.
Then came the fire.
It exploded from within his chest, spreading to his veins, bones, and even his soul. He screamed, but the sound was swallowed by the wind.
Visions struck his mind:
A volcano erupting under the sea...
A man standing alone against ten thousand demons...
A blade forged in a sun's core...
A soul burning for vengeance.
The stone was not just an object. It was a remnant of a forgotten age — from a time before gods ruled, when flame could shape fate.
It had found him. It had chosen him. And now… it was awakening him.
Faizi's body rose into the air.
His wounds sealed. His muscles tightened. The ashes around him formed a ring of glowing embers. The broken wooden sword at his side caught fire — but didn't burn. Instead, it absorbed the flame, changing. Cracks ran along its body, but within them, red light pulsed like molten lava.
When he landed back to the ground, everything had changed.
His eyes now glowed red with flickers of flame. His body radiated heat. His aura — though untrained — felt like a wild beast struggling to break free.
Faizi looked at his hands. He could feel power — raw and angry — coursing through his veins.
"I don't know what you are," he whispered to the stone in his chest, "but if you give me the strength… I will use it. I will kill them all."
He picked up the sword.
A faint flame licked the blade's edge. Not enough to scare a real warrior — but more than any boy had held before.
Suddenly, a crunch of leaves echoed from the trees. Faizi spun, eyes alert.
A wounded demon, half-burnt, crawled from the edge of the forest — the same one that had killed his parents. Its black blood dripped onto the grass.
"You… you shouldn't be alive..." it hissed.
Faizi didn't answer.
He walked forward, slowly, without fear.
The demon snarled and lunged.
Faizi raised the sword.
There was no technique. No cultivation style. Just rage.
He swung — and the flaming blade cleaved through the demon's neck.
The head rolled. The body dropped.
Silence returned.
Faizi stood above the corpse, his breath heavy.
For the first time, he had taken a life. And yet, he didn't feel guilt.
He felt clarity.
"I'll hunt them. I'll train. I'll become stronger. Until the day no demon walks free."
"I swear it on their graves."
And so, began the path of Faizi Tian — the flame-born orphan, wielder of forgotten power. His journey into cultivation had started not with books or teachers, but with blood and vengeance.
The heavens had forgotten him.
But he… would never forget.