Prologue
For the past four days, unrelenting rain had poured over the Lingjian Zishui Sect, drenching the lands of the Zishui Clan without pause. The storm showed no sign of easing. Water flooded every path, thunder rumbled across the heavens, lightning split the skies apart, and fierce winds howled until all travel, all movement, came to a complete halt.
Inside one quiet chamber… a calamity was unfolding.
Two shadowy figures had pinned down a child, forcing poison into his mouth. The bottle's rim was pressed so tightly against his lips that he had no escape; his hands were restrained in an iron grip. He struggled, twisting and thrashing in desperation, but his muffled cries could find no sound. The room itself seemed to suffocate in silence, as though it could only weep quietly in helpless witness to this injustice.
---
Huoling Jinyan Sect
Jinyan Clan
That very same night…
A young boy hurried home, clutching medicine in his small hands. Rain plastered his clothes to his body as he finally reached the door. But…
It was already too late.
The house stood in darkness, eerily still. Only when lightning flashed did the shadows lift, revealing fragments of what lay hidden within. The roar of the storm outside was deafening, yet inside, an unnatural silence pressed down upon him, so heavy that even his heart seemed to refuse to beat....unwilling to face what awaited.
Step by cautious step, he entered.
Then.....
A thunderclap split the heavens, lightning struck the earth, and in that single blinding flash, his world collapsed. The medicine slipped from his trembling hands, shattering on the floor, spilling uselessly across the cold ground.
His knees buckled. He fell where he stood. Tears burst forth like a broken dam, flowing unchecked down his face.
Another flash of lightning.
And there....beside the table....lay two lifeless bodies, motionless and cold.