Kai explained everything.
Not because he wanted to, but because Director Lin deserved to know what she was facing. He told her about the Celestial Vault, the True Prophet, the bloodline markers, and Heaven's Eye's goal.
He did not tell her about being the War God. That secret stayed buried.
Director Lin listened without interrupting, her face growing progressively paler. When he finished, she sat down heavily in one of the conference room's few intact chairs.
"The Ministry has been investigating this for eight months," she said quietly. "Eight months. And we didn't even understand what we were looking at."
"You couldn't have known. This information is restricted to the highest levels of the Heavenly Realm."
"And yet you know it." Her eyes were sharp. "Who are you really, Kai Zhenwu?"
"Someone with more experience in cosmic-level threats than I'd prefer."
It wasn't an answer, and they both knew it. But Director Lin let it pass. "The seventh bloodline—if Heaven's Eye hasn't found them yet, we need to get there first. Can that jade slip identify who they are?"
Kai had been examining the slip while they talked, his divine sense parsing the information encoded within. Names, dates, locations—centuries of intelligence gathering.
And there, buried in the data: a name that made his blood run cold.
"No," he whispered.
"What? What is it?"
"The seventh bloodline." Kai looked up, his expression grim. "It's Chen Wei'er."
The room went dead silent.
"That's impossible," Director Lin said finally. "The Chen family isn't ancient. They have no cultivation heritage."
"Her mother's side." Kai scrolled through the genealogical data on the jade slip. "Chen Wei'er's maternal grandmother was Liu—Liu Xinyi. The Liu family are descendants of Liu Zheng, one of the original seven Vault keepers from five thousand years ago. The bloodline has been diluted through mortal marriages, but the marker is still there. Dormant, undetectable to normal spiritual sense, but present in the blood."
"Then Wei'er is in immediate danger."
"Yes."
As if summoned by her name, Wei'er burst into the conference room. "Kai! Thank God you're alive. I heard the explosion and thought—" She stopped, seeing his expression. "What's wrong?"
Kai stood. "We need to leave. Right now."
"What? Why—"
"Because you're the final piece Heaven's Eye needs to open the Celestial Vault, and they're probably already on their way here."
Wei'er blinked. "I'm sorry, what?"
Director Lin stood as well, her command training kicking in. "Lock down the building. Full defensive formations. Alert all Golden Core cultivators we're under potential attack by a hostile organization with Nascent Soul-level leadership."
Her subordinates rushed to comply.
"Director," Kai said urgently, "your formations won't hold. The True Prophet has been preparing for five thousand years. He'll have techniques specifically designed to breach Ministry defenses."
"Then what do you suggest?"
"We run. Take Wei'er somewhere unexpected, somewhere with no connection to her family or known associates. Buy time to figure out a real solution."
"Running is not the Ministry's way."
"Then the Ministry will die protecting a building while the real target escapes. Your choice."
Director Lin's jaw clenched. But she was pragmatic enough to recognize the truth when she heard it. "Fine. But I'm coming with you. If Wei'er is the key to preventing an apocalyptic scenario, she needs more protection than one Foundation Establishment cultivator can provide."
"I'm not Foundation—" Kai caught himself. "Fine. But we left immediately. Gather whoever you trust absolutely, no more than three people, and meet us at the northwest emergency exit in five minutes."
Director Lin nodded and ran.
Kai turned to Wei'er, who looked shell-shocked. "I know you have questions—"
"Questions?" Wei'er's voice was slightly hysterical. "Kai, I just found out I'm part of some ancient bloodline that makes me a target for a cult trying to open a vault full of god-killing weapons. Questions don't begin to cover it!"
"I know. And I promise, I'll explain everything. But right now, we need to survive the next twenty-four hours."
Wei'er took a deep breath, visibly forcing herself to calm. "Okay. Okay. What do you need me to do?"
"Trust me. Can you do that?"
She looked at him and really looked at him. At the man who'd been her husband's name for three years. The man who'd killed assassins without blinking. Who'd faced down a god and survived. Who was clearly so much more than he'd ever revealed.
"I don't even know who you are," she said quietly. "But yes. I trust you."
Kai felt something unexpected: guilt. She trusted him, and he was still lying to her about his true identity.
Later. He'd tell her later.
If they survived.
"Good. Let's go."
They moved through the Ministry building at a run. Alarms were blaring, cultivators were taking defensive positions, formations were activating throughout the structure.
And through it all, Kai's divine sense kept sweeping, checking for threats.
Which is why he detected them three minutes before they attacked.
Twenty cultivators, all at Golden Core or above, approaching from multiple directions. Moving with military precision. And at their center, a spiritual presence that registered as Nascent Soul but felt wrong, corrupted, twisted, ancient.
The True Prophet himself.
"They're here," Kai said, grabbing Wei'er's arm and pulling her into a side corridor. "Move faster!"
"I'm moving as fast as I can! Not all of us are superhuman cultivators!"
Kai made a split-second decision. "I'm sorry about this."
"Sorry about what—"
He picked her up, throwing her over his shoulder in a fireman's carry, and ran.
With his recovered cultivation, Kai's speed was beyond what mortals could track. The corridor blurred around them. Wei'er yelped in surprise and indignation.
They reached the northwest exit just as Director Lin arrived with three other cultivators—two men and one woman, all at Golden Core.
"They're here," Kai announced, setting Wei'er down. "Twenty hostiles, led by someone at Nascent Soul. We have maybe ninety seconds before they breach the building."
Director Lin's eyes widened. "Nascent Soul? In Haishi City? That's—"
The building shook.
Formations screamed as they overloaded. Somewhere above them, explosions echoed.
"Sixty seconds," Kai corrected. "Go!"
They burst through the emergency exit into the parking garage. Director Lin's vehicle was a reinforced Ministry van, designed to withstand spiritual attacks.
They piled in. The driver, one of Lin's Golden Core subordinates, gunned the engine.
They were fifty meters from the exit when the Ministry building exploded.
Not figuratively. Literally exploded.
The entire forty-story structure erupted in a pillar of black fire that reached into the sky. Glass and concrete and twisted metal rained down. The shockwave hit the van, sending it skidding sideways.
Wei'er screamed. The driver fought for control.
And through the flames, a figure walked.
He was tall, wearing robes that seemed woven from shadow. His face was hidden behind a white mask carved with the Heaven's Eye symbol. But his spiritual pressure was suffocating a weight that made even Director Lin's Golden Core cultivation feel insignificant.
The True Prophet raised one hand.
The van's engine died. The spiritual formations protecting it flickered and failed.
They were trapped.
Kai kicked open the van's door. "Everyone out! Scatter!"
"We can't fight him!" one of Lin's subordinates shouted. "He's a nascent soul! We'll die!"
"You'll die faster if you stay in the van!" Kai turned to Wei'er. "Run. Don't look back. Don't stop. Just run."
"I'm not leaving you—"
"You're the objective! If he gets you, this was all for nothing!" Kai pushed her toward Director Lin. "Protect her. That's an order."
Director Lin nodded grimly, grabbing Wei'er's arm.
The True Prophet continued his advance, moving slowly, deliberately. When he spoke, his voice was like grinding stones: "Kai Zhenwu. The fallen War God. I've waited five thousand years to meet you."
Kai stepped forward, positioning himself between the Prophet and the others. "Then you've waited five thousand years to be disappointed. I'm not who I was."
"No. You're weaker. Fragmented. Barely a shadow of your former glory." The Prophet tilted his head. "Yet you still stand before me. Courage, or stupidity?"
"Both, probably."
The Prophet laughed at the sound of breaking glass. "I like you. Under different circumstances, we might have been allies. Alas, you've chosen to oppose me. So you'll die. Again."
He moved.
Kai barely registered the motion before the Prophet was upon him, one hand reaching for his throat. Kai twisted, avoiding the grab, countering with a palm strike to the Prophet's chest—
His hand stopped six inches away, blocked by an invisible barrier of spiritual energy.
The Prophet's counterattack was a casual backhand that sent Kai flying twenty meters. He crashed into a concrete pillar hard enough to crack it.
Pain exploded through his body. Ribs broken. Internal injuries. His recovered cultivation was significant, but against a true Nascent Soul cultivator, it was nothing.
He'd bought maybe five seconds.
Kai struggled to his feet, coughing blood. "Run!" he shouted to the others.
They ran.
The Prophet watched them go without concern. "Let them. The woman cannot escape. Her blood calls to me. I'll find her anywhere in this city."
"Then you'll have to go through me first."
"I intend to." The Prophet walked forward slowly. "Tell me, War God. Do you know why the Jade Emperor really cast you down? It wasn't about power balance. That was a lie."
Kai froze. "What?"
"The Jade Emperor saw your future. Your destiny. In ten thousand years, you would become a threat to not just the Heavenly Realm, but to reality itself. So he ordered you destroyed before that future could come to pass." The Prophet stopped five meters away. "He fears you, Kai Zhenwu. And with good reason."
"You're lying."
"Am I? Search your feelings. You know it's true."
Kai's mind reeled. Could it be? Had the betrayal been about prophecy rather than politics?
The Prophet raised his hand, gathering dark energy. "But that future won't happen now. Because I'm going to erase you completely. Not even fragments will remain."
The attack came with a lance of pure destruction, moving faster than light, aimed directly at Kai's soul.
Kai had no defense.
He was going to die.
Again.
And then—
A sword appeared.
It materialized from nowhere, blazing with pure white light, intercepting the Prophet's attack. The two forces collided with a sound like reality tearing.
When the light faded, someone new stood between Kai and the Prophet.
A woman, young, wearing the robes of a wandering cultivator. Her cultivation was Nascent Soul, equal to the Prophet's. Her sword hummed with power that felt ancient, primal.
She didn't look at Kai. Her attention was fixed on the Prophet.
"Enough," she said quietly.
The Prophet tilted his head. "And who are you to interrupt?"
"Someone who can't let you kill him. Not yet." The woman's grip tightened on her sword. "Withdraw, True Prophet. Or test whether five thousand years of preparation can overcome ten thousand years of technique."
For a long moment, the Prophet was silent.
Then he laughed.
"Very well. I'll withdraw. For now." He looked past the woman to Kai. "But hear me, War God: the seventh bloodline will be mine. The Vault will open. And when it does, I'll reshape reality itself. Run all you want. Hide all you want. The end is inevitable."
He vanished, his form dissolving into shadow.
The woman lowered her sword and finally turned to face Kai.
He saw her face clearly for the first time.
And his world tilted.
"Hello, Brother," she said softly.
Kai's mouth went dry. "Meilin? You're... you're supposed to be dead."
"So are you." His sister, his younger sister who'd died in the Demon Abyss campaign ten thousand years ago.smiled sadly. "I guess we're both full of surprises."
Behind them, Director Lin and Wei'er had stopped running, staring at the scene in shock.
Kai had a thousand questions.
But only one came out:
"What the hell is going on?"