Chapter 3: Blades in the Shadows
The Seraphic Blade Sect's flying ship arrived on a Tuesday, which Alex found cosmically amusing. In his first life, Tuesdays had been for team meetings and project deadlines. In his second, they had been for stellar conquest planning sessions. Now, a Tuesday marked his departure from the only home his third life had known.
His mother cried. She didn't understand why the sect would want her "frail" son, but she wouldn't question fortune. She packed him meals for a week, sewed protective talismans into his robes, and held him until Patriarch Shen gently pulled her away.
"Let the boy breathe, Lian Mei. This is his chance."
His chance to die in a den of killers, Alex translated. The Seraphic Blade Sect wasn't called the "kindest" of the great powers. They were the knife in the dark, the assassins' academy, the place where mercy went to be forgotten. Perfect for his purposes.
Mina stood at the back of the farewell crowd, the phoenix pendant glowing softly against her skin where she'd tucked it beneath her clothes. Alex caught her eye and winked—the first genuine expression he'd allowed himself in years. She blushed and looked away.
Shen Wei boarded the ship with two other selected disciples, his smug expression faltering when he saw Alex climbing the gangplank.
"What is he doing here?" Shen Wei demanded of Elder Tian.
"The will of the sect is not for you to question, disciple." Elder Tian's rebuke was sharp. "Mind your place."
The flight to the sect headquarters took three days. Alex spent them in his cramped cabin, cultivating silently while the system mapped the ship's structure, the crew's cultivation levels, and the spatial coordinates of their destination. The other disciples—including Shen Wei—avoided him, whispering about the "broken boy who got lucky."
On the third night, the system alerted him:
[Incoming Transmission: Encrypted | Source: Li Xianling]
[Message: "The sect's inner disciple trials have a 60% fatality rate. The outer disciples will try to kill you before you even reach the inner gates. Survive. - S"]
Alex smiled. Even as an enemy, Seraphine was useful.
The Seraphic Blade Sect's mountain headquarters emerged from the clouds like a sword stabbed into heaven itself. Nine peaks, each representing a different aspect of the blade: Swift, Heavy, Poison, Illusion, Void, Fire, Ice, Thunder, and the central peak—Death.
Alex and the other new recruits were herded into the Outer Disciple Courtyard, a brutalist complex of stone and suffering. An inner disciple with a scarred face addressed them without warmth.
"Welcome to your new home. Outer disciples are the sect's foundation. You will work. You will bleed. You will die. Those who survive might become useful."
The orientation was simple: They had three days to settle in. Then the first trial would begin—a free-for-all competition in the Blade Graveyard, where ancient broken swords leaked killing intent and desperate outer disciples fought for the limited slots to advance.
Shen Wei and the other Azure Phoenix disciples immediately formed an alliance, their talents attracting followers. Alex stood alone, examining the graveyard's entrance with the eye of someone who had surveyed battlefields across galaxies.
[Analysis: Blade Graveyard contains 3,247 discarded sword spirits. Each can be absorbed for 5-50 Destiny Points.]
[Optimal Strategy: Collect spirits during chaos, avoid direct combat]
The first trial began at dawn. Fifty new outer disciples entered the Graveyard. The rules were simple: Survive for six hours. Collect sword spirits. The top ten collectors would gain access to the sect's cultivation manuals.
Within the first hour, three disciples died. Shen Wei's alliance moved like a pack of wolves, dominating the best hunting grounds.
Alex moved like a ghost. He didn't hunt sword spirits—they came to him. The system's "Sovereign's Resonance" skill, unlocked at Foundation Building, made him appear as the dominant predator in the area. Sword spirits, being simple entities, submitted without a fight.
He collected forty-seven spirits in silence, storing them in his spatial ring. When Shen Wei's group encountered him near the Graveyard's edge, they saw only a scared boy hiding.
"Look, the cripple is trying to stay out of everyone's way," Shen Wei sneered. "Smart. Maybe you'll survive by being too pathetic to kill."
Alex bowed his head and scurried away, letting them take credit for the "empty territory" he'd just cleared.
By hour four, only thirty disciples remained. The killing intent of the Graveyard was affecting their minds, driving them to desperation. Shen Wei's alliance began fracturing as they turned on each other.
Alex found a quiet corner and began absorbing the sword spirits. Each one dissolved into destiny points, filling his reserves.
[Destiny Points: 240 | System Evolution Progress: 4/10]
The system offered a new option:
[Special Purchase Available: Sword Saint Legacy (Fragment) - 200 DP]
[Description: Grants mastery of the First Blade Principle. Perfect for current setting.]
Alex purchased it. The knowledge poured into him—not as power, but as understanding. He saw the sword not as a weapon but as an extension of will, a concept he had grasped in his Sovereign life but never truly felt.
When the six hours ended, Alex emerged with exactly ten sword spirits—enough to place him at ninth rank, but not so many as to attract suspicion. Shen Wei had twenty-three, placing him second. The top rank went to a scarred girl from a rival clan who had killed four competitors.
Elder Tian looked over the results with cold satisfaction. "The weak have been culled.从今天开始, you are truly outer disciples."
The next month was a brutal routine of labor, study, and constant danger. Outer disciples slept four to a room, their quarters unprotected. Robbery and assault were common. Shen Wei, elevated by his trial performance, became a minor boss in the outer courtyard, extorting weaker disciples for their meager cultivation resources.
He never targeted Alex. It was as if his "pathetic" cousin had become invisible, beneath notice.
[Passive Skill Enhanced: Social Cloaking]
[You are now beneath the notice of anyone more than one full realm above you]
Alex used his invisibility to explore. The sect's nine peaks each held secrets, and the system's mapping function created a perfect three-dimensional model of the entire complex. He identified three hidden troves of abandoned cultivation manuals, two corrupt elders selling sect secrets, and one sealed chamber beneath the Death Peak that even the system couldn't fully scan.
[Warning: Sealed chamber contains entity matching Soul Realm signatures. Approach with caution.]
The entity became his obsession. A Soul Realm being, sealed and contained. It could be a source of information, a potential ally, or a deadly threat. But accessing it would require inner disciple status.
He needed to accelerate his plan.
The monthly outer disciple ranking tournament arrived. Alex watched from the sidelines as Shen Wei fought his way to the top twenty, his techniques flashy but fundamentally flawed. The boy had talent but no true comprehension—a common problem in this age where cultivation speed trumped understanding.
After the tournament, Alex approached the scarred girl who had won the first trial. Her name was Mei Ling, and she was an outcast even among outcasts.
"I can help you reach Foundation Establishing within three months," Alex said quietly, his voice that of a shy boy making an embarrassing offer.
She laughed in his face. "Piss off, cripple."
He persisted. "Your scar. It's not from a blade—it's a qi deviation from forced breakthrough. Your meridians are twisted. I have a... technique that can fix it."
She stopped laughing. Her hand touched the scar that ran from temple to jaw. "How could you know that?"
"Lucky guess." Alex handed her a jade slip—one of the hidden manuals he'd found, modified by the system to address her specific deviation. "Try the first exercise tonight. If it works, come find me. If it doesn't, tell everyone I'm a fraud."
She took the slip, suspicion warring with desperate hope.
The next day, Mei Ling found him in the library. She didn't speak, just sat beside him and opened a book. But her spiritual pressure was different—smoother, more controlled.
Alex smiled inwardly. First ally acquired.
He spent the next two months building a network of the overlooked and underestimated. A boy with a burned hand who could sense spiritual herbs better than any talent. A girl whose stutter concealed a perfect memory for formations. A quiet disciple from a destroyed clan who knew more about poisons than the sect's instructors.
None of them were powerful. All of them were invisible.
Just like him.
Together, they became his Shadow Garden—a term from his Sovereign days for his intelligence network. Through them, he learned which elders could be bribed, which disciples were planning betrayals, and most importantly, how to access the Death Peak's sealed chamber.
The answer was heartbreaking in its simplicity: The chamber could only be opened by someone with "the blood of an innocent, freely given."
In the brutal world of the Seraphic Blade Sect, innocence was rarer than divine artifacts.
But Alex had Mina's pendant. And through it, he had a connection to pure, selfless intention. It wasn't blood, but the system's analysis suggested that intent might be more powerful.
He just needed to reach Foundation Establishing first.
The breakthrough came on a night when the moons aligned—a celestial event that flooded the world with yin energy. Alex retreated to the Blade Graveyard, now empty and quiet. He sat among the broken swords and let the system's "Omniscient Meditation" drink in the moonlight.
Foundation Building to Foundation Establishing was a qualitative change. In normal cultivators, it took years of accumulation. For Alex, with the Golden Core essence still integrating and the sword spirits' power flowing through him, it took exactly forty-seven minutes.
[Realm Achievement: Foundation Establishing]
[Warning: Spiritual signature expanding beyond concealment parameters]
[Emergency Protocol: Deploy False Meridian Rupture illusion]
To any observer—and there were a few, drawn by the Graveyard's unusual energy fluctuations—it would appear as if a disciple had attempted a reckless breakthrough and failed disastrously. The resulting spiritual chaos would mask Alex's true ascension.
It worked perfectly. The next morning, Alex returned to the outer courtyard with his aura still showing Qi Condensing, but his foundation now as solid as bedrock.
Mei Ling noticed immediately. "You're different," she said, her scarred face serious.
"So are you," Alex replied. She had reached Foundation Building last week, thanks to his guidance. "Ready for the next step?"
She nodded. The Shadow Garden was ready.
Their target was the monthly shipment of spirit stones from the Death Peak's mines. Officially, it was transported by inner disciples with Golden Core elders as escort. Unofficially, Alex's network had discovered a secret: The sect allowed outer disciples to "test themselves" by attempting to steal from the shipment. Success meant recruitment into the inner circle. Failure meant death.
It was how the Seraphic Blade Sect found its truly ruthless members.
The heist was planned with military precision that would have made Alex's past life's generals weep with joy. Mei Ling would create a diversion using a formation Alex had designed. The herb-sensing boy would identify the weakest point in the transport's guarding array. The poison expert would disable the inner disciple escorts without killing them—death would bring investigation.
And Alex would take the stones.
Not many. Just enough to register on the sect's ledgers but not enough to trigger war. Exactly 3% of the shipment—an amount that would seem like incompetence rather than theft.
The night of the heist, Alex stood atop the Blade Graveyard's highest point, watching the transport ship descend through the clouds. The system had granted him a new skill for reaching Foundation Establishing:
[Active Skill Unlocked: Void Step (Micro)]
[Description: Short-range teleportation, max range 10 meters. Completely silent.]
He vanished and reappeared on the transport's hull, his presence masked by the Shadow Garden's coordinated chaos. The guard arrays recognized him as "authorized personnel"—a backdoor code he'd spent weeks inserting through tiny, innocuous maintenance queries.
Inside the cargo hold, he found not just spirit stones but something else. A cage containing a small creature, no larger than a cat, with scales that shimmered like a dying star. It looked at Alex with eyes that held galaxies.
[Legendary Creature Detected: Void Kitten (Infant)]
[Status: Bound for experimentation. Bond potential: EXALTED]
[System Recommendation: Acquire at all costs.]
Alex didn't hesitate. He took the creature, storing it in his spatial ring alongside 3% of the spirit stones, and Void Stepped away into darkness.
The heist was a success. The Shadow Garden's members were rewarded with silent promotions to inner disciple candidates. The transport's crew was punished for their "incompetence."
And Alex returned to his room to find Li Xianling waiting.
"You stole from Death Peak," she said, not a question. "Do you have any idea what you've awakened?"
Alex set the spatial ring on his desk. "I know exactly what I've awakened. The question is, Seraphine—are you ready to help me kill it?"
She looked at the ring, at the boy who shouldn't exist, and for the first time since their reunion, she smiled.
"Tell me your plan, Void Emperor."
[Chapter 3 Complete]
[System Evolution Progress: 5/10]
[New Companion: Void Kitten (Bonding in Progress)]
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[END OF CHAPTER 3]
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