The night of Selection carried a quiet kind of tension soft enough that the younger children didn't notice, but sharp enough to sit beneath my skin like a splinter. Lanterns floated above the Longwei courtyard, their warm gold light drifting like small boats across the dark. Every year, the clan tested its children for signs of eye awakening, but this year felt different.
Maybe it was because I was finally seventeen.
Old enough that people whispered I might never awaken anything at all.
When Elder Yun called my name, the sound snapped across the courtyard like a pulled thread.
"Jian Longwei. Step forward."
Conversations hushed. I felt dozens of eyes turn toward me some curious, some dismissive, a few pitying. I kept my face calm as I moved to the testing platform. Inside, my pulse beat a little too loudly.
The pedestal held a shallow bowl of clear water. The testing formation carved beneath it hummed faintly, waiting for contact.
"Hand on the basin," Elder Yun said. "Circulate your Qi as instructed."
His tone was bored. Expected. The clan produced few true prodigies each decade. Most of us were destined to remain supporting pillars at best, sturdy, loyal, and unremarkable.
I placed my palm on the rim. The stone was cool. The water stilled at my touch.
Deep breath. Draw in the Qi.
My internal channels were… well, let's call them serviceable. I'd worked hard for what little progress I had. Qi moved slowly through me, but it moved. I guided the energy down my arm and into my hand.
A warm pulse spilled into the basin.
For a moment, the water glowed soft crimson, gentle, almost embarrassed to be seen. A few murmurs drifted through the air.
"That's something."
"Barely."
"Another ordinary child."
The glow faded before I could even hope it might strengthen.
Elder Yun sighed through his nose. "Unawakened. You may try again next year."
Next year. The words pressed into me heavier than they should.
I stepped away, quiet and composed. My cousin Lan brushed past me on her way to be tested again for refinement; she flashed me an elegant smirk.
"Still nothing, cousin?" she whispered. "Heaven must be busy."
"Or it's waiting until someone else stops talking long enough to listen to it," I murmured back.
Her smile tightened.
The testing continued bursts of light, gasps, disappointment, routine. Once, the bowl shattered for a boy younger than me. Threads of silver danced in his eyes. The elders whisked him away instantly.
A prodigy. Good for him.
Bad for my chances of being remembered after tonight.
When the ceremony finally ended near midnight, the courtyard loosened. Families clustered together, speaking in warm, hopeful tones. Some children bragged. Some cried. The lanterns swayed overhead, their light softening the edges of the night.
I turned to leave the inner courtyard when something at my hip chimed.
A soft glow pulsed from the small jade slip my father had given me.
[Come to the inner hall. Now.]
The message played in my head as if he was there.
My father didn't send messages lightly. A prickling sensation crawled up my spine.
I changed course immediately.
The path toward the central grounds was unusually still. Even the lanterns seemed to burn quieter. As I passed the ancestral hall, a chill brushed my neck. The stone lions standing guard felt like they were watching me not in the usual stoic way, but with a tension so subtle it barely registered.
Something's wrong.
The realization settled in my chest before I even reached the edge of the courtyard.
Then I saw it.
The sky above the main hall shifted from dark purple to crimson alive, pulsing, spreading like ink dropped into water.
This was not a sunset. This was not a natural phenomenon.
This was a wound.
My steps faltered. A low vibration hummed through the air, threading into my bones. The lantern light dimmed. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.
A figure lay sprawled near the courtyard gate.
A guard.
His armor was dented, not broken. His weapon still sheathed.
But his eyes…
His eyes were empty.
Not dead, not blind, empty. The pupils were gone, erased, replaced with a dull grey sheen that reflected nothing.
My breath caught.
Another body. A servant girl. A toppled tray beside her. Another guard. An elder slumped forward, fingers frozen mid-seal.
Every pair of eyes were the same: blank, hollow windows.
Something had taken their sight. No… something had taken the meaning of their sight.
I forced myself forward, each step heavier than the last.
Shouts erupted near the center of the courtyard. Not the disciplined calls of trained guards ragged, terrified voices.
I pushed through a corridor of fallen clan members and emerged into the heart of the main grounds.
There, a dozen cloaked figures stood in a loose circle. Their robes were deep indigo trimmed with thin silver lines, each marked with a sigil: an open black eye split by a diagonal crack.
The sight twisted my stomach.
The Heaven's Gaze Pavilion.
I'd seen their mark only in books. Rumors described them as collectors of rare ocular bloodlines, moving quietly through the continent like vultures waiting for something to die.
My father stood before them.
His robe was torn at the sleeve, his blade drawn, blood streaking his cheek and chin. Despite the chaos around him, his stance remained unbroken.
My mother knelt behind him, desperately tending to a fallen elder.
Fear gripped my heart like a physical hand.
A single figure stepped forward. His mask was porcelain white, expressionless, with one black eye painted on the forehead.
When he spoke, his voice was calm.
"Patriarch Longwei. We came peacefully. You chose violence."
My father spat blood to the side. "Do not pretend righteousness. You came to rob my clan."
"You protect something that belongs to heaven," the masked man said. "A sealed demon eye. An eye capable of seeing through heaven's order. Such power must not remain in mortal hands."
"That 'mortal' is my son," my father growled.
My blood froze.
Son? They came for me?
I'd always thought my lack of awakening was simply misfortune. But my father's words twisted something in my understanding.
My entire life had been carefully constrained, no leaving the clan grounds, no participation in inter-clan exchanges, no traveling with caravans.
I thought it was because I wasn't talented enough to be worth risk.
But what if it was the opposite?
"What did you do?" I whispered, too quietly for anyone to hear.
The masked man lifted one hand.
The crimson sky pulsed.
Qi pressure slammed outward, cracking tiles beneath our feet. A sickening wave of spiritual force rolled through the courtyard. More bodies fell.
"Take the vessel alive. Kill the rest."
My heart jolted.
Vessel.
I turned to run.
A cloaked figure detached from the group and glided toward me with measured steps. Not rushing. Not worried.
As if my escape was an illusion he'd already seen through.
The air in front of me surged.
A red barrier materialized, humming sharply. I crashed into it and bounced back, hitting the stone hard enough to rattle my teeth.
Pain exploded down my spine.
The cloaked man approached, pale lips curving faintly beneath his masked upper face.
"Be honored, child," he said softly. "Few are chosen by heaven."
"Save your breath," I rasped. "I'm not joining your cult."
His smile thinned. "You do not need to join. You need only obey fate."
He lifted his hand.
Invisible force slammed into my throat and lifted me off the ground. My legs kicked uselessly as I clawed at empty air. Pressure tightened, cutting off breath, thought, everything.
My vision blurred.
But behind the growing darkness, something stirred.
A pressure behind my eyes…sharp, molten, alive.
A voice cut through the suffocating haze.
[Do you want to see?]
Not heard. Felt.
[Do you want to see what heaven hides?]
The pain in my eyes became unbearable.
My father's roar echoed across the courtyard. Something colossal shattered. The sky trembled.
I could barely think, barely breathe, but inside, my answer rose clear and fierce.
Yes.
The seal broke.
Fire erupted behind my eyes. I screamed at least; I think I did. Blood poured down my cheeks. My vision twisted, shattered, then reformed.
And suddenly -
I saw everything.
Not with normal sight.
Threads of light crisscrossed the world, Qi currents, hidden flaws, spiritual patterns woven through stone, air, flesh. The cloaked man before me was wrapped in shimmering lines.
And one of them, a small black knot pulsing near his collarbone shone like a beacon.
A weakness.
A fatal flaw.
My body moved before thought caught up.
Qi surged wildly through my damaged meridians, burning through blockages that should have taken months to break. I hit the ground, rolled, and lunged.
The man reacted, thrusting out a hand. A wave of force shot toward me.
But I could see its trajectory before it formed.
I dodged by inches.
My strike pierced the black knot at his throat.
There was no explosion.
Just a soft, sickening collapse.
His Qi convulsed inward. Light snapped inside his meridians like breaking glass. Blood sprayed beneath his mask.
He dropped to his knees.
"You…" he gasped. "Your eyes…"
I wiped blood from my face. My vision pulsed, threads flickering.
"I see you," I whispered.
Behind us, the masked leader turned toward me.
Even across the courtyard, his presence pressed against my skull like an axe against wood.
"The Heaven-Piercing Demon Eye," he whispered. "So, they sealed it inside a child."
Cold dread flooded me.
His attention fixed on me completely.
But beneath the fear, something else churned in my chest. Hard, bright, unyielding.
Resolve.
From this moment on, I would never again close my eyes to the truth.
I would find every flaw in heaven's grand design.
And when the time came -
I would make the sky itself bleed.