He didn't sleep that night.
Hundun sat on the windowsill of the servants' quarters, tail wrapped around his paws. Moonlight turned his silver-black fur into liquid metal.
"First lesson," the fox said. "The Mindforge Sutra is not a weapon. It's a cultivation path. The Path of the Soul."
Zichen sat on his thin bedroll, legs crossed. His elbows stung where the skin had scraped off in the cave. The bandages he'd wrapped were already turning pink.
"I thought my dantian was empty," he said.
"Your qi dantian is empty. You have no spiritual root. You cannot gather qi, form a core, or cultivate in any normal way."
"So I'm still trash."
Hundun's golden eyes narrowed. "I wasn't finished. Your qi dantian is empty — but your soul dantian is not. Most cultivators don't even know they have one. It sits behind the normal dantian, deeper, hidden. Yours is... abnormally large."
Silence.
"How large?"
"Imagine a lake where most people have a cup."
Zichen blinked. "That sounds like it should be a good thing."
"It is. For the Mindforge Sutra. Your soul space is the fuel. The bigger the space, the more seeds you can plant. The more minds you can touch."
A rat scratched at the door.
Zichen opened it. The same rat from the courtyard sat there, black eyes staring up. It had followed him back. It had been waiting outside his door for three hours.
Hundun glanced at it. "Your first soldier is reporting for duty."
"It's a rat."
"Every empire starts somewhere. Most just don't start this low."
Zichen picked up the rat. It sat in his palm, calm. He could feel the thread connecting them — thin, warm, like a strand of silk running from his mind to the rat's tiny brain.
"How many of these can I make?" he asked.
"Seeds? Right now, with your untrained soul, maybe two or three. On humans. Animals are easier — their minds are simpler, less resistance. But a human mind has walls. Beliefs. Ego. Breaking through costs more energy."
"And if I run out of energy?"
"Nosebleed. Headache. Blackout." Hundun paused. "If you push much further past that, your brain liquefies. But that's at least three seeds past your limit, so don't worry about it."
"DON'T WORRY ABOUT—"
"I said three past your limit. Can you count to three?"
Zichen closed his eyes. Breathed.
This fox is going to kill me faster than any cultivator.
Morning came gray and cold.
Zichen pulled on his servant robes. The fabric caught his elbow bandages. He hissed through his teeth.
Hundun sat on his shoulder, invisible to everyone else. The fox existed in a state between physical and spiritual — only Zichen could see and hear him. To the rest of the world, Zichen was just a servant talking to himself.
Which, honestly, wasn't that different from before.
The rat was waiting outside the door again.
"Go," Zichen told it. "Don't follow me. You'll draw attention."
The rat tilted its head. Then it turned and scurried into a crack in the wall.
Hundun sniffed. "Obedient. Loyal. Doesn't ask questions. Better than most humans already."
The morning meal was the usual affair. Servants ate in the back kitchen — cold rice, pickled vegetables, water that tasted like the pot hadn't been cleaned since the sect's founding.
Zichen ate quietly in the corner.
The door slammed open.
"Wei! Where's my laundry?"
Chen Bao. Inner disciple. Qi Formation, fourth stage. Built like a wall and roughly as intelligent. He had made bullying Zichen his personal hobby since they were both twelve.
Zichen stood. "It's drying on the eastern rack. I washed it last night."
"Last night? I needed it THIS morning." Chen Bao stepped closer. He was a full head taller. Qi radiated from him in waves — not strong by any real standard, but strong enough to make Zichen's skin prickle. "What's the point of a servant who can't even do laundry on time?"
Three other disciples watched from the doorway. Smiling. Waiting for the show.
Same script, Zichen thought. Different day.
He lowered his head. "I apologize, Senior Brother Chen. I'll do better."
"You'll do better? You've been saying that for ten years. You're useless, Wei. Empty dantian, empty head."
The watchers laughed.
Hundun's voice whispered from his shoulder. "This one has a spatial ring under his robe. Three spirit stones inside. Want me to—"
No.
"What about a small loan? We give him five spirit stones now, charge him thirty back—"
No, Hundun.
"You have no business sense."
Zichen kept his head down. Chen Bao shoved his shoulder. Not hard enough to bruise. Just hard enough to remind him of the order of things.
Actually, Zichen thought, this one will do nicely.
It happened in the space between one breath and the next.
Chen Bao's hand was on Zichen's shoulder. Skin contact. The most basic requirement.
Zichen reached — not with his hand, but with something behind his eyes. Something new. The thread that connected him to the rat was thin and light. The thread he now pushed toward Chen Bao was like shoving a rope through a stone wall.
Resistance.
Chen Bao's mind wasn't empty like the rat's. It had shape. Structure. Walls built from four years of cultivation, a lifetime of arrogance, and the unshakable belief that he was better than everyone in this room.
Ego, Hundun observed quietly. Thick ego. Hard shell, soft center. Push through the arrogance — there's insecurity underneath. He bullies you because he's afraid of being bullied himself. Use that.
Zichen pushed.
Not against the wall. Under it. Through the cracks where the insecurity lived. Through the gap between "I am strong" and "am I strong enough?"
A thread slipped through.
It was tiny. A single silk strand in a mind full of noise. Chen Bao wouldn't feel it. Not now. Not for days. The seed would sit there, quiet, and slowly — so slowly — it would grow.
Stage 1: Sprout.
Effect: A slight, unexplainable warmth toward Wei Zichen.
Nothing more. Nothing dramatic. Just... a feeling. The kind you don't question because it's too small to notice.
Zichen let go.
The world tilted.
He grabbed the table edge. His vision blurred. A sharp pain lanced through his skull — like someone had driven a needle from his left eye to the back of his head.
Something warm ran from his nose.
Blood.
He covered it with his sleeve. Coughed. Turned away.
"Hey," Chen Bao said behind him. His voice was different. Not softer, but... less sharp. "...Watch the laundry next time."
He left. No second shove. No parting insult. Just a vague sense that the confrontation wasn't worth continuing.
The three watchers looked confused. Chen Bao always went for the second hit.
Not today.
Zichen made it to the washroom before his legs gave out.
He sat on the wet stone floor, head between his knees. Blood dripped from his nose in slow, steady drops. His hands shook.
Hundun materialized beside him, golden eyes serious for the first time.
"Verdict?"
"Headache," Zichen managed. "Bad one."
"That was one seed. On a Qi Formation fourth-stage nobody. A real cultivator — Golden Core or above — would have cost you ten times that. You'd be unconscious. Or dead."
"Encouraging."
"It's realistic. You're a mortal trying to touch the mind of someone who has qi reinforcing their brain. It's like punching a stone wall with a bare fist."
"So what do I do?"
"You get stronger. The Sutra has training methods. Meditation for the soul. Exercises to expand your capacity. And..." Hundun hesitated. "You need to start cultivating. Not qi. Soul energy. It's different. Slower. But it will make your seeds stronger, your reach longer, and your brain less likely to melt."
Zichen wiped the blood from his upper lip. "How long until I can handle more than two or three?"
"Weeks. Months. Depends on how hard you train."
"And how long until someone like an Elder?"
Hundun laughed. It was a dry, sharp sound. "Years, boy. Elders are Nascent Soul at minimum. Their mental defenses would crush your seed like an insect. You try to plant a seed in a Nascent Soul cultivator right now, you won't get a nosebleed. You'll get a funeral."
The door opened.
"Zichen?"
He looked up. Blood on his sleeve. Pale face. Shaking hands.
Luo Qingwu stood in the doorway. Her eyes went wide.
"What happened? Are you hurt? Is that blood?"
"Nosebleed," he said. "It's dry air. I'm fine."
She knelt beside him. Her hand touched his forehead — cool, gentle. Her brow furrowed.
"You're burning up."
"I said I'm fine."
"You always say you're fine. You said you were fine when you broke three fingers carrying cauldrons last winter. You said you were fine when you didn't eat for two days during the—"
"Qingwu."
She stopped.
He looked at her. She was close. Worried. Real.
No seed. No thread. No manipulation. She was here because she chose to be.
Something in his chest tightened.
Don't, he told himself. Don't get attached. Attachment is a leash. And I've worn enough leashes.
Hundun, sitting invisibly on the sink, watched this exchange with unusual silence. His golden eyes moved from Qingwu to Zichen and back.
He said nothing. That was somehow worse.
Zichen returned to the courtyard an hour later. The headache had dulled to a low throb. His nose had stopped bleeding. His hands were steady again.
Chen Bao was practicing sword forms in the eastern training yard.
He saw Zichen pass.
And he smiled.
"Morning, Wei," Chen Bao said. Casual. Easy. Like greeting an old friend.
Three disciples nearby turned and stared.
Chen Bao didn't notice their confusion. Why would he? He didn't feel any different. The warmth in his chest toward the servant boy was small. Natural. Barely there.
But it was there.
Zichen nodded back. "Good morning, Senior Brother Chen."
He kept walking. His face was blank.
Inside, his mind was racing.
It works. It actually works on humans. One seed. Barely a thread. And he went from shoving me to smiling at me in twelve hours.
What happens when I can plant ten? Fifty? A hundred?
What happens when I can reach an Elder?
He walked past the dormitory. Past the training grounds. Past the alchemy pavilion where Qingwu studied. Past the great hall where the Sect Leader meditated behind doors that hadn't opened in three years.
Each building. Each room. Each person.
A map was forming in his mind. Not of hallways and courtyards.
Of targets.
Hundun felt the shift. The fox's ears flattened.
"You're making a list," he said. "You're walking through the sect and making a list."
Zichen didn't deny it.
"I'm prioritizing," he said. "There's a difference."
"No," Hundun said quietly. "There really isn't."
The fox paused.
"But keep going. I want to see where this ends."