Tianchen didn't sleep that night.
The jade slip sat on his mattress, no larger than his thumb. In the moonlight filtering through his window, it looked ordinary. Dull green stone, slightly warm to the touch, with hairline cracks along one edge.
He picked it up and channeled the smallest thread of intent into it.
Knowledge flooded his mind.
Not words. Not images. Pure understanding, the way jade slips transferred information. The manual opened in his consciousness like a scroll unrolling. Diagrams of meridian pathways, descriptions of qi flow, fundamental principles of Foundation Realm cultivation.
Tianchen absorbed it all. His mind categorized and cross-referenced automatically, comparing what he was learning against eighteen years of observation.
Then the knowledge stopped.
Abruptly. Mid-sentence in the theoretical framework. Like a book with its final chapters torn out.
He withdrew his intent and opened his eyes. His heart beat steadily. The incompleteness wasn't a surprise. He'd found it in the discard pile, after all.
But what he'd learned in those few moments was more than he'd gained in eighteen years of watching from the outside.
The manual explained what qi circulation actually meant. Not the visible effects he'd seen during the assessment, but the internal mechanics. How spiritual energy entered through specific meridian gates. How it transformed as it cycled through the body's natural pathways. How the dantian served as both reservoir and refinery.
Simple concepts. Foundational ones.
The kind of knowledge every cultivator learned in their first month of training.
The kind Tianchen had never been allowed to know.
He set the jade slip down and stared at his hands. According to the manual, everyone possessed meridians. Even mortals. The difference was whether those meridians had been opened, whether they could channel qi instead of just containing it dormant.
His meridians had never been opened. The clan had seen to that.
But the manual described the process of opening them. Not completely, but enough to understand the theory.
Body tempering came first. Strengthening the physical vessel to withstand spiritual energy. Then meridian opening, forcing qi through sealed pathways until they yielded. Then circulation, establishing stable patterns of flow.
Three mandatory stages. Each one building on the last.
Tianchen lay back on his mattress. His small room was quiet except for distant night sounds. Somewhere in the clan grounds, someone was practicing sword forms. The rhythmic swish of blade through air carried through the darkness.
He thought about Li Feng's Heaven's Blessing Palm. The way golden light had gathered before dispersing into that hanging palm print.
Now he understood what he was seeing. The gathering phase was qi condensing in the upper dantian. The dispersal was controlled release through arm meridians. The palm print lingered because Li Feng's circulation wasn't quite smooth, there was a hitch in the flow that caused the technique to pulse instead of stream.
A flaw. Inefficient. It made the technique look more impressive but wasted spiritual energy.
Li Feng probably didn't even know.
Tianchen's lips twitched slightly. All these years, he'd watched cultivators perform techniques he couldn't attempt. Now he could see their mistakes.
The irony wasn't lost on him.
He picked up the jade slip again, studying it in the moonlight. The cracks along its edge formed a pattern. Natural fractures from age and use.
Or so he'd thought.
Looking closer now, the cracks seemed too regular. Too specific. They ran along specific angles, stopping at precise points.
Tianchen sat up.
He turned the slip over. On the reverse side, where the surface should have been smooth, there were faint markings. Barely visible. He held it up to the moonlight at different angles.
There. When the light hit just right, he could make out partial characters. Incomplete, like someone had started to inscribe something and stopped.
Or like a second layer of information had been purposefully obscured.
Tianchen set the slip down again and stood. He walked to his window and looked out at the clan grounds. Everything was quiet. Normal. The night patrol passed by in the distance, lanterns bobbing.
He thought about where he'd found the jade slip.
The storage room had been unlocked. Not unusual, it contained discarded materials, nothing valuable enough to protect. But the room was rarely used. He cleaned it once every few months at most.
The jade slip had been sitting on top of a pile of damaged formation flags. Not buried beneath them. On top.
Where it would catch the eye.
Three days ago, Old Steward Han had specifically assigned him to clean that room. Usually, Tianchen chose his own work rotation. That day, Han had been insistent.
"The storage room needs attention," the old man had said. "Go today."
At the time, Tianchen hadn't questioned it.
Now he replayed the memory more carefully. Han's expression. His tone. The way he'd watched Tianchen leave, something unreadable in his eyes.
Tianchen returned to his mattress and sat down.
He picked up the jade slip one more time.
An incomplete manual. Basic information only. Found in an unlocked room he'd been specifically sent to clean. Placed where he couldn't miss it.
Too convenient.
Someone had put it there for him to find.
The question was who. And more importantly, why.
Tianchen considered the possibilities. Old Steward Han was the obvious choice. He'd been the one to send Tianchen to that room. But Han was just a mortal, no cultivation at all.
Where would he get a cultivation manual, even a damaged one?
An elder, then. But which elder would risk the Patriarch's decree? Helping the cursed star cultivate went against explicit orders.
Unless.
Tianchen's thoughts slowed.
Unless someone wanted to see what would happen. To test whether Heaven's rejection was real or just superstition. To observe if the cursed star child could actually cultivate, or if attempting it would bring the disaster everyone feared.
A test subject.
The thought should have angered him. Instead, Tianchen felt nothing but cold calculation.
If someone was testing him, they'd given him exactly what he needed to begin. An incomplete manual meant he couldn't progress far enough to cause real trouble. But it was enough to open meridians, to attempt basic circulation.
Enough to see if he survived.
Enough to see if Heaven responded.
Tianchen looked at the jade slip resting in his palm. The moonlight painted it silver-white. Such a small thing. Such enormous implications.
He had three options.
Return the slip and forget he'd ever found it. Continue as he'd been, carrying water until age took him.
Keep the slip and study it in secret. Learn what he could without attempting actual cultivation. Safe, but ultimately pointless.
Or use it.
Actually try to open his meridians. Actually attempt what he'd been forbidden for eighteen years. Risk whatever consequences Heaven might bring.
Tianchen closed his hand around the jade slip.
The decision had already been made the moment he'd picked it up three days ago. Everything since then had just been confirmation.
Tomorrow he'd find a place outside the clan grounds. Somewhere the formations wouldn't reach. The old forest to the east had caves that went deep enough. No one went there anymore.
He tucked the jade slip under his mattress and lay down.
Eighteen years of watching had taught him to recognize opportunity when it appeared. Eighteen years of observation had prepared him for exactly this moment.
Whoever had left the slip would get their answer soon enough.
Tianchen closed his eyes. For the first time in as long as he could remember, sleep came easily.