Prologue

  ---

  The battlefield doesn’t bleed. It drowns. Blood spreads thick and endless, swallowing names, faces, and hope. Quinming steps through it anyway. Each movement burns, every breath cuts through his chest like broken glass.

  He doesn’t know why he’s still standing. He doesn’t care.

  "You scurry so desperately," the voice cuts through the silence, soft and lazy. The Heavenly Demon. His tone is mocking, bored, like a man toying with his food.

  Quinming doesn’t bother looking up. He knows that tone. It’s the tone of someone who’s already won.

  The four of them stand, bloodied and broken. The strongest force Murim has ever known, reduced to gasping breaths and trembling hands. And Brother Zhi, leader of the Huashun Sect, holds them together with sheer willpower.

  Zhong Zhi isn’t the strongest among them, but his plans are why they’ve survived this long. His voice has been their anchor, his orders the thread keeping them alive.

  But now that thread frays.

  The Demon moves first. Cold. Silent. His arm sweeps through the air like it’s nothing, but the white-gold Qi that arcs forward carves through the ground like a blade. Quinming dives, the heat brushing past his skin.

  Before he loses an arm, Zhi is there.

  Petals swirl as Zhi steps forward, his back straight. He doesn’t falter. Doesn’t turn.

  "Carry on," he says softly.

  The Qi slams into him, and the sound splits the air. The ground shudders. Petals scatter like a prayer undone.

  And then the thud. Heavy. Final.

  Quinming doesn’t look back. He can’t. But he feels it—the hollow absence where Zhi once stood.

  Petals darken as they hit the ground. He grips his sword tighter, blood slick on the hilt. Zhi’s voice lingers in his ears: "The weak hesitate, but the strong endure."

  Quinming swallows hard. He’s had enough of enduring.

  He lifts his sword, slashing forward with everything he has. The others follow, their blades flashing in tandem.

  The Heavenly Demon barely reacts. His hand rises, tearing the ground apart. One warrior stumbles; the Demon’s hand crushes their chest, blood spraying hot across the dirt.

  Another scream. A furious roar. The final lunge of a warrior who knows they’re already dead. Their blade burns with azure Qi, but the Demon sidesteps with ease, a sharp strike sending their head flying.

  Bodies crumple.

  But the opening is there.

  Quinming lunges low, dark petals blooming with every step. His sword pierces the Demon’s stomach.

  Steel grinds against something unnatural, and the shock shudders through his arms. The Demon stiffens. Quinming twists his wrist, shoving the blade deeper, ignoring the searing pain that shoots up his arms.

  The sword meets the Demon’s dantian.

  He channels everything he has left, life force raging through the blade. Dark red petals burst in a violent cascade, spinning wildly like shards of glass.

  The sword exits the Demon’s back.

  Their eyes meet.

  The Heavenly Demon blinks. Slow. Unbothered. His fingers brush the hilt lightly, curling over it as he glances down, his expression one of mild curiosity, as though a sword lodged in his stomach is an unexpected trifle.

  “You impress me, Taoist,” the Demon murmurs, his voice calm, almost indulgent. “To think, your sword actually reached me.”

  Quinming sways, his vision swimming. The world narrows, edges fraying like a tapestry unraveling in the wind.

  At his feet lies his brother’s sword, the treasured blade of their sect. Beyond it, Zhi. His body lies motionless, severed in half, blood pooling into the broken earth. Quinming’s breath catches—sharp and involuntary. The world lurches, and his stomach twists violently.

  He can’t look away. The sight sears itself into him.

  “...” The Demon’s voice drones on, distant and faint, words dripping with detached cruelty. Quinming doesn’t hear them.

  His focus fixes on the sword at his feet. Zhi’s sword. The Sect’s blade, passed from leader to leader for generations.

  A symbol of their legacy. A legacy now buried beneath ash and blood.

  He bends, black strands falling into his eyes, mingling with the grime and blood smearing his face. His fingers tremble as they close around the hilt.

  The Demon’s voice sharpens, cutting through the haze. “But do you think a sword will change your fate? Foolish. What you cut here is nothing but a shadow of me. I will return. But you...” His tone is mocking. “You will vanish, like all the rest. You—”

  “Shut up.”

  The snarl rips from Quinming’s throat, raw and broken. His voice wavers, teetering on the edge of collapse.

  "Whether you return or not,” he growls, lifting his gaze, “the fact remains—I cut you. I cut your neck. Remember that when you crawl back.”

  Rage boils over, an unstoppable tide. His focus sharpens to a singular point.

  He lunges forward. Zhi’s sword gleams in his hands, faint flickers of light trailing behind it like an echo.

  The blade arcs clean through the Heavenly Demon’s neck.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  The head falls, rolling once before coming to a stop. The body collapses atop the heap of corpses like a rotten crown atop a kingdom of decay.

  Quinming stumbles, his breath ragged and uneven. Around him, Qi-laden plum petals drift, faint and fragile, dissolving before they can touch the blood-soaked ground.

  He doesn’t look at the Demon’s body. His gaze drifts instead to the corpses surrounding him.

  Prayer flags flutter weakly in the mist, tied to broken spears of the Empire's army. Beneath them, amid the chaos of broken blades and torn banners, small personal items stand out starkly—a monk’s beaded bracelet, a torn ribbon, a hairpin stained with mud and blood.

  Fragile, intimate things that belonged to people.

  Now they belong to no one.

  This isn’t victory.

  This is survival, bought with too much blood.

  The petals drift slower now, weaker. Forever fading.

  “Damn it,” Quinming mutters hoarsely, his voice cracking. His hand tightens around the hilt of Zhi’s sword. “What a pointless thing.”

  The ground sways beneath him, his legs trembling harder with each step. Strength drains faster than he can breathe, but he knows it’s not just exhaustion.

  "Brother Zhi," he rasps, his voice trembling. "Is this what victory looks like? Because it sure as hell doesn’t to me.”

  The mist creeps in, thick and clinging, weaving around the corpses like a mourner’s veil. His legs shake harder. Strength draining faster than he can control. He knows it isn’t just exhaustion.

  ‘I’m dying,’ he realizes, feeling the hollow ache in his stomach where his dantian and Qi once thrived like a bottomless ocean.

  He sucks in a shuddering breath, his fingers brushing the hilt of Zhi’s sword. He can barely lift it now. The ache above his navel gnaws at him—a hollow where his dantian once thrived.

  ‘I burned through everything. Qi, blood, strength… I burned it all.’

  Brother Zhi’s words echo faintly in his mind: “Carry on.”

  “How?” he whispers, his knees buckling. The weight of the sword in his hand feels unbearable, heavier than any mountain. “Why’d you leave it all to me, Brother? I can’t even carry myself!”

  His knees strike the cold, wet earth. Blood soaks into his robes, the metallic tang thick in his throat. He laughs. Even in his ears it sounds bitter, hoarse, and broken.

  Not a damn thing. As the bloodless man known as both the Dark Blossoming Sovereign and Sword of Huashun, he didn't protect a damn thing.

  His head hangs low, his shoulders trembling.

  Everything is silent now. Chaos replaced by a heavy, oppressive stillness. Even the carrier birds refuse to touch this cursed place. His hand fists his soiled robs. Each breath is heavier than the last. He stares down at Sect sword. Brother Zhi’s sword. His hands too weak to grasp it.

  “Ha... ha...” His laugh lingers, his chest heaving. “This is it? This is how a Grandmaster on the verge of Saint dies?” His voice cracks as he spits the words into the stillness. “Broken, useless, drowning in mud.”

  His thoughts twist, spiraling into futility.

  ‘What about Huashun?’

  They’d left behind the young and the crippled. And now, there’s no one left to protect them. No one to lead them. The sect’s techniques would die with him, buried in the mud.

  ‘With no sword to defend them, they won’t last long.’

  They would not last long. This world was not kind enough for that. No matter what Brother Zhi said about honor. Those who eyed Huashun would jump at this chance like hungry wolves and no one would be there to stop them. No matter the fact that Huashun saved the world.

  The world tilts, his shoulder crashing into the blood-soaked ground. The earth clings to his face, cold and suffocating.

  “What’s the point?” he mutters hoarsely, his voice barely audible. “Huashun saved the world, and now it’s dying anyway. Honor, righteousness—what good were they in the end?”

  What was the point? Every step, every swing of his sword, every sacrifice. It led to this? What even was this? Huashun saved the world but lost everything.

  Regret. It presses in, heavy and unrelenting. He sees flashes of plum trees in bloom, their blossoms falling like snow. The laughter of a life he didn’t take seriously enough. Zhi’s sharp voice scolding him as he skipped training for another drink.

  his mind whispers.

  The silence grows suffocating, the weight of his failure crushing him. His vision darkens.

  But then, a sound.

  It yanks him back from the abyss.

  A melody floats through the mist, haunting and lilting, threading through his thoughts like a knife. He blinks, his breath catching.

  Through blurred vision, a shadow emerges from broken woods.

  She walks with a calm, unhurried grace. Her golden hair gleams faintly, catching the red glow of the dawning sun. Vivid green eyes meet his. Around her, violet butterflies shimmer like fragments of starlight.

  ‘

  Her bare feet glide over the ground, untouched by filth or gore. She does not belong here. He instinctively knows this. Not to this battlefield. Not to this world.

  The melody shifts into words as she kneels, her voice low and mournful. He strains to understand, but the language is unfamiliar, slipping through his thoughts like water.

  “Who… are you?” he rasps.

  She kneels beside him, her hands cool and deliberate as they gather his head into her lap. Her fingers glide through his hair with a strange tenderness. Her lips curve into a soft, mournful smile.

  “You called me,” she says simply, “Your regret sang louder than any cry for help.”

  “I didn’t…” he mutters, confusion clouding his exhaustion.

  Her lips open.

  “...”

  Her lips part, but her words are distant, like a half-remembered dream.

  She waits.

  For what?

  His answer.

  And for whatever reason... he nods.

  Her lips press against his forehead.

  The sensation jolts through him. It is not warm, not cold, but something far deeper—like the essence of a thousand lifetimes branding his soul. Pain, not of the physical sort, burns through him like molten metal.

  The battlefield crumbles, light and shadow falling into the void. Quinming’s vision dissolves, the last thing he sees is her golden hair fading into the fog. She holds him close. Her melody lingers, eternal and haunting, as the world falls and he is snatched away.

  “Do not forget, there is always a price.” Her words echo in the abyss. “Beware the hands that offer salvation, may yet lead you to your endless ruin.”

  ----

  He jolts awake.

  The lantern’s dull glow flickers above him, casting craggy shadows over the low wooden beams. The air smells damp and musty, tinged with incense and… oil? Cleaning oil? His nose wrinkles.

  Quinming blinks, his sight blurred. His head pounds. No, not pounds. It’s like a blacksmith is hammering away at his skull. He groans, sitting up too quickly, wincing as the motion sends sharp pain lancing through his temple.

  His hand flies to his head, fingers brushing bandages wrapped tightly around it. Beneath them, the wound burns, raw and sharp, like an old scar torn open.

  But the hand—

  His heart stutters. He stares at it. Small. Thin. Calloused in odd, uneven places. He flips it over, flexing the trembling fingers. It feels wrong. Completely and utterly wrong.

  Where are all his scars?

  “What the hell?” he rasps, his voice hoarse and unfamiliar. His throat tightens. His frown deepens as his hand rises to touch his neck.

  His voice. It’s off. Higher. Softer.

  It’s not just his hand. His legs—short, thin, and unfamiliar—are tangled in a worn blanket. He shoves it off, lurching to his feet. His knees nearly buckle.

  He grabs at the wall to steady himself, glaring down at his scrawny legs.

  "What is this?” he growls, the sound low and brittle.

  Eighty-seven years. Eighty-seven years spent perfecting himself. Eighty-seven years spent refining his body to near perfection, every muscle honed, every scar earned, Qi flowing through his veins like a river carving its own path.

  And now?

  He stares down at himself, scrawny and fragile, the body of a child barely strong enough to carry water.

  Weakness clings to him, sinking into his bones. His breath quickens. His head spins, and the room sways around him.

  He leans against the wall, cursing under his breath.

  “You’re going to hurt yourself again, Quin-Quin.”

  He freezes.

  His eye twitches. Quin-Quin. A name no one had dared to call him, not even as a joke.

  He turns his head slowly.

  A woman stands in the doorway, arms crossed, her sharp eyes narrowing as she steps closer. “What did I tell you? Stay in bed. You’re lucky to be alive.”

  “Quin-Quin?” The name drips from his lips like poison. He glares at her, incredulous. “Who dares call me…” He waves vaguely at his bandaged head, at his pathetic frame. “…?”

  “You,” the woman replies flatly. Her tone is more dismissive than amused. “It’s your name. What else would I call you?”

  His mouth opens. Nothing comes out.

  Another voice chimes in, cheerful and far too casual for the circumstances. “Madam Li said you need to rest, Quin-Quin. If she sees you up, she’ll have your head.”

  A boy steps into view, rail-thin and grinning as he balances a tray of folded linens. He looks at Quinming like this is perfectly normal.

  Quinming stares at him.

  The dizziness surges. His knees wobble. His body betrays him yet again.

  The woman sighs, stepping forward to catch him before he crashes to the floor. Her hands are firm, steadying his weak, trembling frame with ease.

  Quinming’s lips part, but the only sound that escapes is a dry, bitter laugh.

  “You’re lucky that fool didn’t kill you,” she mutters, pressing a cool cup to his lips. “But if you keep this up, your luck will run out.”

  He swallows reluctantly. The water cool, easing the sharpness in his throat. He leans his head back against the wall, glaring at the ceiling.

  “Quin-Quin,” he mutters again, his tone dry. “What am I now, a child meant to fetch tea for elders? I’ve felled demonic sect leaders, walked unbeaten through Jianghu, and this is my title? A nickname for toddlers and puppies?”

  The woman’s brow arches. “What a grand imagination you have for a boy who has never set foot out of the brothel grounds. You’re welcome to find a better name when you’re not half-dead.”

  His glare sharpens, but she’s already turned away, fussing over something out of reach.

  Quinming’s gaze drifts around the room, taking in the worn wooden walls, the faint smell of incense and soap, the way the shadows pool in every corner. It’s not home. It’s not Mount Hua.

  His breath catches. He tries to summon the image of his brothers, his sisters, the sect halls filled with laughter and training shouts. Instead, all he can see is the battlefield. The broken swords. The blood-streaked ground. Brother Zhi’s still body lying motionless in the dirt.

  The Huashun Sect he knew is gone. Forever.

  And who even knew what the state of the Sect was now.

  He presses his fists against the wooden floor, trembling with frustration.

  “You’re thinking too hard,” the woman says, her tone curt but not unkind. “Madam Li will be here soon. Rest while you can.”

  “Madam Li?” Quinming rasps, the name foreign on his tongue.

  A boy—bright-eyed and chipper despite the tension—pokes his head in. “Madam Li’s been having us look after you again. It’s her kindness you’re alive, you know.” His tone shifts, faintly exasperated. “The brothel’s at its busiest, and you’re still causing trouble.”

  Quinming closes his eyes, his head pounding harder now, as though mocking him. The pieces of this situation are slowly falling into place, and none of them look good.

  A brothel. A servant’s storeroom. A child's name, spoken like it’s always belonged to him. And that pain in his back, sharp and persisting, festering just beneath the surface of thought.

  ‘What nameless corner of the world have I been cast into?’

  The word Quin-Quin echoes in his mind, grating like the edge of a dull blade. The world had once called him the Dark Blossoming Sovereign, the shadow under the plum blossoms, a name that inspired fear and respect in equal measure.

  Now, a woman in a brothel calls him Quin-Quin, and he has no Qi left to argue.

  “This can’t be right,” he mutters, bitterness curling through his thoughts like smoke. “I saved the world. I cut down the Heavenly Demon. And yet...” His gaze drops to the threadbare blanket and the dim, creaking storeroom.

  No.

  It has to be a punishment.

  ---