Axton Vail had lived seventeen years without once being called by his full name...not by family, not by teachers, not even by the servants who pretended he didn't exist when he passed them in the halls of Vail Manor.Mistake. That's what his half-sister called him.It. That's what his half-brother preferred.Nothing. That's what his stepmother's silence said louder than words ever could.The room they'd given him wasn't really a room. More like a storage closet someone had cleared of boxes and called mercy. Eight feet by six. A cot that smelled like mildew and broken promises. One blanket...thin enough to read through if you held it up to the light, which Axton had done exactly once before deciding some truths were better left unexamined.The walls were stone. Cold. The kind of cold that seeped into your bones and made a home there, until you forgot what warmth felt like.He sat on the edge of his cot now, three in the morning, listening to the sound of laughter drifting up from the f

The sewers smelled like civilization's shame.Rot and rust and something chemical that burned the back of Axton's throat with every breath. His bare feet, he'd lost his shoes somewhere in the carnage, couldn't remember when, splashed through water he refused to think about. Cold. Viscous. The kind of liquid that carried diseases with names you didn't want to learn.Behind him, sirens wailed. Cultivator enforcement. The Sentinel Order, probably. They'd have tracked the spiritual disturbance at the Manor within minutes. A seal breaking released enough energy to light up every detection array in the city.Ahead, only darkness and the sound of water dripping from pipes that looked older than the buildings above them.Axton ran toward the darkness.His body protested every step. The power that had erupted at the altar had receded, but it left traces. His veins felt too hot. His skin too tight. Like he'd been wearing someone else's body and now his real one didn't quite fit anymore.The whi

The tunnels smelled like age and secrets.Not sewage this time. Something older. Stone that had been carved centuries ago by hands that understood cultivation and warfare in ways the modern world had forgotten. The walls were smooth, covered in symbols that glowed faintly blue, providing just enough light to see by.Kael moved through the darkness like he'd walked these passages a thousand times. Probably had. His sword was still drawn, gray smoke trailing from the blade like breath in winter.Behind them, the sound of pursuit. Footsteps. Voices. The Heptarchy champions weren't giving up."How far do these tunnels go?" Axton's voice echoed slightly despite his effort to whisper."Far enough. The Shadowvein Sect built them during the Divine-Mortal War. Escape routes. Supply lines. Burial chambers for cultivators who died protecting the city." Kael turned a corner without slowing. "Most people forgot they exist. The Heptarchy remembers. They'll search systematically. We have maybe twent

Axton woke to the smell of burning.Not fire. Something worse. Chemical. Like someone had tried to cook metal and given up halfway through.He sat up fast. Too fast. His head spun and his ribs screamed and every muscle in his body reminded him that yesterday he'd fought three cultivators and barely survived.The room was empty. Kael was gone. The candle had burned out. Gray morning light filtered through cracks in the painted window.The smell was getting stronger.Axton rolled off the cot. His legs almost gave out. The Aegis burn from last night was worse than he'd expected. Using blue mode had cost something. His cultivation pathways, the channels that carried Qi through the body, felt raw. Oversensitized. Like nerve endings after touching something too hot.He made it to the door. Listened.Voices downstairs. Kael's. Someone else. Male. Unfamiliar.Axton's hand went to his sleeve. The knife was there. Always there. He drew it. The dark blade caught what little light existed and see