The first thing I learned about the Zhao family was that cruelty sounded different when spoken over an expensive breakfast.Porcelain clicked against saucers as sunlight filled the dining room. Beyond the windows, the estate’s gardens were immaculate, and black cars lined the drive. Three generations of Zhaos sat around a long table. I stood near the wall with a tray, waiting for someone to remember I belonged to the family.“Ryan, you’re blocking the light,” Aunt Zhao said without looking up. “Move before you ruin everyone’s appetite.”I stepped aside. A few cousins laughed into their tea.I was twenty-eight and had been married to Crystal Zhao for three years, yet I still ate after the family finished. My spiritual roots had been shattered since birth, leaving me unable to absorb the energy that gave cultivators their strength. To the Zhaos, I was less useful than a servant and more embarrassing than a stranger. My marriage had only given them someone new to blame when Crystal refus

The guards marched me through the Zhao estate as pale morning light spilled across the polished stone paths.I had walked these grounds for three years, usually with my eyes lowered while servants and relatives found new ways to remind me that I did not belong. Today, the same people hurried toward the ancestral hall, dressed for a ceremony they believed would bring honor to their family. None of them looked at me as a man being led to his death. To them, I was an offering that had finally become useful.I kept my shoulders rounded and my breathing uneven, careful not to let the new strength in my body change the way I moved. Beneath my skin, the energy from the cave rested like a current held behind a dam. I could feel it, but I could not yet trust myself to direct it without drawing attention. The entity had given me a path, not mastery, and the distinction mattered more with every step toward the hall.The ancestral hall stood at the center of the estate, its dark wooden doors fram

The knock came before sunrise, followed by the scrape of a key in my door. I had barely slept after hearing the guards discuss Grandfather Zhao’s plans, and the ache beneath my chest wound had kept me from settling into a comfortable position. When the door opened, two guards stood outside with a third man carrying a lantern.“The patriarch is waiting,” the first guard said. “You’re to come with us.”I dressed without arguing. The Zhao family had spent three years treating me as if I were too insignificant to notice, yet one failed ritual had turned my every movement into something worth watching. I followed the guards through the cold corridors, keeping my steps measured and my shoulders slightly bowed. Beneath that familiar posture, I listened for the current of energy inside me, careful not to stir it.Grandfather Zhao waited in the courtyard with two senior elders and four guards. Beside him stood a bronze instrument shaped like a shallow bowl, its surface covered in fine marks. H

Master Shen’s warning followed me back to my room.The man had looked at my damaged roots and found something that the Zhao elders could not explain, yet he had left without accusing me or offering help. Outside my door, the guards changed shifts and reported every movement to someone higher in the family. Even the smallest sound reminded me that I was being watched.I sat on the floor and turned my attention inward. The current beneath my ribs felt quieter than it had during the examination, but when I tried to guide it toward my palm, it tightened and pushed back. I remembered how I had redirected the altar’s energy and stopped the tunnel from collapsing. Both times, I had acted before I could think, and both times I had paid for it afterward.“You knew Shen would notice,” I said to the entity.“I knew the energy might respond to his test.”“That’s not the same as warning me.”“You were already being examined. A warning would not have changed the risk.”I pressed my fingers against

The first warning came before we reached the property.I was sitting in the back of the Zhao family's vehicle when the primordial entity stirred inside me, interrupting my attempt to control the energy moving through my body.“Pay attention,” it warned.I looked through the window at the buildings passing along the eastern outskirts of the city. “What is it?”“The energy beneath this property is stronger than I expected. Do not approach it carelessly.”That was all it said before falling silent.I tightened my grip on Grandfather Zhao's sealed order. He had sent me here to prove whether my survival had changed anything, but the entity's warning suggested that the assignment carried a danger even the patriarch might not understand.The vehicle turned onto a narrow road and stopped beside a neglected compound surrounded by a rusted fence. A faded sign identified it as Zhao Property Seven, an old cultivation resource station that had been abandoned several years earlier.Zhao Lei climbed