Ashes To The Peak

Chapter 4: The Hollow Vessel.

Hours passed, days passed...

Throughout the relentless tick of time, he remained suspended in a state of profound bewilderment, wondering endlessly about what had happened to him and how his fate had been so cruelly upended.

Twice a day, the thug came to check on him.

The man would burst into the room, shove basic food down his throat, and spew whatever coarse, filthy drivel came to mind. The physician also visited every few days, quietly mixing potent, bitter concoctions over the damp floor before forcing the dark liquid between Zareth’s lips.

Slowly, the paralyzed vessel began to respond to the treatment.

The cold, corpse-like stiffness melted away bit by bit; his fingers began to twitch with intent, and his deathly, ash-gray skin gradually regained a faint trace of natural color.

During this grueling recovery, as much as he could not comprehend how he had gone from being consumed by flames to lying in a filthy bed in the slums, the young man slowly grew accustomed to being called "Zareth."

Neither the thug nor the physician ever heard him reject or deny the name. He bore it in silence, letting the syllables wash over him like a cloak that belonged to someone else.

Yet, whenever night fell and he was left alone in the damp darkness of the shack, he could not stop the tears. Night after night, he wept silently into his filthy pillow, wracked by an unbearable emotional agony.

Over and over, he interrogated his own mind: "Why? What did I do to deserve this? How could this happen?"

The memories of his past life as the Holy Son of the Heavenly Ember Sect flooded his mind in relentless waves. He relived every cruel betrayal, desperately searching through his past for any hidden clue, any subtle oversight, any reason why no one, not a single soul, had believed in his innocence.

He recalled the dreadful weeks before his public execution. He remembered the cold court meetings and the grand interrogations held within the sect’s high halls.

One by one, his fellow disciples, his junior brothers, his senior brothers, even his sisters, had stepped forward to offer damning confessions against him. Every piece of evidence had been meticulously crafted; every false testimony had carried overwhelming weight.

Most painful of all was the memory of his fiancée. During those interrogations, she had refused to meet his desperate eyes, offering him nothing but an icy wall of unbridled disdain.

Once, he had been the brightest star in the heavens, a genius revered by millions, placed upon a pedestal of absolute glory. In a single instant, he had been stripped of his honor, branded a demonic monster, and reduced to nothing.

These tragic scenes replayed behind his closed eyelids like an inescapable nightmare, and night after night, his muffled sobs echoed softly within his makeshift abode.

About three weeks passed...

By now, despite his utter confusion over possessing the memories of Zareth Crow while bearing the soul of Belmoth Cross, he had begun to accept the bitter reality of his existence.

The original Zareth Crow, a frail, sickly young man of Blackwater Town, had died roughly a month ago after suffering from years of chronic illness. And Belmoth Cross, who should have been reduced to scattered ashes upon the Judgement Summit, was now inexplicably inhabiting this broken shell in the deepest slums of Blackwater, forced to live under the dead boy's name.

The heavy rain had finally ceased a few days prior.

Without the constant hammering of water against the rotting roof, the vibrant, chaotic noise of the slums bled into the room. Even distant sounds from the busier market districts of Blackwater Town carried all the way into this shabby, secluded shack.

Zareth lay flat on his back, still bedridden, staring up at the water-stained ceiling.

Twitch!

He focused his willpower and tried moving his limbs.

His body resisted, but after a moment of intense concentration, he managed to flex his arm slightly, though he could only lift his forearm as far as his elbow before his strength gave out.

Next, he tried turning his head. With a stiff, agonizing effort, his neck moved a fraction of an inch to the side.

"What a truly messed-up body," Zareth muttered under his breath, his voice raspy and thin. "I have been pondering endlessly... but lying in this bed waiting for answers will bring me nothing."

He sighed, his eyes narrowing as he stared into the dim room. "I have thought through every single possibility, yet I still have no real answers. Did my soul swap with someone? Did Belmoth Cross truly become Zareth Crow?"

He paused, a dark chill running down his spine. "Even if that is the case... how? Such techniques require ancient, forbidden arts... demonic arts."

Demonic!

The word echoed violently through his soul. Memories of the Execution Elder accusing him of colluding with the demonic path surfaced once more, sharp and vivid.

Yet this time, he did not break down into tears. Having spent the past three weeks stewing in his own grief, he had grown numb to the weight of the accusation.

"Forget about that for now," Zareth thought, forcing his mind away from the past. "I need to focus on what lies directly before me as Zareth Crow. I have to get this body moving."

He closed his eyes, settling his mind into a state of deep, absolute quiet.

"First, I need to try my absolute best to perceive the surrounding Aether Qi," he instructed himself.