Chains Of Eternity: Defiling Heaven

Early stage Qi refining in a single night

The scavenger market rose out of the red dust like a scab on the land.

Xiao Meng stared from the wagon seat. Tents of patched hide leaned against walls of scrap iron. Splintered stalls sold bones, rusted talismans, and jars of "spirit dust" that looked suspiciously like sand. Between them, people sat in the dirt with hollow cheeks and ribs showing through ragged cloth, palms turned up to every passing wagon. Eyes measured the guards' weapons and slid away. A man clutched a loaf to his chest as if the air itself might steal it.

"Don't give them anything," Qingyue whispered. Then she dug into her sleeve and pressed a copper coin into a child's hand.

"Why are they like this?"

"Because of the war." It was the quietest he had ever heard her. "When the heavens fell, we were cut off from the mainland's spiritual veins. Nothing grows right here. The strong left, and the ones who couldn't dig through the ruins for relics to sell for bread. That's what a scavenger is ."

She forced her smile back. "Come on, our manor is ahead!"

The Su Clan's resting manor stood in the center of the market like a jade set in mud: high grey walls, formation plates glowing along the gate, guards at every corner, swept courtyards. A steward showed Xiao Meng to a room in the east wing.

He had just pulled off his outer robe when the door banged open.

"Brother Xiao, they said your room is..."

Qingyue froze, her eyes went round. They traveled across his bare chest, lean and corded like carved stone.

"Wow." She drifted closer. "Brother Xiao, you look amazing. Are those real? Are there rocks under your skin?"

Xiao Meng glanced down at himself, then at her. "Please leave."

"Just let me poke it! Once! I want to see if it's hard!"

"No."

"One finger!"

He turned her around by the shoulders and steered her out like a very determined cat. Her hand kept reaching back. "So stingy!"

"What are you two doing?"

The voice was cool and gentle, they both froze. A woman stood in the corridor in a purple gown, a dragon-shaped hairpin in her black hair, her skin pale and her eyes like winter ice. She looked at the half-dressed man, then at the girl dangling from his hands.

"Big sister Su Yin?" Qingyue looked away, pouting. "What are you doing here?"

"The master requests this gentleman in the main hall." Su Yin's gaze lingered on Xiao Meng. "Do dress yourself."

He dressed and followed her. In the corridor, he felt it: a thin, cold hostility drifting from Su Yin like frost off a windowpane, aimed at him. Behind them, hot and sulky, Qingyue's resentment, aimed squarely at Su Yin's back. Only one of the two was dangerous.

In the main hall, Su Beichen sat in fresh dark robes. Beside him sat a man with white hair tied in a ponytail, a long beard, and blue eyes in a face full of cunning. Something about him sent a faint chill along Xiao Meng's spine.

"So this is your swordsman," the stranger said, smiling. "Thinner than I expected."

"being thin doesn’t mean they can’t fight," Su Beichen replied. "About the tariff..."

"Tomorrow." Elder Wen rose, bowed, and left, his eyes lingering on Xiao Meng a heartbeat too long.

Su Beichen's shoulders eased. He poured tea. "Qingyue's mother died when she was nine, of the ruin sickness, on a trade road like ours. Since then I have spoiled her terribly. She acts strong and cheerful, but at night she still calls for her mother in her sleep. I brought her on this journey to train her. She will inherit the caravan and everything we own." He smiled bitterly. "You must think I'm a bad father."

Xiao Meng was silent a while. "I don't know what it means to be a father," he said at last. "So it is not my place to judge."

The old man laughed. "I did not tell you this for pity, young man. I want to know whether I can trust you with my daughter."

Xiao Meng exhaled. "I mean no harm to you or to her. She's noisy, but she isn't a bad person, also I can tell she has a pure soul. I feel at ease when I'm around her."

Su Beichen roared with laughter. "Careful, boy. That is my little girl you are praising!"

Xiao Meng blinked, utterly lost. Qingyue reminded him of someone he could not name, and something inside him urged him to keep that bright smile alive.

"Relax, I'm teasing." Su Beichen tossed him a scroll. "This is the Azure Stream Breathing Art, a basic Su Clan technique. Nothing grand, but a foundation."

That night, Xiao Meng unrolled the scroll beneath a single lamp.

His body knew what to do. He sat cross-legged on the floor, spine straight, and sank into a spirit trance.

The technique was simple: draw spirit energy in, guide it along the meridians like water through channels, and circulate it between the dantians. But when his awareness reached them, he found only ruin.

His dantians were there, but they were broken. The lower dantian was a shattered lake, its floor webbed with cracks. The middle was a pot smashed and glued back together by something unwilling to let it die. Spirit energy poured in and leaked out again, like water through a sieve.

Nine chains bind the sleeping sun...

The riddle rang in his head, again and again, the same damned poem.

He gritted his teeth and forced it through. Pain exploded through his body, white and tearing, as if he were being stitched together with red-hot wire. He pushed harder. The Azure Stream flowed through him, cool and clear, easing the edges of each fracture, and the repair began, naturally, as though some part of him remembered how.

Then the backlash hit.

He doubled over and coughed blood onto the floor. His vision swam. Fumbling, he found the healing pill Su Beichen's steward had given him and swallowed it, and warmth spread through his chest.

He sat up and began again.

Again, sweat soaked his robe. The lamp burned low, and the crack in the lower dantian narrowed by a hair, then another. By the time the first grey light touched the window, a single thread of spirit energy was circulating through his body, thin and warm.

He opened his eyes.

Su Qingyue was always the first to wake. She bounced down the east corridor and pushed open his door. "Brother Xiao! Breakfast!" The room was empty.

"Ran off, I'd say," a guard in the courtyard told her. "A scavenger who wanted a free meal."

Qingyue stamped her foot. "Brother Xiao is not that kind of person! He's not a thief!"

"My men saw him wandering around last night," Lu Heng said coolly. "Perhaps scouting."

Her hands clenched into fists. The commotion drew Su Beichen and the elders, and the guards dropped to their knees to report.

"You're certain?"

"Yes, my lord. And one of the horses is missing, along with several jars from the cargo."

Qingyue's eyes brimmed with furious tears. Then Xiao Meng walked into the courtyard. He looked the same, yet nothing about him was. His steps were lighter, steadier, and a calm pressure surrounded him that made the guards step back.

"Brother Xiao!" Qingyue's jaw dropped. "Wow! Did you just form a spirit core? You're at the early stage of Qi Refining!”

Mu Jian eyes bulge in confusion “That's impossible, you formed a spirit core in a single day?"