Heaven's Only Men Cultivator

Chapter 16 - The Art of the Ruler

The silver dragonet on Li Feng's shoulder let out a sharp, anxious chirp as the temple walls continued to vibrate. Long Chen stood tall, her mercury eyes scanning the high, vaulted ceiling where the sound of those thousand wings still echoed.

"They cannot enter yet," she said, her voice cutting through the rumble. "The mountain's ancient wards are still reacting to my awakening. But we have very little time, Li Feng. A key that cannot turn is just a useless piece of metal."

"Then show me how to turn," Li Feng said, his hands balled into fists. "I'm tired of just being a target."

Long Chen reached into the folds of her silver gown and pulled out a small, hexagonal jade cylinder. She pressed a hidden groove, and a projection of golden light flooded the space between them. Shifting characters, ancient and burning, swirled in the air.

"This is the Yang Sovereign Art," she said. "It is the original technique of my father's court. It was never meant for a human, but your Core has already changed your lineage. You are no longer just a man. You are the vessel."

Ying Yue stepped closer, her eyes narrowed at the floating script. "This looks like it would kill a normal cultivator. The flow paths are completely reversed. You're asking him to push the energy against his own heartbeat."

"The sun does not follow the rhythm of the heart," Long Chen countered. "The heart follows the sun. Li Feng, sit. Now."

Li Feng sat on the freezing jade floor. The dragonet hopped off his shoulder and curled up near the pedestal, its silver scales dulling as it watched him.

"Close your eyes," Long Chen commanded. "Forget the air in your lungs. I want you to find the center of the Core. Do not breathe the mountain air. Breathe the fire inside."

Li Feng did as he was told. He plunged his consciousness into the golden grain in his chest. It was no longer just a spark; it was a churning, violent sea of molten gold.

"Now," Long Chen's voice echoed in his mind. "Pull a single thread of that heat. Drag it up through your throat, down your spine, and into your stomach. Do not let it stop. If it stalls, it will burn through your flesh."

Li Feng pulled.

The moment the energy left the Core's container, he let out a choked gasp. It didn't feel like power. It felt like he had swallowed a mouthful of liquid lead. The heat was so intense that his vision turned a stark, blinding white behind his closed lids.

"It's... it's too much," he groaned, his skin turning a deep, angry red. "My chest... it's going to burst."

"Your body has been dry for nineteen years," Long Chen said, her voice cold and unyielding. "For a thousand years, your kind has been denied this heat. Your meridians are like parched riverbeds. They are brittle. They are narrow. If you do not force them open, they will shatter."

"He's burning up!" Ying Yue shouted. She reached out to touch his shoulder, but her hand recoiled instantly. "He's literally steaming! Long Chen, stop this! He's not ready!"

"He will never be ready if we wait for comfort!" Long Chen roared. "Li Feng! The slave thinks he is a victim of the fire! The Sovereign knows he is the fire! Which one are you?"

Li Feng gritted his teeth, the smell of his own scorched hair filling his nose. I am not a slave, he thought, the words a silent scream in his skull. I am not going back to the dirt.

He stopped fighting the pain. Instead of trying to dampen the heat, he threw the gates of his meridians wide open. He invited the fire in.

The golden thread became a torrent. It raced through his body, charring the internal pathways, leaving a trail of agony that made his muscles twitch and spasm. He felt his ribs expanding, the bone groaning under the pressure of the expanding Yang Qi.

"That's it," Long Chen whispered, her tone softening with a grim sort of pride. "Circulate it. One loop. Two. Make the mountain recognize its master."

Li Feng's skin began to glow with a fierce, amber light. Sweat evaporated off him in thick plumes of white vapor. He felt his consciousness wavering, hovering on the edge of a black abyss, kept anchored only by the pulsing connection to the Dragon Princess.

"Don't stop," she urged. "Again."

.

Seven days passed in a blur of fever and light.

The temple had become a forge. Li Feng hadn't moved from his spot on the jade floor. Around him, the silver grass had blackened and shriveled from the ambient heat.

Ying Yue sat by the entrance, her violet blade resting across her knees. She looked thinner, her eyes tired from a week of sleepless guarding. She watched Li Feng, who now looked fundamentally different.

The boy who had arrived at the peaks was gone. This Li Feng was broader, his jawline sharper, and his skin possessed a permanent, bronze sheen. Even in repose, a faint hum of energy vibrated in the air around him.

"He's survived the first cycle," Long Chen said, appearing from the shadows of the inner sanctum. She looked at Li Feng with a clinical intensity. "But the bottleneck is his flesh. His spirit is a dragon, but his body is still a man's. It's like trying to hold a star in a glass jar."

"How much longer does he have?" Ying Yue asked.

"The body will adapt, or it will fail," Long Chen replied. "But we no longer have the luxury of time. The silver wings outside have stopped circling. They've landed."

Li Feng’s eyes snapped open.

They weren't brown anymore. They were two orbs of liquid gold, the pupils slitted like the princess's. He exhaled, and a visible puff of golden mist escaped his lips.

"I can hear them," Li Feng said. His voice was deeper, vibrating with a tectonic weight. "They're at the base of the jade stairs."

"You finished the week," Ying Yue said, standing up and heading toward him. She looked at his face and paused, her hand hovering near his cheek. "You look... different, Feng."

"I feel like I'm made of iron," he said, standing up. The movement was effortless, his body feeling weightless despite the raw power he was carrying. "But the heat... it doesn't stop. It just keeps building."

"That is the Sovereign's burden," Long Chen said, handing him a simple, black silk robe to replace his charred rags. "You are a sun that never sets. You must learn to bleed the excess energy into your strikes, or it will eventually consume you from the inside."

"Then let's go bleed some of it," Li Feng said.

"Wait," Ying Yue said, her head tilting as she listened to the wind howling through the temple's entrance. "The resonance... it's changed. It’s not just the Executioners anymore."

Long Chen walked to the edge of the plateau, looking down into the sea of clouds that masked the mountain's base. Her mercury eyes widened slightly.

"The Holy Light has sent their finest," the princess said. "And the one leading them... she carries a relic of the Upper Realm."

Li Feng walked to her side. He looked down, his enhanced vision piercing through the mist. At the foot of the final staircase, a sea of white-robed figures had gathered. In the center, a woman stood alone. She carried a staff that dripped with a cold, silver light, and her aura was like a frozen moon, clashing violently with the mountain's natural warmth.

"Lin Yue," Li Feng whispered.

"She's found us," Ying Yue hissed, her violet aura flaring in a defensive stance. "And she brought an army of Saintesses with her. We're trapped, Feng. There's no back door to this mountain."

Li Feng looked at the golden marks on his wrists, then at the Dragon Princess. He felt the Yang Sovereign Art pulsing in his veins, a tidal wave of fire waiting for a target.

"We aren't trapped," Li Feng said, his slitted eyes fixed on the silver light below. "They are."

"The Saintess has the Lunar Seal," Long Chen warned. "If she touches you, she will try to lock your Core back into the darkness. Do not let her get close."

"She won't get close," Li Feng said.

He stepped out onto the edge of the plateau, the wind whipping his new black robes around his legs. The silver dragonet chirped and landed on his shoulder, its scales reflecting the golden light of his skin.

Below them, Lin Yue looked up. Even from this distance, Li Feng could see the shock on her face. She raised her staff, and a pillar of silver moonlight punched through the clouds, aimed directly at the temple.

"The anomaly is found!" her voice echoed up the mountain, cold and full of a strange, desperate longing. "By the Architect's law, the sun must be extinguished!"

Li Feng didn't flinch as the silver beam raced toward him. He raised his right hand, his palm glowing like a miniature forge.

"The sun doesn't extinguish, Saintess," Li Feng shouted back, his voice rolling down the peaks like thunder. "It just rises."

He slammed his fist into the air, and a wave of pure, unadulterated gold met the silver moonlight. The collision shook the entire range, turning the sky into a battlefield of fire and ice.

***