The Forsaken Disciple: Rise of the Immortal Emperor

CHAPTER 1 – The Disciple Who Could Never Cultivate

The first rays of dawn had yet to touch the mountains when the laughter began.

“They said Heaven had abandoned him before he was even born.”

The words drifted through the cold morning air like a curse that refused to fade, repeated so many times over the years that no one even remembered who had first spoken them.

By now, no one in the Azure Heaven Sect bothered to question whether they were true.

Perched atop towering emerald peaks that pierced the clouds, the sect stood as one of the great cultivation powers of the Eastern Frontier.

Waterfalls cascaded from floating cliffs, spiritual cranes glided between jade-green pavilions, and dense rivers of spiritual qi coursed through the mountains like invisible veins.

Every morning, disciples gathered in the vast cultivation plaza to absorb the purest essence of dawn before the sun fully rose.

To outsiders, the sect looked like a sacred paradise, a place blessed by Heaven itself, but to Chen, it had always felt more like a prison.

Hundreds of disciples hurried toward the cultivation grounds in crisp azure robes embroidered with silver clouds. Their faces shone with excitement as they spoke of breakthrough opportunities, martial techniques, and dreams of one day ascending beyond mortality.

Only one person walked in the opposite direction.

A weathered bamboo broom rested across Chen’s shoulders as he moved quietly along the stone path. His robe had once been blue, but years of washing and mending had worn it down to a dull gray. The sleeves had been patched so many times that hardly any of the original fabric remained.

He kept his eyes lowered as he walked, because he had learned long ago that meeting another disciple’s gaze rarely ended well.

As he passed, the nearby conversations began to soften. One after another, voices dropped until only whispers remained. “Look.”

“The sweeper’s here.”

“I heard he still hasn’t advanced.”

“Five years…”

Someone let out a short, mocking laugh. “Five years at Body Tempering First Layer. Even children cultivate faster than that.”

Laughter spread through the crowd in ripples.

Chen continued forward as though he had heard nothing. He neither quickened his pace nor slowed it, and that calm indifference frustrated them more than any protest ever could.

The path leading to the cultivation plaza stretched for nearly a mile, winding between ancient spirit pines whose roots had witnessed generations of disciples rise and fall.

Keeping those paths spotless was Chen’s responsibility. He swept them every morning, every afternoon, and every evening, regardless of whether the skies brought blazing sun or cold rain.

On paper, his title was “Outer Disciple.”

In practice, he lived like a servant. The distinction existed only in name.

Above him stood the Inner Disciples, the sect’s brightest talents, who lived in private residences, received personal instruction, and enjoyed rare cultivation resources along with the admiration of everyone around them.

Beneath them were the Outer Disciples, hundreds of hopeful cultivators scrambling for scraps of opportunity and recognition.

And below, even that crowded struggle stood people like Chen.

He was useful enough to work, but far too worthless, in their eyes, to matter.

A group of younger disciples approached from the opposite direction, their footsteps loud against the stone. At their head walked a broad-shouldered youth with sharp eyebrows and an arrogant smile.

Zhao Feng.

At seventeen, he had already reached the Body Tempering Seventh Layer, making him one of the strongest outer disciples of his generation.

Four eager companions followed close behind him, and the expressions in their eyes told Chen everything he needed to know. Trouble had arrived.

Without a word, Chen stepped aside to let them pass. Unfortunately, that was exactly what Zhao Feng had hoped he would do.

“Oh?” Zhao Feng stopped directly in front of him and grinned. “So it’s our famous sweeper.”

His companions burst into laughter.

Chen lowered his head slightly in greeting. “Senior Brother Zhao.”

“At least you still remember how to show respect,” Zhao Feng said.

Chen did not answer.

Zhao Feng began to circle him slowly, looking him up and down as if he were inspecting livestock at a market.

Then he lifted one hand and tapped the bamboo broom resting on Chen’s shoulder with a single finger.

“I’ve been wondering,” he said lightly, “does this broom cultivate faster than you do?”

The others erupted into louder laughter.

Chen remained silent, and the steadiness of his expression only irritated Zhao Feng more.

“So quiet today?” Zhao Feng asked.

Chen still said nothing.

The smile on Zhao Feng’s face began to fade. Without warning, he snatched the broom from Chen’s shoulder and threw it onto the muddy ground. “You missed a spot.”

His companions understood at once. Grinning, they stepped onto the freshly cleaned path with mud-covered boots, stomping carelessly across the polished white stone.

One footprint became two. Then two became twenty. In moments, the entire section of the path was covered in dirt. Hours of work vanished in seconds.

One disciple kicked over a bucket of clean water, sending it spilling across the ground. Another scooped up fallen leaves and scattered them back over the stones with deliberate carelessness.

“Looks like you’d better start over,” one of them said.

Chen looked at the mess in silence. Then he bent down, picked up the broom, and set the overturned bucket upright. Not a single complaint left his lips.

Zhao Feng frowned. “Aren’t you angry?”

Chen gathered the wet leaves into a neat pile before finally answering. “If I become angry, will the path clean itself?”

For a moment, no one spoke.

Even Zhao Feng seemed taken aback by the reply.

Then his expression hardened. “So that’s what you think,” Zhao Feng said as he stepped closer until only inches separated them. “You think enduring humiliation makes you noble?”

Chen did not answer.

His silence, more than anything else, fed Zhao Feng’s temper.

Without warning, Zhao Feng lashed out.

A heavy kick slammed into Chen’s side, and pain exploded through his ribs. He stumbled several steps before catching himself with the broom. A thin line of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.

The surrounding disciples laughed again. “Look at him!”

“He can’t even take one kick!”

“What a disgrace.”

Chen raised a hand and wiped the blood away with the back of his sleeve. His breathing remained steady, not because the pain was slight, but because he had grown used to it.

For five years, he had endured this: five years of ridicule, five years of being reminded, every single day, that he did not belong.

Five years of watching everyone around him move forward while he remained trapped at the lowest stage of cultivation, wondering why Heaven had granted every other disciple a chance to rise and denied that same chance to him.

There had once been a time when he fought back. There had been a time when he argued, resisted, and believed that relentless effort could overcome a lack of talent. That boy had vanished long ago.

Now he endured, because surviving another day was better than dying for the sake of wounded pride. Just then, the ringing of an ancient bronze bell rolled across the mountain.

Dong, Dong, Dong. The sound marked the beginning of the morning assembly.

The disciples immediately straightened. Even Zhao Feng stepped back as an elderly man in flowing white robes descended the broad staircase overlooking the cultivation plaza.

His silver hair was tied behind his back, and his sharp eyes swept across the gathered disciples like unsheathed blades. Elder Han.

At once, the outer court fell silent.

Only the faint scraping of Chen’s broom against stone disturbed the stillness.

Elder Han’s gaze settled on him, and unmistakable disappointment crossed the old man’s face.

“You,” he said.

Chen stopped sweeping and bowed his head. “Yes, Elder.”

“Come forward.”

A hundred pairs of eyes turned toward him.

Chen obeyed without hesitation. His heartbeat remained calm, not because he expected kindness, but because he already knew what was coming.

Elder Han looked him over for a long moment before speaking loudly enough for everyone present to hear. “You still dream of becoming an immortal?”

The question hung over the plaza like a blade. Some disciples smirked. Others laughed openly.

Chen lowered his head. “I stopped dreaming years ago.”

The elder gave a single nod. “Good,” he said.

Then came the words that struck harder than Zhao Feng’s kick.

“Dreams are wasted on trash.”

Laughter erupted across the plaza.

Chen stood motionless, his fingers tightening around the bamboo broom until his knuckles turned white. Yet his face revealed nothing.

There was no anger in it, no grief, no hatred, and no tears. There was only the stillness of someone who had learned how to endure what should never have been endured.

But beneath that silence, something inside him still refused to die. One day, he thought, with a quiet so deep it was almost formless, you will regret saying those words. No one heard him. No one noticed the steel hidden behind his lowered eyes.

To everyone else, Chen remained exactly what they had always believed him to be: a disciple who could never cultivate, and therefore could never matter.

After the assembly dispersed, Elder Han spoke again without turning back. “The ancestral mountain paths have not been cleaned in days.”

Chen bowed. “I understand.”

The ancestral mountain lay far from the bustling training grounds, and few disciples ventured there anymore.

Ancient stone stairways vanished into dense forest, where abandoned shrines and crumbling statues stood as forgotten relics of the sect’s distant past. Most believed the place was touched by misfortune.

Chen welcomed the solitude.

As he climbed the weathered steps, the noise of the sect gradually faded behind him until only the wind remained. The deeper he went, the quieter the forest became. Soon, even the birds had stopped singing.

Chen slowed. Something felt different.

Near a broken stone statue whose face had long since crumbled away, a faint shimmer flickered between the roots of an ancient tree. At first, he thought it was only a trick of the light.

But dawn had not yet reached this side of the mountain. The glow pulsed once, soft and golden. Then it pulsed again.

Chen’s grip tightened around the broom, and the exhaustion in his body vanished at once. Slowly and carefully, he stepped toward the ruined statue.

Beneath the cracked stone pedestal, something was glowing, and the moment his shadow fell across it, the mysterious golden light suddenly blazed brighter.