Su Yang stood transfixed. The cavern was a cathedral of silence, its only congregation the ancient, watchful murals and the sublime, crystalline coffin at its heart. The air itself was thick, heavy, and tasted of ages. It was a weight that pressed not on his body, but on his very soul. His own misery, the cold, the hunger—all of it receded into a distant, insignificant hum. He was in the presence of eternity.
Hesitantly, drawn by a force he could not comprehend, he took a step forward. Then another. His ruined shoes made no sound on the smooth, polished stone floor. The ethereal light from the crystal veins gleamed on the surface of the coffin, making the swirling mists within seem to quicken their pace, as if stirred by his approach.
He stopped before the dais. The coffin was a masterpiece of impossible craftsmanship. It was not opaque crystal, but something clearer, purer. It seemed less a container and more a window into another reality, one of gently shifting, luminous fog. He could see the faint, humanoid outline within, but no details.
Awe warred with a primal, instinctual fear. Every fiber of his modern, rational being screamed at him to turn back. To flee this place of forgotten power. But the part of him that had been shattered, the part that had cried out to the heavens for answers, was mesmerized. This was an answer. A terrifying, incomprehensible one.
Driven by a need to confirm it was real, to touch this miracle, he slowly, tremblingly, reached out his right hand.
His fingertips made contact with the crystal surface.
It was not cold, as he expected. It was warm. A deep, resonant, living warmth that seeped into his chilled skin.
And then it happened.
The moment his skin touched the crystal, the surface seemed to liquefy, to become impossibly adhesive. It wasn't glue; it was a fusion. A deep, resonant hum filled the cavern, vibrating up through the dais and into his bones. The swirling gold and silver mists within the coffin surged toward his hand, swirling around the point of contact like a vortex.
Panic, pure and undiluted, lanced through him.
He tried to pull back. His muscles strained, his arm trembling with the effort. But it was useless. His hand was held fast, as if the crystal had grown around it, becoming a part of his very flesh. He pulled harder, a grunt of fear escaping his lips. The adhesion held, unyielding. He was trapped.
His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat in the immense silence. He pulled again, throwing his weight backward. Nothing. He braced his feet against the base of the jade dais and pulled until he felt his shoulder joint scream in protest. The coffin did not budge. It was impossibly, immovably heavy, as if it were anchored to the very core of the world.
Terror took hold. He was chained to this… this tomb. He would die here, slowly, of thirst and hunger, his body preserved as a macabre addition to the scene.
"Let go! Please!" he begged the empty air, his voice a hoarse whisper that was swallowed by the cavern's grandeur.
He began to struggle in earnest, a wild, frantic animal caught in a trap. He pulled and twisted, trying to break the seal. In his desperate thrashing, his pinned hand scraped violently against the one part of the coffin that wasn't perfectly smooth—a nearly imperceptible seam where the lid met the base.
A sharp, searing pain shot through his palm.
He cried out, yanking instinctively from the fresh wound. And for the first time, his hand moved. Just a fraction. It was still held, but the sudden movement, combined with the injury, had an effect.
A single, perfect drop of blood welled from the cut on his palm. It was a vibrant, shocking red against the absolute clarity of the crystal. It hung for a moment, suspended by the surface tension, before it was drawn into the coffin.
It did not smear. It sank. Like a stone through water, it descended through the crystal and into the swirling mists within.
The effect was instantaneous and cataclysmic.
The deep hum became a deafening roar. The entire cavern trembled. Dust and small stones rained down from the unseen ceiling high above. The luminous veins in the walls flared into blinding brilliance.
The golden and silver mists inside the coffin went wild, spinning furiously, converging on the drop of blood. They consumed it, and in that moment, the coffin flashed with a light so intense Su Yang had to squeeze his eyes shut.
When the light faded, the adhesion was gone. His hand was free.
He stumbled backward, falling hard onto the stone floor, clutching his injured hand to his chest. He stared, wide-eyed and breathless.
The crystal lid of the coffin was no longer sealed. It had shifted, sliding open soundlessly by a few inches. A light, not of this world, spilled from the opening—a soft, golden radiance that held the warmth of a sun and the coolness of the moon simultaneously.
From within that light, an aroma bloomed. It was the scent of ancient sandalwood and rare incense, of petrichor after a first rain, and something else… something divine and indescribable.
Trembling, Su Yang pushed himself to his feet and approached again, drawn by a morbid, irresistible curiosity. He leaned over, peering into the open coffin.
His breath caught in his throat, and for a moment, his heart seemed to stop.
Inside lay a man.
But not a decayed corpse, not a skeleton. The body was pristine, perfect. It appeared to be in a deep, tranquil sleep. The skin was warm and lifelike, with a healthy glow. The face was that of an old man, yet it was unlined by the petty concerns of mortality. It was carved from jade and wisdom, framed by long hair the color of spun moonlight and a beard that flowed like a silver waterfall. His features were noble, severe, and held an authority so profound it felt like a physical force.
He was clad in robes of impossible majesty. They seemed woven from the fabric of the cosmos itself—a deep, midnight black embroidered with constellations that actually shimmered and moved, and threads of gold and silver that swirled in patterns mimicking the celestial dance of Yin and Yang. An intimidating, palpable aura radiated from the body. It was not hostile, but it was so immense, so overwhelmingly powerful, that Su Yang felt like an ant standing before a mountain. Each breath became a laborious effort, his lungs struggling against the pressure of the divine energy that filled the space.
This was no mere king or emperor. This was a being who had commanded the heavens and shaped the earth. And he was… fresh. As if he had lain down mere moments ago.
The contradiction was too much. The sheer, impossible reality of it shattered the last of Su Yang's rational mind. The adrenaline, the terror, the awe, the hunger—it all crashed down upon him at once. His vision swam, the magnificent figure blurring. His knees buckled, and he began to crumple to the floor, consciousness fleeing.
Just before the darkness could claim him, an ethereal voice rang out. It did not come from the body in the coffin. It seemed to emanate from the very air, the very stones, the very fabric of reality within the cavern. It was ancient, layered with the weight of countless millennia, and crackling with a barely restrained power.
"WHO… DARES… DISTURB… MY ETERNAL SLUMBER?"
The voice was not loud, yet it vibrated through Su Yang's bones, shaking him back to awareness. He jerked upright, his eyes darting around wildly.
Before him, the air above the coffin shimmered. The light coalesced, pulling together the swirling mists of gold and silver until they formed the faint, translucent image of the old man from the coffin. It was a remnant soul, a wisp of consciousness preserved through eons. His eyes, though spectral, were open. They blazed with an inner light, filled with a tempest of anger, annoyance, and an immense, weary grandeur.
He glared down at Su Yang, his expression one of utter contempt.
"You… a mortal? A pathetic, qi-starved, trembling worm of a mortal? You have the audacity to trespass in my sanctum? To defile my rest with your meager, filthy blood?"
Each word was a lash, a hammer blow of disdain. Su Yang could only stare, mute with terror.
"The heavens have truly fallen into jest," the specter continued, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "To send a puling child, weak of body and spirit, to the tomb of the Primordial Yin-Yang Emperor! Have the eons eroded all respect? All sense?"
The Emperor's ghostly form drifted closer, peering at Su Yang as if he were a particularly disgusting insect. "Look at you! Drenched in river filth, clad in rags, your spirit fractured by some trivial mortal woe. You are nothing. You are less than nothing. You are a stain upon the memory of true power!"
Su Yang flinched, the insults striking with the force of physical blows. He wanted to protest, to explain, but no words would come. He could only kneel there, shivering under the gaze of a god.
The Emperor's tirade continued for another moment, a magnificent outpouring of cosmic irritation. But then, as his spectral eyes swept over Su Yang one more time, his cursing abruptly ceased.
A flicker of something else—shock, disbelief, then dawning, awe-struck realization—passed over the ancient face.
"Wait…" The ethereal voice lost its thunderous quality, becoming sharp, focused, probing. "This feeling… this unique resonance…"
The remnant soul drifted even closer, until it was mere inches from Su Yang's face. The young man could feel a strange energy emanating from it, not warm, not cold, but a perfect, balanced neutral. It washed over him, through him, as if scanning the very core of his being.
The Emperor's eyes widened. The anger vanished, replaced by an expression of pure, unadulterated astonishment.
"It cannot be…" he whispered, the sound like the rustling of stars. "After all this time… across the endless turning of the kalpas… to appear now… here… in this worthless, backward realm…"
He pulled back, his form shimmering with a new, intense light. He looked at Su Yang not with contempt, but with a kind of rapturous incredulity.
"Boy," the voice was now different. Softer, yet thrumming with a profound intensity. "You possess a constitution lost to legend. A myth whispered only in the highest heavens and the deepest hells."
He paused, letting the weight of his words hang in the ancient air.
"You bear the **Yin-Yang Creation Body**."
Su Yang stared, uncomprehending. The words meant nothing to him.
The Primordial Emperor's soul seemed to gather itself, its form growing slightly more substantial. The impatience was gone, replaced by the solemn gravity of a master about to impart ultimate knowledge.
"To be so ignorant," the Emperor murmured, more to himself than to Su Yang. "This supreme treasure, fallen into the dust… Very well. Listen, and engrave this upon your soul. In the Primordial Chaos, before the heavens were divided, all was one. The supreme Dao gave birth to the Two Manifestations: Yin and Yang. From their interplay, the Ten Thousand Things were created."
His voice took on a rhythmic, chanting quality, as if reciting an ancient scripture.
"Most beings are born leaning to one aspect or the other. Even the greatest cultivators spend millennia seeking balance, attempting to harmonize the opposing forces within their dantian. It is the fundamental struggle of all creation."
The spectral form gestured toward Su Yang.
"But you… you are not of that struggle. You are its embodiment. Your very cells, your spirit, your marrow—they are a perfect, innate equilibrium of Yin and Yang. You do not seek balance. You *are* balance. You are the living manifestation of the Taiji itself. Your body is not a vessel for Qi; it is a crucible for Creation. You do not cultivate power; you generate it, naturally, from the harmonious union of opposites within you."
He looked at Su Yang with something akin to reverence.
"This body is the key to the ultimate Dao. It is said its possessor can tread the path of dual cultivation not as a mere technique, but as their natural state of being. Their progress is not linear; it is exponential. With a suitable partner, with a true destined consort… the potential is limitless. It is a power that could restore a broken world… or unmake a perfect one."
The Emperor fell silent, his blazing eyes fixed on the stunned young man kneeling before him. The cavern seemed to hold its breath.
The insults, the curses, the humiliation—all of it was forgotten. Su Yang could only process one staggering, world-shattering truth.
He was not nothing.
He was legendary.