Kael's mouth opened, but no words came through. His throat worked uselessly, producing only silence.
His mind screamed at him with sudden clarity, this was the master from the journal. Xuanyan Qiu. The legendary cultivator who'd surpassed the Ascendant Realm.
But how? A fragment of his soul, somehow sealed within the journal's first page? Or was this something more, something stranger and more impossible?
The monk's frail frame seemed to sag under invisible weight, his thin shoulders bowing as if crushed by burden beyond comprehension.
"We burned the heavens and drowned the earth to delay your awakening," he said, his voice trembling with profound grief that seemed to echo from centuries past. "Yet here you stand, unchained once more."
He paused, his ancient gaze never leaving Kael's face.
"Not as a beast… but as a man."
