Lihuen walked through the darkness.
Not total darkness — but living. An absence of light that didn't scream, but waited. Every step he took seemed to die a few meters ahead, absorbed by stone so ancient it had forgotten what sound was. It felt less like a tunnel and more like walking through a mineral memory. Something from before men. Before maps.
Sen followed in silence, as supple as a shadow. Her deep blue eyes caught the faint, invisible glimmers that sometimes rippled along the walls. She wasn't leading — she was accompanying. But deep down, he knew she sensed more than he did. That she understood.
The stone was smooth. Sometimes laced with crystalline veins. Not luminous, but… aware. Pulses flickered beneath the surface, brief, like nerves under a layer of rock. Symbols drifted between layers, never staying still. Too fast to read. Too slow to ignore.
For a moment, he considered stopping. Not out of fear — but strangeness. That feeling of having already gone too far to turn back. But Sen let out a soft growl — low, warm. Not a warning. A confirmation.
So he continued.
The corridor widened without warning.
And suddenly — nothing. A vast, open void.
Before him, a bottomless and topless shaft. Suspended in the abyss were circular platforms, floating in the black. Some connected by fractured arches, others isolated, lost in the dark. And at the center, suspended midair, a twisted column of stone and mineral filaments. It pulsed softly, like a heart made of obsidian.
Sen leapt without hesitation.
She jumped with the ease of one who never doubts. One platform. Then another. As if she already knew the way. Lihuen followed. No calculation. No hesitation.
The ground beneath his feet barely flexed. He felt, somehow, that even gravity hesitated here. Some platforms swayed. Others dissolved once he left them. Still others only appeared the moment before he landed.
He didn't try to understand. He watched Sen. She never missed.
So he trusted her.
At last, they reached the central column.
Up close, it was massive. Motionless — yet alive. It didn't rotate. It throbbed. A low vibration resonated through it, like a slow, deep breath. It felt like it was waiting.
Sen sat, her eyes fixed on him.
Lihuen placed his hand on its surface.
The world shifted.
A wave twisted through his mind. Sound bent. Light exploded in silence. And everything disappeared.
He was elsewhere.
A white space. Infinite. Without up or down. A light with no source wrapped around him. No shadows. No weight.
And before him — three forms.
Floating. Blurred. In motion.
They were not human. But not absent. They vibrated with such dense presence that he read them, felt them, knew them. Not as beings. As directions.
The first seemed forged from fire and forgetting. Its shape fragmented, as if it had been shattered and reforged. A broken spear hung from its hand. Loose chains drifted around it.
The second was still. Frozen. Its face a smooth mirror, with no mouth, no eyes. A single black feather hung from a thread in its hand, as if ready to write on nothing.
The third… was absence. A hand extended. Nothing more. No form. No body. Just that gesture — open, irreversible.
They spoke.
Not with words. But in his mind.
— The threshold opened at your step.— Silence has recognized you.— A title has been inscribed.
Then they spoke again, as one breath:
— The Title has been given.But it is not yet yours.You stand within the Domain of Qin, memory of the ancients.If you wish to walk beyond the paths, you must leave it.Alive.If not, the Title returns to forgetfulness.
Silence stretched.
Then the light condensed into a symbol.
Burning. Suspended.
[Title Received: He-Who-Walks-Beyond-Paths]Rarity: LegendaryPath: NebulousClass: None Defined
Passive Effect:He who walks beyond paths finds thresholds others do not.Serenity brings power. Shock brings revelation.At each turning point, a line shifts, and legend takes shape.
Active Effect — Invocation of the Three:When the thread of reality frays — at death, at betrayal, at the end —you are summoned into the In-Between.Three forms face you. Never named. Always different.Each one embodies a rupture in the course of things.You choose. And the world bends.But it never yields.
He opened his eyes.
He was lying flat, back on a cold slab. The light had changed. The platforms now seemed frozen mid-air. Even the wind had gone silent.
Sen was nestled against him, quiet.
The central column was cracked. At its heart floated a bluish sphere — soft, almost fragile.
Lihuen reached out.
The sphere came to him effortlessly. When it touched his palm, a soft burn engraved itself there. The rune. Anchored. Present. Alive.
He sat for a moment, eyes lost in the suspended void around him.
He-Who-Walks-Beyond-Paths.
He didn't know if it was a responsibility, an anomaly… or simply a truth. The Title hadn't defined him. It had designated him. A subtle difference. And now it was up to him to bring to life what others would call a Path.
He looked at his hand. The rune still glowed, softly. No threat. No triumph. Just presence. Stable. Silent.
He thought of the words:"You choose. And the world bends. But it never yields."
It was dizzying. Power didn't lie in brute strength or authority. It was there — in the gap. In the moment suspended between cause and consequence. And that was where he was expected. Not to follow. Not to command. But to influence.
He rubbed his face. Let out a quiet sigh.
— I don't know if I'm ready for this… but the world doesn't always ask.
Sen barely lifted her head, peaceful.
He gave a faint smile.
— All right. They say you have to earn a Title. Let's see what it costs.
And without another word, he stood.
He resumed walking slowly, the silence still dense around him. After a few steps, he muttered, without thinking:
— Wonder what Kaen would do in my place…
He stopped. Blinked.
— Kaen?… Who's Kaen?
The name had burst out like an old memory — but with no memory behind it. Just an impression. A reflection without a mirror. He shrugged. Let it go.
His gaze slid to the rune, still etched beneath the skin.Path: Nebulous. Title: Legendary.
He didn't know exactly what that meant. Only that it meant something.Nebulous… wasn't an element. It was an in-between.Something vague. Shifting.Not very reassuring.
But maybe it suited him.
He'd never really walked straight lines anyway.
He clenched his jaw. Lowered his head a little.
— Legendary, huh…
No pride. No fear. Just a strange truth to carry. And the sense that now, every step would matter.
He hadn't taken ten more steps when something changed.
A breath, first. Light. Irregular. As if the mountain — or what lived within it — remembered it could breathe.
Lihuen stopped.Sen snapped her head up, ears aimed forward.
The silence was no longer holding. It was cracking in places. Crumbling softly, like dry skin. Dust began falling from the ceiling. Then a low rumble rose from below. Not violent. But steady. Relentless.
Lihuen stepped back. Behind him, the platform he'd just crossed… was gone. Dissolved. Or moved.
He turned around. The corridor he thought he had seen just moments ago had changed. It was no longer a straight line, but a series of forks. Moving arches formed and closed like living rings. The walls themselves seemed to hesitate between two forms. Smooth, then rough. Stable, then fractured.
The ground began to tremble. Softly at first. Then with rhythm. With will.
And then… they appeared.
They hadn't been there a second before.
Figures — twice the height of a man — sculpted from the very rock of the place. Not statues. Not quite. Forms half-human, half-archaic. Their limbs made of articulated stone blocks, as if they had detached from the wall to take life. Their faces had no features, but two hollows glowed faintly where eyes should be.
Sen growled. A deeper sound than usual. Not fear — warning.
Lihuen stepped back. But the stone behind him had changed. Sealed. Smooth.
They were trapped.
Or… being tested.
The wind rose suddenly. Harsh. Erratic. It came from nowhere — and everywhere at once. It whirled through the shifting arches, whistling between platforms, stirring up dust like an ancient cloud.
The stone golems moved. Slowly, but with mechanical precision. They didn't charge. They surrounded.
Lihuen instinctively placed a hand over the rune. It pulsed. Not in fear. In agreement.
He understood — this wasn't an attack.
Not yet.
It was… the next step.
The true test.
The Domain was shifting. Changing. Closing in.
And he would have to find a way out.