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Chapter 1 – Sword of Light, Heart of Iron
Eastern Wastes
The wind howled across the scorched remains of the Eastern Wastes, whistling between crumbling pillars and ash-stained stones. Where once stood the Moon-Weaver Cult—a sect accused of harboring demonic techniques—now only corpses remained, broken and bloodless.
At the center of the ruin stood a man cloaked in white.
His robes were unstained, despite the massacre. They fluttered faintly in the lingering breeze, pristine like untouched snow. His long black hair was tied into a high tail that reached the middle of his back, and a sheathed sword hung motionless at his waist. His eyes—calm, narrow, cold—scanned the battlefield with no sorrow and no satisfaction. Only certainty.
Lin Tianlan. The Demon Slayer. The Sword of Radiant Judgment.
Behind him, a dozen cultivators from allied sects followed in hushed awe. Not one dared speak. Their eyes flicked from the mangled bodies around them to the lone man at their head. The slaughter had taken less than half an incense stick's burn. Not a single enemy had touched him. Not even their spiritual Qi had brushed his robes.
Tianlan took a final glance at the corpse of the cult leader—a gaunt woman with crescent moon tattoos scorched into her skin—and turned away.
"Burn the bodies," he said.
A younger cultivator swallowed hard. "Senior Lin… there were children in the compound. Infants. They—"
Tianlan's eyes flicked to him, sharp as the blade at his side.
"Their Qi was tainted. Would you have them grow to devour your sect?"
The boy flinched and bowed. "Forgive me, Senior brother."
"There is no forgiveness in righteousness," Tianlan replied. "Only purification."
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That evening, as the flames roared behind him, Lin Tianlan sat alone on a cliffside overlooking the valley. The moon hung low, draped in a veil of red mist. He meditated with his legs crossed, the sheath of his sword resting against his shoulder.
His mind, though trained to silence, stirred.
The memory returned again. It always did, after each purge.
He was five. Hiding under a collapsed altar. His mother's voice—soft, desperate—calling his name through the din. His father's sword arm broken, dragging his wife behind him, blood gushing from his thigh. And above them, cloaked in dark crimson robes and laughing as homes burned, the shadow of a demonic cultivator raising a black flame—
He gasped and opened his eyes.
That part always blurred. He remembered the fire, the screams. The pain. But the face of the attacker was always shrouded, as if the heavens themselves refused to let him recall.
"I will kill them all."
He clenched his fist, nails digging into his palm. "Every last one."
A soft rustle behind him. He didn't turn.
"Junior Sister Yue," he said, calmly.
A voice like silk replied, "How do you always know it's me?"
"Your breath lacks killing intent. Plus, your fragrance, it's the Green Jade essence isn't it?"
She stepped closer, her robes trailing behind her like petals. Yue Ruyan of the Violet Plum Sect was famed for her grace, beauty, and devotion to Tianlan. Dozens of marriage proposals followed her, but she ignored them all—for him.
"I came to offer medicine," she said. "And my company."
"You may leave the medicine," Tianlan said, not unkindly. "But I do not require your comfort."
She knelt beside him, placing a jade bottle near his knee. "You fight alone too often. Even the sun grows weary without a moon to share the sky."
Tianlan didn't answer.
"You're always alone after the battle," she said, her voice softer. "Don't you ever want someone beside you when the fighting stops?"
"I have my sword."
"And when your sword dulls?"
"It will not. And if it does, it will be when I die, andit will shatter with me."
Yue Ruyan looked at him for a long moment. Then she rose and said, "One day, Lin Tianlan… you will realize a blade cannot warm your soul."
He said nothing. She walked away.
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That night, he dreamt again.
But this time, the fire was softer. The same village burning… but the shadows above weren't laughing. They were screaming—fleeing. One of them was running toward him. Reaching out with trembling hands.
Not to hurt him… to protect him.
He sat bolt upright in his chamber, drenched in sweat.
"No," he whispered. "They killed my family. Demons. Heretics. I saw them."
But the face he remembered as a child—the robed figure with the outstretched hand—wasn't cruel.
It looked like his mother.
He woke up in sweat. He then shook his head and went to sleep, unbeknownst to him, a huge storm is coming his way. A storm which will change him to the core .
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The next morning, he received a report. A new sect had emerged in the upper realm—an unorthodox order centered around black lotus cultivation, duality, and… harmony between Yin and Yang. A sect where men were transformed to femboys who will have to be fully devoted to their master...going by the name Heavenly Demon.
Silk Lotus Sect.
Lin Tianlan's grip tightened around the scroll.
"Demonic filth," he muttered.
But something in his chest pulsed faintly. A ripple. A tremor not of anger—but of something he couldn't name.
And so, with sword in hand, he turned toward the heavens.
"I will cut down every heresy until there is nothing left. Not even a mere Thought."
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Silk Lotus Realm
Far beyond the veil of righteous realms, within a still void blooming with unlight, the Silk Lotus trembled.
Its central stalk rose from an obsidian lake. Around it, 5 out of 6 petals curved inward like waiting mouths. Most were dim.one was fully opened. But now ,a petal—just one—flickered faintly, rhythmically, like a heart remembering how to beat.
The second petal.
Yan Xue stood before it, quiet, his body wrapped in sheer black silk that moved like breathless mist. His expression was not excited. It was reverent. His lotus petal mark on his chest also began pulsing while quietly locking onto a location. A person to be exact.
He exhaled. "It's beginning. His Qi is shifting."
From behind him, arms wrapped around his waist, warm and unyielding. The embrace was possessive without being cruel.
Ryu Yeon-Hwa, the Heavenly Demon, whispered into his ear:
"He doesn't know what he is. He doesn't know what he came from. But he'll feel it—though my will. Through you."
"When your Qi meets his, something inside him will crack.Supreseed memories will surface."
Yan Xue closed his eyes, letting his own Qi spiral upward—floral, fluid, forbidden.
he said softly. " He'll fall through me."
Yeon-Hwa smiled behind him. "And at the bottom, he'll find me."
The lotus stirred. The second petal was waking.
And somewhere far below, a sword cultivator whispered a vow he would never fulfill.
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