The night was still.
Too still.
Moonlight spilled like silver fire over the courtyards of the Celestial Dawn Sect. The wind had gone silent, as if holding its breath for what was about to come.
Lu Xuan stood alone in the Hall of Empty Flames. The wide stone floor beneath his feet had once been a place of meditation. Now it reeked of blood and memory.
He could still feel Elder Shi Qiran's last breath — the warmth fading from the old man's fingers as he collapsed in Lu Xuan's arms, betrayed not by a stranger, but by the very Sect Master he had served his entire life.
It wasn't the loss that haunted Lu Xuan most—it was the cold, calculated reason behind it.
"You were never his student. You were his cage," the Sect Master had told him, standing tall beneath the great banner of Celestial Dawn. His robes shimmered with celestial runes, but his eyes were dark, empty.
"You bear the Immortal Demon God Body," the man had continued, his voice emotionless. "Shi Qiran was assigned to watch you, not guide you."
Lu Xuan had not replied then. He couldn't. His hands had trembled—not from fear, but from something deeper.
From the rage of knowing he had been used all along.
That same day, the Sect had been thrown into disarray.
The Council of Elders had been called in haste, their expressions unreadable as they stood behind the curtain of white flame in the central hall. Rumors had already begun to spread — whispers that the Zhao Empire was preparing for war, that the Sect Master was negotiating with envoys behind closed doors.
Some elders remained loyal. Others hesitated.
Elder Yan, fire-eyed and sharp-tongued, had struck his staff against the floor. "You would hand over Lu Xuan to the Zhao Emperor for peace?"
The Sect Master raised his gaze, voice calm. "Not for peace. For balance. The boy is becoming unstable. His power… it is unnatural."
"He's not a threat," Yanwu replied, narrowing his eyes. "He is the only reason the Sect still stands after the Blood Lotus catastrophe."
"He is a threat," came the reply, cold and absolute. "Even to himself."
No one noticed the shadow that slipped away from the council chamber.
But she heard everything.
Su Xue sat alone beneath the cherry tree—the same place where she had once told Lu Xuan that even demons could be reached.
Now, she wasn't sure.
The letter in her hand was sealed with wax bearing his insignia. She had not opened it.
Not yet.
She stared at it in silence, her eyes reflecting the pale moon above. Her cultivation had reached the Nascent Soul stage, her strength pulsing beneath her skin like a sealed star.
But none of it felt like enough.
Not when the man who had once made her laugh had become a stranger.
Not when the truth of her family's death—at the hands of the first Demon God, a past incarnation of Lu Xuan—clawed at her every time she looked at him.
"I hate you," she whispered, eyes glinting.
Then, without hesitation, she dropped the letter into the nearby lantern flame.
She didn't even watch it burn.
Far from the Sect's inner chambers, Lu Xuan stood on the edge of the northern cliffs, where the sky touched the peaks in silence.
His robes whipped around him in the growing storm.
Power roared inside him—terrifying, ancient, and unrelenting.
The first level of the Immortal Demon God Body had awakened fully when he broke into the Nascent Soul realm, and now he could feel it humming with destructive resonance. His physical strength had increased tenfold, his qi so dense it bled from his pores like dark mist.
But it was the mental changes that truly unnerved him.
His thoughts came faster. Sharper. More cruel.
It was as if his past lives were whispering from within the dark corners of his soul.
"You cannot die," the voice inside him said. "You can only be sealed."
And worse—
"You will be sealed again if you hesitate."
Lu Xuan clenched his fists.
He had once sought peace. Now he saw how hollow that dream had been. The Sect, Su Xue, even Shi Qiran—they had all been pawns in a cycle of manipulation and fear.
He looked to the heavens. The stars offered no guidance.
"Then I'll carve my own way," he said.
And the wind howled in answer.
Later that night, the inner courtyard was filled with disciples gathering around the shrine newly erected for Elder Shi Qiran.
Some offered incense.
Others whispered prayers.
Lu Xuan did neither. He simply knelt before the shrine and bowed his head.
Then, slowly, he rose.
And left.
There were no tears in his eyes.
Only fire.
End of Chapter 42