The slag pit fell silent — its rust pool still as old iron under moonless root veins.
Above, the ruin's terraces lay hushed in cold wind.
Below, within cracked ribs and marrow flame, the forging fang pulsed — a newborn shard of spirit iron bound in flaw, wolf echo, forge ghost, and devoured slag.
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Li Tianyin's eyes cracked open — silver rings glimmered in black irises, ember runes dancing behind soot lashes.
Every breath hissed pain through fissured ribs, but the pact devoured that pain, pressing its ember teeth deeper into bone.
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The forge ghost whispered: Fang must roar.
The wolf's echo snapped at marrow edges: Strike prey. Taste iron. Draw blood.
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The forging fang pulsed, hungry for more than echo slag — it needed true iron veins and living blood to bite.
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Tianyin's tiny hands scraped the slag floor — raw palms tracing root fissures that snaked deeper into the buried forge veins.
Above the slag chamber, stone ribs cracked open — a tunnel, long collapsed, where novice disciples once carried spirit ore from the outer mines to the forge hall's mouth.
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He pulled himself upright — feet slipping on rust dust, ribs cracking wider with every breath.
Yet the ember flame hissed bright — rune brand flickering, forging fang shivering against marrow.
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He crawled into the tunnel — a throat of broken stone veins and dangling root tendrils that dripped cold sap like stale oil.
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On Earth, he'd once pried open a rusted train car behind the scrap yard fence — looking for copper coils and hidden iron bars to melt down for coins.
The metal cut him deeper than any blade — but his fingers never let go.
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Here, the vein would cut deeper — but the flaw begged for each slice.
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The tunnel spat him into a hollow — the buried forge hall.
Where once hammer songs rang under iron banners, only rusted racks and dead coals waited in the hush.
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But in the forge hall's heart, an old spirit iron vein bled faint ember motes where a hammer pit split the stone floor.
No sect elder stood guard.
No talisman sealed its flow.
The Silent Bell's roar had cracked old ward runes wide open.
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The forging fang pulsed behind Tianyin's ribs — tiny marrow voice hissed through cracked lips:
> "Fang must bite."
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He crawled to the pit's edge — spirit iron gleamed faint beneath slag crust, veins of raw ore pulsing like a heartbeat long forgotten.
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He pressed his tiny palm to the vein — cold ore sang through bone, marrow flame hissing where forge ghost and wolf echo licked the forging fang's tip awake.
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Pain bit deep — marrow fissures split wider, blood hissing against iron grit.
The pact roared: Feed the fang.
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He tore a shard of ore free — nails ripping open, blood dripping on raw spirit iron.
The forging fang inside the hammer seed flared — ember runes curled tighter, binding blood and ore into its half-formed tip.
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But raw ore was not enough — the pact demanded prey.
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At the forge hall's far wall, old spirit iron lumps stirred — echoes of failed forging beasts, half-sleeping inside slag cages.
They sniffed the flaw's hiss — hungry for marrow heat they could never taste above root.
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One stirred awake — a forge lizard, scales of cracked slag and spirit iron, tongue flicking sparks against the old anvil stone.
Its hiss rattled rust racks overhead — a lullaby of death for any novice who dared step too close.
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Tianyin did not crawl back.
Tiny feet braced on cold stone — ribs cracked.
The forging fang howled inside — marrow flame pressed ghost ember through bone veins, flaring the rune brand to white heat.
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The forge lizard lunged — jaws snapping for flawed flesh.
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He struck first.
A child's fist, blood-soaked, slammed the raw ore shard into the lizard's throat.
The forging fang's echo hissed — marrow flame bit slag scale, dragging spirit iron blood into the flaw.
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The beast writhed — echo slag and hot ore marrow flowing down the pact's vein into the forging fang's core.
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Pain bit deep — Tianyin's vision swam in ember sparks.
But the flaw devoured it.
The forge ghost hissed.
The wolf's echo snarled.
The forging fang roared.
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The beast collapsed — slag scales cracking, spirit iron marrow leaking into the child's broken palms.
The pact drank deep — forging fang sealing its raw tip with the lizard's iron blood, tempering marrow with beast echo.
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In the hush, the forging fang rang its first true roar — a tiny note that shivered through cracked bone like a hidden blade being born in darkness.
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Tianyin slumped over the dead forge lizard — ember breath rattling through ribs that would never close.
The forging fang pulsed steady — no longer just a promise, but the seed of a blade that would drink limit after limit, flaw after flaw.
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Above the buried forge hall, the ruin's cracked terraces whispered with the Silent Dao Bell's hum — Heaven's Flaw had struck again.
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End of Chapter 19
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