The summer wind was dry and sharp, carrying dust across the narrow paths of the mountain. A boy walked alone, his feet bare and hardened from years of toil, his figure thin as though the flesh had been carved away by hunger.
His name was Wei Han.
He carried a bundle of firewood on his back, the coarse rope biting into his shoulders. The path wound upward through rocks and crooked pines, but he climbed in silence, neither panting nor frowning. His eyes, dark as stagnant water, never wavered from the trail.
The village at the foot of the mountain was nothing but a place of decline. Years of drought had reduced fertile fields into cracked earth. Cattle and goats lay dead in the ditches. The people turned on each other. Families traded daughters for grain. Neighbors fought over a cup of rice. Last winter half the village starved.
Wei Han buried his parents with his own hands when he was nine. They had given him their food until their bodies grew weak and their skin clung to bone.
When they could no longer rise, he watched the light in their eyes dim and vanish. That day he shed no tears. He dug shallow graves by the edge of the forest, placed stones upon them, and returned to the village with an empty expression.
Since then Wei Han spoke little. He worked, ate, and slept like a shadow among the villagers.
On this day he went into the mountain to gather wood. Yet when he reached the familiar ridge, his eyes caught a sight that had not been there before.
A landslide had torn open the earth, revealing broken stones scattered among the roots of pines. At the center of the debris, half-buried in soil, stood a weathered arch of black stone. Strange symbols curled along its surface, faint and eroded, but not entirely erased.
Wei Han placed the firewood aside and approached. His steps were steady, his face unreadable. The arch led to a hollow where shattered tiles and collapsed pillars lay in disarray. Once, it must have been a shrine, but now it was nothing more than a ruin forgotten by heaven and earth. Moss clung to the walls and the air smelled of damp stone.
At the heart of the ruin, a single stele remained upright. Cracks ran through its surface like veins of frost. The carvings upon it were broken in many places, yet a section near the center still glimmered faintly, as if untouched by time.
Wei Han stopped before it. His gaze lingered, calm yet piercing.
He reached out.
The moment his fingers brushed the cold surface, the world shuddered.
A searing light erupted from the stele, not dazzling but heavy, pressing against his mind like an ocean crashing upon a pebble. Countless symbols surged forth, weaving themselves into his consciousness. His vision turned black. His body convulsed and fell against the stone floor.
Pain. It tore through him, clawing at flesh and bone. His chest burned as though fire and ice battled within his heart. He could hear whispers, ancient and distant, neither male nor female, chanting words he could not understand. The voices merged and split, one righteous, one demonic, colliding in endless conflict of devils and gods.
Wei Han lay upon the ground, his thin body trembling, sweat pouring down his face. Blood seeped from his lips. Any ordinary child would have screamed, but no sound escaped his throat. His jaw clenched, his eyes opened wide, and in their depths no fear could be seen.
Hours passed. And the agony continued. Slowly the whispers sank deeper, carving themselves into his sea of consciousness. They became lines, instructions, a scripture etched into the marrow of his soul.
When night fell, the ruin grew quiet. The light faded from the stele, and Wei Han's body stilled.
He gradually opened his eyes.
The stars above were sharp and cold. His chest rose with steady breaths. The pain remained, coiled within his veins, but his gaze held no confusion. Instead, there was clarity. The scripture had taken root within him, its meaning clear.
It was the Primordial Qi Heart Sutra.
A method beyond mortal grasp. A internal cultivation scripture that allowed the refinement of both Spiritual Qi and Demonic Qi, to merge them into Primordial Origin Qi, something beyond the reach of ordinary cultivators.
Wei Han sat up slowly. He pressed his palm against his chest, feeling the faint rhythm of his beating heart. His lips parted, but no words came. The boy sat in silence beneath the crumbling shrine.
Around him, the ruins trembled. The stele, having given its secret, cracked down the middle and collapsed into dust. The shrine's stones crumbled, leaving only rubble scattered across the floor.
It was as if it had waited for this moment, for him and no one else. And now it's existence was irrelevant.
Wei Han rose slowly. His body swayed, drained by the ordeal, but his steps did not falter. He picked up his bundle of firewood and turned away from the ruin. Behind him, the mountain swallowed the shrine, burying it once more in silence.
When he returned to the village, the lamps had already gone out. Dogs barked at his passing, and shadows stirred behind doors. He walked to his small hut at the edge of the fields and placed the wood by the hearth. The room was bare, only a straw mat and a clay pot resting in the corner.
Wei Han lay down. The scripture echoed in his mind, each line clear, each word sharp. His body was frail, his dantian yet unopened, but deep within, a path had already begun to take shape.