The clang of wooden swords rang sharp across the training yard, mingling with the shouted chants
of disciples practicing their forms. Dust swirled beneath the midday sun, kicked up by the stamping
of dozens of feet. Their uniforms bore the proud insignia of Cloudspire Academy, a minor cultivation
school that stood at the fringes of Azure Heavens Continent's vast dominions. At the farthest edge
of the yard, where no instructor's eyes bothered to linger, stood a boy whose ragged clothes did
little to hide the sweat clinging to his thin frame. His blade was not the polished steel of the inner
students, nor even the decent iron of outer disciples. It was a chipped practice sword, its handle
frayed, its balance long since lost. He swung it anyway. Again. And again. "Pathetic," a voice
sneered nearby. A pair of boys, their uniforms neat and fresh, stood watching him. One crossed his
arms while the other mimicked the boy's unsteady stance, wobbling deliberately until they both
burst out laughing. "Orphan brat thinks he'll cultivate with roots that dull? He'll be sweeping floors
until he dies of old age." Their words struck harder than their laughter, but the boy's grip only
tightened. His name was Jianyu, though few ever bothered to call him by it. To most, he was simply
"the orphan," the stray picked up off the streets when he was eight and tossed into the Academy as
little more than a servant. Ten years had passed since then, yet little had changed. His spiritual
roots — the measure of one's potential on the path of cultivation — were painfully average, so
ordinary they inspired neither envy nor pity. In a world where geniuses soared like dragons, Jianyu
was a stone left in the dirt. But still, he swung. Each motion burned his arms, each breath came
ragged, yet his eyes did not waver. The dust stung, the mockery echoed, but deep inside, an ember
refused to die. "Again," he whispered to himself, raising the dull blade. His arms trembled, but the
sword rose. The laughter of the boys echoed across the yard, drawing the attention of a few others.
Some chuckled, others smirked, and a handful glanced away with disinterest. In Cloudspire
Academy, the strong were admired, and the weak were invisible—unless they made for
entertainment. "Do you hear that, Jianyu?" one of the boys jeered. He snatched a stone from the
ground and tossed it lazily in his hand. "Every swing of yours sounds like a dying mule groaning for
its last breath. You should save us all the pity and quit before you embarrass this Academy any
further." The stone flew before Jianyu could react, striking his shoulder with a dull thud. Pain flared,
but he did not stumble. He simply adjusted his grip, the chipped sword steady once more before
him. The boys frowned at his silence. Mockery was satisfying when it broke spirits. Yet this boy
never snapped, never shouted, never begged. He only endured. That stubborn endurance made
him a target all the more. "Waste of air," the second boy muttered. They turned away, bored now
that their words and stones had failed to bring tears. Jianyu exhaled slowly, lowering the sword for
the briefest of moments. His shoulder throbbed, and his arms trembled with exhaustion, but within
his chest his heart pounded like a war drum. I can't give up. Not here. Not ever. The path of
cultivation had never promised mercy. Every lesson drilled into him since childhood made it clear:
cultivation was defiance against the heavens themselves. To absorb the world's spiritual qi, to
temper flesh and spirit, to rise beyond mortality—it was not a gift, but a constant battle. Only the
strong ascended; the weak fed the soil of their betters. And yet, what choice did an orphan have?
Without strength, he was nothing. Without cultivation, he was no more than prey, destined to bow to
every sneer and boot pressed against his neck. The clang of swords shifted in rhythm as the
instructor barked commands at the other disciples. Jianyu's gaze flickered toward them. Their forms
were sharper, their movements faster. Some had already reached the Refining Meridian Stage,
where the body grew stronger with every cycle of qi. Others whispered proudly of breakthroughs
into the Spirit Foundation Realm, a level that separated mere mortals from cultivators worthy of
recognition. Jianyu clenched his jaw. He was still struggling to circulate qi steadily through his
meridians, forever hindered by the mediocrity of his roots. Where others glided, he stumbled.
Where others soared, he crawled. But still, he moved. He lifted the blade once more, repeating the
simple strike the instructor had long since stopped correcting him on. Dust swirled at his feet, the
weight of the world pressing down on his shoulders. He struck again. And again. And again. Until
his vision blurred. Until the wooden blade slipped from his fingers. And still, before collapsing,
Jianyu whispered through cracked lips: "Again…" The world tilted as Jianyu sank to his knees, his
chest heaving. The chipped sword lay forgotten in the dirt, its dull edge glinting mockingly beneath
the sunlight. Sweat poured down his brow, stinging his eyes. His body screamed for rest, yet his
mind—unyielding, stubborn—refused to bow. As the haze of exhaustion thickened, fragments of
memory surged like ghosts from the depths of his past. He saw the flicker of fire. The collapsing
roofs of ramshackle homes. The desperate cries of neighbors crushed under falling beams. And the
silence that followed when dawn came, leaving only ashes where a small village once stood. Jianyu
had been seven that night. By the time the smoke cleared, there were no parents to scold him for
sneaking scraps, no siblings to share his hunger with. Only emptiness. He remembered wandering,
barefoot and hollow-eyed, through the muddy roads of neighboring towns. He begged, stole when
he could, fought stray dogs for bones. To merchants, he was a pest. To travelers, he was a
shadow. To the world, he was nothing. Until fate—or perhaps cruelty—delivered him to the gates of
Cloudspire Academy. The Academy was no grand sect, not one of the legendary orders sung about
in tales. It was a modest school, training disciples on the edge of the Azure Heavens Continent. Yet
to a starving child, its gates were like the doors of paradise. Meals, roofs, clothes—even if they
came with lashes and endless chores—were luxuries beyond imagining. Still, there had been a
price. Tests revealed his roots were average, no brighter than the countless others doomed to
mediocrity. The instructors spared no words of encouragement. The disciples spared no kindness.
And yet, in that moment when he was handed a chipped practice sword, Jianyu felt something stir
within him. A sliver of hope. For years, he clung to that sliver. While others mocked, he endured.
While others slept, he practiced forms in the dead of night. His strikes lacked grace, his qi circulated
sluggishly, but he refused to stop. If the heavens themselves declared he would crawl, then he
would crawl until his knees bled. The jeering laughter of disciples in the present snapped him back
from the haze of memory. Jianyu blinked, finding himself sprawled in the dirt, the taste of iron thick
in his mouth. His limbs trembled, too heavy to lift. "Still alive, orphan?" one of the boys sneered from
afar, his voice dripping with disdain. "Do us a favor and die quietly. Even the worms deserve better
company than you." Their laughter faded as they walked away, leaving Jianyu alone beneath the
merciless sun. The boy pressed his palms into the dirt. His body screamed in protest, his muscles
trembling with every twitch. Yet slowly, agonizingly, he pushed himself upright. His knees buckled,
but he did not fall. With shaking fingers, he reached for the chipped sword lying beside him. And
raised it once more. The training yard emptied as dusk approached, the disciples filing away in
pairs and groups. Jianyu remained, shoulders heaving, his shirt clinging to his body with sweat. He
raised the chipped sword again but felt nothing—no weight, no power, no progress. His arms were
lead, his strikes dull echoes of the forms he had practiced. It was useless. The more he trained, the
less he felt any change within. His qi remained sluggish, his meridians clogged as though resisting
his will. Swinging the blade a thousand times would not make him soar like the geniuses around
him. For the first time in years, Jianyu let the sword fall to the ground. He stared at his trembling
hands, nails cracked, skin blistered. His breaths came ragged, his vision blurred. A hollow laugh
rose in his throat, though no sound escaped. What was the point? Without thinking, his feet carried
him beyond the Academy's gates. The guards hardly noticed; he was no one worth stopping. Past
the stone walls, the forest loomed—an expanse of towering pines and twisting roots, shrouded in
mist. Few disciples wandered there without supervision, for the woods hid spiritual beasts that
preyed on the unwary. Yet tonight, Jianyu walked as though in a dream. His body ached, his spirit
heavier still, but the whisper of the forest called him forward. The chirp of crickets, the rustle of
leaves, the scent of damp earth—it was the first peace he had felt in years. The path wound deeper
until the trees parted, revealing a clearing bathed in silver moonlight. At its heart roared a waterfall,
cascading from a jagged cliff into a crystal pool below. Mist drifted on the air, carrying with it an
energy both tranquil and strange. Jianyu felt his breath catch; it was as though the very qi here
pulsed with life, richer than anything he had drawn within the Academy's walls. He stumbled closer,
kneeling by the water's edge to cup it in his palms. The liquid shimmered faintly, cool against his
parched lips. For a fleeting moment, he felt the ache in his body ease, as if the forest itself had
embraced him. But the serenity shattered in an instant. The sky darkened, clouds swirling where
none had been. A low rumble shook the ground. Jianyu looked up just as a jagged spear of
lightning tore the heavens, splitting the night in two. The bolt struck him square in the chest. Agony
consumed him—blinding light, searing pain, as though his very soul had been ripped apart. He
screamed, but the roar of thunder swallowed his voice. His body flung backward, crashing into the
pool beneath the waterfall. The current dragged him down, spinning him into the depths. Jianyu
clawed for air, but instead of drowning, he felt the water carry him through a hollow behind the falls.
His body scraped against stone, then slid onto solid ground. Darkness engulfed him, save for a faint
glow seeping from cracks in the cavern walls. Groaning, he forced himself to his knees. The pain
from the lightning remained, but beneath it pulsed something else—an energy foreign and wild,
threading through his veins. His gaze lifted, and his breath stilled. Before him lay a chamber unlike
any he had seen. Ancient runes pulsed faintly on the stone floor, their light converging around a
solitary stone pedestal. Resting atop it were two objects: a jade slip etched with strange markings,
and a small scarlet-red bottle, no larger than a finger, within which swirled a single drop of glowing
liquid. Jianyu's heart pounded. He should have been terrified, yet awe rooted him in place. The air
here was thick with power, a suffocating yet alluring pressure that pressed upon his soul. He
staggered closer, his trembling fingers brushing the jade slip. The moment his skin touched it, a
voice thundered in his mind—deep, ancient, and unyielding. "You who have stumbled upon my
legacy… know this: I am the Heaven Devouring Sage. My path is one the heavens themselves
condemned, yet one that defies all shackles. If you dare walk it, you shall gain the power to
consume all energy under the sky. If you falter, your body will shatter, and your soul shall scatter to
dust." Jianyu staggered back, clutching his temples as the voice of the Heaven Devouring Sage
thundered within his mind. Countless fragments of memory, knowledge, and will flooded into him,
each piece sharper than a blade. The jade slip crumbled to dust in his hands, its essence seared
into his soul. Images filled his thoughts: a lone figure standing upon shattered mountains, devouring
the very heavens above. Beasts fell, their cores dissolving into streams of light. Rivers of qi bent
and swirled, swallowed into his body like a bottomless abyss. The figure's flesh tore, then mended
stronger; bones shattered, then reforged like immortal steel. And then—silence. The knowledge of
the Heaven Devouring Art now lay dormant in Jianyu's mind. A secret cultivation technique
forbidden by the heavens themselves. Its first passages burned vividly in his thoughts: "The
devourer fears no poison, no impurity. All energy is sustenance. All resistance is fuel. Devour,
refine, ascend." Jianyu's chest rose and fell rapidly. To cultivate such a path was madness. Beasts'
cores were known to rot the body with venom if not refined by skilled alchemists. Unrefined qi could
twist meridians, cripple limbs, even explode the dantian. But this art claimed to devour all without
rejection, refining body and soul alike. His eyes drifted to the pedestal once more, where the scarlet
bottle shimmered faintly. Within swirled a single drop of liquid, glowing like molten ruby. Even
sealed, its presence filled the cavern with a suffocating aura. A memory surfaced from the slip's
inheritance: The Heaven's Marrow Elixir—an essence born from the condensed blood of divine
beasts, tempered with immortal herbs. One drop to rebuild the body from its core, to refine the
vessels of qi into perfection. A thousand drops to forge a god. One to remake a mortal into a genius.
Jianyu's throat went dry. His hands trembled as he lifted the bottle, uncorking it with a faint pop. The
scent that escaped was overwhelming, a fragrance both intoxicating and terrifying. His instincts
screamed that a single drop held enough power to tear him apart. Yet if he walked away now, what
awaited him? Mediocrity. Mockery. A lifetime of crawling. His jaw tightened. "If this is madness…
then I will embrace it." He sat cross-legged before the pedestal, closed his eyes, and began
circulating the Heaven Devouring Art. Instantly, the air around him shifted. Threads of qi from the
cavern surged toward him, drawn as if by a vortex, funneling into his dantian. His meridians
screamed in protest, but the art swallowed every impurity, stripping away chaos, refining it into pure
essence. With his cultivation running, Jianyu lifted the bottle and tilted it. The single scarlet drop slid
onto his tongue. Fire. The elixir erupted within him, a storm of molten energy. His veins lit like rivers
of magma. Muscles shredded, bones cracked, blood boiled as though every part of him rebelled
against existence. He convulsed, biting down hard to keep from screaming, his nails gouging the
stone beneath him. But the Heaven Devouring Art stirred. Like a bottomless abyss, it seized the
storming power and dragged it into its depths. The flames that should have annihilated him were
swallowed, refined, reborn. His blood thickened, glowing faintly. His shattered bones knitted back
together, stronger and denser than before. Tendons tightened like iron cords. His meridians
widened, pulsing with vitality, no longer sluggish but roaring like rivers in flood. Every cell of his
body trembled, destroyed, then reforged. Agony consumed him, but so too did clarity. His
once-muddied qi channels now gleamed like polished jade. His dantian, once weak and fragile,
pulsed with a brilliance he had never known. Hours passed—minutes, days, he could not tell. When
at last the storm subsided, Jianyu opened his eyes. Gone was the frail, trembling boy. His gaze
burned with a scarlet glint, sharp enough to pierce stone. His breathing was steady, his body light
yet overflowing with power. Even standing still, he felt as though he could tear through mountains.
He flexed his hands, marveling at the strength coursing through them. For the first time in his life,
the weight of mediocrity had lifted. He had been reforged—not by talent, not by birthright, but by
defiance. Jianyu rose, his voice hoarse yet unwavering. "From this day forth," he whispered into the
cavern's silence, "no chain, no heaven, no fate shall bind me. I will devour all that stands in my
way." The waterfall roared beyond the cavern, as if the world itself trembled at his vow.