Irelion didn't go back to the barracks. There was nothing for him there but ghosts and the mocking echo of his own weakness. He moved with a grim purpose, skirting the edge of the training grounds and melting into the dense woods that climbed the back of the sect mountain.
He didn't need a path. The memory of this mountain was etched into his soul. Third left past the lightning-scarred oak, avoid the loose scree on the incline, duck under the low-hanging rock that scraped his forehead the first time. He moved by instinct, a ghost navigating a graveyard he knew by heart.
The entrance to the Weeping Grotto was just as he remembered: a dark, unassuming gash in the rock face, hidden behind a thick curtain of damp vines. He slipped inside, the sudden cool a balm on his skin. The air smelled of wet stone and decay.
He ignored the main passages, heading deep into the oppressive darkness. He ran his left hand along the rough wall, counting his steps. One hundred and twelve. He stopped, his fingers tracing the cold rock. To anyone else, it was a solid, unremarkable wall. But his memory was absolute. He found the slight depression, no bigger than his palm, and pushed.
A low, grinding groan, like the mountain clearing its throat, echoed in the tunnel. The section of wall receded, revealing a dark chamber beyond.
And then he saw them. A soft, milky-white glow emanated from the back of the chamber, pushing back the gloom. A dozen small herbs, their silver leaves pulsing with gentle light. Moonpetal Herbs. A genuine, weary smile touched his lips. It was the first one in this new life.
He didn't hesitate. He harvested one—just one—and sat cross-legged on the cold stone floor. He popped the bitter herb into his mouth and crushed it between his teeth.
The energy that flooded his system was not a gentle stream. It was a torrent of ice-cold fire. His meridians, narrow and impure, felt like they were being scoured with sand and lightning. It was a raw, grinding agony, a biological scream from a body being violently remade.
His first instinct was to stop, to let the energy dissipate. But then he saw her face. Aurelia, consumed by holy fire, her skin melting away, her eyes wide with a pain he couldn't stop.
He leaned into the pain.
He channeled the memory of the fire that killed her, using that phantom heat as an anvil. He hammered the raging Qi in his body against it, his grief a forge, his rage a bellows. He was no longer just cultivating. He was performing a brutal act of alchemy on his own soul, transmuting loss into power.
The bottleneck to the 4th Stage wasn't a wall; it was a mountain. He smashed himself against it, again and again, until something inside him cracked. With a soft pop deep in his dantian, the pressure vanished, replaced by a surge of clean, dense energy.
Mortal Realm, 4th Stage.
He slumped against the wall, panting, his body slick with a foul, black sweat of expelled impurities. He had taken the first step.
But strength alone wouldn't be enough. As the herb's energy settled in his dantian, his tactical mind was already cataloging resources. The grotto wasn't just a cultivation site—it was a laboratory.
He examined the cave walls with new eyes. Sulfur deposits stained the rocks near the entrance, yellow streaks that reeked of volcanic activity. Iron-nettle grew in thick patches near the moisture-rich areas, its dried leaves brittle and sharp. And in the deeper chambers, he'd seen the telltale glow of Fire-Ant nests.
The components of Ravenna's "little surprises."
His hands moved almost of their own accord, testing a piece of sulfur between his fingers. The texture was right—crumbly, reactive. He crushed a dried nettle leaf, watching it fracture into razor-edged fragments.
Not yet. He didn't have the cores, didn't have the catalyst. But he knew where to look. And more importantly, he knew he'd need them.
The Blackwood Forest patrol was coming. He could feel it like a distant storm on the horizon, an inevitability written in the tapestry of fate he was trying to reweave.
When that storm arrived, he'd need more than a cheap iron sword and borrowed time.
As the roaring in his ears subsided, he heard something else. Voices. Muffled, coming from the main tunnel outside his hidden chamber.
"...sure no one saw us?" It was Jin's arrogant, grating voice.
"Who would come to this dump?" another voice replied. "It's perfect. We can stash the spirit stones we won from the bets here until the heat dies down."
Irelion's blood ran cold. He held his breath, instantly suppressing the new, volatile Qi that was still settling in his meridians. The grinding stone that sealed the chamber was heavy, but it wasn't soundproof. If they found the seam...
Footsteps crunched on the gravel just outside. "This wall looks loose," Jin's crony said. "Maybe there's another tunnel back here."
A heavy thud echoed as someone kicked the stone seal. Irelion didn't breathe. His heart was a silent, frozen lump in his chest. For a terrifying moment, he thought the jig was up.
"It's solid," Jin grunted, his voice laced with annoyance. "Forget it. Let's just bury them under that pile of rocks near the entrance. No one will ever look there. Come on."
The footsteps receded, their voices fading into the darkness.
Irelion waited for a full five minutes before he dared to let out a breath. He leaned his head back against the wall, a tremor running through him that had nothing to do with cultivation.
He was stronger now. But he was also a man with a secret, hiding in a cave that was no longer safe. He had enemies, however pathetic, sniffing around the edges of his sanctuary. He needed to get stronger, faster. Because ghosts couldn't afford to be discovered.