The wind didn't rustle the trees.
It avoided them.
Within Lee's forest, silence was no longer a lack of sound — it was obedience. The trees didn't creak without permission. The animals stayed underground. Even the spirits moved carefully now, afraid to draw attention.
But something did.
Lee's eyes flicked open.
He was no longer alone.
A figure in the distance stepped through the underbrush with solemn, practiced grace — robed in thick prayercloth, carved bones hanging from a staff that shimmered with spiritlight. Eyes like faded embers scanned the forest.
He didn't belong.
Lee stood slowly.
"Shaman," he said softly.
The figure froze.
Then approached.
"You've desecrated this place," the old man said. "I can feel it in every leaf. In every spirit too afraid to speak."
Lee offered a small, charming smile.
"Strange. They don't seem to mind."
"They're twisted," the man snapped. "Bent around your will. I've seen this before. Your aura stretches for miles. Your name stains the wind."
He raised his staff, and blue fire coiled up its length.
"You've been threading spirits. Binding them. Warping them. Do you even understand the laws you're breaking?"
Lee tilted his head.
"I understand them," he said. "I just never agreed to them."
A pulse of spiritual energy cracked the earth.
The tracker narrowed his stance.
Lee didn't flinch.
Then the old man's eyes widened, just a little — the realization dawning.
"I… can't win against you," he said.
Lee blinked. "No."
And yet the shaman didn't flee.
He turned.
And ran.
Three days passed.
Lee didn't chase.
He watched from the shadows as the shaman emerged again — this time, not alone.
With him stood a broad-shouldered man, greying at the edges, with a familiar posture. Hands like stone. A scar over his cheek.
Lee's old martial arts master.
The only man who'd taught him how to fight.
The only one who once saw him as a son.
They found Lee at twilight, in the middle of his clearing — seated on a stone, eyes half-closed, as if he were waiting for a question he'd already answered.
His master stepped forward first.
"Lee," he said.
Silence.
"You've become a monster."
Lee opened his eyes.
"No," he replied calmly. "I've always been one. You were just too soft to see it."
The shaman snarled. "He threads spirits like sewing needles! He's tampering with the veil between realms—"
"I am the veil," Lee said, standing.
"And you," he turned to his old mentor, "you taught me to strike with precision. To never waste a movement. To win with grace."
He took a step closer, smiling faintly.
"You thought you were raising a prodigy. You were nurturing a weapon."
The old man's jaw tightened.
"I failed you."
"You tried," Lee said gently. "But I was never yours to save."
Then the fight began.
The shaman called down pillars of spiritfire.
The master closed the distance, fists like meteors.
Lee moved like smoke — weaving through blasts, parrying blows with effortless precision. Not graceful. Inevitable.
He struck the shaman first — a burst of compressed aura that crushed the man's ribs with invisible force. He fell, choking on his own breath.
Then came his master.
They fought longer.
But the end was certain.
Lee's hand pressed against the man's chest, a seal burning bright between them. The old warrior locked eyes with his former student — not with hatred… but grief.
Lee whispered, "Thank you for trying."
And ended it.
Later, beneath the burnt pines of the charcoal forest, Lee dug two graves with his bare hands.
Not because he cared.
But because memory matters.
On the first stone, he carved:
"Kaishen of the Veil – Walker Between Worlds
He sought truth in the dark and found fire."
On the second:
"Master Yoru Bo of the Iron Wind
Here lies a man who cared — more than I ever deserved."
He stood over the graves for a moment, watching the ashes drift.
No guilt. No sorrow.
Just wind.
He turned away.
And smiled.