The Celestial Meridian Sect rarely mobilized its disciples.
Novices trained. Elders taught. The Sect remained a mountain of silence, rarely disturbed by the outside world. For them to march — even to investigate an incident — meant something had shaken their foundation.
Ren Xiang felt the tension long before the command was spoken. The air vibrated faintly, as if the mountain itself was holding its breath.
Ilvara stood at the center of the training yard, surrounded by rows of novices, adepts, and the few inner disciples allowed to join. Her jaw was clenched. Even the wind seemed to hush for her voice.
"A village under our watch," she said, "has been struck by an unknown force. Shadows — not beasts, not humans, not specters — have attacked and corrupted several youths."
Mira inhaled sharply beside Ren Xiang.
Taro muttered, "Corrupted? Like what happened to that old man in Xiang's hometown?"
Ren Xiang's fist tightened. The filaments. He remembered the pattern — the parasitic roots draining energy through microscopic meridian channels.
Ilvara continued, "Reports say the shadows appeared only briefly, left almost no physical wounds, and yet left children in comas, their meridians drained to the brink."
A murmur swept through the novices.
Ren Xiang closed his eyes. The shadows weren't killing — they were… testing, measuring. Sampling.
Just as they had measured him.
Ilvara raised a hand, silencing the noise. "We go not for war, but for containment and study. We do not know the enemy. That makes them dangerous."
She turned.
"Ren Xiang. Mira Seline. Taro Flint. Step forward."
The three froze.
Taro squeaked, "WHY am I being summoned?! I bruise easily—"
"Because you're strong for a novice," Ilvara snapped. "And because you have a good heart. We need both."
Taro puffed up slightly, then realized that good hearts usually suffered and shrank again.
Mira bowed respectfully. Ren Xiang remained still, waiting.
Ilvara looked at him with a strange expression — part warning, part trust. "Xiang, your sensitivity to resonance is invaluable. And…"
She hesitated.
"And they may come for you again. Best that we stay near."
Ren Xiang nodded.
The Sect set out by noon.
A column of robed disciples marched across the narrow mountain road like a river of pale cloth. Elders surrounded Ilvara and several adepts traveled ahead, scouting the path. Ren Xiang walked near the front, Mira at his left and Taro dragging a spear that was clearly too heavy at his right.
"Lift it properly," Mira hissed.
"I AM lifting it properly," Taro groaned. "It's just… very spear-like."
Ren Xiang chuckled softly. Mira threw him a look that said: Focus. But even she could not suppress a faint smile.
They descended from the Sect's mountain plateau into the thick forests that blanketed the lower slopes. Trees rose like ancient pillars, roots as thick as boulders coiled into the ground. The air smelled of moss and river silt.
Several adepts circled above on giant feathered hawks, scouting. Their shadows darted across the forest floor like swift arrows.
Ren Xiang observed everything — the way the leaves rustled unnaturally when the wind blew from the west, the faint hum of energy under the soil, the shifting pressure in the air. Patterns emerged constantly.
"Stop thinking," Mira murmured, elbowing him lightly.
"I can't," Ren Xiang said.
"I know," she sighed, "but if you think this hard every hour, you'll burn your brain out by sixty."
Ren Xiang blinked. "My past life lived only to thirty."
Mira froze. "...What?"
Ren Xiang realized what he'd said and cleared his throat. "I mean—my brain feels older than my age."
Mira narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but Ilvara's sharp call saved him from explaining.
"Quiet," she commanded.
The column halted.
A strange scent swept through the forest — cold, metallic, and sour. A smell like the aftermath of lightning, but wrong. Elder Ilvara lifted her hand. "We're close."
The forest opened into a small valley — and the village appeared.
Or rather, what remained of it.
The huts were intact, but the air around them shimmered faintly. Tendrils of thin mist coiled around the houses. The entire valley had a muted hush, like sound had been swallowed.
Ren Xiang felt the hairs on his arms rise.
A shout rang out from an adept ahead. "Elder! There is corruption in the air."
Ilvara raised her blade. "Form the Crescent Formation."
Disciples moved instantly, forming a protective arc around the village entrance.
Ren Xiang, Mira, and Taro were positioned near Ilvara. The elder kneeled and placed her palm on the ground. A pulse of luminous energy surged from her skin into the soil.
The mist recoiled.
"Shadow residue," she muttered. "It's strong."
She looked at Ren Xiang. "Xiang. Do you sense anything?"
He inhaled.
Immediately — the world tilted.
NOT physically — but through his meridians. A resonance hummed in his chest, tugging him toward the village's central square. His bones buzzed faintly. His Inner Sea rippled. The star-node pattern from the urn flashed in his mind.
"It's gathering," Ren Xiang whispered. "It's centered… in the middle of the village."
"In what?" Mira asked.
"I don't know," he whispered. "Something is waiting."
Ilvara nodded grimly. "Stay close."
They advanced.
The central square was empty — except for a well and a single unconscious boy lying beside it.
Mira gasped. "He's just a child…"
Taro swallowed hard. "Elder… this feels wrong."
Ilvara approached the boy slowly. Her blade glowed. "His meridians are drained… but his soul is intact."
Ren Xiang knelt beside her and examined the boy. The same filaments from before — microscopic root-like tendrils — clung to the child's chest, barely visible. They pulsed faintly, sucking.
He reached out—
"Don't touch!" Ilvara snapped.
But Ren Xiang's hand was already hovering.
The filaments twitched violently, recognizing him.
And suddenly — the entire well erupted.
Black mist burst out like a geyser, swirling into a towering shape. A shadow — tall, humanoid, but featureless — rose from the stone mouth of the well. Its presence froze the air.
Mira stumbled back. "That— That's—"
"A Wraith," Ilvara growled. "But larger. Stronger."
Ren Xiang's blood turned cold.
The creature wasn't a wraith.
Not fully.
It carried the same distortion, the same bending of air—
But something inside it shimmered with geometric patterns.
Like the star-node lattice.
Like the urn.
Like the Abyss.
The Wraith shrieked — a sound that burrowed under the skin — and lashed forward.
Straight at Ren Xiang.
Ilvara moved faster than thought — intercepting the blow. Her blade sliced through the shadow, but the Wraith reformed instantly. Its arms extended like liquid smoke, wrapping around Ilvara's blade and pulling her off balance.
Ren Xiang rose instinctively.
Mira grabbed him. "DON'T—! You're not ready!"
"I don't have a choice," he replied quietly.
The Wraith's body shifted — and six jagged tendrils shot toward Ren Xiang.
He inhaled sharply.
Every meridian in his body flared.
The Inner Sea rippled.
The star-node pattern ignited like a constellation at his core.
Ren Xiang moved.
Not fast — not strong —
But precisely.
He stepped aside exactly one inch, and the tendrils missed his ribs. Another tendril lashed for his throat — he ducked, breath aligning with the lower meridian nodes. The next strike twisted unnaturally; Ren Xiang pivoted again, steps instinctively following the pattern from the alabaster urn.
The Wraith screeched — its movements losing cohesion.
Ilvara gaped from behind her blade. "He's… disrupting its rhythm…"
Ren Xiang inhaled sharply.
He felt the resonance. The Wraith had a pattern. An internal frequency. A core.
A weak point.
He raised his hand and struck the air — not the Wraith — but the empty space in front of it, exactly where the resonance bent out of phase.
A shockwave rippled.
The Wraith convulsed violently, its form flickering.
Mira shouted, "What did you do?!"
Ren Xiang didn't answer.
He struck again — another invisible point, another frequency node.
The Wraith screamed — a dissonant shriek that cracked the earth beneath it. Shadows peeled away from its body like torn cloth. The tendrils retracted, flailing.
Ilvara's eyes widened. "He's destabilizing its anchor!"
Ren Xiang stepped closer, body vibrating with the star-node resonance. He aligned his breath, his stance, his will.
He struck the third and final weak point.
The Wraith imploded silently — collapsing into a vortex of black smoke that spiraled into the well and vanished.
Silence swallowed the square.
No one moved.
Ilvara exhaled shakily. "Ren Xiang…"
Ren Xiang turned, breathing hard. "It was following a recurring cycle. A geometric pattern. Once disrupted, it couldn't maintain form."
Mira stared at him like he was a ghost. "Xiang… that wasn't training. That was—"
She didn't finish.
Because from the far side of the village, a second scream rose.
Then a third.
Then dozens.
Shadows rippled across rooftops.
Dozens of wraith-like forms surged toward them.
The valley trembled.
Ilvara steadied her blade. "Xiang. Mira. Taro."
Her voice darkened.
"This is no scouting raid. This is a breach."
She pointed her sword at the horizon, where black shapes swarmed.
"Today… we fight."