True subjugation is not forcing someone to kneel.
It is handing them a crutch at the moment they are most desperate.
When they finally stand upright again, they no longer remember who gave it—
only how it felt to stand.
The thirtieth night inside Blackwind Cavern.
Just past midnight.
Jiang Muchen stood before the deepest stone wall of the cave, torchlight flickering across damp rock. Shadows danced like living things, revealing carvings that seemed to writhe under the firelight.
They were not natural markings.
They were words.
Ancient Demonic Script—each stroke twisted like a struggling worm, radiating a chill that had survived three thousand years.
He had been here for a full month.
On the surface, he had led two dozen low-born disciples to cleanse corruption, repair formations, and complete a sect-issued task.
In truth, he had mapped every inch of Blackwind Cavern—every side tunnel, every cracked restriction, every lingering remnant of ancient power.
And only in the final three days had he discovered this wall, hidden behind a curtain of falling water.
When the torch illuminated the first line, Jiang Muchen's breath stalled.
It was the final testament of an Ancient Demon General—Youhai.
"…By order of the Demon Emperor, I guarded this cavern, protecting the teleportation array leading to the Abyssal Demon Nest.
When the Human Alliance shattered the formation, I offered my broken body as sacrifice, destroyed the array core, and concealed the Demon-Calamity Orb within…"
The text ended abruptly—cleaved apart by a sword strike left by a human cultivator three millennia ago.
But below it, Youhai had carved one last passage, pouring the remnants of his soul into stone:
"Whoever finds these words is bound by fate.
I have sealed a fragment of my soul within this wall, awaiting one worthy of awakening it.
Should you inherit my legacy, I shall pass down the Ancient Demon Body-Refinement Art—Netherbone Demon Physique.
Beware: only one with a Foundation Establishment body may endure the demonic infusion."
The torch trembled.
Behind him, a disciple named Li Hu swallowed hard.
"Senior Brother Jiang… what does it say?"
Li Hu was the seventh neutral disciple Jiang Muchen had "won over" in these thirty days.
Two weeks earlier, while repairing the eastern formation, Li Hu had been struck by a residual Corrosive Poison Seal. His entire right arm had blackened and rotted within moments.
It was Jiang Muchen who used water from the Spring of Life to wash the wound again and again.
Jiang Muchen who crushed his own share of antidote pills and applied them directly.
Jiang Muchen who stayed awake the entire night beside his bed, poring over an old Manual of Detoxification borrowed from a retired alchemist—its pages bent and worn at the section on corrosive poisons.
By dawn, the rot had scabbed over.
Since that day, Li Hu looked at Jiang Muchen as though at a man who had given him a second life.
Jiang Muchen did not hide the truth.
He translated the inscription line by line, his voice calm—yet every word sent a chill through the group of disciples behind him.
Ancient Demons.
Teleportation arrays.
Demon-Calamity Orbs.
A battlefield from three thousand years ago—real, buried beneath their feet.
"Senior Brother…" Li Hu stared at the line about inheritance.
"This legacy…"
"We'll take it," Jiang Muchen said.
"But not now."
He raised two fingers like a blade. A thread of pale-green sword Qi condensed at his fingertip and carved a line into the blank stone beside the inscription:
"Three years hence, when my Foundation is complete, I will return."
—Jiang Muchen of the Red Dust Pavilion
The characters sank three inches into solid rock, carrying the rhythm of Clear Wind Sword Intent.
A mark—and a seal.
For three years, unless someone surpassed his cultivation, no one could erase it.
"Senior Brother… why?" Li Hu asked.
"This legacy demands Foundation Establishment. If we take it now, we can't protect it."
Jiang Muchen turned to the group.
"What you saw today—bury it. Not because I doubt you. But because if this secret leaks, none of us will survive. Not us. Not our families."
His voice was soft.
Its weight crushed bone.
Every disciple nodded.
They had seen what Jiang Muchen had done this month—
How he always took the smallest share of pills.
How he always stood at the front when danger came.
How he had even sent medicine, overnight, to the sick mother of a disciple.
This was a man worth trusting with one's life.
"Senior Brother, I swear it!" a female disciple cried, eyes red.
"If I speak a word of this, may lightning strike me dead!"
"Me too!"
"Count me in!"
Twenty oaths echoed through the cavern.
Jiang Muchen smiled.
He took out small cloth pouches—one for each person.
Inside were dozens of pale-green seeds, fragrant with clean, living Qi.
"Seeds of Clearheart Grass," Jiang Muchen said.
"Plant them around your dwellings. Sprout in three days, mature in seven. They cleanse miasma within thirty meters and aid cultivation."
Hands trembled as they accepted them.
Clearheart Grass—rare, expensive, almost never available.
And he gave them away by the handful.
"Senior Brother… how can we ever repay you?" Li Hu choked.
"By living," Jiang Muchen said, patting his shoulder.
"Live well. Cultivate well. And show the world that low-born disciples can carve their own path."
He paused.
"Pack up. We return to the sect. And remember—be discreet. Xiao Chen won't let this go."
Later, Jiang Muchen walked alone to the far side of the cavern.
A skeleton leaned against the wall.
Black combat garb of the Nether Ghost Manor.
A broken sword pierced through its chest.
Ghost Seven.
After fleeing grievously wounded, he had returned in secret—likely to recover something Xiao Chen had hidden here.
He triggered a shattered restriction Jiang Muchen himself hadn't noticed.
Soul-devouring sword Qi had ended him.
When Jiang Muchen found him, he had been barely alive.
"Save… me…" Ghost Seven had rasped, fingers clawing at Jiang Muchen's leg.
"I know Xiao Chen's… secret… the Shattered Star Mine…"
He died mid-sentence.
From his body, Jiang Muchen recovered two items:
A recording stone.
And a parchment journal.
The recordings showed three meetings between Xiao Chen and Ghost Wuying, master of the Nether Ghost Manor.
Soul pearls traded.
Forbidden artifacts exchanged.
And finally—both kneeling before a black array deep within the Shattered Star Mine.
At its center rotated a fist-sized black orb.
The Demon-Calamity Orb.
The journal detailed Xiao Chen's plan:
Star-sha energy drawn from the heavens.
Demonic essence from the abyss.
His own Heavenly Calamity Battle Body as the vessel.
To forge the legendary Heavenly Calamity Demon Body.
Foundation Establishment killing Golden Core.
Jiang Muchen closed the journal.
He bowed once to the bones.
"You were my enemy," he said quietly.
"But thank you—for trading your life for the truth."
When they emerged from Blackwind Cavern, dawn broke through the clouds.
Wang Duobao rushed over, thinner than before, eyes dark with worry.
Then he froze.
Behind Jiang Muchen stood two dozen disciples—upright, steady, eyes sharp as drawn steel.
Their gazes toward Jiang Muchen were no longer mere respect.
They were faith.
"Good work," Jiang Muchen said.
"But now—we move from the shadows into the light."
Far away, the sect gates shimmered in morning mist.
Jiang Muchen touched the recording stone, the journal, and the snow lotus hidden in his robes.
Xiao Chen.
Your secrets are mine.
Your pawns are leaving.
Your dead end… I've already started building.
The dealer had changed.