The clerk's voice rang out, cutting through the low hum of conversation in the pavilion.
"Li Shui. Willow Rest Orphanage. No affiliation."
A scattering of glances turned his way—brief, incurious, already moving on. In a hall filled with youths draped in embroidered silks and clan sigils, an orphan in a worn half-and-half cloak was little more than background.
Li Shui rose from the upper tier without hurry. He descended the stone steps one at a time, boots making no sound on the damp crystal. The cloak swayed gently with each movement—the deep-blue left half hanging heavy and straight like still midnight water, the pale water-blue right half shifting with faint, rippling wave patterns that caught the pavilion's cold light and threw it back in soft glimmers.
He reached the platform and stepped onto its center, standing exactly where the luminous channels converged. The air here felt denser, as though the accumulated Worldly Natural Energy of centuries pressed lightly against his skin.
The overseeing elder—an old man with a long white beard and eyes sharp as winter frost—regarded him for a moment longer than he had the others. Then he raised one thin hand.
The array awakened.
Runes along the crystal channels ignited in sequence, glowing soft azure. Threads of liquid light rose from the grooves—thin at first, translucent, almost hesitant. They circled Li Shui's body slowly, brushing his arms, his chest, the edges of his cloak, as though tasting the air around him.
The pavilion's vast dome quieted further. Even the nobles in the lower seats paused their murmured conversations. The commoners and orphans in the upper tiers leaned forward slightly.
Li Shui stood motionless, hands loose at his sides, ponytail resting against the back of his cloak. His breathing was slow, even. His expression unchanged—calm, distant, as though he were merely watching rain fall on a far-off river.
Inside him, the vast stillness that had always lived in his chest began to move.
It was not sudden.
It was patient.
A low, resonant hum rose from beneath the platform, felt more in the bones than heard in the ears.
Then the water answered.
It did not rise as a mere pillar.
A torrent surged upward from the crystal—pure, crystalline, perfectly controlled—forming a towering column that spiralled gracefully around him. The surface was mirror-bright, reflecting every rune in the dome with flawless, almost hypnotic clarity. Suspended droplets caught the light and scattered it into soft azure halos that drifted lazily outward, as though time itself had slowed within the array's bounds.
The elder's composure cracked for the first time that day. His eyes widened behind his spectacles.
"Primary resonance… upper eighth-grade water resonance."
A hush fell, deeper than before.
Upper eighth-grade water.
Not just high—exquisitely high.
Water at this purity was rare even among the great houses. It promised limitless depth, seamless control, the ability to drown armies or heal entire battlefields with equal ease.
The column rotated once, slowly, majestically, then drew inward, condensing into a perfect sphere of water that hovered at Li Shui's chest level. It was the size of a grown man's torso, yet it floated weightless, its surface so still it might have been carved from sapphire.
The array's threads pressed deeper, drawn by something more.
The air within the pavilion grew heavier, charged with an ancient pressure that made the crystal beneath the platform vibrate faintly. The suspended droplets trembled.
From the heart of the water sphere, golden light flared—bright, celestial, undeniable.
The water rippled as a colossal draconic silhouette uncoiled within it: scales of brilliant star-gold, mane flowing like comet trails, eyes burning with the cold light of distant constellations. Wings of pure lightning unfurled, edged in violet so deep it bordered on black. The dragon's presence was silent, yet every person in the hall felt it in their resonant palaces—a low, instinctive tremor of awe.
The liquid threads solidified into a second manifestation beside the water sphere: a coiling pillar of living starlight and thunder, the Celestial Dragon's form twisting upward in slow, majestic spirals that reached nearly to the dome's ceiling.
The elder's voice, when it came, carried a note none had heard from him before—quiet astonishment.
"Secondary resonance… lower seventh-grade Celestial Dragon resonance."
The reaction was not loud.
It did not need to be.
In the lower tiers, a few noble youths sat up straighter. Recruiters from mid-tier academies exchanged glances and began making discreet notes. Representatives from greater clans leaned forward almost imperceptibly, eyes narrowing in calculation. In the upper seats, the orphans from Willow Rest watched in stunned silence—Da Niu's mouth slightly open, Ah Lan's hands clenched on the railing, Xiao He frozen mid-wave.
Dual resonances at awakening were already exceptional.
Upper eighth-grade water paired with a Celestial Dragon—even at lower seventh-grade—was a combination spoken of in old records, the kind that appeared once in a generation, if that.
The synergy was self-evident: water to amplify and conduct celestial lightning with perfect precision, the dragon to command the heavens themselves.
The water sphere and the golden dragon circled each other once—serene and ferocious in flawless harmony—before merging into a single radiant orb of azure and gold that hovered above Li Shui's open palm for several long heartbeats.
Then both manifestations dissolved, breaking into a gentle rain of light—azure droplets and golden sparks—that fell around him in a soft, private storm, pattering onto the crystal like the quietest applause.
The array dimmed at last.
Silence lingered, thick and respectful.
The elder cleared his throat, regaining his formal tone.
"Li Shui. Upper eighth-grade water resonance as primary. Lower seventh-grade Celestial Dragon resonance as secondary. Dual palaces, exceptional compatibility and potential."
He paused, then added—quietly, but clearly enough for the front rows to hear:
"Extraordinary."
Li Shui bowed once—small, precise, his face as calm as ever.
He turned and descended the steps.
Behind him, conversation resumed gradually—low, measured, the kind that happens when something significant has occurred but no one wishes to be the first to shout about it.
A few recruiters rose slowly from their seats.
A noblewoman in the third row tilted her head, murmuring something to her attendant.
A clan representative folded his arms, eyes never leaving the boy in the half-and-half cloak.
From the upper tiers, Da Niu finally closed his mouth. Ah Lan exhaled a breath she had not realized she was holding. Xiao He tugged at her sleeve, whispering something urgent that went unanswered.
Li Shui walked through the pavilion's great archway and into the outer corridor.
Outside, the clouds had parted further. Shafts of pale sunlight struck the wet stone, turning puddles into mirrors.
He paused beneath the arch for a moment, breathing steady.
Inside his chest, the water flowed—vast, calm, limitless.
Above it, the Celestial Dragon spread wings of starlight and thunder—patient, proud, fully awake.
He pulled the half-and-half cloak tighter around his shoulders, feeling the familiar weight of both halves against his skin.
Then he stepped forward into the light, ponytail swaying once with the motion.
The world had measured him.
And for the first time in his life, it had taken true notice.