The sky above Longhuang City burned the color of fresh blood.
Not sunset.
Not dusk.
Judgment.
Crimson banners bearing the sigil of Chi Long Huangchao whipped violently in the wind, their embroidered dragons shimmering as waves of flame essence rolled across the capital. The pressure in the air was so heavy that even seasoned cultivators regulated their breathing.
Today was not a festival.
It was an ending.
Thousands gathered in the Imperial Execution Plaza — sect elders in formal robes, armored officers of the Crimson Guard, noble families seated in elevated pavilions. Ordinary citizens crowded the outer edges, eyes wide with awe and fear.
At the center of the formation stood a single man bound in Dragon-Seal Chains.
Mo Chen.
His black robes were torn. Blood had dried along his sleeves and collar. Suppression talismans clung to his chest and spine, sealing every fragment of qi within him.
Nine towering pillars surrounded him, engraved with ancient dragon runes. Each hummed with restrained Dragon Vein Fire — a flame meant to burn not only flesh, but lineage.
Above him hovered Emperor Long Tiangong.
A colossal crimson dragon phantom coiled behind the emperor's back, its golden pupils glowing with imperial authority.
"Mo Chen," Long Tiangong's voice rolled across the plaza like thunder over a battlefield. "You walked Shi Dao — the Path of Devouring. You consumed cultivation bases. You devoured rare bloodlines. You shattered the foundation of Qinglin Sect and slaughtered its three elders."
A ripple of murmurs spread through the crowd.
Mo Chen slowly lifted his head.
Despite the talismans suppressing him, despite the chains biting into his wrists, his spine remained straight.
His face was pale.
His eyes were calm.
"They were weak," he said.
The words fell like a blade across silence.
Long Jin, the Crown Prince, stepped forward. Flame patterns pulsed faintly along his armor.
"You dare speak so proudly beneath imperial judgment?" Long Jin's voice sharpened. "Even now, you refuse repentance?"
Mo Chen's lips curved faintly.
"In this world," he replied softly, "strength is the only repentance."
Gasps rippled outward.
The Dragon-Seal Chains tightened.
Once, Mo Chen had stood at the peak of Yuan Domain.
Once, sect masters trembled at the mere rumor of his presence.
He had devoured those stronger than him.
He had refined stolen bloodlines.
He had believed one truth without compromise:
Power defined morality.
Mercy was inefficiency.
Compassion was weakness.
And now—
He stood beneath the empire's fire.
Long Tiangong raised a single hand.
"Begin."
The nine pillars ignited.
Dragon Vein Fire descended.
It did not burn like ordinary flame.
It invaded.
It entered meridians like molten iron poured into shattered glass. It sought qi, blood, lineage — and erased them.
Mo Chen's flesh cracked.
His sealed meridians screamed.
The remnants of his cultivation shattered under unbearable heat.
Yet he did not scream.
Pain was familiar.
Death was predictable.
He turned inward instead.
His core was destroyed.
His qi extinguished.
His path ended.
And yet—
Deep within the ruins of his soul—
Something pulsed.
Slow.
Heavy.
Ancient.
The Dragon Vein Fire reached it.
And trembled.
For a fraction of a breath, the execution formation flickered.
Long Tiangong's brows furrowed.
The fire pressed deeper.
It touched the pulse—
And recoiled.
Mo Chen saw darkness.
Not with his eyes.
With something beyond them.
Endless black.
And within it—
Two golden pupils opened.
Vertical.
Immense.
Not crimson like the imperial dragon.
Not human.
Wilder.
Older.
Uncrowned.
A voice without sound reverberated through the void.
Mine.
The world exploded into white.
Cold.
That was the first sensation.
Not flame.
Cold earth beneath thin bedding.
Mo Chen's eyes snapped open.
A cracked wooden ceiling.
Rough beams.
The faint scent of herbs.
He tried to move—
Agony tore through his body.
Different from execution pain.
Internal.
His meridians felt like shattered stone.
He instinctively attempted to circulate qi—
Nothing moved.
Only resistance.
Complete obstruction.
A weak cough escaped his throat.
A woman's voice trembled nearby.
"Xiao'er… don't move…"
Xiao'er?
Memories not his own flooded in.
Lin Xiao.
A frail boy from a remote village under Qing River Prefecture.
Born with severe Yin-Yang imbalance.
Meridians blocked from birth.
Unable to cultivate.
Doomed to die before thirty.
Mo Chen's breathing slowed.
He understood.
He had died.
Executed beneath imperial flame.
And yet—
He lived again.
In a broken vessel.
Night settled quietly over the small village.
The woman — this body's mother — slept beside the bed, exhaustion overtaking fear.
Lin Xiao — Mo Chen — closed his eyes.
He searched inward.
There was no core.
No realm.
No devoured qi.
Only emptiness.
And within that emptiness—
A thread.
Golden.
Thin as silk.
But alive.
It pulsed once.
Heat spread across his chest.
Then—
Pain.
His blocked meridians trembled violently, as if something vast pressed against sealed gates.
His breath hitched.
Within his mind—
A silhouette formed.
Massive.
Coiling.
Scaled in gold and shadow.
A dragon.
But not the crimson imperial dragon.
This one felt untamed.
Primordial.
Uncrowned.
His pupils flickered.
For a heartbeat—
They became vertical.
Then returned to normal.
Sweat soaked his back.
He was not reborn empty.
He carried something.
A shattered Dragon Core.
And it had followed his soul.
The next morning, weakness remained.
Lin Xiao attempted to sit up slowly.
His body trembled.
The meridians were blocked completely — but now he sensed something else.
The blockage was not natural.
It felt deliberate.
Like sealed gates.
As if something inside him was being restrained.
He placed a trembling hand over his chest.
The golden thread pulsed faintly in response.
If he forced qi circulation—
He might break.
Or—
He might open a path.
Mo Chen had once devoured entire sect inheritances.
He had never been cautious.
He inhaled slowly.
Even without qi, breath carried the faintest trace of natural essence.
He guided it carefully toward his lowest meridian.
Pain flared instantly.
Veins burned.
Blood pressure surged violently.
His body convulsed.
The golden thread reacted.
Heat erupted through his chest.
A crack echoed inside him.
For a brief second—
Qi flowed.
Wild.
Unstable.
His vision blurred.
The air around him distorted faintly.
The wooden table beside his bed split down the middle.
Then—
Everything collapsed.
He fell back, gasping.
Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
Outside, villagers shouted in alarm.
His mother rushed inside.
"Xiao'er!"
He forced his breathing to steady.
He had opened it.
One thread.
One crack in the sealed gates.
And when that crack formed—
He had felt something else.
A faint pressure.
Distant.
Watching.
Far beyond the village.
Hundreds of miles away—
In Longhuang City—
Long Xiu stood upon a balcony overlooking the imperial capital.
His shadow stretched unnaturally long beneath him.
He frowned slightly.
A fluctuation.
Brief.
Faint.
But familiar.
"Impossible," he murmured.
Mo Chen was dead.
Burned by Dragon Vein Fire.
Erased.
And yet…
Something stirred beneath the horizon.
Not crimson.
Not imperial.
Golden.
Ancient.
Uncrowned.
Long Xiu's fingers tightened along the stone railing.
"If you truly survived," he whispered to the wind,"this world will not remain stable."
Back in the small village, Lin Xiao lay weak but awake.
The pain remained.
The obstruction remained.
But now—
He understood.
The Yin-Yang imbalance was not a defect alone.
It was a seal.
Something inside him was being suppressed.
Something that even imperial Dragon Vein Fire could not erase.
His fingers curled slowly.
Once, he had devoured the strong to climb.
This time—
He would climb differently.
Not blindly.
Not recklessly.
But he would climb.
Because somewhere in this empire—
Princes prepared for war.
Bloodlines were hunted.
Thrones were unstable.
And beneath the surface—
Something far older than the Crimson Dragon stirred.
Lin Xiao closed his eyes.
Deep within his soul—
The golden pupils opened once more.
Watching.
Waiting.
The Uncrowned Dragon had awakened.