The silence that followed Yun Baek-Ho's departure from the Ancient Blossom Pavilion was not one of peace, but the heavy, suffocating pressure of a storm-cloud finally touching the earth. Namgung Tae, the once-shining "Genius" of his age, lay sprawled in the dust of the crater, his lightning-based Heavenly Bolt aura reduced to mere static. The hundreds of silver-threaded robes in the audience were no longer shimmering; they were trembling.
High Lord Jo Mu-Sang, the absolute leader of the Murim Alliance, did not move from his gilded throne. His knuckles were white, gripping the armrests carved from spirit-jade. For fifty years, he had presided over the "White Path" as if it were a high-end corporate board, managing the Nine Great Sects and Six Great Families with a smile and a ledger. To see a Namgung—the very bloodline of Anhui's sword sovereignty—pinned like an insect by an unarmed boy from a "hidden" clan was not just a defeat; it was a systemic error.
"Elders," Mu-Sang finally spoke, his voice a low, dangerous vibration. "Remove the boy. And bring me the head of the messenger who led him here."
The recovery was frantic. Disciples of the Southern Edge Sect rushed forward to lift Namgung Tae, whose pride had been shattered more thoroughly than the marble beneath him. In the high gallery, the leaders of the Zhuge and Hebei-Peng families whispered in urgent, jagged tones. They were the "Reasonable Authority Figures" of the Murim, yet they were corrupted to the core, fearing any shift in the status quo that they had so carefully curated.
While the Alliance scrambled to save face, the true declaration was delivered not by Baek-Ho, but by a lone, blind messenger who stood at the gates of the Alliance's central headquarters in Hubei.
He held a scroll of ancient silk, dyed the deep crimson of a setting sun. When the guards attempted to seize it, the messenger simply let the scroll unfurl. It didn't fall to the ground; it hovered, held aloft by a "Wind-Walking" current of Ki that shouldn't have been possible for a non-combatant.
The text was written in the calligraphy of Patriarch Yun Cheon-Hwi, and it was titled: The Declaration of Sovereignty.
"For five centuries," the scroll began, its words glowing with a faint, golden light, "the sky has been partitioned by those who trade in legacies. You speak of Justice while the common man starves for a single manual. You speak of Orthodoxy while your bloodlines hoard the Nature Realm like coin. The Yun Clan no longer recognizes the board. We no longer recognize the Lord. From this day forth, the Anhui mountains and the western valleys are a Sovereign Zone of Heaven. Any who seek the Dao through merit, rather than birth, are welcome. Any who seek to maintain the old lie... are courting the void."
The declaration was a political nuclear strike. It was the "First Plot Point" that kicked the world out of its passive stagnation. By claiming autonomy, the Yun were not just rebelling; they were asserting that they were the "mostly good counterpart" to the Alliance's bureaucratic empire.
At the summit of the Heavenly Pillar, five hundred miles to the west, Patriarch Yun Cheon-Hwi stood at the edge of a precipice. Below him, the Yun estate was a hive of silent, efficient motion. His people did not practice the "standard" arts of the Central Plains. They did not rely on pills to force their Dantians to grow.
"The Alliance will respond with the Silver Vow," a voice said behind him. It was Elder Renge, a former Wudang spiritualist who had defected years ago after seeing the rot within her own sect.
"Let them," Cheon-Hwi replied. He didn't turn around. His eyes were fixed on the horizon, where the clouds were beginning to churn. "A million men marching under a banner of greed is still just a million men. They fight for a legacy that is already dead. We fight for the Era that is yet to be born."
He raised a hand, and the atmosphere around the peak seemed to ripple. This was the "Ethereal Enlightenment" stage of the Nature Realm, where the user no longer used Ki, but authored the very laws of the world.
"Baek-Ho has broken the mirror," the Patriarch whispered. "Now, we must clear the glass."
By nightfall, the Murim Alliance had activated the Silver Vow. This was an ancient emergency organization that theoretically united over a million martial artists for a "Holy War." In reality, it was a press-gang of small sects and merchant families, forced to provide fodder for the Great Families' ambitions.
The orders were sent to the Henan, Hubei, and Shandong provinces. The target was clear: the Yun estate. The justification was "Heretical Unorthodoxy." But as the Alliance armies began to march, the first-rate warriors and 3rd-rate trainees alike couldn't help but look toward the West.
They were marching toward a war they had been told was for justice, yet the weight of the Yun's "Martial Soul" still rang in their ears like a bell of truth. The cycle of the clans was ending, and the march toward the Murim Federation had begun.