The cave was silent—too silent.
Not the peaceful kind of silence one finds in deep meditation, but something far more unsettling. It was as if the very fabric of existence had paused here, holding its breath. Within this isolated pocket of reality, time did not flow as it did outside. It twisted, stretched, and bent to rules unknown.
Here, four months in the outside world equaled a full year.
Lin Shuan stood still, his eyes slowly scanning the vast inner space of the cave. What appeared from the outside to be a simple, ancient cavern now revealed itself as something far beyond comprehension. Inside, it resembled a miniature cosmos—endless darkness adorned with faintly glowing stars drifting lazily, as if they were fragments of a forgotten universe.
Yet even those stars felt… restrained.
Beside him stood Tian Wuchen.
For the first time since Lin Shuan had known him, the usually composed and unreadable master looked shaken.
His gaze was fixed—not on the stars, not on the space around them—but on Lin Shuan's forehead.
On the mark.
A faint, mysterious symbol that had been with Lin Shuan since childhood… now pulsed ever so slightly, as if responding to something unseen.
Lin Shuan noticed.
"Master… what happened?" he asked, his voice cautious but filled with concern.
Tian Wuchen did not respond immediately.
Instead, he slowly raised his hand, reaching toward Lin Shuan's forehead.
Instinctively, Lin Shuan stepped back.
"Master… please… don't touch it," he said, unease creeping into his tone.
That reaction alone was enough to confirm Tian Wuchen's suspicion.
He exhaled softly and lowered his hand.
"Don't worry," Tian Wuchen said calmly, though his eyes remained sharp. "Tell me… do you know anything about this mark? What it is… and why you have it?"
Lin Shuan froze for a moment.
Inside his mind, fragments of memory surfaced.
His parents.
Their voices.
Their expressions.
"This mark… is a blessing from our ancestors."
A blessing…
Then why—
Why had people always feared him?
Why did others avoid him… whisper behind his back… look at him as if he carried something ominous?
His fists clenched slightly.
If it's a blessing… then why does it feel like a curse?
He lowered his head.
"No, Master… I don't know anything about it."
The moment those words left his mouth—
Everything changed.
The entire space fell into absolute stillness.
The drifting stars slowed.
Then… stopped.
A strange pressure filled the air, as if reality itself had become heavy.
The sky within the cave began to distort.
The stars—those silent witnesses of time—started rearranging themselves.
Forming something.
A scene.
A memory.
A forgotten past.
Lin Shuan's breath caught in his throat as the illusion unfolded before his eyes.
A battlefield.
No—
A war beyond imagination.
Countless warriors clashed in a chaotic storm of destruction. Tens of thousands of figures moved like streaks of light, their attacks tearing through space itself. Every strike shattered the void, leaving behind cracks that refused to heal.
Time… was frozen.
Yet the battle continued.
"How… is this possible…" Lin Shuan whispered, his voice trembling.
Then—
He saw him.
A figure flashing like lightning across the battlefield.
His movements were not merely fast—they were impossible. In one instant, he stood within a solar system… and in the next, he appeared in another, as if distance held no meaning to him.
Beside him roared a colossal golden dragon.
Its presence alone devoured the surrounding space, its body coiling through dimensions as though they were nothing more than threads.
Tian Wuchen slowly raised his hand and pointed toward that figure.
"Ten thousand years ago…" he began, his voice heavy with memory, "among the younger generation… he was the fastest existence in the entire universe."
He paused.
"…Lin Xin Jian."
Lin Shuan's heart slammed violently against his chest.
"My… ancestor?"
Tian Wuchen nodded.
In the vision, Lin Xin Jian moved again—disappearing and reappearing across galaxies in an instant.
"That movement technique," Tian Wuchen continued, "was his own creation… Lightning Immortal Path."
His eyes narrowed slightly.
"It wasn't speed."
"It was the destruction of spatial laws."
Lin Shuan stared, unable to blink.
Hundreds of warriors surrounded Lin Xin Jian.
But these were no ordinary cultivators.
Their powers felt… wrong.
Unfamiliar.
Terrifying.
"They weren't from Tian Yuan Continent… nor Wan Shou Continent," Tian Wuchen said quietly. "Their strength came from something beyond the known laws of this universe."
The battlefield grew even more chaotic.
The enemy warriors wielded strange void energies—dark, twisted forces that seemed to bend reality itself. Their attacks did not simply destroy… they corrupted.
Even space recoiled.
Yet—
They still couldn't stop him.
Tian Wuchen's voice trembled faintly.
"He… was my only friend."
Lin Shuan turned slightly, surprised.
"He saved my life… more times than I can count."
In the vision, Lin Xin Jian's sword moved.
One swing—
And entire star systems collapsed.
Another—
Galaxies shattered like glass.
The sky tore apart.
Time reversed in fragments.
Reality screamed.
The scale of destruction was beyond comprehension.
Lin Shuan felt his mind nearing its limit just trying to process it.
But then—
Everything changed.
A sudden strike.
A dark, void-infused energy pierced through Lin Xin Jian's chest.
Lin Shuan's eyes widened.
"No…!"
In the vision, Lin Xin Jian staggered.
The golden dragon roared violently, but the damage was already done.
"That power…" Tian Wuchen said slowly, his voice heavy, "was not something we understood."
Lin Xin Jian's veins began to freeze.
Not from ice—
But from something far worse.
His energy pathways twisted.
His Luo Essence reversed.
His entire cultivation began to collapse from within.
"He could move faster than anything in existence," Tian Wuchen continued, "but those enemies… could travel through the void itself."
"They were just as strong."
The battlefield turned grim.
Lin Xin Jian continued fighting.
Even while dying—
He slaughtered hundreds.
Erasing them from existence completely.
But his body… was breaking.
Piece by piece.
"He destroyed them," Tian Wuchen said, "but he paid the price."
The scene shifted.
The battlefield disappeared.
Now—
A forest.
Ancient.
Dense.
The same forest surrounding the cave.
"I brought him here," Tian Wuchen said softly. "Without thinking… I created this space… this isolated universe… to hide from those enemies."
Lin Shuan's eyes trembled.
"This… place…"
"Yes," Tian Wuchen replied. "This entire 'cosmos'… exists because of that moment."
In the vision, Lin Xin Jian lay within the cave.
Wounded.
Broken.
But alive.
"For ten thousand years…" Tian Wuchen said, his voice growing heavier, "he endured."
Lin Shuan's breath became uneven.
"Ten thousand… years?"
"He believed he would recover."
But Tian Wuchen shook his head slowly.
"It wasn't just physical damage."
The vision zoomed closer.
Lin Xin Jian's body revealed something horrifying.
That dark void energy… had spread.
It had invaded his very essence.
"It twisted his energy channels," Tian Wuchen explained. "Even his cultivation… began to disappear."
"And his ice-attributed essence…"
Lin Shuan's pupils shrank.
"…was sealed within his own heart."
A suffocating silence followed.
"We tried everything," Tian Wuchen said, his voice almost breaking. "Every method… every treasure… every technique…"
"But that void energy…"
He closed his eyes briefly.
"…existed beyond the laws."
Lin Shuan felt a chill run down his spine.
His mind struggled to comprehend everything.
Ancient war.
Unknown enemies.
Void powers beyond rules.
A warrior who could shatter galaxies…
Reduced to a dying man.
And then—
A terrifying realization struck him.
His hand slowly rose to his forehead.
The mark.
His voice trembled.
"Master…"
Tian Wuchen looked at him.
"…this mark…"
For the first time—
Tian Wuchen did not answer immediately.
Because he knew.
The truth behind that mark…
Would change everything.