The late afternoon sun was sinking when Li Wei limped back to his quarters, ribs aching, pride shattered.
Sparring practice had ended with him sprawled in the dirt, coughing blood, while Senior Disciple Liang sneered down at him.
"You should stick to sweeping courtyards, orphan," Liang had spat, spiritual energy flickering around his fingers.
The rest of the Outer Sect students didn't even bother hiding their laughter.
As night approached, Li Wei sat alone beneath the willow behind the alchemy yard, nursing a swelling bruise.
Yu Long poked his nose out of Li Wei's collar and grunted.
> "If we keep doing things the right way, you'll be dead by the end of the year."
"I know," Li Wei muttered, eyes shadowed. "That's why we're going to the Jade Archives tonight."
A drunken elder stumbled past, reeking of cheap peach wine. He stopped, staring at Li Wei through bleary eyes.
"You... you smell like lightning and dragons..." the old man whispered.
Li Wei blinked. "What?"
But the man staggered away, muttering to himself:
> "Born under a shattered sky... doomed to break the seal..."
Yu Long hissed, uneasy. "That... was not wine talk."
---
Midnight. The Ironheart Sect slept.
The Jade Archives loomed ahead—six stories of sacred wood and spirit steel, protected by wards older than the sect itself.
Li Wei approached the gate. Its guardian formation shimmered like oil on water. He drew a copper pin and shoved it into the side latch.
"Improvised seal-breaker. Works every time," he said.
Yu Long facepalmed with his tail.
> "No, no it doesn't."
But it clicked.
They slipped inside.
---
The air in the outer archive was heavy with dust and paper—thousands of scrolls, manuals, jade slips, maps, and texts. The public sections were lined with beginner cultivation techniques:
Iron Root Breathing
Spirit-Touched Palm
Stone Skin of the Mountain Ox
Li Wei ignored them. He headed deeper, into the Crescent Wing, where a carved obsidian gate pulsed with blue runes. Sealed.
Yu Long floated up and began nibbling the air, drawing spiritual diagrams with his claw.
> "Give me a moment. I'll short-circuit the ward."
A sudden pressure fell over the room—cold, ancient, disapproving.
They weren't alone.
A candle flared at the far end of the library. A monkish figure, face covered in golden robes, stood by the scroll shelves. It didn't move. Didn't breathe.
Li Wei blinked. When he looked again, the figure was gone.
> "I hate this place," Yu Long muttered.
---
Inside the forbidden wing, the walls were carved with Heavenly Script. The scrolls here sat inside crystal boxes sealed with Dragon Tooth Seals.
Li Wei followed the pulse. His veins felt drawn—magnetized.
In the center stood a pedestal. Upon it rested a single scroll, black with red-tipped edges. No dust, no seal, no label—until Li Wei stepped closer.
Then words glowed across its surface:
> Heavenly Vein Ignition Technique – Fragment I
Yu Long froze.
> "No. Nope. That's not for humans. That's for monsters."
Li Wei's hands were trembling. He reached out anyway.
The moment his skin brushed the scroll—fire raced up his arms.
---
The mirrors on the wall shattered. A shape coalesced from their shards—a spectral guardian with antlered horns and hollow eyes.
> "You are not worthy," it said.
Li Wei ducked just in time to avoid a slash of spectral wind. Books flew. Shelves cracked. Scrolls tumbled.
Yu Long transformed mid-air into a glowing serpent, slamming into the guardian with raw force.
> "You pick the worst libraries," he shouted.
The guardian struck again. Li Wei grabbed a jade flask and flung it. Blinding Dust exploded, giving Yu Long time to coil around the entity.
> "Now, read it!" Yu Long shouted.
Li Wei unraveled the scroll. The words leapt from the page, searing themselves into his meridians.
> "AAAAAGHHH!"
---
He fell to his knees, body convulsing. The Heavenly Vein Ignition Technique didn't just channel Qi—it rewrote the body's spiritual network.
Veins lit up in his arms and chest—a map of the stars, a circuit of flame.
Visions poured in:
Armies of cultivators fighting atop floating islands.
A being cloaked in starlight forging this technique during the Ancient Sky-Break War.
The scroll being sealed away because it burned its users alive if incomplete.
> "It's only a fragment..." Li Wei gasped.
> "But it's alive," Yu Long whispered, trembling.
The guardian reeled backward and knelt.
> "Bloodline recognized... flame accepted... path opened."
Then it vanished.
---
Li Wei awoke hours later beneath a tree outside the archives. Dawn light filtered through the leaves.
His spiritual sea had changed. Expanded. Refined.
He was now Qi Gathering – Level 5. From level 2.
His limbs felt fire-forged. His breath carried lightning. The scroll had bound itself to his blood.
> "No one must know," Yu Long said. "They'll kill you for it."
Li Wei nodded, clutching his robes tighter.
Footsteps.
He hid behind the tree just as two inner sect disciples entered the archive yard.
"I heard someone triggered the seal ward last night," one whispered.
"The Elders are furious. Whoever it was... is doomed."
Li Wei slipped away silently.
---
Hours later, Elder Ma Qian, keeper of the archives, stood before the shattered mirror wall.
She knelt, pressing her fingers to the ground. A pulse of energy flowed outward.
> "Ignition... impossible..." she muttered. "Only one bloodline could—"
A shadow emerged behind her.
"Let it be," said Elder Ning, appearing with folded arms.
"But the scroll—"
"It has chosen. Let him walk the path. It is not yet time."
Ma Qian hesitated, then nodded.
As Li Wei passed the Lotus Pavilion later that day, someone watched him.
A girl in inner disciple robes leaned against the railing, eyes narrowed.
Her aura was unreadable.
> "The Ignition calls again," she whispered, and vanished.
In a sealed chamber far below the mountain, a council of elders gathered.
One figure spoke, its voice distorted by layers of formation screens.
> "The boy has awakened the Veins."
> "We must kill him before the stars align," someone said.
But a third voice, deeper, colder, cut in.
> "No. Let the seal burn. Let the stars descend. The Akashic Scrolls will find their bearer."