Three days had passed since the vault beneath Blackglass Ravine was cracked open.
Liu Shen stood on the high cliffs, wind whipping through his hair. The Witness's memories still churned in his mind—a thousand fragmented truths burned into his soul.
Behind him, Yu Meixing and Lei Qing knelt before the ravine's altar. The last of the formation seals had been lifted. The stronghold was now theirs.
> "This place is hidden from heaven's gaze," Lei Qing murmured.
"But only for so long."
Liu Shen nodded. "Then we use it before it's too late."
---
A Place for Outcasts
Liu Shen gathered every scrap of formation stone, every array buried in the ravine, and every ancient command rune left behind by forgotten sects.
He began reforging the fortress.
Not into a temple. Not into a throne.
But into a haven—for those cast out, hunted, or betrayed.
> "We'll gather the broken," Liu Shen said.
"The ones the heavens abandoned. The ones they fear."
> "We'll become their shadow."
He called it:
> The Sect of Shadows.
---
The First to Answer
By the seventh day, the first of them came.
A boy with burnt skin and no eyes, led by a phantom flame.
> "They called me cursed," he said.
"But your fire… it sings to mine."
Liu Shen touched the boy's forehead.
> "You're not cursed. You're untamed."
Next came an old woman whose dantian had been shattered. She once served the Divine Alchemists of the Eastern Sky.
> "I was discarded when I could no longer refine pills."
"But I still remember the formulas."
And a pair of twins who shared one soul, hunted by sects for defying reincarnation law.
> "We fight to stay alive."
One by one, Liu Shen accepted them all.
Not for their pasts.
But for what they could become.
---
The Nine Vows of Shadow
To unify them, Liu Shen inscribed nine vows into stone with his own blood and flame.
1. We vow loyalty to the Sect, not to blood or creed.
2. We vow to strike from silence.
3. We vow to protect our own.
4. We vow to never kneel before the heavens.
5. We vow to learn what is forbidden.
6. We vow to remember betrayal.
7. We vow to wield truth as weapon.
8. We vow to grow strong enough to never break.
9. We vow to destroy the throne above.
Yu Meixing read the vows aloud.
The Sect of Shadows was no longer just an idea.
It was a movement.
---
A Spy Among the Ruins
But as more disciples trickled in, a shadow moved among them not of Liu Shen's making.
In the hollow chamber once used by the Celestial Envoys, Lei Qing caught a flicker of divine essence.
Someone had broken the seal from the inside.
A spy. Or a traitor.
And they had already sent a message to the heavens.