Blood stuck to the stones.
Not fresh anymore, just thick and ugly, half-dried, like it refused to disappear.
Torches spat smoke instead of light, and the air had that same bitter taste—iron and ashes and something that felt like memory.
The Chen clan hall was quiet.
Not the kind of quiet that means peace.
The kind that means everything that could scream already did.
Xuan Chen sat on the throne.
Too young for that seat.
Too pale. Too still.
But the way his hair slid across his facewas different , the way his eyes looked like they'd saw someone older than anyone in the room—due to this nobody called him a boy.
They just looked down.
Stayed small.
Not one bowed out of respect.
Not one out of love.
Only fear. Pure, heavy, silent fear.
The voice from the ring came low and rough, like someone who'd seen too much.
"Boy," it said, half laughing. "Fear rots fast. You'll need more. Kill a few. Raise a few. Silence the rest."
Xuan Chen didn't even blink. Just breathed out.
"Watch me."
The Elders
Three of them came forward.
Old men who lived too long, not because they were clever, just because they didn't fight.
They'd survived every storm by pretending to be air.
He watched them shuffle closer—bent, trembling, faces pale as dust.
"You lived," he said quietly, almost gently, "not because you're strong. But because you knew when to shut up."
One of them tried to speak, voice shaking.
"Young master, we—"
A sound came out of nowhere.
Not thunder, not wind. Just pressure.
It just slammed into his chest and folded into him in half. He gasped like a fish on dry ground without water .
"From now on," Xuan Chen said, voice cold, "you're not elders. You're my guardians.
In the name for now.
You'll keep this clan standing till my father wakes.
If you fail… you'll wish you died with the rest."
They didn't argue. Didn't even look at him.
Just pressed their foreheads to the floor.
"Yes, young master."
The air felt like it could break.
Relief and dread tangled into one heavy breath.
Survival always comes with aftertaste.
The Slave Mark
Chains scraped.
They dragged someone in—his cousin. His uncle's son.
Crying so hard his nose ran, words choking before they even came out.
"Cousin… please…"
Xuan Chen stood.
One slow step after another down the stairs.
The flames on the torches bent away from him.
"You laughed when I was weak," he said.
"When I bled. When I begged."
He tilted his head over him . "Remember?"
"I-III didn't"
He said to cut his voice in words
"Silence."
His hand rose.
A strange light burned there—black and gold tangled together, alive, crawling like veins in the air.
When it touched skin, the room filled with the smell of meat and the sound of a scream that didn't end right.
It cracked halfway through, raw and ugly.
People watched.
No one breathed.
The light faded.
Smoke curled from the mark on the boy's chest.
Xuan Chen looked at him like he was already gone.
"You're not a Chen anymore. You're nothing. A slave."
He waved. Guards dragged him away, limp and sobbing.
"Sell him. Let him feel what he wanted me to feel."
The silence that followed wasn't respect.
It was surrender.
The New Story
He held a handful of scrolls of the clan, the edges stained with someone's blood and some fleshy skin over his clothes.
His voice cut through the still air of silence to listen.
"You want to know why the elders died? Why my uncle fell? Why this hall smells like death?"
Nobody answered. Heads stayed down.
"Here," he said, throwing the scrolls.
They hit the floor harder than they should've.
"Proof."
"They sold us out. To the Tai clan.
They planned to open the gates during the war.
My father stopped them. He killed them not as a monster—but as protector."
The words spread like poison wrapped in honey.
Gasps. Whispers. Some even cried.
They wanted to believe it. Needed to.
So they did.
"Remember this!" he shouted, voice raw enough to cut.
"They weren't victims. They were traitors!
Their blood bought your peace!"
The hall broke open.
Tears. Oaths. Shaking voices.
Not everyone believed—but no one dared to say so.
Fear had a name now.
Xuan Chen.
The Throne of Fear
He sat again.
Back to the throne. Eyes steady.
The ring's voice came, lazy and amused.
"Ruthless. You chained them with fear, then fed them a story to make it taste sweet. I almost like you."
Xuan Chen smiled, small and cold.
"Mercy for the useful. Chains for the rest. A story for the blind. That's how you rule."
He leaned back, hands still, eyes tired but sharp.
"This clan is mine. When my father wakes, he'll see what I built for him."
The Spies
Outside the walls, the night wasn't quiet.
It never is.
Caravans sat by the road.
Guards pretended to sleep.
Eyes watched the Chen estate through the dark.
Spies.
From the six great clans.
Every one of them waiting to see if the Chen heir was just a boy—or something worse.
They heard the scream.
Saw the smoke.
One whispered, "Not a boy. A wolf wearing a boy's skin. Remember his name—Xuan Chen."
Another scribbled a note:
The boy claimed his uncle a traitor. The clan believed. Fear turned to loyalty. He rules now.
The parchment burned to ash, carried away by talisman fire.
By dawn, every great clan would know.
And somewhere, someone powerful would whisper that name.
After
Xuan Chen sat there long after they were gone.
The blood on the floor was almost dry.
His cousin's voice still hung in the rafters.
His father still slept behind the wooden door in chen estate.
The hall was empty, but it felt like it was watching him as a mystery of hevean was great.
And far beyond the Chen estate—
the world had already started to turn.