Beneath the cultivation tower lay a concealed passage; its entrance buried.
"Not bad," Wu Han remarked, acknowledging the mind behind its construction.
The chamber had been built directly beneath a sea of flowing Qi.
Any trace of contraptions was drowned in that current, like hiding a needle in an ocean of hay.
Without knowing the secret in advance, even a careful search would trigger an alarm.
Or risk a reckless move, uprooting the entire tower, marking oneself as an intruder and declaring war on the clan at its very center.
At that point, the secret would no longer be worth the trouble. Anyone strong enough to force their way through would already be past needing it.
Wu Han cast an illusion, sealing their presence from the outside world.
Then he reached out and activated the mechanism.
The Luo Clan's sigils along the pillars flared to life, lighting one after another in a precise sequence. As for the order, Wu Han did not bother deciphering it.
He followed the freshest residual trace left by the last person who had entered.
"Only a year since it was last opened," he muttered, faintly surprised.
That was far too recent for a secret of this level.
When the final sigil settled, light spilled across the floor.
Stone shifted. A hidden path revealed itself beneath their feet.
Wu Han stepped forward first, leading Luo Lan down the descending stairway and into the depths below.
With a flick of his finger, light ignited along the passage, illuminating the stairs from top to bottom.
Luo Lan followed closely behind, watching in silence, caught between awe and confusion.
"Hey, Lan," Wu Han said casually as they walked. "I've got a question for you."
"What?"
"After last time, what have you been doing?"
"I…" Luo Lan hesitated. "Mostly napping in the garden. Sometimes walking in the mountains."
Her voice faltered at the end. She was afraid it sounded like wasted time.
The agreement had been clear.
She would uncover the Luo Clan's secret, and he would give her a cure.
Yet most days, she had wandered aimlessly, tasting a kind of freedom she had never known in her entire life.
"You're lazier than I thought," Wu Han said with a chuckle.
Luo Lan stiffened, embarrassment flushing her face. No one had ever spoken to her like that before.
"What's that look?" Wu Han glanced back, amused. "Ashamed?"
"N–No!" Her face reddened further, a faint pout forming despite herself.
He laughed. "I'm joking. Still, if others saw someone with your talent slacking off while they worked themselves half to death just to narrow the gap, they'd probably die on the spot from jealousy."
"They can have it," Luo Lan muttered. "If I get to sleep in warmth forever."
Wu Han did not reply. He led them onward until the stairway ended.
At the bottom stood two statues, towering and unmoving. Immense spiritual pressure poured from them, heavy enough to press against the bones.
Beyond the statues rested a silver cauldron, untouched by dust or stain, yet steeped in an unmistakable ancient presence.
Wu Han stopped. His divine sense spread outward, probing the space inch by inch.
The two statues are guardians. One more step, and I'd be killed on the spot.
The power lingering within them far surpassed even Luo Chen's. It was layered, deep, refined by time, making Luo Chen seem like a child standing before a mountain. Whatever had carved these guardians had wielded strength far beyond what this town could ever produce.
"Your ancestor truly reached the Nascent Soul realm," Wu Han said slowly. "She possessed power on the same level as yours."
The extreme cold sealed within the statues resonated faintly with Luo Lan. Whoever had built this place had suffered from the same condition she did.
The difference was simple.
Her ancestor had come from a powerful, wealthy clan. Luo Lan had not. No matter how dominant the Luo Clan was within this town, in the greater world they were little more than drifting dust.
"She did?" Luo Lan asked quietly.
Wu Han nodded. "See the swords in their hands? They're forged from a rare metal that absorbs cold Qi. Even the statues themselves are designed to preserve energy with minimal loss."
He paused, studying them more closely.
"Interesting."
He could not name the material, but he did not need to. His divine sense had already mapped its function.
"I want it."
Wu Han reached into his storage ring and retrieved the jade slip Luo Chen had given him.
It carried nowhere near enough authority to directly disarm the guardians. But Wu Han had no intention of doing that.
The statues allowed passage only to the one recognized as the head of the Luo Clan.
Wu Han's solution was simple.
Create one.
He suspended the jade slip in midair. A spell circle unfolded around it, ancient sigils rotating in silence.
Ethereal chains pierced the slip and dragged something out—a dull gray orb—while the jade itself rapidly faded; its glow extinguished.
"Let this be a lesson," Wu Han said calmly. "Never give your identification to someone else."
With a snap of his fingers, the orb began to change.
Its surface warped. The form followed form, until a figure stood before them.
"Father?" Luo Lan gasped.
The man before her looked exactly like Luo Chen. His presence, his mannerisms, even the faint familiarity she had known her entire life were there.
Everything except one thing.
Power.
He did not need it. Why bother filling a useless shell when it was only meant to pass a gate?
A fragment of identity was still a fragment of the person who had created it.
And for a god, that was more than enough to deceive a mechanism.
The statues' eyes flared as they swept over the replica of Luo Chen. After a brief pause, the guardians withdrew their swords and turned aside, allowing passage.
"Not so fast."
Before approaching the cauldron, Wu Han placed his palm against one of the statues and closed his eyes. His divine sense surged outward, amplified and sharpened, slipping through every seam, every hidden joint, every microscopic channel carved into the construct. A single adjustment followed. Then another.
Crack.
The sword tore free from the statue's grasp and fell into Wu Han's hand.
The guardians did not react.
They were assembled from separate components.
And anything assembled could be taken apart.
Luo Lan watched in quiet horror as her ancestor's legacy was dismantled in an instant.
"Here," Wu Han said casually. "Try holding this."
He tossed the sword at her.
The moment her fingers closed around the hilt, a connection formed. The cold within her stirred, resonating with the blade. A faint glow spread through the dull metal, soft at first, then steady.
The sword answered.
A clear, delicate sound rang out, crisp as a bell. Frost-blue light traced the edge as the blade sharpened, gleaming with clarity.
"What do you feel?" Wu Han asked, already dismantling the second statue. This time, he kept the metal for himself.
"Good…" Luo Lan answered softly.
The word felt wrong in her tongue. Almost shameful.
To think that something capable of easing her pain had been hidden within the clan all along stirred a quiet sense of injustice.
The moment she held the hilt, the cold inside her surged toward the blade, drawn into it as if seeking refuge. The pressure in her body eased, her breath smoothing out.
Still, she knew it would not last.
It was only a temporary measure.
"There's something I wanted to tell you," Luo Lan said quietly.
"The cold is coming back stronger, isn't it?" Wu Han said, his tone calm, as if he had already seen through her thoughts.
"Yes. How did you know?" She had not wanted to tell him.
In her eyes, Wu Han was a perfectionist who took pride in his work. She did not want to complain about the cure fading, about the cold creeping back as if it had only been waiting.
"I'm smart," Wu Han replied lightly, a faint smile touching his lips.
Then he continued, "Your body is special. So special that the world favors you and keeps trying to give you gifts."
That was why, the moment he first laid eyes on her, he had wanted her.
Not her beauty.
Not her power.
Just her.
Anything done to her carelessly, necromancy, puppetry, even magical enslavement, would be a waste. It would reduce her to nothing more than discarded material, another piece of trash.
"You've seen this before?" Luo Lan asked.
She was curious now, unsettled by how he seemed to understand her body better than she did herself.
"I have," Wu Han said. "An old friend of mine had the same condition."
His smile faded.
Some memories lingered so deeply that not even becoming a god could erase them.
When the world chose someone, it gave them the weight they could bear—and more.
And these cursed people, the chosen of the world, had a name.
Heroes.