The Secret Realm was silent, an ancient and dense kind of silence-as if the space itself awaited something. Currents of spiritual energy flowed erratically while the demonic beasts, once agitated, began to cower, fearing what was approaching.
Jun Tian slowly opened his eyes. Before him, the spiritual lake trembled, its surface reflecting fragments of crimson light coming from nowhere. Even breathing felt laborious under this heavy air.
Before he could even bat an eyelid, his spiritual companion, Yue Lian, had appeared beside him.
"You felt it, didn't you?" she asked, her voice serene but full of caution.
Jun Tian nodded as his gaze turned to the horizon.
"It's coming from the center of the Secret Realm. Something… very ancient has awoken."
The ground quaked again. It was in the distance that spiritual clouds began to swirl and form a gigantic vortex, as if both heaven and earth were connected. Streams of golden and purple Qi intertwined, each carrying a pressure that would cause any ordinary cultivator to collapse.
In the various regions of the Secret Realm, all the cultivators stopped fighting.
Some looked upwards in amazement, while others, in utter fear.
"What kind of energy is this?!" shouted a young man from the Thousand Chains Sect, observing the firmament.
"It's as if the realm itself has awakened!" said another.
Even at the edges of the outer barrier, elders and masters that were observing from outside felt a slight spiritual oscillation-though they still couldn't understand what was happening. It was as if a power beneath the layers of the world stirred, beyond their understanding.
In the center of the Secret Realm, the origin of everything was revealed.
A gigantic mountain, covered by silvery mist and rune seals, started emitting a deep, dark light as the sound of cracking echoed across the plains. The energy currents that enveloped it began to break one by one, releasing fragments of Qi that soared to the heavens like flames.
Deep within that mountain, amidst ruins and a forgotten altar, a translucent sphere pulsed like a heart returning to life. From within it, a hoarse voice echoed:
— Millennia… so many millennia… since the war ended…
The sphere's light grew, and a spectral figure began to rise, enveloped in spiritual currents. Its form was vague, but its presence was suffocating. The surrounding space distorted, and the air seemed to bend involuntarily in reverence.
— I… still exist? — murmured the remaining soul, its voice heavy with confusion and bitterness. — No… there is something… someone…
It gazed through the spiritual stream, and its consciousness traveled through the layers of the Secret Realm until it found a distant point — a young man with purple eyes, whose newly broken aura shimmered like a new sun.
A faint smile formed in the shadow.
— How curious… someone defying the Dao in this broken world.
At that very moment, Jun Tian felt a cold wave wash over him. His expression turned serious, and Yue Lian looked at him intently.
"What happened?" she asked.
"A powerful consciousness... is watching me," he replied, his voice low and controlled.
Yue Lian closed her eyes, feeling the spiritual flow around her.
"It's not a simple presence. This soul… it's too ancient. It doesn't belong to this era."
The spiritual wind blew, bringing a distant, almost imperceptible murmur, as if the Secret Realm itself were whispering something.
Jun Tian raised his gaze to the sky, where the spiritual vortex grew without stopping.
"So she awoke because of my advance," he said, in a calm but firm tone.
"Yes," Yue Lian replied. "Your realm disruption disturbed the balance of this place. The Secret Realm was a prison… and now the prisoner awakens."
The young cultivator took a deep breath, his purple and black aura gently swaying.
"Prison or not… if he stands in my way, I will destroy him."
Yue Lian stared at him, her expression somewhere between pride and apprehension.
— Your words… are the same as those an ancient cultivator spoke before facing the heavens.
Jun Tian merely smiled.
— Perhaps fate wishes to repeat history.
Meanwhile, at the forgotten altar, the remaining soul opened its eyes fully. A crimson glow illuminated the place, and ancient runes began to swirl around its ethereal body.
"A cultivator dared to break the cycle of this underworld…" she said, her voice icy. "Very well. Let him come. Let him prove himself worthy of touching what has been lost."
The entire ground trembled, and a wave of spiritual energy swept through the realm like a roar.
Mountains shuddered, rivers reversed their flows, and the sky shimmered as if time itself had bent.
Jun Tian watched silently, his eyes gleaming a deep purple.
He could feel it—the true challenge was beginning now.
The instant the ancient soul awakened, the Secret Realm breathed again.
And with it, the fate of everyone within that domain began to change.