The bells of Kaiyuan did not ring for joy. They rang for balance.
Every century, when the stars aligned in a circle of crimson light, the world gathered to offer its virtue to Heaven. The Festival of Karma was what they called it—a sacred day when sins were measured, and goodness was burned away to preserve the so-called harmony of existence.
From mountain to valley, incense pillars rose like pillars of judgment. Priests sang hymns written before time, their tones solemn yet rotten, carrying the scent of devotion and decay.
In the heart of the Western Frontier, the Yun Clan stood among the chosen.
Yun Wuxian was seven when the summons came. The sky that morning was too bright, too clean, as though Heaven wanted to make its cruelty look divine. Villagers dressed in white lined the path toward the altar, each family holding bowls of spirit ash—the symbol of repentance.
His father, Yun Shan, walked in silence beside him. His steps were steady, but the hand that held Wuxian's was cold and trembling. Behind them, Yun Lian walked as if her soul had already been taken.
"Father," Wuxian asked softly, "why do they bow when they see us?"
"Because," Yun Shan replied, "we will do what they cannot."
The procession reached the plaza. A thousand candles burned upon the marble steps, their light merging into a single flame that reached toward the heavens. Priests in golden robes moved like shadows between the fires, chanting in a language no mortal tongue should know.
The High Priest raised his hand. "The hour of offering has come. Heaven demands redress. Virtue must be weighed, and the excess returned to flame."
The crowd repeated in unison, "Balance to Heaven, peace to the world."
Music began—low drums that mimicked heartbeats, flutes that cried like lost spirits. The sound filled every breath, every silence. It was beautiful, and yet behind that beauty lay the stench of fear.
One by one, families stepped forward. Fathers, mothers, children knelt before the altar. Their names were called, and their prayers answered by the fire. Every spark that rose into the sky was greeted with cheers—another soul purified, another debt paid.
When the Yun name was spoken, the cheers fell silent.
Yun Shan stepped forward. The priests watched him with reverence and unease. To the world, he was a paragon of virtue—the man who had once healed a dying valley with his cultivation of life-essence. Yet Heaven, in its perfect cruelty, had chosen him to repay that virtue with blood.
Yun Lian's hands clenched Wuxian's shoulders. "Stay here," she whispered. "Do not speak, no matter what you see."
Wuxian said nothing. He could feel the tremor in her voice like the trembling of a candle about to die.
Yun Shan ascended the altar steps alone. The High Priest met his eyes. "You understand the decree?"
"I do."
"You accept the balance?"
Yun Shan smiled faintly. "I accept that Heaven never gives without taking."
The priest nodded. "Then may your merit return to the source."
The music swelled. The wind howled. Gold light began to bloom around Yun Shan as he extended his arms toward the heavens. His voice rose, calm, unwavering.
"Let this virtue be returned. Let this body be the offering."
The crowd bowed. The fire flared—but what the people saw was not a man consumed, only a shape dissolving into light, scattering like dust beneath the will of Heaven.
Yun Wuxian could not cry. His eyes followed the vanishing glow until it became indistinguishable from the stars painted upon the temple dome. He felt neither warmth nor sorrow, only the echo of a voice that still lingered in his blood.
"Karma is balance," said the priests. "Balance is mercy."
But Wuxian's heart whispered something else. If mercy requires a body, then mercy is hunger.
After the ceremony, the priests declared that the heavens were satisfied. The bells rang again, louder, brighter. The people rejoiced as though balance had truly been restored. Only the Yun household was silent.
That night, Yun Lian sat beside her son, staring at the empty seat where Yun Shan once prayed. The house smelled of incense and ash.
"He believed in it," she murmured. "All his life, he believed Heaven would be just if he was good enough."
Wuxian looked at her. "Was he wrong?"
She touched his face. "He was faithful."
He didn't understand. Faith, he realized, was the name mortals gave to their fear when they tried to love it.
Outside, the festival continued. Lanterns floated above the river, each carrying a wish written in gold ink. The priests sang of renewal. Children laughed beneath banners of light. The world celebrated its equilibrium while the ashes of the righteous scattered unseen.
Yun Wuxian walked to the edge of the village. The air still shimmered faintly where his father had stood. He knelt, touching the ground. It was warm—not from life, but from what life had given up.
In that warmth, he thought he heard his father's voice, faint and distant.
"My son," it said, "when you look at the sky, do not envy it. The higher it rises, the more it must consume to stay bright."
He lifted his eyes. The heavens were filled with fire. Yet in the gaps between the stars, darkness moved—quiet, endless, patient.
He whispered to the empty air, "If Heaven feeds on virtue, then who feeds on Heaven?"
The wind did not answer, but it carried with it the scent of burning prayers.
Days turned into months. The Yun Clan dwindled. Without its patriarch, the clan's blessings faded; their fields withered, their offerings went unanswered. The priests said it was the price of balance. The villagers whispered it was the taint of the markless child.
Yun Lian grew ill. She could no longer stand through the nightly chants, so Wuxian prayed in her place. He lit incense, though the smoke refused to rise straight. He bowed before the ancestral tablets, though no spirit ever stirred.
"Father," he said one night, "did Heaven hear you when you gave everything?"
No voice answered. Only the rustle of the altar flames, weak and uneven.
The next morning, a messenger from the Divine Court arrived. He bore a decree written in silver ink.
To maintain balance, the remnants of excessive virtue must be purged. The Yun bloodline shall atone for the imbalance they created.
Yun Lian read the words in silence, her eyes dull. Then she folded the decree, placed it beside the unlit candle, and whispered, "They are not done with us."
Wuxian sat by the window. "Will they take us too?"
She smiled faintly. "If they do, they will find nothing left to take."
The Festival of Karma returned the following year. The bells rang again, slower this time—as if even the metal had grown weary of Heaven's hunger. The villagers marched once more toward the altar, dressed in white, their faces painted in ash.
But among them walked a boy who did not belong to the balance of this world.
Yun Wuxian watched as the priests raised their torches. He saw the same fire that had once devoured the image of his father. Yet now, he understood. It was not punishment. It was appetite.
The flames did not cleanse. They consumed.
As the hymns reached their crescendo, he closed his eyes and remembered the last thing his father had ever said—words half-lost in the roar of the ritual, carried only by the wind that night:
"You will understand, my son… Heaven is always hungry."
The music faded. The stars pulsed faintly above the altar, bright as teeth in the mouth of a god. And deep within Yun Wuxian's silent heart, something began to stir—cold, slow, and infinite.
It was not hatred. It was understanding.
For the first time, he saw Heaven not as a judge, but as a beast that fed on faith. And in that moment, the child without light took his first step toward becoming the shadow that even Heaven could not swallow.