Ren learned quickly that correction was heavier than opposition.
Opposition pushed back.Correction pulled inward.
And people resisted that pull far more fiercely.
He spent the next days moving between small groups who had taken fragments of the idea and twisted them into something brittle. He didn't confront them all. He didn't even speak to most.
He listened.
And when he spoke, he chose his words carefully.
"This isn't about stopping others," he told one group camped beside a river."It's about knowing when not to move."
They stared at him, confused.
Another group scoffed outright.
"Easy to say when people listen to you," one man snapped.
Ren met his eyes calmly.
"They didn't listen because of me," he replied."They listened because they were already tired of being pushed."
That unsettled them.
Some walked away.Others stayed quiet.
The echo inside Ren pulsed — strained, but steady.
He felt the weight accumulating.
Not on his shoulders.
On his presence.
People began to look to him for answers he refused to give.
"What should we do?""Where should we go?""How far is too far?"
Ren didn't answer most of those questions.
Not because he didn't care.
Because answering them would turn habit into command.
By the third day, Ren noticed something worrying.
Those who listened… listened too closely.
They waited for his reaction before acting.Paused when he paused.Moved when he moved.
Ren stopped walking.
The small cluster behind him nearly collided into one another.
"This has to stop," Ren said quietly.
The echo tightened — understanding.
The courier frowned.
"Stop what?"
Ren turned.
"Following me."
Silence.
"We're not following," the guard said automatically.
Ren raised an eyebrow.
They hesitated.
Ren exhaled slowly.
"I won't become a reference point," he said."Not like that."
The young cultivator swallowed.
"But people trust you."
Ren's gaze softened.
"And that's why I can't let them wait on me."
He stepped aside from the road.
"From here on, you choose your direction," he said."Not relative to mine."
The echo pulsed — firm, aligned.
Some nodded immediately.
Others looked lost.
A few turned back the way they had come.
It hurt.
Ren didn't show it.
That night, Ren camped alone again.
The echo felt heavier now — not weakened, but burdened by connection.
"This is the cost," Ren murmured."Influence without authority."
The echo didn't deny it.
Somewhere far away, a report landed on a desk.
Subject actively discouraging dependence.Correcting imitators without consolidating control.
The reader frowned.
"That's inefficient."
Another voice replied quietly:
"It's intentional."
Ren lay beneath the stars, breathing slow.
He didn't know how many would listen.
He only knew that if he failed here…
The shape he was building would collapse into another hierarchy.
And that was the one thing he refused to create.