I closed my eyes and let my breathing guide . Slowly, I raised my arms and let them fall into the rhythm I’d felt atop the Soaring Swallow. The sequence Ren Zhi had narrated like a story, but that my body had rembered like truth.
Light on my feet.
Flow into the first sweep; step, twist, dip the shoulder, drive forward. I spun, weight rolling from heel to toe, and pivoted into a low sweep. My fingers brushed the dirt.
The next step ca fluidly: a rise, a cross-kick, and a spiral. A jab, followed by a feint. The motion danced with the fire of the Heavenly Fla Mantra. Fast, deliberate, and unpredictable.
And then, the finale.
I leapt high, legs loose, air slicing past my skin. My body folded at the apex. The axe-kick ca down hard, crashing into the dirt with enough force to send up a spray of dust.
I landed in a low crouch, hand braced against the earth.
Ren Zhi, whoever he was, had been guiding . Quietly. Sharply.
And I still hadn’t confronted him.
I’d tried poking at the topic with Elder Ming during our morning drills. Casual questions. Hypotheticals. But he shut them down with the ease of a man who’d seen too much and knew how to deflect even more. Every ti I veered close, he’d tilt his head, stroke his chin, and pivot to correcting my posture or recounting so old fairytale.
Secrets, I realized, weren’t so rare in this world.
And I had a few of my own, didn’t I?
Still, if Ren Zhi wanted to hide his strength, I wouldn’t drag it out of him. Not yet.
Instead, I turned my focus back to the form, replaying the sequence. But this ti, my mind sparked with an idea.
What if I… combined it?
The axe-kick was strong , but what if I added weight?
I took a breath, walked through the motion, then tried again.
Step. Leap. Pivot in the air. And as my foot ca down—
ROOTED BANYAN STANCE!
I flooded my entire body with qi, grounding it mid-fall.
The effect was imdiate.
My body dropped like an anchor, faster than I’d ever moved before. My heel smashed into the dirt with a thunderous crack. My leg nearly buckled from the force, but I braced, sliding into a half-kneel.
It was like dropping my pill furnace on soone’s head.
I grinned, panting slightly.
And repeated the move again.
And again.
With every practiced movent, the transition between my activation of the Heavenly Mantra Fla and the Rooted Banyan Stance got smoother and smoother.
But not seamless.
It was harder than learning how to reinforce objects with my qi. It was an entirely different concept. There was still a lag; barely a blink, but it was there. A hiccup in my control. One mont, my qi surged like wildfire, licking at my limbs, explosive and quick. The next, I had to force it to condense, to sink, to root itself like a thousand-year-old tree. Two opposing flows. Two opposing intentions.
Fire and earth.
Speed and weight.
Every ti I switched, I felt the recoil: a stutter in my balance, a hesitation in the air. I had to account for it manually, shifting my weight, aligning my spine, recalibrating the angle of my descent mid-jump. There was no room for error. If there was a single misalignnt I’d either lose all montum or crash down at the wrong angle and injure myself.
So I focused. Sharpened my intent like a blade. I listened to the internal flow of energy within my body. Felt its rhythm inside .
Step. Leap. Mantra. Twist.
Fla. Apex. Shift—
ROOTED.
This ti, I didn’t just fall. I dropped.
And just before impact, I aligned my body and flow of energy so it struck together. A unified whole.
BOOM!
The earth buckled.
A crater blood underfoot, almost a full pace wide. Shattered dirt and stone burst outward in jagged ridges.
I stood at its center, heel embedded in compacted earth, steam rising faintly off my shoulders.
Then it ca.
Mind has reached Essence Awakening - Rank 1.
My breath caught.
I'd felt it—that stillness, that clarity in the jump before the impact. I hadn’t reacted to the lag this ti. I’d accounted for it. Threaded the delay into the timing itself.
Not a revelation.
An expansion.
The world didn’t stop, it widened.
My thoughts which used to feel like a single thread I followed from point to point, now stretched into a web. Each thread held firm. I could feel my balance, the curve of my spine, the grip of my heel against packed soil. I noted the dust in the air, the slight change in wind, the heat steaming off my skin and the minute flow of energy within my body.
None of it distracted .
None of it overwheld .
They were all present, together.
As though ti itself had not slowed; but I had caught up to it.
This story originates from . Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Before, I might have noticed one thing and missed another. Corrected one angle, and lost montum elsewhere. Now, I could take in the whole of it; not in sequence, but in layers.
So this is what it ans for the Mind to reach the next realm.
I stood in the center of the crater, my body thrumming with qi and effort, and exhaled slowly.
“Oh,” said a voice behind , dry and amused. “That one has teeth.”
I spun around.
Elder Ren Zhi stood with his hands folded behind his back, smile playing on the edge of his lips. His robes fluttered softly in the evening wind, his eyes remaining closed.
“You’ve got a knack for naming things, I hope?” he added. “That deserves one.”
I blinked, heart hamring. “How long were you watching?”
“Long enough,” he said with a shrug, though his expression didn’t shift. “Not bad form, either. A little rushed on the downswing, but the intent was clear.”
I hesitated, still catching my breath. “You’re blind.”
Ren Zhi raised a brow. “Mm. You sound surprised.”
“Because I doubt it,” I said bluntly. “You know too much. About my techniques. About cultivation, beyond that of a person telling fairytales. Like you're soone whose lived it. Either you're extrely imaginative, or…”
He tilted his chin up faintly, as if amused. “Or I’m more than a blind old bookseller.”
The smile on his lips didn’t fade, but it stopped being playful. “You’re not wrong. But you’re not entirely right, either.”
I waited, half-expecting him to brush off. But instead, he exhaled through his nose and stepped closer, feet light on the dirt despite the stiffness he feigned in his posture.
“I told Shan Ming I would stay uninvolved,” he said. “That I wouldn’t get tangled in the affairs of sects or wars or rising stars. I’ve done enough of that in my life.”
I kept quiet.
“But,” he continued, “your ntor told you’d reached a threshold. That you’d learned all you could from him. That you needed soone else now to push you. To break the plateau.”
My breath caught slightly. So Elder Ming had told him. Or asked him.
Ren Zhi turned his face slightly, not toward , but toward the cracked dirt where my foot had struck. “I agreed. With one condition.”
My heart quickened. “What condition?”
I tried to reach out, to estimate, to calculate just what his cultivation rank could be. But to my senses, he just felt like an ordinary man. Compared to the qi that rolled off the Envoy in waves, or that of sect elders like Silent Moon's sect leader, Jun... there was nothing.
But my mind couldn't fully say with certainty this blind man before was inferior to them.
And what sort of incentive would it require for him to move?
“No questions,” he said simply. “You will not ask about who I am. You will not ask to fight for your village. You will not request my help with cults, sects, or power plays.”
He turned his face fully toward now, his expression unreadable. “I am here to teach. Nothing more.”
It hit harder than I expected.
Because I could feel it now; his presence. Not just the surface calm of an old man with good posture. My heart thudded against my ribs, a low drumbeat in my ears. A thin sheen of sweat prickled down my back despite the cool evening air.
Bloodlust? No.
It was closer to standing at the mouth of a sleeping volcano. Quiet. Patient. But undeniably, terrifyingly alive.
I opened my mouth to say sothing, but before I could, the ground shifted behind .
A silver blur shot forward.
Windy.
He landed between us with a thud, coiled in a tight spiral, body low to the ground, fangs bared. His scales glead under the evening light, and his tail whipped once in a sharp crack against the dirt.
I could see it: the hesitation in his posture. The way his muscles trembled.
Windy’s tongue flickered rapidly, tasting the air, his body winding tighter as he tried to decide what this presence before him was.
Ren Zhi didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t even so much as raise a brow.
He rely stood there, hands still folded behind his back, as if the threat of a spirit beast’s fangs ant nothing at all.
“You have good instincts,” Ren Zhi said lightly, addressing Windy without truly speaking to him. “But you would be wise not to bare your fangs at a pond you cannot asure the depth of.”
Windy hissed low, a confused, reluctant sound, but didn’t strike.
I reached forward slowly and laid a hand on his side.
“Easy, Windy. It’s alright.” My voice was calm, but inside, my heart was still racing.
It took a few tense breaths before Windy’s coiled body eased a fraction. His head lowered, his stance shifting subtly from attack to guarded observation.
I looked back up at the blind bookseller, and continued with what I was going to say.
There was a part of that wanted to question everything; how Ren Zhi could hide so much strength, how he knew so much without seeing, why soone so clearly extraordinary chose to act so... small.
But that wasn’t what he was asking of .
He wasn’t demanding loyalty. He wasn’t demanding secrets in exchange for lessons. All he wanted was distance. Privacy.
A life free from the endless web of obligation that devoured cultivators like insects in a spider’s nest.
Was that so much to give?
If Ren Zhi had ant harm, he could have acted a hundred tis over by now. Slipped away when no one was looking. Struck when our backs were turned. Left chaos in his wake.
But he hadn’t.
And sohow, I knew... taking this seriously wasn’t just about politeness. It was a asure of character. A test, whether he intended it or not.
I clenched my fists at my sides, feeling the dirt and sweat clinging to my skin, grounding .
Then I straightened my back and spoke.
“I swear,” I said quietly, voice steady despite the slight shake I felt inside, “upon myself and my path—that I will not pry into your past. I will not seek your aid beyond the teachings you freely offer. Whatever you give, I will accept. Whatever you choose to keep, I will respect.”
The words weren’t rehearsed.
They weren’t a formal cultivation pledge.
But they ca from the marrow of , raw and sincere.
The world... shifted.
A low pulse thrumd through the earth beneath my feet, a vibration I felt more in my bones than my ears. The air tightened, like the instant before a thunderclap, and a translucent shimr flickered at the edges of my vision.
The Heavenly Interface.
A contract has been created with a Binding Oath.
Parties:
First Party: Kai Liu
Second Party: Ren Zhi
Agreent:
The First Party shall not seek, inquire, or delve into the true identity, history, or affiliations of the Second Party, nor shall he permit others to do so on his behalf.
The First Party shall not entangle the Second Party in matters of sectarian conflict, demonic cult pursuit, village defense, or any venture beyond the scope of scholarly instruction.
Scope of Relationship:
The Second Party's sole duty shall be that of a teacher, offering wisdom, martial or otherwise, as he sees fit.
No other obligations, alliances, or expectations shall be imposed.
Duration:
This oath shall remain in effect until such ti as either party severs it by mutual consent, or until the end of one party's life.
Special Clauses:
Accidental discovery of identity, if unpursued or unspoken, does not constitute breach.
If a situation arises where the Second Party must act to preserve his own life, the oath shall not hinder him.
Acknowledgnt:
Upon mutual verbal assent, this contract is sealed by Heaven’s Will, immutable save by mutual release.
Binding Oath. The feature I unlocked after my first contract with the Azure Silk Trading Company.
I had forgotten about it. I didn't think there'd be a situation where I'd require it. Was it triggered when I swore upon my honor?
"What is this? What did you do?"
The old man's face turned to , his brow furrowed. For the first ti since I t him, he looked uncertain. The pressure that surrounded intensified, stealing my breath away.
Windy, still tense under my palm, shifted restlessly, his tail flicking against my ankle.
I held my ground, raised both palms slowly in front of .
"I didn’t an to," I said quickly. "It wasn’t sothing I did on purpose. It's the Heavenly Interface."
Ren Zhi said nothing. His posture didn’t shift, but I could feel his focus sharpen like an invisible blade honed at my throat.
Carefully, I went on.
"It... listens," I said. "It makes the vow real. It turns it into a contract. A Binding Oath, enforced by Heaven’s Will. Whatever that may an."
I paused, searching for the right words. "I've only had it happen once before. When I signed a trade agreent with the Azure Silk Trading Company. That one was formal... it needed both parties to agree. This—" I gestured awkwardly toward the faint shimr still lingering around us, "—this just... activated."
Ren Zhi remained silent, but I could see the faint flicker of sothing moving behind his closed eyes.
How did it manifest for him, I wondered? Did he hear the Interface sohow? Feel it brush across his spirit like a turning page?
The seconds stretched.
Then, finally, he spoke.
"These terms," Ren Zhi murmured. "They need adjustnt."
I stiffened instinctively, but he raised a hand, almost lazily, almost reassuringly.
"I agreed to teach you," he said. "But if Heaven’s Will binds it... it must be made clear. I see now, how this contract works. It is quite intuitive."
He tilted his face upward, almost as if gazing toward the stars above.
The air shimred again. The Binding Oath screen blurred, then refocused with a faint chi.
Parties:
First Party: Kai Liu
Second Party: Ren Zhi
Agreent:
The First Party shall not seek, inquire, investigate, or otherwise attempt, whether directly or indirectly, to uncover the true identity, history, or affiliations of the Second Party, nor permit, instruct, or enable others to do so on his behalf.
The First Party shall not entangle, involve, or situate the Second Party in any matter relating to sectarian conflict, demonic cult pursuit, village defense, political intrigue, or other ventures beyond the strict scope of voluntary scholarly instruction as determined solely by the Second Party.
Scope of Relationship:
The Second Party's sole duty shall be that of a teacher, offering wisdom or martial insight solely at his discretion, without obligation or expectation.
The Second Party retains the absolute right to refuse, and, or withdraw any teaching at any ti without breach.
Duration:
This oath shall remain in effect until terminated by the Second Party’s sole discretion, or upon mutual consent, or upon the end of one party's life.
Special Clauses:
Accidental discovery of identity, if unpursued, unspoken, and unused for personal or external gain, does not constitute breach.
Should circumstances arise threatening the Second Party’s life, reputation, freedom, or concealnt, the Second Party may act freely without breach of oath.
The First Party shall not create or manipulate circumstances intended to force or coerce the Second Party’s involvent.
Acknowledgnt:
Upon mutual verbal assent, this contract is sealed by Heaven’s Will, immutable save by mutual or Second Party's sole release.
I stared at the screen as it finalized, feeling a bead of sweat trail down the back of my neck.
The terms were razor-sharp.
Every angle covered. Every loophole sewn shut.
Ren Zhi wasn’t leaving any room to wriggle, whether by ignorance, accident, or intention.
It gave him all the leverage.
And still—
"I accept," I said without hesitation.
Ren Zhi raised an eyebrow, his head tilting slightly, like he was asuring anew.
"Are you sure you know what you're doing? Binding yourself so casually?"
I t his gaze. Or as close to eting it as I could, given the thin veil over his sight.
"Maybe," I said. "But the terms are only restrictive if I planned on breaking my word. Which I don't."
I straightened my shoulders, feeling the certainty harden in my chest.
"Even without the oath," I continued, "I'd have honored what I promised. Swearing it just makes it easier to prove."
Ren Zhi remained still, the evening wind tugging faintly at the sleeves of his robes.
"I already know," I said quietly, "that you'll let advance my cultivation. You already have at the Soaring Swallow."
I thought of the rooftop. Of how easily he’d guided , through nothing but a voice and a rhythm, into pushing the boundaries of what I thought was possible with the Heavenly Fla Mantra.
"And if all you ask in return is that I respect your privacy... then I'd be beyond stupid to expect you to make more concessions."
A long pause.
Then, finally—
"I accept," Ren Zhi said simply.
The interface pulsed once, blue light blooming like a ripple in a still pond. Then the screen vanished, dissolving into the air.
For a mont, it seed like nothing changed. No flash of power, no crack of thunder.
But inside I felt it.
Sothing unseen. Watching.
asuring.
As if heaven itself had turned its eye, not with hostility, but with a cool, distant awareness.
A presence that would weigh my every step against the promise I had made.
Ren Zhi shifted, folding his hands behind his back again. The old smile returned, but it was quieter now. Fainter.
"Don't seek out," he said over his shoulder as he began walking back toward the village. "I’ll find you when the ti cos for your training."
And just like that—
He left.
No dramatic vanishing act. No flicker of qi.
Just a man walking down a dirt path, as if he had been nothing more than a weathered old traveler passing through.
Windy let out a low, uneasy trill beside , his coils brushing against my ankle.
I stayed there a long while, watching Ren Zhi’s figure grow smaller against the dimming skyline.
I had no idea what I’d just gotten myself into.
But I knew one thing for certain.
Whatever ca next, whatever he intended to teach ...
It wouldn’t be like anything I had ever learned before.
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