"Anyone who tries to kill usually dies," Rowan rcer said calmly. "I don’t believe in rcy for that sort of thing.
But today, I’m in a very good mood. What you gave was worth more than your life."
A faint smile touched his lips.
He placed his hand on Victor Shaw’s head.
"I’ll let you live," Rowan continued. "But your mories are mine."
Victor’s body went rigid.
Death was off the table.
But a soul-search wasn’t.
Rowan had no intention of keeping moral boundaries where enemies were concerned. Victor had tried to murder him. That ended any obligation to play fair.
Besides, Victor’s mind held answers Rowan genuinely wanted.
What really happened back then.
What Nathaniel Hale and the others had done.
What the so-called "great event" actually was.
A few seconds later, Rowan pulled his hand back.
His expression shifted from neutral... to startled... to outright fascinated.
"So that’s what it was," he murmured. "And Fiona Barlow is... his resurrected daughter? A half-immortal?"
The truth was uglier and stranger than rumor.
Years ago, a man nad Rootless One had lost his daughter.
Grief shattered him.
He gathered thirty-six powerful mystics and ford a secret brotherhood. Together with eight of them, using an ancient inheritance left behind by a legendary master, they created eight forbidden arts.
Then they sacrificed themselves.
All of it.
To resurrect his daughter.
Because one of the eight contributors had been absent, the resurrection was incomplete. Fiona returned without her mories.
Even so, she gained an ageless body and an endless internal energy source.
A living half-god.
Rowan wasn’t interested in the tragedy.
Resurrection ant nothing to him. He had multiple thods for it already.
What caught his attention was sothing else.
"The Celestial Ridge," he said softly. "And that ancient inheritance."
The place where ordinary people could be turned into mystics.
That was not normal.
In most worlds, power required inborn compatibility. No bloodline, no magic. No talent, no awakening.
Even advanced ditation systems still required natural aptitude.
But the Celestial Ridge?
Anyone who walked its path would gain the ability to cultivate internal energy.
Even animals.
A monkey that completed the route would develop intelligence and spiritual awareness.
That wasn’t training.
That was rewriting reality.
And the ancient inheritance?
Eight people used fragnts of it to create eight forbidden arts.
Together, those arts resurrected a half-immortal.
That alone made the inheritance priceless.
Rowan nodded to himself.
"Yeah. I’m definitely going there."
He tossed Victor Shaw out of his inner world like discarded luggage.
Then Rowan vanished.
Victor hit the ground and lay there, shaking.
"...What kind of monster did I just provoke?"
He wiped cold sweat from his forehead.
"That thing... he’s not even human anymore."
Victor had never encountered anyone like Rowan in his entire life.
Not even the Grandmaster.
If anyone in this era could rival the ancient legend, it was Rowan rcer.
"And he still wanted my art..."
Victor shuddered.
"...Forget it. He spared . That’s enough. I’m never going anywhere near him again."
He transford into a bird and fled.
Deep in the Qin Mountains.
Rowan hovered above a vast, unnatural ravine.
"So this is the Celestial Ridge," he murmured. "It really does look like a spine."
From above, the valley’s ridges and grooves resembled vertebrae.
Anyone who walked through it would unconsciously circulate internal energy along those lines.
Complete the route once, and the body would gain cultivation compatibility.
It was elegant.
And terrifying.
Rowan descended.
The mont he crossed the boundary, invisible pressure slamd into him.
His internal energy destabilized. The space itself resisted his entry.
"A man-made energy field," he noted. "Clever. But not enough."
Golden light wrapped his body.
Rowan reached forward and physically tore a hole through the invisible barrier and stepped inside.
The energy field was essentially a geomantic formation.
A hybrid of defense system, curse engine, and probability distortion field.
Enter the wrong way, and you wouldn’t just get injured.
You’d die in a way no one could ever explain.
The only reason Rootless One had entered safely was because his ability neutralized all energy constructs.
Afterward, he learned the correct path and brought the others in.
Rowan already knew the route.
He’d only wanted to test the field’s limits.
Conclusion: powerful, but breakable.
"Restore."
A single word.
A repair spell washed over the entire valley.
The altered grooves were reset.
The destroyed inheritance markers reappeared.
The Celestial Ridge reverted to its original configuration.
Rowan exhaled.
Rootless One had sabotaged this place after using it. Anyone entering afterward would die instead of awakening.
That wouldn’t do.
He dismissed the valley’s animals and began studying the terrain.
Structure.
Energy flow.
Causality feedback.
Inheritance anchors.
Rowan didn’t leave for over a week.
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