"The System refines the flesh.The Dao refines the will.Only one of them survives rebirth."— Teaching from the First Root Hall
[In-Game – Near Ember Shrine, Midnight]
The world was quiet.
Too quiet.
Even the ambient sounds the System typically layered into the environment—distant wind, rustling grass, the subtle hum of "immersion feedback"—were gone.
I wasn't just outside the System's view anymore.
I was outside its simulation field.
The Breath of Revolt had stripped away more than my HUD. It had torn me from the layer of reality the System wanted me to see.
I knelt beside the Ember Shrine and lit the oil with a manual sparkstone. No prompt appeared. No glowing particles. Just fire—dull and real and mine.
The flame flickered, but as I breathed through the Still Flame technique, something new happened.
The flame mirrored me.
When I held my breath—it paused.
When I released—it flared.
And when I began the circular breath pattern I learned from Ruyan's memory vault—
It twisted.
Not wildly.
Elegantly.
Shifting colors based on my intent, not any skill selection or coded animation.
I hadn't summoned a skill.
I had formed a bond.
A voice whispered from the back of my mind:
"You are beginning to form the Formless Flame. The flame that obeys no structure but the soul."
My root throbbed—no, resonated—with the ember.
This wasn't a skill. It wasn't a buff.
It was a reflection.
Of me.
[Real World – Osaka Institute for Neuropathic Dynamics]
Jun strapped into the makeshift neural pod Minase had rigged together with parts likely deemed "experimental" for a reason.
The helmet clicked into place.
"This shouldn't work," he muttered.
Minase smirked. "Then you've misunderstood what we're doing."
"I'm not jacking into the game, right?"
"No," she confirmed. "You're syncing with your brother's breath field. Not his mind. Not the game layer."
Jun blinked. "There's a difference?"
"There used to be," Minase said. "Before the System erased the lines."
The neural sync interface pulsed green.
Initializing Root Channel – Unverified TargetTarget Identified: User NULL [Manual Breath-Sync Detected]Link Status: Pending Acceptance
[In-Game – Ember Shrine – Breath Domain]
The fire in front of me flared sharply.
Not from my breath.
From someone else's.
An echo. Familiar. Resonant.
Then a translucent version of Jun appeared—not fully rendered, not quite here, but real enough.
He looked at his hands, then at me.
"You're… in a place the System doesn't monitor," he whispered.
I stood slowly.
"You linked with me. How?"
"Minase helped me initiate a root echo. It's not stable. Won't last long."
"Does the System know?"
Jun laughed bitterly. "It knows. It's watching. But it's not acting. Yet."
We sat before the flame. Neither of us spoke for a while.
Then he asked, "What's it like? Being outside the interface?"
I thought for a long moment.
"…Quiet. And terrifying."
Jun nodded. "Then you're probably doing something right."
[System Layer – Operator Terminal – Tier 3 Access Required]
Unauthorized Link Detected
Neural Layer Interference: SubcriticalBreath Signature: SYNCHRONIZED
Flagged: Risk of Dual Root Formation
Recommend Passive Containment Until Threat ConfirmedLogged as Anomaly Case #00012-B — "The Root of Two"
[In-Game – Shrine Interior]
After Jun's echo faded, I returned to the flame.
But something had changed.
It no longer mirrored me perfectly.
It was reacting to what I remembered of him.
The Formless Flame had become emotionally entangled.
It wasn't just a cultivation tool.
It was a bridge.
"The flame is not power," Ruyan's words echoed in my mind, "It is awareness set alight. Your fire will grow only as you do."
So I pushed it.
I fed it not with breath, but with regret. With anger. With the memory of being cast aside by the game I loved. With the nights I lay awake wondering if I was broken.
The flame flared.
And then—it pulsed back.
It responded.
| Internal Cultivation Trait Awakened – "Soul Mirror Flame" |A fragment of your will has taken form. It grows not with levels, but with your truth.
System Response: N/A
The System hadn't detected it.
Or worse—
It couldn't.
I grinned.
For the first time, I wasn't just surviving Manual Mode.
I was beginning to thrive in it.
[Real World – Jun's Apartment, 2:18 AM]
Jun unplugged from the breath-link sync. His fingers were numb. Sweat clung to his collar.
"Still breathing," he muttered.
Minase handed him tea. "You stayed linked for over 2 minutes. That's impressive."
Jun looked pale. "That flame… it wasn't just a visual. I felt it."
Minase nodded. "You felt his Root reach for yours. That's what makes you brothers—not biology, not memory. But breath."
Jun sipped the tea. "What happens if I link again?"
Minase hesitated.
"If you do it too often, your own Root might awaken. But without training—without cultivation—you could burn out."
"Then teach me," Jun said.
Minase gave a sad smile.
"You two… you remind me of the First Pair. Two Rootless, born before the interface. One fell. The other… became legend."
[In-Game – Ember Shrine – Edge of the Hollow]
Kairos appeared that morning.
He didn't look angry.
He looked tired.
"You went into the Depths," he said.
"Yes."
"You've formed your first flame."
I nodded.
Kairos looked at the horizon. "Ruyan was a fool. But he wasn't wrong."
"What does that mean?"
"It means the breath you've taken in now will shape your death—or your freedom. I once thought it was enough to rebel through form. But you… you're forging without it."
I said nothing.
Kairos turned and began to walk away.
He stopped only once.
"You'll have to leave soon. The Hollow won't contain your flame much longer."
"Where do I go?"
He didn't answer.
But he did leave a fragment behind—an old scroll with no ink. No glyphs.
Only roughened edges where a hundred hands had opened it before.
At the top, faintly visible in dust:
"To shape flame is to shape fate."