The cave was quiet again, but Lin Yan could feel the difference within himself.
He had killed.
He had bled.
And he had lived.
The embers in his dantian glowed brighter now, responding to his growing will. Though his cultivation level was still low—barely at the threshold of **Body Tempering Stage, Third Layer**—his foundation was unique. It was built not on pills or stolen yang, but on pain, grit, and survival.
Mei Qingxue sat across from him in meditation, eyes half-lidded. Her presence was as still and commanding as ever. But tonight, something in her expression had softened.
"Tell me," she said suddenly, breaking the silence, "what do you fear most?"
Lin Yan was taken aback. In all these weeks, she had never asked him anything personal. She had trained him, healed him, but never pried.
He hesitated, then lowered his gaze.
"I fear being chained again," he said quietly. "Not just my body—but my spirit. I don't want to be helpless again."
She nodded. "Then your path must be different from everyone else's. You can't cultivate the way they do."
He looked up. "Then how?"
She turned and pointed at a scroll placed beside the fire. "That contains a technique passed down by rogue cultivators—those who were exiled, abused, broken like you. It's called the **Path of Shattered Flame.**"
Lin Yan picked up the scroll and opened it. The first line burned itself into his mind:
> *"Only by breaking yourself can you become whole. Only by dying once in spirit can you be reborn in soul."*
---
The cultivation method was brutal.
Where normal techniques nurtured qi slowly, this one **demanded sacrifice**. Each level required the user to confront their most painful memories and channel that torment into spiritual energy.
He would be forced to face everything he wanted to forget.
"You can stop," Mei Qingxue said, her tone calm but serious. "You don't have to walk this path. You can stay here. I won't chain you."
Lin Yan closed the scroll slowly.
"No," he said, his voice firm. "If I stop now, I'll never be free. Not truly."
She didn't smile, but for a heartbeat, something almost like pride flickered in her eyes.
---
That night, as the fire crackled and the snowstorm howled outside the cave, Lin Yan meditated.
He opened the scroll again, placed his palm on his chest, and recited the first mantra of the **Path of Shattered Flame**.
Pain struck like lightning—**not to his body, but to his soul.**
He saw himself, chained to a stone altar.
He heard their voices again—mocking, seductive, cruel.
He felt his helplessness return.
But this time, something inside him fought back.
A whisper.
**"You are not a vessel. You are fire."**
And in that moment, his spirit surged. The embers in his dantian flared—and for the first time, they formed a flame.
---
Lin Yan passed out.
When he woke, he was drenched in sweat, his body trembling.
But his cultivation had broken through.
**Body Tempering Stage — Fourth Layer.**
More importantly, the flame in his soul no longer flickered. It **burned**.
He had taken the first step.
Not as a furnace.
But as a **cultivator**.