Dawn's first gray light crept over the eastern ridges, but the Li Clan compound still lay under an uneasy hush. Guards moved like specters through the courtyard, voices reduced to whispered prayers. News of the Dark Moon Sect's pact and Li Tian's deadly hospitality had spread through every corridor overnight.
In the Council Hall, Li Tian sat back in his father's old dragon chair, robes still damp with candle smoke and ash. Across from him, the Council elders formed a rigid semi-circle—each man's face a mask of fear, grief, or cold calculation. Elder Yuan, now Li Tian's shadow, knelt beside the chair, head bowed so low that his long beard pooled on the marble floor.
Xiao Chen hovered at the doorframe, eyes rimmed red from sleepless nights, clutching the hilt of his blade as though it were the only firm thing left in the world.
Li Tian's gaze swept the room, settling on Yuan. "The Dark Moon Sect is our ally," he said quietly. "Their assassins strike at our enemies beyond these walls tonight. Which means you no longer fear the Zhao Clan—you fear your own masters if they fail."
Elder Yuan's shoulders shook. "Y-yes, Young Master." His voice quavered like a reed in the wind.
The candle flames danced low. Li Tian rose, voice carrying through the hush. "Tonight, we send a message to the Zhao Clan. Not a threat—but proof." He stepped from the dais, the dragon chair's carved back looming behind him like a sentinel.
"We will bring the body of their most arrogant general to their front gates before midnight. Let them taste the fear they force upon us."
A stunned murmur rippled through the elders. One of them dared ask, "But Young Master—our forces are weakened after slaying the assassins…"
Li Tian's smile was cold as frost. "Then we strike precisely, swiftly, and vanish before they raise an army. The Dark Moon Sect's blades move unseen—only the result remains."
He strode into the corridor, the Council scattering like panicked birds. Xiao Chen followed, heart hammering—a trap? a massacre? he could not tell.
In the old armory, Li Tian found the seven guards who had once served his father. Their armor hung dusty on racks; their eyes, however, burned bright.
He faced them under the arc of torches. "Tonight," he said, "we ride to the Zhao gates. You know their general—General Cao. He led the siege on our southern village last year, butchered our farmers in name of 'justice.' Tonight, he dies at our hands."
A soldier spat on the ground. "He'll pay, Young Master."
Li Tian's nod was curt. He handed each man a sealed order—his signature burning red across the parchment—and a dark vial: a single dose of Shadow Toxin, so potent that a single drop in a water skin could kill ten men by dawn. "For swift victories," he murmured.
Xiao Chen held the last vial, mouth dry. Li Tian caught his eye. "No mercy," he reminded the boy. "We are wolves now."
Dusk found them cantering through the mountain pass, cloaked in black—seven Li Clan riders and one trembling servant boy, against the silent, looming peaks. Their horses' hooves made no sound against the moss; the wind was their only herald.
The Zhao Clan's main gate lay half a day's ride away—a fortress of ivy-stained stone, guarded by two dozen archers and a small detachment of infantry. But tonight, Li Tian relied on subtlety, not force.
Under the Dark Moon Sect's pact, two Sect assassins joined the Li riders—masked figures on silent horses, blades sheathed until the moment of truth. One was the blade that had knelt before him in the study; the other, a shadow among shadows.
At a silent signal, the Dark Moon riders slipped ahead. They scaled the high walls with grappling claws, dropping into the gatehouse with no sound. Within minutes, the archers slumped in their towers, the gates fell open, and the golden serpents' banners billowed outward—unaware that betrayal had already crept into their veins.
Li Tian and his seven war riders galloped through the yawning breach, hooves sparking on the cobblestones. Lanterns flared to life as guards raised alarms—shouts and steel clashing like thunder. Arrows whistled past, striking walls and shields, but each swallow of Shadow Toxin had sapped the defenders' will to fight.
In the central courtyard, they found General Cao: tall, proud, armor gleaming beneath the torchlight, rallying his men with a roar so fierce it shook the guards' resolve.
Li Tian dropped from his horse, blade drawn, silent beneath the chaos. He strode toward the general, every step measured. A dozen swords flashed to defend Cao—but at Li Tian's signal, the Dark Moon assassins struck.
A masked blade found Cao's shoulder; another clipped his knee. The general staggered, roaring in rage as his men faltered. Within seconds, Li Tian stood before him, rain-slick hair plastered to his skull, eyes lit by the sword's reflection.
"General Cao," Li Tian intoned, voice carrying to every corner of the courtyard. "You judged my people unworthy of mercy." He crouched, eye to eye with the bleeding general. "Tonight, you learn justice."
His sword rose and fell once—swift, merciless. Cao's eyes widened in shock, then faded. The palace guard froze. The only sound was the general's body thudding against the wet cobbles.
Li Tian stood, blade drip-dry, and spoke to the stunned army. "Return to your masters," he said, tone quiet but absolute. "Tell them the Li Clan does not kneel. And if they march on me—this is only the beginning."
By midnight, Li Tian's riders had severed Cao's head and wrapped it in the dark silk of his own banner. They set it atop a pike planted before the massive iron gates—guards too terror-stricken to stop them.
Then they vanished. Under cover of storm clouds and the Dark Moon Sect's sorcery, the entire raiding party slipped back into the mountains, leaving the Zhao gates swinging on rusted hinges and the courtyard littered with dead and dying.
As they rode for home, Xiao Chen dared a glance at Li Tian. "General Cao… he's dead?"
Li Tian's horse whinnied into the wind. "Dead," he confirmed. "And so is the fear he spread."
He rode on, heart pounding not with regret but exhilaration. The first salvo had been fired. The world would soon learn the price of crossing a villain.
At dawn's first light, the Li Clan compound awoke to fresh whispers: the Zhao Clan's gates defiled, their banner desecrated, a general's skull on a spear. The Council elders convened in secret—fear etched in every crease of their faces.
But Li Tian did not return to Council. He stood atop the western watchtower, rain-drenched, cloak whipping in the wind. Below, the morning mist curled like phantoms around the compound's walls.
Xiao Chen approached quietly, kneeling at his side. "They'll come for us now," the boy whispered. "Warlords, sects, every snake in the grass…"
Li Tian's gaze was fixed on the distant mountains, where smoke rose in thin tendrils from the Zhao city. "Let them come," he said softly. "I've only just begun. Soon, they will all know—treachery to Li Tian is a death sentence writ in blood."
A final thunderclap shook the tower, and a single dark blossom fell from the eaves, drifting against the storm-gray sky.
The villain's fire spreads.
And by dawn's end, the empire would tremble.