The cave was dim, lit only by the low, flickering glow of Rui Yan's Heavenless Soul Embryo. The black spiral at the center of his core pulsed rhythmically, more alive than flame, more still than void.
On the floor before him sat six soul beasts' cores, a bowl of concentrated ink made from crushed Nightshade Marrow, and a stack of old talisman papers Lin Yu had "borrowed" from the sect's outer alchemy vault.
Rui dipped his brush into the ink, slow and exacting.
"If the Immortal Courts are watching me now… let them see what they fear."
He began to write.
Not with a mortal brushstroke, but with soul-script—a language erased from history, once used by Heavenless Cultivators to defy divine law. Each stroke twisted the air. Each rune bled pressure into the cave. Lin Yu, standing at the entrance, clutched her robes, sweating under the weight of it.
"What… are you making?" she whispered.
Rui didn't look up.
"A trap. One that will bait the spider… and burn the web."
After two hours, the scroll was complete.
At first glance, it looked like any mid-tier talisman scroll—black script on aged parchment, sealed with a red spirit stamp.
But to those with perception, it was a death sentence.
🜂 [Marked Soul Scroll – Heavenless Variant]
➤ When activated by someone else's qi, the scroll binds to their soul, tags them with a reversed karmic link, and mirrors their spiritual path back at them—shattering core alignment.
➤ Result: Instant soul collapse for any cultivator below Dao Heart Realm.
Rui wrapped the scroll in a silk cloth and handed it to Lin Yu.
"Drop this in the Inner Flame Pavilion's request box. Make sure you're seen."
She hesitated. "They'll know it's from you."
He met her gaze. "That's the point."
Later that night, in the Inner Flame Pavilion, Elder Shui of the Celestial Harmony Pavilion sat alone in his quarters, leafing through scrolls left by outer sect initiates. Most were nonsense—requests for pill formulas or cultivation advice.
Then he found the scroll.
His eyes narrowed at the seal.
"This… soul script? Impossible. It was destroyed in the Divine Cleansing…"
Curiosity—and arrogance—overrode caution. He touched the scroll with his qi.
The scroll glowed once.
Then hissed.
A pulse of black energy erupted, coiling around his soul.
He screamed.
All across the sect, disciples felt it.
A ripple through the spiritual fields.
A sudden vacuum.
A soul implosion.
Rui, sitting at the mouth of his cave, opened his eyes.
"Caught the first spider."
Moments later, a system-wide bell rang across the sect grounds:
Dong—Dong—Dong—
Three bells. Inner Elder Fallen.
Panic spread like wildfire.
Lin Yu ran to him. "You… that was—?"
"Yes."
"Now they'll send stronger ones," she said.
Rui nodded. "Good. Let them come."
Far away, inside the Celestial Harmony Pavilion's inner sanctum, three elders knelt before a floating jade orb. The face of a woman shimmered within, her eyes cold as eternal frost.
"You say Elder Shui was killed by a soul technique?" she asked.
One elder bowed low. "A forbidden method… possibly related to the Heavenless Path."
The woman paused.
"Send the Soul Wardens. Disguised. Quietly. If this is truly Heavenless… the Tribunal must not learn of it. Yet."
In the Thousand Blade Sect, Rui began preparing his next step.
The soul furnace was gone. The scroll had done its work. The ember had evolved.
Now it was time to test the first real cultivation technique of the Heavenless Path.
He called it:
🔥 [Void Spiral Sutra]
A meditation method that devours surrounding spiritual qi, but purifies it of karmic trace. Energy becomes "raw," free of Heaven's Laws—dangerous to others, but pure power for the Heavenless.
He sat cross-legged.
And began.