The quiet chaos of the Inner Court had fractured. The moment the theft of the Cloud-Drifting Bloom was discovered, the entire Duskwind Sect exploded into a frenzy of power and panic.
Arin felt the change in the air a heavy, suffocating weight of refined spiritual energy. This was not the arrogant sweep of Kaelen Dravos; this was the methodical, absolute response of the true masters. The highest-level Elders and Formation Masters had been roused, and they met the theft of the Bloom as an existential threat.
The spiritual sweeps launched now were not nets; they were walls. Focused waves of Aperture-stage spiritual sense that penetrated stone and wood, searching for any dense, foreign Qi signature. The Sect was under total lockdown, the flow of spiritual energy in the entire mountain complex becoming tight and controlled.
Arin was deep within the maintenance tunnels, clutching the remaining Cloud-Drifting Bloom. He was still invisible to the primary sweeps due to his zero-Qi profile, but the secondary, material searches were closing in. He could hear the sound of the maintenance tunnels being opened and searched by low-level Outer Disciples now a place considered beneath contempt only hours ago.
He relied on his two stolen assets. The schedules guided him through the tunnel junctions that corresponded to the least-trafficked foundation sections above, and his Blood-Engraved senses allowed him to hear the infinitesimal scraping of boots on the stone twenty feet above him. He moved through the sludge, silent and predatory, a ghost fueled by a god's stolen essence.
But the immense spiritual pressure building within him was becoming a greater threat than the Sect's search.
The tiny fragment of the Cloud-Drifting Bloom he had consumed was not meant for a low-level core. Its energy was pure, vast, and demanding. His small, constantly drained dantian, while reinforced, was now overflowing, struggling to contain the spiritual pressure. His core felt like a glass globe about to shatter from internal force. He had reached the point where further delay meant self-destruction. The glass globe was ready to shatter.
I have the sacrifice. The defiance is achieved. The sustenance is secured. The cage must be completed, or it will break.
Arin knew the fusion had to happen now, even under the eyes of the most powerful cultivators in the region. There was no time to find a secure spot. He located a disused section of pipe, sealed himself into the narrow space, and without preamble, initiated the final stage of the first blueprint arc.
He pulled out the majority of the remaining Cloud-Drifting Bloom and, with a silent, desperate prayer to Seliora, focused his will on the crescent Mark. He commanded the divine fragment to consume the massive, stored energy to use the ultimate sacrifice of the herb as the fuel for his transformation.
The pain was instantaneous and total, eclipsing the agony of his previous ascents. The fusion began not in his blood or his bone, but in the deepest layer of his being: his marrow. The spiritual energy of the Bloom, channelled by the Mark, bypassed his bone and began to etch runes directly onto the core source of his life force.
It was an internal, total rewrite. Arin's vision whitened. He felt his spiritual core violently compress, while simultaneously, his bone marrow, the source of his blood, his life, his raw vitality, was infused with the cold, refined power of the goddess.
In the midst of the agonising process, a massive, oppressive shadow passed directly over his hiding spot. A pulse of Aperture-stage spiritual energy, razor-sharp and penetrating, swept through the stone. The Elder's sense was absolute, searching every millimetre of the foundation.
The transformation process was so violent that the Lunari energy spiked, almost exposing Arin to the Elder's sense. But the Mark, desperate to survive the detection, greedily pulled on the last of the external Cloud-Drifting Bloom energy, using it as a shield. The Elder's spiritual sense paused just for a breath then swept on, dismissing the faint energy surge as a residual side effect of the recently removed Bloom. Arin survived the near-detection by the narrowest of margins.
The pain peaked, the internal pressure releasing in a surge of cold, refined energy. The runes were complete. Arin had achieved the Marrow-Sealed stage.
The Fourth Divine Mark was complete.
Arin was no longer a beggar running on borrowed time. His core was now unified, stabilised, and possessed its own internal, potent Qi reservoir, a slow-releasing source of spiritual energy generated by the infused marrow itself. He no longer needed to cycle ambient Qi; his body was a sealed system of divine refinement. His foundation was whole, complete, and strong enough to endure the path ahead.
His objective was complete. He had defied the system, acquired immense resources, and secured the foundational strength necessary to survive the wider world. He could now leave the confines of the Duskwind Sect.
Arin didn't waste a moment. Using the quiet, newly stable Qi generated by his marrow, he navigated the complex sewer exit, finding the low-tide channel that ran directly down the mountain toward the outer valley. He left the tunnels, emerging into the dense, foggy cover of the foothills just before dawn.
He stood on the threshold of the Sect's jurisdiction, looking back at the mountains. The Duskwind Sect was still convulsing in chaos, a mighty organisation brought to its knees by the impossible defiance of a single, 'cursed' labourer.
Arin had his foundation. He had his path. He had a piece of the cosmos etched into his very being. The Inner Court was violated, the Heir humiliated, and the spiritual resources were secured. His debt to Seliora was paid, and his journey now truly began. He turned and walked away from the mountain, leaving the world of the Shallow Well behind him.