Back in the suffocating confines of his shack, Jin Mu did not sleep. The revelation from Instructor Kuan's words echoed in the stillness, a relentless drumbeat against the walls of his mind. Sealed. A threat. Crippled. Each word was a nail hammered into the coffin of his old self.
The boy who endured was gone. In his place was a specter, his eyes burning with a cold fire in the gloom.
"You heard," Jin Mu stated, his voice a low rasp. It was not a question.
…I did. The sorrows of this world are a tapestry woven from such threads. Betrayal. Fear. The powerful preying on the weak. It is a story as old as the stars.… Heaven's Lament's voice was devoid of surprise, filled only with a profound, resonant weariness.
"The story ends here," Jin Mu vowed, his knuckles white as he clenched his fists. "You said we could do more than survive. You said there was a path. Show me. I am ready to pay any price."
…Ambition born of grief is the sharpest blade of all. Very well. The Art of Silent Shadow is not merely about perception. It is about embodying the void. Your body, boy, is a dull piece of iron, brittle from neglect and filled with the impurities of your short, hard life. Before you can wield the shadow, you must become it. You must forge yourself in the Kiln of Emptiness.…
"The Kiln of Emptiness? What is it?"
…It is the foundation. Other cultivators absorb Qi to cleanse their meridians and temper their flesh. You have no Qi to absorb. Therefore, you must turn inward. You will use the stillness you found, the very essence of your nothingness, as the hammer and the fire. You will compress your own body, squeeze out its weaknesses, and create a vessel of silent, condensed strength.…
The description was as terrifying as it was abstract.
…Sit. Find the stillness as you did before. But this time, do not let the shadow energy merely pool inside you. Command it. Will it to crush you from within. It will feel like the mountains are collapsing upon you. Your bones will scream. Your muscles will tear. If your will falters, the pressure will break you. If you endure, the impurities will be expelled, and what remains will be… stronger.…
There was no hesitation. The promise of pain was nothing compared to the agony of another day of powerlessness.
Jin Mu sat on the floor, the damp wood cold against his skin. He closed his eyes, and as he had been taught, he dove into the abyss of his own despair. The stillness found him quickly this time, a familiar, cold embrace. The dark, silent energy began to flow into his empty core.
Previously, he had let it gather passively. Now, with a desperate, silent roar of his will, he seized control of it. He imagined the quiet energy turning into a colossal, invisible hand, gripping every fiber of his being. Then, he commanded it to squeeze.
Pain.
It was not the sharp, clean pain of a punch or a cut. It was a deep, grinding, compressive agony. It felt as if every bone in his body was being slowly pulverized into dust. His teeth clenched so hard his jaw ached. A strangled gasp escaped his lips. The air in his lungs was forced out, and he found he could not draw another breath. His vision swam with black spots.
This is it. This is the price.
He thought of Jin Wei's sneer. He thought of the word "useless" echoing in the rain. He thought of the chilling revelation: crippled. His entire life had been stolen from him.
The pain was immense, but his fury was greater. He did not fight the pressure; he welcomed it. He poured all his hatred, all his years of suppressed rage, into the act of self-destruction. He willed the force to crush him harder, to burn away the weakness, to leave nothing behind but a core of unbreakable will.
Time ceased to exist. There was only the crushing, the grinding, and his silent, screaming defiance.
Suddenly, something inside him snapped. Not a bone, but a barrier. A torrent of foul, hot energy burst from deep within his tissues. A black, sticky sweat, thick as tar and reeking of decay, erupted from every pore in his body, soaking his thin robes and pooling on the floor beneath him. It was the physical manifestation of years of malnourishment, minute injuries, and stagnant potential.
The crushing pressure receded, leaving him gasping on the floor like a fish out of water. Every muscle trembled with exhaustion. His limbs felt like lead, and the world spun violently. But beneath the profound fatigue, there was a new sensation.
A lightness. A cleanliness.
He felt… empty. But it was a different kind of emptiness. Not the hollow ache of a sealed Gate, but the pristine emptiness of a perfectly forged, untainted vessel. The dark, silent energy now flowed through him without resistance, a cool, soothing river where before there had been a stagnant swamp.
Slowly, painfully, he pushed himself up. He looked at his hands. They were still calloused and thin, but the skin seemed tighter, the lines sharper. He clenched his fist, and for the first time, he felt a flicker of genuine, tangible power coiled in his muscles. It was minuscule, a candle flame in a hurricane compared to a true disciple, but it was his.
…The first firing is complete,… Heaven's Lament's voice stated, a hint of something that might have been approval in its ancient, melancholic tone. …You have taken the first step on the path of forging an unbreakable body. The pain has just begun.…
Jin Mu looked down at the black filth staining the floor, then back at his own hands. A slow, grim smile touched his lips for the first time in years. It was not a smile of joy, but of deadly resolve.
"Let it begin."