The first thing Jin Tie became aware of was the warmth of the sun on his eyelids, painting the inside of his world a gentle, sleepy red. The second thing was a voice, cutting through the last, clinging remnants of a dream about soaring on the back of a cloud-dragon.
"Aniki? Aniki, are you awake? The morning bell rang ages ago!"
It was a voice that could coax birds from the trees and sweetness from the most hardened sect elder. It was also, at this particular moment, an instrument of profound injustice against his sleep.
Jin Tie kept his eyes closed, his breathing deep and even. He was fifteen years, two months, and—he calculated lazily—probably seventeen days old. He was a scion of the Jin Clan, the former rulers of this world, a fact that meant less to him than a good pillow on a cool morning. Grand destinies and celestial ambitions were for people who hadn't discovered the sublime art of the afternoon nap.
A shadow fell over him. He could smell the faint, clean scent of lotus blossoms and ink that always clung to her.
"Aniki..." the voice whispered, closer now, tinged with exasperation. A small hand tentatively shook his shoulder.
That was his cue.
In a movement too swift for a boy supposedly just roused from slumber, his hand shot out and snagged a slender wrist. His eyes flew open, a grin already spreading across his face, sharp and mischievous.
"Got you," he declared, his voice still rough with sleep but laced with pure, unadulterated glee.
His junior sister, Jin Yue, yelped and tried to pull back, but his grip was like a gentle, inescapable trap. Her face, a perfect oval with eyes like polished jet, was a picture of flustered alarm. A single strand of her obsidian hair had escaped its simple tie, framing her cheek.
"Aniki! You were pretending!" she accused, her cheeks puffing out.
"Merely testing my little sister's vigilance," Jin Tie said solemnly, sitting up but not releasing her wrist. "A dutiful sister, sent to wake her esteemed elder brother, should be prepared for counter-ambush tactics. It's chapter three, verse twelve in the 'Proper Sibling Etiquette' scroll. You have been neglecting your studies."
"There is no such scroll!" she protested, though a reluctant smile played on her lips. She knew this game. She lived this game.
"Are you calling your aniki, the hope of the illustrious Jin Clan, a liar?" he gasped, placing his free hand over his heart as if wounded. "The former rulers of this very world? Our ancestors are weeping in the celestial realm. I can hear them. Weep, weep, weeping."
He tugged on her wrist, pulling her just a little off-balance so she had to brace a hand on the edge of his bed. Her face was now inches from his, her wide eyes reflecting his own teasing glint.
"You're impossible," she huffed, but she was laughing now, a sound like tiny wind chimes.
"That's 'You're impossible, Aniki,'" he corrected, his grin softening into something more genuine. He reached up with his other hand and gently tucked the stray strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers lingering for a second. "And you're far too easy to fluster. What if I were a marauding spirit, here to steal the finest jewel of the Jin Clan? You'd be snatched up before you could even say 'morning bell'."
Jin Yue finally wrestled her wrist free, rubbing it with exaggerated injury. "The only marauding spirit here is you, terrorizing me before I've even had my morning tea."
"Terrorizing? This is advanced cultivation training. I'm building your character." He swung his legs out of bed, stretching his arms over his head with a satisfied groan. "And my price for this invaluable instruction is... your share of the honey-glazed buns from the kitchen today."
Her jaw dropped in genuine horror. "No! Not the buns! Brother, you monster!"
Jin Tie laughed, the sound easy and full. The morning sun, now unobstructed, lit up the simple room. The world outside, with its whispers of their clan's fallen glory and the weight of a name like 'Jin,' felt a million miles away. Right here, at this moment, with Jin Yue looking at him with mock fury and real affection, was the only kingdom that mattered. She was his world, and poking fun at it was simply his way of holding it close.
The honey-glazed bun truce had been brokered, as it always was, with Jin Tei magnanimously settling for only three-quarters of her share instead of the whole. Now, trailing after Jin Yue as she skipped towards the courtyard, he watched the way the morning sun caught in her hair. In a couple of months, she would be ten.
Ten. A significant age in any martial arts family, a milestone where foundations were laid and futures were forged. For most children of the Jin, it would mark the intensification of physical training, the strengthening of the body's ki channels, the first serious steps on the path of a warrior.
A path forever closed to Jin Yue.
The physicians, with their solemn faces and hushed tones, had called it a tragedy. "Blocked meridian gates," they'd said, their words final and heavy as a tombstone. "The body's intrinsic ki cannot flow. Martial arts, true mastery... it is out of the question." The clan had mourned, seeing a precious branch of their lineage forever weakened.
Jin Tie had felt a different emotion entirely: a profound, selfish wave of relief.
Let the world chase glory and learn to shatter stone with their palms. Let them spar and strain for dominance in the martial arts circles. His little bun was safe from all of it. He didn't have to lie awake imagining her facing down brutish challengers in some dusty arena. The harsh realities of the martial world, the constant pressure to prove the Jin name—she was insulated, protected by what others saw as a crippling flaw. To him, it was a divine shield. Her safety, her simple happiness, that was his sole duty, the one purpose that gave his own laid-back existence its sharp, undeniable focus.
He followed her into the sun-dappled courtyard, where a small stone table held a single, dreaded item: a ceramic cup steaming with a thick, pungent medicinal tea. The air soured with the smell of bitter roots and iron.
Jin Yue's cheerful skip faltered. Her nose wrinkled, a look of pure, unadulterated disgust twisting her delicate features. This was the daily battle.
"Aniki," she whined, turning pleading eyes towards him. "Do I have to? It smells like old boots and tastes worse!"
"This," Jin Tie declared, leaning against a pillar with his arms crossed, "is the price for your stolen bun. A fair trade, wouldn't you say? Drink up. It's for your constitution." He kept his tone light, but his gaze was fixed, unblinking.
It was a well-known fact in their household that Jin Yue, left to her own devices, would find the nearest potted plant and sacrifice the vile concoction to it. She had a champion's talent for disposing of the medicine the moment no one was watching.
But Jin Tie was always watching.
She let out a dramatic sigh that seemed to come from the depths of her soul. With the grim determination of a warrior facing execution, she picked up the cup. Her eyes, wide and shimmering, looked from the murky liquid to his face, searching for any sign of relenting.
He simply raised an eyebrow, a faint, challenging smile on his lips.
Seeing no escape, she pinched her nose shut, tipped her head back, and downed the entire contents in one, desperate gulp. A violent shudder wracked her small frame immediately after. She slammed the empty cup down, gasping for air as if she'd just surfaced from drowning.
"See? Not so bad," Jin Tie said, pushing off the pillar and striding over. He produced a small honey candy from his sleeve, a magician completing his trick.
She snatched it from his hand, popping it into her mouth to vanquish the bitterness. The betrayal in her eyes softened into a grudging acceptance.
He ruffled her hair, his heart impossibly full. Let the world have its martial prodigies and its might. His kingdom was right here, in a sunlit courtyard, built on the simple, unshakable foundation of a little sister's well-being and the vigilant enforcement of her medicinal tea consumption. It was, he thought with immense satisfaction, a far grander destiny than any the martial arts world could ever offer.
The late afternoon sun cast long shadows across the study, illuminating dust motes dancing in the air like lazy spirits. Here, in the private sanctum of the clan head, the weight of the Jin name was supposed to feel heaviest. Yet, Jin Long, a man whose very name meant 'Golden Dragon' and whose power could make mountains tremble, was not sitting in his austere chair of polished ironwood.
Instead, the master of the Late Stage of the Profound Concept, one of the world's true powerhouses, lay with his head pillowed in his wife's lap, a deep frown etched on his face. The Heavenly Lightning meridian gate within him, a legendary gate that allowed him to command the fury of the skies, currently hummed with the petulant energy of a frustrated father.
"He has the Primordial Monad Gate, Mei," Jin Long grumbled, his voice a low rumble. "The legendary foundation of our ancestral arts. The gate that supposedly holds the seed of all creation. And what does he do with it?" He let out a long-suffering sigh, the kind usually reserved for catastrophic diplomatic failures, not a fifteen-year-old's napping habits. "He uses its profound, innate capacity for adaptability to perfect the art of skipping training."
Li Mei, her fingers gently combing through her husband's dark hair, didn't look up from the embroidery hoop in her other hand. Her serenity was a perfect counterpoint to his stormy energy. "Our son is a growing boy. He needs his rest."
"Rest? He's had fifteen years of rest!" Jin Long's eyes, which could flash with lightning, were wide with exasperation. "With that gate and even a sliver of zeal, like my brother's brat, he should easily be at the Middle Stage of Ki Manifestation by now! He should be shaping ki into solid constructs, not just reinforcing his arms to steal pastries without getting caught. His talent is terrifying, Mei. Absolutely terrifying. And he's using it to calculate the optimal angle for lazing in a hammock."
He could feel it, the boundless, silent potential sleeping within his son. The Primordial Monad Gate wasn't just powerful; it was profound, a blank canvas upon which any martial art could be painted to perfection. And the boy treated it like a particularly comfortable blanket.
"He has his own path, Long," Li Mei said, her voice as calm as a still lake.
"His own path leads directly to the kitchen, or the library to read frivolous novels, or back to his bed!" He was working himself up again, the air in the room beginning to crackle with unseen energy.
Thwack.
A sharp, precise pain, no greater than a bee sting, bloomed on the crown of his head. Li Mei had flicked him with her pinky finger. It was a move devoid of ki, yet it carried the absolute authority of a wife who had long ago mastered her formidable husband.
"Ow! What was that for?"
"For bothering my boy," she stated, her tone final. She finally looked down at him, her eyes soft but unwavering. "So what if he's not a fanatic like the others? At least he practices when it's time to. Master Feng said he attended all his forms and ki circulation sessions this week without complaint. You should be glad he is practicing now, instead of scheming new ways to avoid it entirely."
Jin Long hmphed, settling back into her lap, the nascent lightning in the air dissipating. She was right, of course. She always was. There was a time when the boy would simply vanish at the sound of the training bell, leaving behind cleverly constructed dummy clones made of pillows and blankets. The fact that he was now showing up, even if with the enthusiasm of a prisoner marching to his cell, was progress.
But still. The Primordial Monad Gate. To have such a legacy, such a key to the highest peaks of martial power, and to see its bearer more concerned with his sister's honey buns… It was enough to give the mighty Jin Long a perpetual headache. A headache that only his wife's lap and the gentle stroke of her fingers could ever hope to soothe.
"He didn't know it yet, but that quiet, lazy boy's path — the one he mocked — would soon shake the heavens themselves."