Lei Man walked through the moon-drenched courtyards of the Lei estate, the strange, exhilarating fire of his first victory still thrumming in his veins. He was a third-level body cultivator. He was a warrior. He was… someone else. The quiet satisfaction of this new reality was a warm cloak against the cool night air.
As he turned into the secluded path leading to his own small courtyard, a figure darted from the shadows of a scarlet willow. It was a young woman in the simple gray robes of a servant, her face pale with worry in the moonlight, her hands twisting the fabric of her apron. The original Lei Man's memories supplied a name instantly: Lian.
She had been his only friend. A low-ranking maid who, for reasons the old Lei Man cherished and the new Lei Man couldn't fathom, saw past his status as "trash." She saw a gentle, wounded soul, and had offered him a quiet, unwavering kindness that had been his only comfort. The original Lei Man had been deeply, secretly, in love with her.
She rushed to his side, her voice a frantic, scolding whisper. "Young Master! Where have you been? I heard you went into the city! Alone! Are you mad?" She reached out, her hands hovering as if to check him for injuries. "You can't do things like that! The city is dangerous for… for someone like you. Those merchants, the guards, they're cruel. You could have been robbed, or beaten, or worse!"
Her concern was a tangible, smothering blanket. To the boy who used to live in this body, it would have been a balm. To Leo, the soul now in residence, it was a chain, pulling him back to the weakness he had just started to claw his way out of. He saw her not as a friend, but as a living, breathing reminder of the pathetic boy he was pretending to be.
He took a half-step back, avoiding her touch. The movement was small, but it was enough to make her freeze, her hands still hovering in the empty air between them.
"Lian," he said, and the voice that came out was not the timid, grateful tone she was used to. It was calm, detached, and utterly foreign. "I am fine."
She blinked, her brow furrowing in confusion. "But… you shouldn't have…"
"What I should or shouldn't do is my own concern," he said, the words feeling cold even to him. He knew this was cruel, but it was a necessary cruelty. He could not afford an anchor to the past. "Thank you for your concern, but it is not needed."
Lian stared at him, her worry slowly being replaced by a dawning sense of hurt and fear. This wasn't her Lei Man. Her Lei Man was shy and gentle, and would have been flustered and grateful for her attention. This person was a cold, distant stranger wearing his face.
"Young Master?" she whispered, her voice trembling slightly. "What's wrong? Did someone hurt you? Did someone threaten you to make you act this way?"
He looked her directly in the eyes, severing the final thread. "Nothing is wrong, Lian. But we need to be clear. Whatever you think was between us… it's over. It was a childish fancy. We should not see each other this way again. It is inappropriate."
The words struck her with the force of a physical blow. Her face crumpled, disbelief warring with heartbreak. "Inappropriate? Childish?" Tears welled in her eyes, shimmering in the moonlight. "I was… I was worried about you! I'm the only one who ever is!"
"And I appreciate that," he said, his voice unwavering. "But it is no longer necessary."
That was the final cut. She stared at him, her gaze tracing his features as if searching for a single sign of the boy she knew. She found none. "Your eyes…" she finally choked out. "They're different. They're cold."
Her accusation hit a flicker of something deep inside him—a pang of guilt, a ghostly twinge of the original Lei Man's sorrow. He ignored it.
Lian let out a choked sob, a sound of profound and utter disillusionment. "You've become cruel, Young Master," she whispered, tears now streaming freely down her cheeks. "All this time I defended you, telling everyone you were just gentle. But you've become just like them. Just like all the others."
She didn't wait for a reply. She turned and fled, her sobs echoing in the quiet courtyard before being swallowed by the night.
Lei Man stood alone, the empty space where she had been feeling colder than the rest of the air. He felt no triumph, only the grim, hollow satisfaction of a surgeon who has just completed a painful but necessary amputation. He had cut away the last piece of the old Lei Man's heart.
He looked down at his own hands, clenching them into fists. He could feel the latent power humming beneath the skin, a power born from chaos and madness. He was no longer the gentle, wounded boy Lian had loved. He couldn't afford to be. Kindness was a luxury for the strong, and he was only just beginning to learn what strength felt like.
The victory in the alley was a brutal, sloppy affair, and Lei Man knew it. Power without control was just a tantrum. His punch had been a blunt instrument, propelled by a flood of raw energy. It had worked on unprepared thugs, but against a real cultivator, he would have been dismantled in seconds. He needed a technique, a framework to pour his newfound strength into.
The next morning, he walked with a purpose he'd never felt before, his steps sure and steady on the stone paths of the Lei estate. He returned to the grand pagoda of the ancestral library, a place he had been chased from his entire life.
Elder Feng was there, as always, sweeping the same stone steps with the same ancient broom. He looked up as Lei Man approached, his weary eyes showing a flicker of recognition, followed by the immediate return of dismissal.
"The Discarded Pavilion is that way," the elder said, his voice the rustle of dry leaves. "Surely you have not exhausted its... treasures... already."
Lei Man stopped before him and gave a respectful bow. "Elder, I have reached the third level of Body Strengthening. I request access to the Hall of Martial Foundation."
The elder stopped sweeping. He slowly turned his head, his cloudy eyes squinting at Lei Man, searching for any sign of a lie. What he saw made him pause. The boy's sickly pallor was gone, his frame seemed more solid, and his eyes... his eyes held a calm confidence that was utterly alien. More than that, the elder, with his own deep cultivation, could feel the faint but undeniable hum of Qi circulating within Lei Man's body, a steady thrum far beyond that of a mere novice.
"A fluke," the elder grunted, though his voice lacked its earlier conviction. "A momentary surge. The rules are clear. Only those at the second level or above may enter the Hall."
"Then test me," Lei Man said simply.
He held out his hand, palm up. He focused, not on the gentle loop of the Rainbow Caterpillar Method, but on the memory of the raw, green fire from the Jade Sprouts. He gathered the Qi in his dantian—now a roaring flame compared to yesterday's spark—and pushed it towards his hand. A soft, pale green light enveloped his palm, solid and unwavering. It was the undeniable sign of a cultivator who had solidified their foundation.
Elder Feng's eyes widened. He stared at the glowing hand, then at Lei Man's calm face. He had seen this boy yesterday, a talentless stray with a single, pathetic flicker of awakened Qi. To jump to the third level overnight was not just impossible; it was unheard of, a violation of the very principles of cultivation.
"Impossible..." the elder whispered, more to himself than to Lei Man. He looked around, as if to make sure no one else was witnessing this absurdity. He took a deep, rattling breath and leaned heavily on his broom. "But... undeniable."
He sighed, a long, weary sound of a man whose meticulously ordered world had just been irrevocably cracked. "Very well. The rules are the rules. You have met the requirements." He gestured with his head towards the main entrance of the pagoda. "The Hall of Martial Foundation is on the first floor. Do not touch anything you are not meant to. And do not cause trouble."
With that, he turned his back, resuming his sweeping with a new, agitated energy, as if trying to physically sweep away the impossibility he had just witnessed.
Lei Man entered the main hall, and it was like stepping into another world. Unlike the dusty, neglected storeroom of the Discarded Pavilion, this hall was immaculate. It smelled of polished wood, ancient bamboo, and the faint, sharp scent of pressed ink. Rows upon rows of scrolls were organized with perfect precision on massive shelves that reached towards the high, vaulted ceiling. This was a library of power, and it hummed with a latent energy that made the hairs on his arms stand up.
He moved through the aisles, his eyes scanning the names carved into the wooden shelves. "Fist Techniques." "Leg Arts." "Movement Skills."
He pulled scroll after scroll, his excitement growing. Tiger's Claw Fist. Mountain-Shattering Strike. Flowing River Kick. The Way of the Silent Step. Each was a legitimate, powerful technique, a direct path to martial prowess. But as he read them, the same problem as before arose, magnified a hundredfold.
The Tiger's Claw required an explosive, aggressive circulation of Qi. The Flowing River Kick demanded a smooth, cyclical pattern. The Silent Step involved breaking Qi into tiny, subtle bursts. They were all brilliant, but they were all completely incompatible. Trying to practice one would make it impossible to learn another. A cultivator was meant to choose one path and walk it for years.
Lei Man, however, didn't want to choose. He wanted it all.
He gathered a dozen scrolls—five for fists, five for legs, two for movement—and found a secluded reading alcove in the back of the hall. He spread them out, his eyes darting from one to the next, trying to deconstruct them, to find a common thread, a way to merge the unmergeable.
His head began to throb. The intricate diagrams of meridian pathways began to twist and blur. The elegant characters detailing stances and breathing patterns started to wriggle on the page like agitated black worms. The sheer volume of contradictory, high-level information was a thousand times more potent than the flawed ramblings of the Discarded Pavilion.
The air in the alcove grew thick and heavy. The polished wood of the shelves began to breathe. The scent of ink sharpened, becoming acrid, and a high-pitched, chittering sound started to echo in his ears, a sound no one else in the library could hear.
He clutched his head, a groan escaping his lips. He was losing control. The world was dissolving again. He was falling into another trip.