In this world, names carried destiny.
Those born with illustrious surnames walked beneath heaven's favor.
Those without… were trampled into the dirt.
Xu Yan had no name worth remembering.
He was called many things—trash, dog, nameless thing—but never a cultivator. Not even a human, in the eyes of the Xu Clan.
At sixteen, his cultivation remained nonexistent.
No Qi.
No meridians worth mentioning.
No future.
He knelt in the rain outside the ancestral hall, blood mixed with mud beneath his fingers.
"You dared touch the Young Master's spirit stone?" an elder sneered.
Xu Yan raised his head. "I didn't steal it."
A slap came faster than thunder.
"You speak lies even now," the elder said coldly. "A nameless orphan dares defy the Xu bloodline?"
Xu Yan tasted iron.
The crowd watched in silence. Some with pity. Most with satisfaction.
Finally, the verdict fell.
"Expelled from the Xu Clan. From this moment onward, Xu Yan no longer exists."
The gates closed behind him.
He collapsed outside the mountain path, laughter echoing in his ears.
If heaven refused to acknowledge him—
Then he would devour heaven itself .