CHAPTER 3: THE SHATTERED SILENCE AND THE WEIGHT OF DIVINITY
The silence that followed the explosion was not empty; it was heavy, suffocating, and charged with a pressure that made the very oxygen feel like molten lead. Li Xiao stood amidst the smoking ruins of what used to be his shack. The splintered wood and thatched straw had been pulverized into fine grey ash, swirling in a vortex around his feet. He didn't move. He simply stood there, his tattered robes fluttering in a wind that he alone commanded.
In his mind, the echoes of five hundred years of sacrifice were still screaming. He could still feel the warmth of Lin Yue's tears on his hands from the simulation, and the phantom sensation of lightning tearing through his simulated soul still made his nerves twitch. But the sorrow was no longer just a memory; it had been refined into a cold, diamond-hard intent. Every tear shed in that virtual past had been converted into a drop of golden spiritual essence, filling his newly formed Dantian to the brim.
[ Injection of 5,000 years of battle experience and 10,000x multiplied cultivation base: Complete. ]
[ Current Realm: Golden Core Peak. ]
Li Xiao slowly opened his eyes. They were no longer the dull, defeated eyes of a discarded disciple. They were deep, abyssal pools of violet light, flickering with the cold brilliance of a thousand stars. He looked at his hands. The skin was now fair and translucent like the finest mutton-fat jade, and beneath it, his veins throbbed with a golden radiance. He was no longer human; he was a living relic of a lost era.
"Li Xiao! You piece of trash! What have you done now?"
A harsh, grating voice broke the stillness. From the mist and dust, a group of figures emerged. Leading them was Chen Huo, his face twisted in a mixture of irritation and confusion. Behind him were several other outer disciples, the same ones who had spent years using Li Xiao as a punching bag. They had heard the explosion and rushed over, expecting to find Li Xiao dead or injured in some foolish accident.
Chen Huo stopped ten paces away, coughing from the dust. He looked at the crater where the shack once stood, then at the figure standing in the center. At first, he didn't recognize him. The boy standing there was taller, his posture straight as a spear, emitting an aura that made Chen Huo's own Foundation Establishment cultivation tremble in fear.
"Li Xiao? Is that you?" Chen Huo narrowed his eyes, his hand instinctively reaching for the hilt of his sword. "What happened here? Did you steal a forbidden artifact from the sect storehouse? Answer me, you rat!"
Li Xiao didn't turn his head. He didn't even acknowledge Chen Huo's existence. He was looking at the horizon, toward the distant Imperial Palace, sensing a connection that spanned thousands of miles. His silence was the ultimate insult.
"I'm talking to you!" Chen Huo roared, his face flushing red with rage. Being ignored by the sect's most famous 'garbage' was a humiliation he couldn't endure. He drew his sword, the cold steel gleaming under the moonlight. "I don't know what kind of trick you're playing, but I'll beat the truth out of you. Kneel!"
Chen Huo lunged forward, his sword humming with the meager Qi of someone who had barely touched the threshold of cultivation. To the other disciples, his movement was fast, a lethal blur. But to Li Xiao, it was pathetic. It was as slow as a dying insect crawling through mud.
Li Xiao finally turned his gaze toward Chen Huo. It was a look of pure, unadulterated indifference. He didn't draw a weapon. He didn't even raise his hand. He simply released a fraction—a mere sliver—of his Sword Intent.
*BOOM.*
The air itself seemed to solidify. A wave of invisible pressure, sharp enough to cut through mountains, erupted from Li Xiao. The ground beneath Chen Huo's feet shattered into a spiderweb of cracks. Before his blade could even get within three meters of Li Xiao, the sheer pressure of the aura snapped the steel sword into a hundred fragments.
"Argh!" Chen Huo screamed as he was slammed into the ground by an invisible weight. It felt as if a mountain had been dropped on his shoulders. He crashed into the dirt, his bones creaking and his breath leaving his lungs in a sharp gasp.
The other disciples behind him were thrown back like autumn leaves in a hurricane. They tumbled across the grass, their faces pale with terror. They tried to stand, but their legs refused to obey. The aura emanating from the boy they had once bullied was so vast, so ancient, that it felt like they were standing before a primordial god.
"Aura manifestation... Sword Intent becoming physical..." one of the disciples stammered, his voice trembling. "This... this isn't Body Refining. This isn't even Foundation Establishment. This is... a Golden Core Master!"
"Impossible!" Chen Huo groaned, his face pressed into the mud. "He was a trash... a Ninth-Rank waste! How... how can a waste become a Master overnight?"
Li Xiao walked toward Chen Huo, his footsteps silent yet echoing in the hearts of everyone present. He stopped inches away from Chen Huo's head. The golden light surrounding him was so intense it began to singe the grass.
"Ten years," Li Xiao spoke. His voice was low, but it vibrated through the earth like a funeral bell. "For ten years, you enjoyed the feeling of standing above me. You took my stones, you broke my spirit, and you called me a parasite."
He looked down at the shivering man. "But in the span of a single heartbeat, I have lived lives you cannot imagine. I have watched empires fall and gods bleed. To me, you are not even a speck of dust on my path."
Li Xiao raised his foot and pressed it lightly on Chen Huo's back. A sickening crack echoed through the clearing. It wasn't a fatal blow, but it was enough to shatter Chen Huo's pride and his cultivation base. "Since you like the mud so much, stay there. From this day forth, you and I do not live in the same world."
Li Xiao looked up at the sky. High above, he could see the streaks of light—the Sect Elders were coming, drawn by the massive eruption of Qi. Any other disciple would be terrified, but Li Xiao only felt a cold amusement.
[ Ding! New Function Unlocked: System Manufacturing. ]
[ Would you like to create a 'False Path System' for your enemies? ]
A cruel smile played on Li Xiao's lips. He wasn't just going to kill his enemies. He was going to give them 'hope'—a system that would make them think they were geniuses, while in reality, every bit of their progress would be harvested by him.
"Let them come," Li Xiao whispered. "The Architect has returned, and the world's debt is long overdue."
He stood there, a solitary figure of gold and shadow, waiting for the elders to arrive. He was no longer a victim of
the Blue Cloud Sect. He was the master of their destiny.