The city lights of Dawnriver flickered beneath a cloudy twilight, casting long shadows across the rooftops as the wind howled like a mourning beast.
Bai Zhen stood alone on the rooftop of an abandoned chapel, overlooking the sprawl of a district once vibrant with life.
Now it was silent, scarred by cracked walls and collapsed streets. Even the wind seemed hesitant to linger. His eyes were closed.
A pulse ran through his chest not physical, but spiritual, like a distant heartbeat echoing across time. The Godseed, buried deep within his soul, stirred awake. He felt it before he heard the system.
[Connection Detected – Descendant Awakening]
[Name: Shen Yuan]
[Bloodline Sync: 74%]
[Realm: Initial Foundation Establishment]
[First Bond Established. Initiating Link…]
His breath caught.
For a single moment, Bai Zhen saw through another's eyes.
The dusty sunlight of a desert basin. Crimson skies. A boy barely sixteen with wild black hair and bloodied knuckles, standing victorious over the corpse of a horned wolf.
In his hand was a cracked sword; in his eyes, the stubbornness of a child who refused to die.
Bai Zhen staggered back, the vision severed. His heartbeat thundered in his ears.
The Godseed pulsed again, and warmth flowed through his body faint, but undeniable. It wasn't a technique, nor energy he had cultivated himself.
It was borrowed power, channeled through ancestral threads. A gift from a life he hadn't shaped, but helped birth.
[+2% Strength]
[+1% Perception]
[Godseed Resonance Level: 3%]
[Next Awakening Threshold: 10%]
He opened his eyes slowly. For the first time in days, the storm clouds over Dawnriver seemed to pull apart.
Behind him, a door creaked open. Soft footsteps crossed the cracked tiles.
„It's begun, hasn't it?" came the voice of Uncle Kael, calm but grave.
Bai Zhen didn't turn. His gaze remained fixed on the horizon.
„Yes," he said. „The first thread has awakened. And with it… so has fate."
The courtyard of the Skywatcher Barracks lay in eerie stillness. The moon overhead was pale and glassy, casting silver shadows across shattered tiles and scorched stone. Broken training dummies lay discarded, their straw innards strewn like battlefield remains.
In the center of this chaos, a lone figure knelt in silence, his body trembling, not from fear but from something far deeper.
Lian Mu's fists were clenched tight enough to draw blood.
His breathing came in short, ragged bursts. Each inhale scorched his lungs, each exhale released a heat that curled the air.
His robes clung to his back, drenched in sweat, dust, and the faint scent of burning qi. The spiritual pressure surrounding him was so thick that even insects had abandoned the space. The night itself held its breath.
He willed himself upright, staggering to his feet with the grace of a dying man. But his gaze sharp, defiant, furious was that of someone clawing their way back from the edge of defeat.
With trembling arms, he raised his fists once more.
„First Form… Gale Breach!"
His right foot stamped forward, the movement crisp despite his exhaustion. A surge of energy spiraled through his body, concentrating in his core, then out through his fists.
A blast of kinetic force roared from his hands and tore across the courtyard, splitting a reinforced stone slab clean in half.
The backlash sent him reeling.
Lian Mu dropped to one knee, coughing up blood.
His meridians were fraying at the edges. His body had long passed the point of tolerance. But something inside him refused to yield. Something ancient. Dormant. Until now.
Then the change began.
First, a low thrum barely audible, like a heartbeat buried beneath earth and time. His dantian pulsed in response, and a warm glow began to rise from within. Not gold. Not red. Something in between, like liquid fire and celestial dawn.
Then it surged.
Like a tidal wave crashing through a brittle dam, energy tore through his meridians, cleansing and ravaging them in equal measure.
His body arched as lightning hot pain coursed through his spine. His mouth opened in a silent scream, eyes wide as the world around him blurred into streaks of light.
[Bloodline Detected…]
[Compatible Descendant: Lian Mu]
[Establishing Bond with Godseed Host…]
[Generation Rank: Second]
[Godseed Resonance: 13%]
[Initiating Core Formation Protocol…]
Lian Mu collapsed to the ground, but before he struck the stone, a soft golden barrier formed around him, catching his fall.
The air around him thickened, spiraling into a vortex. Spirit energy was rushing toward him from every direction, drawn as though by instinct, pulled into the storm forming within his soul.
Atop the Ruins of West Hollow Tower the same night
Far from the Skywatcher Barracks, at the edge of the broken spires of West Hollow, Bai Zhen stood unmoving on a windswept balcony.
The air shimmered with residual energy. His eyes, once dim with fatigue, were now glowing faintly with celestial gold.
He felt it.
The resonance. The bond. It pulled at his very soul like an echo from his own bloodline.
A second thread had woven itself into the Godseed.
And this one burned hotter.
[Godseed Synchronization… Updated]
[New Descendant: Lian Mu]
[Spiritual Core Grade: Mid-Tier]
[Transfer Bonus: +3 Strength | +3 Endurance | +1 Qi Regeneration]
[Passive Trait: Not Yet Unlocked]
[Next Milestone: 15% Resonance]
Kael's heavy boots clunked against the stone as he approached behind him.
„Let me guess… another one awakened?" Kael asked, though his tone lacked surprise.
Bai Zhen nodded slowly. „Lian Mu. His flame is… raw, but persistent. He's fighting for something. Or someone."
Kael raised an eyebrow. „You can sense his emotions now, too?"
„Not clearly. But through the Godseed… there are fragments. Emotions. Instincts. Intent. And pain."
Kael leaned on the wall beside him, watching the storm cloud spiral over the southern district.
„It's starting faster than I thought. Two bonds in barely a day. And with every descendant that awakens, you grow stronger, don't you?"
Zhen didn't answer at first.
He looked at his own hand.
Once pale and calloused, it now thrummed with energy. Faint veins of golden light ran beneath his skin, pulsing in time with a deeper heartbeat.
The Godseed the divine remnant buried within his soul was no longer silent.
„I don't just grow stronger, Kael. I evolve."
He looked up toward the storm.
„And so do they."
Skywatcher Barracks Inner Training Field
Lian Mu's vision slowly returned.
He was lying on his back, staring up at a night sky streaked with silver threads of cloud. His body felt light, almost ethereal. The agony was gone. Replaced by… something new.
He sat up, slowly.
The ground around him had changed. Spirit energy was still thick, but no longer chaotic. It was flowing through him, into him, like a river guided by unseen hands.
He reached inward with his spiritual sense and gasped.
In the center of his dantian, spinning like a miniature star, was his Spiritual Core. Golden red. Laced with celestial runes he couldn't comprehend. It pulsed steadily, harmoniously, like a second heart.
„This isn't normal…" he whispered.
Then he heard it.
A voice not external, but deep within. Ancient. Familiar.
[You are mine, and I am yours. Climb, and through you, I ascend.]
Lian Mu staggered to his feet.
His mind raced.
But even as the fear rose, something deeper stirred within him.
Excitement.
His path, once choked with obstacles and rejection, now opened like a gate to the heavens. The old rules no longer applied. He had stepped beyond them into a world few could ever touch.
He clenched his fists, energy rippling across his skin.
„I don't know what this is… but I'm not going to waste it."
His eyes blazed.
„I'll rise. No matter what stands in my way."
Ashen Isles Elsewhere
In the silence of the Ashen Isles, where the wind never blew and the ocean was made of still mist, an old man in silver robes opened his eyes.
His pupils shimmered with starlight.
„A second flame has ignited," he said, voice barely above a whisper.
A servant behind him shivered. „What does it mean, master?"
„It means… the Primordial Thread is weaving faster than prophecy foretold."
He turned toward a mirror of obsidian water, where an image flickered into view: Lian Mu, unconscious in a scorched courtyard, surrounded by drifting petals of light.
The old man's fingers tightened on his staff.
„And it means he must be watched."
The wind was unusually quiet.
Within the barracks infirmary an ancient hall carved from jade stone and reinforced by formation runes Lian Mu stirred.
His breathing had stabilized, and the rapid pulsing of energy within his meridians had slowed to a gentle thrum, like the humming of a sacred bell.
As he blinked his eyes open, the dim lanternlight above painted a warm orange glow across the ceiling.
For a long moment, he just… lay there.
Not in pain. Not in fear.
Just silence.
Then the memories hit him.
The training. The breakthrough. The voice. The golden energy. The searing pain, followed by an inexplicable peace.
Lian Mu slowly sat up, groaning as sore muscles resisted. His fingers instinctively pressed against his chest.
Beneath the skin, he could feel it a subtle heat, as though a small ember had lodged inside his core.
His dantian pulsed in response, glowing faintly with reddish-gold light.
A knock came at the door.
„You're awake," said a familiar voice.
Kael entered, wearing a casual cloak over his military robes. His usually stern face carried a flicker of relief.
„Wasn't sure you'd make it through the night."
Lian Mu offered a faint smirk. „Neither was I."
Kael stepped beside the bed, placing a small box on the nearby table. It was carved from white ironwood expensive, clearly out of place here.
„What's that?" Lian Mu asked.
Kael crossed his arms. „A gift. From my uncle. You remember Bai Zhen, right?"
Lian's body stiffened. „The one who was watching me earlier…"
„He wasn't just watching you," Kael replied. „He was… checking something. And it seems he found it."
Lian Mu glanced at the box, heart pounding.
Inside it was a single golden pill the size of a pearl, encased in silk cloth. The air shimmered faintly around it.
„That's a Spirit Nourishing Pill," Kael said. „Normally reserved for Peak Foundation Realm cultivators. Zhen said you'd need it more than they do."
Lian frowned. „Why would someone like him care about someone like me?"
Kael gave him a long look. „Because you're not just 'someone,' Lian. Not anymore. You're bonded to something… beyond comprehension. That golden energy inside you Zhen calls it the Godseed Flame. And you're not the only one bearing it."
Lian's lips parted in disbelief.
„What does this Godseed want from me?" he asked, voice low.
Kael's expression turned grim. „To ascend. Through you. Through others like you. It doesn't force you but if you grow, it grows. The stronger your generation becomes, the stronger he becomes.
Zhen believes it's symbiotic… though, there's a price."
Lian clenched his fists. „Of course there is."
Kael placed a firm hand on his shoulder.
„I know it's a lot. But think about what you can do with this. No longer scraping by as a bottom ranked trainee. No more hiding. You've seen it, haven't you? You've felt it. This power isn't just a tool. It's a legacy."
Lian remained silent for a long while.
Then, slowly, he reached for the pill. The silk felt cold in his hand, in contrast to the heat inside his chest.
„I'm not doing this for Bai Zhen," he muttered. „Or for some god's legacy. I'll use this power… to protect what I have left."
Kael gave a tight nod. „That's all anyone can ask."
Elsewhere Night's Edge Forest
At the edge of the province, where trees stood as tall as towers and mist moved like living creatures, a cloaked figure walked calmly along a moonlit path.
Her steps made no sound. Her presence left no trace.
But her eyes silver with a tint of lavender glowed softly beneath the hood.
In her hand, a fragment of obsidian glowed with golden runes. As she lifted it, the reflection changed showing Lian Mu, sitting on his cot, clutching the Godseed Flame.
„Another one…" she whispered.
Her lips curved into a faint smile.
„It begins again."
Back in the Barracks
Lian Mu lay back down, the pill now consumed and dissolving within his system. Gentle waves of warmth spread outward, reinforcing his bones and soothing his battered meridians.
It wasn't just healing him it was strengthening the very foundation of his cultivation.
Yet he couldn't shake the feeling that something far larger had taken root.
That he was now part of a storm whose eye was still forming.
But he wasn't afraid. Not anymore.
As his breathing steadied and sleep returned, the last thing he saw was a faint flicker of light dancing in the corner of his vision like a single spark from a divine flame, waiting patiently to be fanned.