The Scion of Ruin

The sun hung low in the sky, its wan light casting long shadows across the worn flagstones of the Azure Cloud Sect's outer courtyard. A procession of figures shuffled forward, heads bowed and shoulders stooped, draped in grey uniforms that looked like they had been dyed in dust. Among them, Li Shen stood silently, his back straight despite the itch of the coarse hemp uniform against his skin. His new identity clung to him more oppressively than the ill-fitting clothes — a handyman, the lowest rung in a sect that touched the heavens.

Before them rose a squat hall of dark wood and stone — the Handyman Division's administrative building. It was functional, devoid of ornamentation, and reeked faintly of old incense and cleaning herbs. Inside, an assembly had already gathered.

"Line up, you worthless things!" barked an older disciple overseeing the induction, his expression a mixture of boredom and disdain. "When Elder Guo speaks, you shut up and listen. Or you'll be scrubbing latrines with your tongues."

Li Shen's lips pressed into a thin line. He stood silently as the others jostled into place. Some were boys, barely older than fifteen. Others were hardened by the weather of the world — failed cultivators, fallen clansmen, bastards from border towns. All carried the same hollow-eyed desperation.

The heavy doors creaked open, and silence rippled through the room like a sudden frost.

Elder Guo entered with the slow precision of someone who measured contempt in ounces. Gaunt and skeletal, with hawk-like eyes and a yellowed beard that tapered to a fine point, he looked like a man carved from old paper and spite. His robes were a pristine blue, embroidered with silver clouds — a stark contrast to the dull greys of the assembled handymen.

He walked to the center, clasped his hands behind his back, and let the silence stretch.

"You," he said finally, his voice dry and brittle like aged scrolls. "You are here because you are useless."

No one moved.

"This is not an exaggeration. This is not hyperbole. This is truth." He turned slightly, his eyes sweeping the line of handymen like a blade. "The Azure Cloud Sect stands among the five great sects under heaven. We take the talented, the divine-rooted, the dragon-blooded. You…" — he gestured vaguely — "...are none of those."

His gaze locked on Li Shen. "Some of you carry worse than mediocrity. Some of you," he said, voice dropping like a hammer, "bear curses so deep that even the Qi of the world turns its face from you. Your very existence offends the heavens."

A chill pricked at the back of Li Shen's neck. He knew those words were for him.

Elder Guo raised his hand and curled his fingers inward. From the air itself, threads of greenish light coalesced into his palm — dancing motes of Qi that shimmered like fireflies.

"This," he said with quiet reverence, "is what cultivators seek. This is spiritual Qi. With it, we temper the body, refine the soul, and transcend mortality."

He let the energy swirl for a moment longer, then snapped his fingers. The Qi winked out of existence.

"You," he said, his voice turning cold again, "will never touch it."

Gasps came from some of the newer recruits, a few glancing fearfully at their own hands as if trying to feel the invisible energy around them.

Elder Guo stepped aside and waved a dismissive hand. "Take one of the manuals. A formality. Read it if you like — or don't. It won't matter."

A stack of thin, worn books lay on a stone table near the wall. The title etched on the cover in fading gold read: The Fundamentals of Qi Circulation: Stages 1-10 of Qi Condensation.

The moment the line dispersed, Li Shen moved quickly, collecting his copy with trembling fingers. He clutched it to his chest like a relic, barely noticing the sneers and grunts of the other handymen as they shuffled away to begin their chores.

---

That night, Barracks Seven breathed the scent of sweat and mildew. The long room, lined with crude wooden beds, was dimly lit by a single flickering lantern near the entrance. Snores and murmurs filled the air as exhausted boys and men fell into fitful sleep. Li Shen sat cross-legged on his straw mat, the manual open in his lap.

The paper was rough, the ink faded in places, but the words struck him like thunder:

Qi Condensation Realm: Ten Stages to power. Ten gates to walk through.

---

> Stage 1: Qi Sensing — The awareness of ambient spiritual Qi.

Stage 2: Qi Drawing — Guiding a strand of Qi into the meridians.

Stage 3: Meridien Expansion — Widening energy channels for flow.

Stage 4: Qi Tempering — Strengthening Qi against impurities.

Stage 5: Dantian Convergence — Directing Qi into the Dantian.

Stage 6: Qi Circulation — Establishing a complete spiritual loop.

Stage 7: Minor Manifestation — Enhancing the senses and reflexes.

Stage 8: Internal Strengthening — Reinforcing the bones and blood.

Stage 9: Major Manifestation — Externalizing Qi into physical form.

Stage 10: Qi Solidification — Compressing Qi into a nascent core.

---

His eyes lingered on those ten stages, as if sheer will could burn the knowledge into his bones.

So structured. So complete. So far away.

And beyond it — Foundation Establishment. Hints of higher realms: Core Formation, Nascent Soul, Immortal Ascension. Each layered and structured, each containing their own ten-stage framework. Ten upon ten — like climbing a stairway into the sky.

Li Shen closed his eyes, letting the room fade. He began the first exercise: calm the breath, empty the mind, extend spiritual sense outward.

At first, nothing. Then — a faint hum.

He gasped softly. It was there. The Qi. The sect was soaked in it. The spiritual energy felt like music just outside the range of hearing, vibrating through the stones, through the trees, even through the very walls.

He reached for it.

And the moment he did, the music soured.

It wasn't just resistance. It was rejection.

The Qi that danced around him turned cold, as if recoiling in disgust. A pressure pressed down upon him — invisible yet suffocating. It wasn't pain, not exactly. But it was worse. It was denial. Like reaching for warmth and finding only frost. Like being locked out of his own body.

He strained harder, willing his mind to pull that energy in.

Nothing.

No warmth. No tingling. No trickle of power.

His Dantian — the spiritual center nestled deep in his core — was void. Not just empty, but barren. Like a field salted by the gods.

His breathing quickened, panic rising.

He shifted position, tried again. Again. And again. Hours passed. Sweat dampened his brow. His limbs ached. His mind throbbed.

Still nothing.

A sound nearby broke his trance — a muffled grunt. He turned his head just slightly, eyes squinting in the darkness.

Across the barracks, a scrawny boy — maybe fourteen — sat cross-legged, his body trembling. Then, faintly, just for a moment, a flicker of soft white light pulsed around his chest.

It faded almost instantly, but it was real.

The boy had touched it. He'd begun to sense Qi.

Li Shen swallowed hard, bitterness thick on his tongue. The boy had no aura, no talent. He was average. But even average was enough.

And he — the child of calamity, bearer of the Heaven Asura Destruction Body — was left in silence.

Was this what it meant to be cursed?

He clenched his fists until his knuckles turned white.

No. He wouldn't accept that.

If the ten stages of cultivation were a ladder to the heavens, then he would forge his own ladder. Or dig a tunnel beneath the mountain.

Li Shen reached beneath his straw mat and pulled out the cloth-wrapped object he had hidden.

A short, crude blade — more tool than weapon. But when he held it, something stirred inside him. A low pulse, not of Qi, but of instinct. Memory. Rage.

Blade Cultivation. His unique path. A method not written in any manual, not blessed by the heavens. But when he practiced with the blade — when he moved, when he meditated with it — the Heaven Suppression didn't press him down quite as hard.

It didn't welcome him, but it didn't block him either.

Some nights, he could almost feel strength building in his arms, his breath syncing with each slash. Not Qi in the traditional sense — not the ethereal energy described in the manuals — but something darker. Sharper. Closer to killing intent.

It was slow. Primitive. Instinctual.

But it was his.

He unwrapped the blade completely and traced its edge with a finger. Tiny chips lined its length, but he didn't care.

He whispered, "If heaven won't grant me power… I'll carve it out of the world instead."

He closed the manual, slid the blade beneath his bedding again, and lay back.

Above him, the wooden ceiling loomed like a prison's bars. But in his mind, he saw the ladder again — the ten gleaming rungs stretching upward, each one guarded by walls of Qi and disdain.

He would not climb that ladder.

He would shatter it.