Mist coils over the field, soft and heavy, shrouding the mountain’s flank.

Merin moves within it, every strike of his fist and sweep of his palm rippling outward in blue waves that shudder through the air.

When his foot stamps the ground, dust erupts and stones lift, dancing weightless before crashing back under the pulse of his energy.

From above, a voice breaks the rhythm.

“Brother! Brother!”

A girl descends the stone steps that wind down the mountain, her light robe swaying, its style matching his own.

Merin halts, shoulders still, eyes turning toward her.

She reaches him, breath unsteady, and manages between gulps of air, “Brother… Master called for you.”

Merin nods, wordless, his expression calm. He brushes past, feet carrying him toward the steps, his figure steady as he begins the climb.

He is Merin. Eighteen years have passed since his first cry rang in this world.

That day, he should have died—an infant swallowed by flame. His spirit, powerful as it was, had been useless, unable to stir the world’s energy.

Only the energy shield channelled from his newborn essence shielded him, thin and fleeting, burning away second by second.

Another minute and he would have perished.

But before death could take him, a man entered the fire. That man carried him from the collapsing house, his body wreathed in blue light.

From then on, fate turned.

That man became his master. That man was the Sect Master of Lanshan.

And the Lanshan Sect became his home.

The great hall of Lanshan is silent except for the steady burn of lantern light.

Merin—Yu Feng in this world—stands among five fellow disciples, their shadows cast long across the polished stone floor.

At the head of the hall, the sect master sits unmoving, his presence vast, while a row of elders flanks him like stone pillars.

His junior sister slips past him and takes her place at their master’s side, her robe trailing faintly across the steps.

From the left, Elder Ji speaks, voice low but clear, “The sect has a mission for you six.”

The air stirs with whispers, the disciples beside Merin trading guesses and half-thoughts, but he does not move. His gaze is fixed on Elder Ji, steady as stone.

Elder Ji’s eyes sweep across them. “We have received word—some soldiers of the Wu city-state… have begun turning into giants.”

The murmur thickens. A disciple leans in close, hissing beneath his breath, “Spirit Bead.”

Elder Ji nods once, grave. “Yes. Spirit Bead.”

Merin feels it immediately—the weight of his master’s gaze pressing against him, sharp as a blade.

He does not flinch.

The name stirs fire in his chest, for the thief who stole the bead not only ended the lives of this body’s parents, but nearly severed his mission before it began.

Had he died, his soul would have been torn, weakened beyond repair. For years, he would have been trapped in recovery, barred from entering this world—or any other.

He survived. But his oath remains.

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When he finds the thief, he will not grant him the mercy of death. He will strip his soul bare, bind it, and burn it as a lamp until nothing remains.

Now, Elder Ji’s words confirm the trail. The giants in Wu city-state can only mean one thing—the thief is there, or Wu knows about him.

The hall falls into silence again, until at last the sect master speaks, his voice heavy, calm, but leaving no room for refusal.

“Yu Feng stays. Everybody else, leave.”

The disciples bow and file out, whispers following them, until only Merin remains, his figure still at the hall’s centre, eyes lowered yet alert.

His master’s gaze fixes on him like the weight of a mountain.

“Are you okay?” the sect master asks, his voice carrying concern.

“Yes,” Yu Feng answers, calm and crisp.

Merin does not want bonds here. He came into this world as an enemy, not a son or disciple.

“Yu Feng, can you not say more than one word?” his master presses.

Merin stays silent, eyes steady on the middle-aged man.

“Master, do you need me to do anything? If not, I shall take my leave. I depart at dawn tomorrow.”

The sect master sighs, weary, and waves his hand. “Go, go.”

Merin bows once, turns, and leaves the hall without another word.

Back in his quiet room, he sits cross-legged on his bed. From a hidden pouch, he takes out a jade bottle and tips a smooth white pill into his palm. He swallows it without hesitation.

His breath steadies, and he begins cycling the Jade Qi Refining Technique.

In this world, humans cannot touch the boundless spiritual energy that floods heaven and earth. Their bodies and spirits are insulators, sealed from it.

Instead, cultivation begins with sensing their essence, channelling it, and through that strain, birthing Qi. To grow stronger, they rely on herbs, demon beast flesh, and pills to expand that Qi, feeding it back into essence, refining it again and again.

The path is measured by how many complete cycles—or turns—a cultivator can circulate Qi through their body.

10 turns mark a Refiner.

100 turns, a Master.

1000 turns, a Great Master.

2000 turns, a Grand Master.

5000 turns, a Great Grand Master.

10,000 turns, a Supreme Master.

But no one has ever reached 10,000.

At Master, a cultivator’s lifespan begins to stretch, though by no more than twenty years. Each threshold of a thousand turns adds only another twenty.

And with every rise, refining the next turn grows tenfold harder, until most cultivators spend their entire lives locked at a single stage.

Merin exhales, blue ripples shivering through the room. He closes his eyes, sinking deeper into the endless circulation, the pill’s warmth spreading like fire through his veins.

The next day at dawn, Merin rides out with his five fellow disciples, their horses’ hooves striking rhythm in the cold morning air as they leave the mountain gate behind.

They pass through the village first, where peasants bow hurriedly, eyes filled with both reverence and fear. Beyond lie the farmlands, a patchwork of wheat and millet trembling in the wind, then finally the wilderness spreads open before them—untamed, vast, and brooding.

Yu Lei glances at the rising sun and says, “We’ll need three nights in the wilderness before reaching Tang City.”

Merin rides silently, his thoughts turning inward.

In the sect’s records, it is written that a Grand Master Qi Refiner is enough to stake a claim in this world, to carve out a territory for humanity. A Grand Master would cut down forests, slay demon beasts, and force a small stretch of wilderness into submission, making space for villages and farms.

This is the way of survival here: humans live in sects or city-states, bastions against the wilderness. First comes a city or sect, then the clearing of a radius around it, and only then do villagers move in to farm.

Yet even these strongholds are fragile. Every few decades, the demon beasts gather in tides, sweeping into human territory. The larger the human settlements grow, the greater the tide that comes crashing against them.

Beside him, Wang Zhen chuckles, leaning forward in his saddle. “Should we spend a little time enjoying ourselves in Tang before the mission? Some wine, some fun?”

He turns, grinning at Merin. “What do you say, Junior Brother Feng?”

Merin keeps his eyes on the road. “Let us reach Tang City safely first.”

Wang Zhen laughs. “The wilderness between the sect and Tang isn’t dangerous. Our elders clear the path every year, driving off the strong beasts. We’ll only see strays.”

Another disciple, Yu Qingshan, shakes his head. “Not anymore, relations with Tang have soured these past years.”

Wang raises a brow. “Why?”

Yu Lei answers this time. “Because the Tang City Lord once promised that his daughter—born with the Blue Jade Spiritual Body—would enter our sect. But instead, she joined the Water Sword Sect.”

The others mutter, trading theories, but Merin stops listening. His gaze drifts ahead, where the endless green of the wilderness ripples under the morning wind.

When, he wonders, will he finally be able to forge his body into a spiritual body?

Only those born with such a body can naturally absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. Without it, no matter how vast their spirit, they remain cut off from the world’s greatest power.

But humans have never been content with limits. Not in this world, not in any other.

Through centuries of study, they observed the gifts of those born with innate spiritual bodies, dissected their differences, and from that knowledge forged methods to reshape the ordinary. Techniques to create acquired spiritual bodies.

In the Lanshan Sect, this path is called the Jade Spiritual Body Technique—an arduous, dangerous practice that requires years of refinement. Few succeed, fewer survive, but those who do are reborn.

Merin clenches his fist lightly on the reins, his eyes narrowing against the morning mist.

No matter the cost, he must walk that path.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep