Jin lay in silence.
Not just the silence of the forest, but a deeper one—a void where time had ceased to matter. Slowly, his breaths became steadier, the stiffness in his limbs fading like a receding tide. He turned his head, the motion sluggish, but filled with purpose.
Birdsong returned to his ears. The scent of damp earth and wildflowers reached his nose. But beyond those sensations, there was something else… something new humming quietly within him.
He clenched his fingers into fists. The strength was still returning, but it was there—real and tangible.
As memories returned in fragments, Jin's chest tightened. He remembered the laughter of his squad when spells had accidentally struck him. The icy look in Elder Varek's eyes. The moment the assassins had surrounded him with blades drawn and mercy absent.
His jaw clenched.
"I should be dead," he whispered, voice hoarse.
But he wasn't.
He could feel something foreign inside of him—a presence. Dormant, but pulsing faintly like a distant drumbeat. The dark orb. He remembered it now. That strange moment between life and death. Two orbs, one of light and one of dark, had warred beside his broken body—and the dark one had claimed him.
He didn't understand what it was… only that it had saved him.
With effort, Jin sat up. Pain shot through his spine, but it was bearable—more an echo than a scream. Around him, the clearing was untouched by human hands. Nature had wrapped him in a cocoon, as if the forest itself had guarded his recovery.
He inhaled deeply, trying to circulate his essence.
That was when he noticed it.
His meridians, once faint and clogged, now felt wide and refined—like rivers, not trickles. The elemental essence around him flowed into his body effortlessly, drawn as though magnetized. Not just fire essence, but earth, wind, and water too.
Jin furrowed his brow and summoned his focus.
First, he gathered fire essence. It responded instantly, forming a flickering ember in his palm.
Then wind.
The air vibrated around his fingers.
Next water. Then earth.
Each obeyed without resistance.
And the sensation…
He was no longer barely scraping affinity. These elements moved with eagerness, aligning with his soul.
"High-grade," Jin muttered, realization dawning. "In all four…"
It didn't make sense. Even prodigies were rarely gifted with more than one high-grade elemental affinity. His original fire talent had barely been mid-grade. How had he gained this?
The orb. It had to be.
Jin closed his eyes and delved deeper.
He followed his essence flow inward, peering into his dantian, the spiritual core of his cultivation.
What he saw left him stunned.
Three domains pulsed in harmony. His elemental cultivation, now at the early-stage Adept Realm, radiated with controlled strength. But his body cultivation and even his soul cultivation—the two other sacred paths—had also reached the early-stage Initiate Realm.
All three.
Balanced.
Synchronized.
Impossible.
Jin's eyes snapped open, chest heaving.
"This… this shouldn't be possible."
Not even the ancient heroes of Detrox had achieved balanced triple-path cultivation. Let alone without guidance, without a master.
He rose slowly to his feet. His muscles ached, but his stance was solid. Stronger than it had ever been.
Two years.
Two years of silence, of stillness, of healing.
He wasn't the same Jin who had begged for mercy in the forest, who had been mocked, sabotaged, left for dead.
That Jin had died.
What remained was something new—something forged in betrayal and reborn in darkness.
"I'm alive," he whispered.
But then his fists tightened, and his gaze turned toward the distant mountains where Aegis Sect waited.
"And I haven't forgotten."
His heartbeat quickened. The flame of vengeance rekindled in his chest. He had been weak, but not anymore. The world had abandoned him… but now, it would remember him.
And it would fear him.