Mu Ruyin's breath was steady now.
She lay on her side in the cooled center of the ash ring, robe pulled carefully back over her shoulders. Her spine still shimmered faintly from the seals, but the glow was gentle—no longer volatile.
Fang Yuan hadn't moved from his position beside her.
His left hand rested lightly on the earth. His right still hovered slightly above her Core, not touching, just listening.
Lei Qing stepped forward slowly, boots skimming the edge of the broken circle.
"Her Qi's stable," they said quietly. "Smoother than before."
Fang Yuan nodded, but didn't speak.
Ruyin's eyes fluttered open.
"I saw them," she murmured.
"Who?" Fang Yuan asked.
She stared upward, not at the ceiling—but through it.
"In the fracture. When the tether cracked. I saw students. Dozens of them. Watching us."
Lei knelt just outside the circle. "You mean the system recorded it?"
She shook her head.
"No. Not screens. Not drones. Just… eyes. Not hostile. Just curious."
Fang Yuan stood, slow and deliberate. His knees stiffened from kneeling too long, but his breath was full again.
"They're starting to sense it."
"Sense what?" Lei asked.
He stepped out of the circle. The ash crunched faintly beneath his feet.
"That we're real."
Lei tilted their head.
Ruyin answered instead.
"Most students don't know what they're missing. They think Core advancement is power. Efficiency. Data."
She sat up slowly, wincing a little, but her voice was steady.
"But now they've felt something else. A Qi that answers. A path that breathes. And they're wondering—why does theirs feel… silent?"
Fang Yuan looked at her.
"We can't wait anymore."
He turned toward the cracked door of the greenhouse.
"I'm going to open a training session."
Lei frowned. "Here? Publicly?"
"No. Quietly. One student at a time. No promises. No lectures. Only breath. Action. Proof."
Ruyin stood, brushing ash from her sleeves. She looked thinner. Tired.
But her eyes held fire again.
"I'll help."
Lei glanced at the door. "We're already watched."
"That's fine," Fang Yuan said.
He walked to the edge of the garden where the stones still curved upward and placed both palms to the ground.
Golden light shimmered—soft, almost imperceptible.
Not a beacon.
Just an invitation.
He closed his eyes.
"If they're ready," he whispered, "they'll find us."
Fang Yuan remained crouched by the far wall, palms still pressed against the stone. The shimmer had faded. The ash circle behind him no longer glowed. Mu Ruyin stood just beyond it, arms crossed, gaze watchful. Lei Qing leaned near the fractured entrance, listening.
Then—
The sound.
A single step outside.
Soft.
Then another.
The crunch of gravel. Paused breath.
Lei Qing didn't turn, only whispered, "One."
Fang Yuan remained motionless.
Mu Ruyin turned slightly toward the entrance.
Another footstep.
A figure stood at the threshold, just outside the shattered arch.
She was young—barely past novice rank by the look of her uniform. Her Core band flickered blue-green, unsteady, like her Qi couldn't decide if it wanted to rise or recoil.
She didn't speak.
Didn't bow.
Just stood, frozen in indecision.
Fang Yuan raised his head.
Their eyes met.
The girl opened her mouth.
Closed it.
Then said, "I felt… something. At first I thought it was a malfunction. Then I thought I was being tested. But now I think—"
She faltered.
Ruyin stepped forward gently.
"You think what?"
The girl swallowed.
"I think I've never heard my own breath until just now."
Silence.
Then Fang Yuan stood fully.
He said nothing.
He only extended a hand—flat, steady, open.
Not a command.
An offer.
The girl stepped forward, hesitant.
She crossed the threshold.
And something in the air changed.
Barely.
But real.
Like the room had taken a breath for the first time.
Fang Yuan guided her to the inner circle of ash.
"No technique," he said quietly. "No form. Sit."
She did.
Slowly. Awkwardly. Knees trembling.
Ruyin knelt beside her and placed one hand lightly against the girl's back.
"Just breathe," she said.
"That's it?"
Lei Qing smiled faintly. "It's always been it."
The girl closed her eyes.
Breathed in.
And something, somewhere, stirred.
A thread of Qi sparked. Brief. Wild. Unfiltered.
But honest.
Fang Yuan met Ruyin's gaze.
The first had come.
The girl's breath slowed.
Shallow at first.
Then deeper.
The ash beneath her knees didn't glow. The Qi in the air didn't tremble. But Fang Yuan felt it—like warmth rising under ice.
Real cultivation was never loud.
It was felt.
He stepped back from the circle, letting Mu Ruyin guide the girl into a second breath. Lei Qing sat cross-legged nearby, keeping their gaze half-closed, half-alert.
A second sound came from the doorway.
Soft. Steady.
Another student.
This one older—closer to ranking status. His Core band flickered with the faint gold of mid-tier simulation mastery. He said nothing.
Fang Yuan nodded once.
The boy sat.
He didn't ask for permission.
Five minutes later, a third arrived.
This one didn't even step inside. She stood near the broken wall, leaned on a column, and just... watched. Like she was guarding a dream.
By the hour's end, five more had come.
No one spoke above a whisper.
No names were exchanged.
And yet, within the circle, seven students now sat in the ash, eyes closed, breath low. Their Qi didn't shine. Didn't pulse. But it moved—awkwardly, imperfectly, honestly.
Lei Qing murmured, "You haven't taught them any technique."
"I'm not going to," Fang Yuan said.
Mu Ruyin looked up. "Then what are you doing?"
"Reminding them what silence sounds like."
He walked among the students.
Adjusted postures with a fingertip.
Guided a wrist here, a spine there.
When one of them trembled from inner resistance, he said nothing.
He simply breathed beside them.
And the trembling slowed.
By nightfall, the greenhouse was quiet.
No alarms. No guards.
But on the Academy's mainframe, a passive alert flared in a private node:
Seventeen students recorded below expected energy output. All within Radius 12. Core performance untraceable.
Xu Ran read the report in silence.
His finger tapped once against the edge of his desk.
No words.
But deep beneath his office floor, a second alert triggered.
One line of system logic, written long ago:
If cultivation deviates from system lineage, initiate counter-measure: Phase Ember.
He didn't activate it.
Not yet.
But he opened the file.
And watched.
The night was still.
The students had not left.
Some had fallen asleep where they sat, their bodies instinctively folded into meditative poses. Others remained awake, simply breathing. Watching each other. A few wept, not from pain—but from the unfamiliarity of peace.
No lights. No banners. No systems.
Only warmth.
Fang Yuan sat outside the ring, legs crossed, eyes half-lidded. His Qi burned low but steady. Not fueling a fight. Feeding a flame.
Mu Ruyin moved among the seated students, checking posture, realigning breath. Not like a teacher.
Like a gardener.
Lei Qing stood at the arch of the ruined doorway, still and sharp, watching the dark path beyond.
It was just before the third hour when footsteps sounded from the far corridor.
Not rushed.
Measured.
Leather soles on stone.
Fang Yuan didn't move.
Lei didn't call out.
They all felt it.
The figure stepped into view.
Robes not of a student. Not armor. Dark grey. Trimmed in faded blue.
An instructor.
But not one from combat. Not Core division.
One of the archivists.
Fang Yuan recognized the face before the voice came.
Instructor Meilan.
Once a student herself during the final years of the Core conversion era. Never loud. Never cruel. Known for silence. For rules.
She stepped into the greenhouse. The students watched, unsure.
Ruyin tensed.
But Meilan didn't raise her voice.
She looked at the ring.
Then at Fang Yuan.
And lowered herself to one knee.
The ash whispered beneath her.
She bowed her head.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
"I remember," she said.
No one spoke.
"I was there when the last breath-based cultivator at this Academy was expelled. They said he was inefficient. Emotional. Prone to failure."
She looked up, eyes wet—not with tears, but weight.
"He died in the rain, outside the southern gate. No one recorded his name. Not because it wasn't known."
She looked at Fang Yuan now.
"But because we were told not to remember it."
Silence again.
Then she reached up—and removed her Core band.
The air shifted.
A small ripple of honest Qi—clumsy but real—fluttered through her skin.
"I can't teach what I don't know," she said.
"But I can follow."
Fang Yuan stood.
Walked to her.
Offered his hand.
And she took it.
Behind her, three more students stepped into view.
Then five.
The path was waking.
Not through fire.
Through breath.
The greenhouse air had never felt so still.
Instructor Meilan sat quietly near the circle, breathing like the others. No words. No questions. Only presence.
The students had spread into quiet clusters, some in meditation, some just lying on the cracked earth, eyes open to a night sky they'd never looked at without filter glass.
Then the first flicker came.
A girl near the back twitched—suddenly, sharply—hand pressed to her wrist.
"My band's hot," she whispered.
Another student nearby looked down.
"So is mine."
Then another.
And another.
Qi flow began to wobble.
Not spike. Not drop.
Flutter.
Like something inside them was being pulled.
Fang Yuan rose to his feet instantly.
"Everyone, still."
Too late.
A boy near the edge of the ash ring gasped.
His Qi surged outward—then collapsed in on itself, like a breath inhaled too deep and forgotten.
He didn't scream.
He convulsed.
Fell sideways.
Mu Ruyin was already moving. She caught him before his skull struck stone.
She pressed her fingers to his Core band.
It pulsed red once—then faded.
"I can't stabilize it," she said. "It's not just spiking—it's disassembling."
Fang Yuan crouched beside them, hand hovering over the boy's chest.
He felt it.
Not pain.
Not energy.
Fracture.
Not of the Core.
Of spiritual narrative—the connection between breath and identity.
"What's happening?" Lei asked, stepping closer, eyes sharp.
Fang Yuan looked up, voice cold.
"Phase Ember. A silent fail-safe. If the system detects too many deviations from Core protocol, it activates internal destabilizers."
He looked at the students now standing, afraid. Some holding their wrists. Others gripping their heads as Qi turned against them.
"It doesn't punish. It doesn't correct."
He stood.
"It erodes."
Meilan staggered forward, blinking. Her own band flickered yellow.
"What do we do?"
Fang Yuan lifted his hand.
"Take them off."
"They're keyed to their Qi systems," she said. "Removal will cause temporary identity collapse."
"Better a collapse we choose," he replied, "than one we can't survive."
He raised both hands—Core band glinting gold.
Then broke it.
Not shattered.
Unwound.
The glow around it folded inward—silently. Like a flower pulled back into bud.
The students gasped.
Then one—just one—followed his lead.
Then two.
Then ten.
Bands clicked.
Snapped.
One by one, the lights faded from their wrists.
Not darkness.
Relief.
The air steadied.
The pressure stopped.
Fang Yuan stood among them, breath low.
"They made you believe cultivation starts with numbers," he said. "They were wrong."
He looked at the fragments on the ground.
"It starts here."
He tapped his chest once.
"And no one owns this."