The cave stank.
Burnt stone. Blood. Something sharp in the air, like the edge of a storm.
Wuyan crouched near the mouth of the cave, her tail curled close, ears twitching.
She didn't move.
Her eyes—slitted, golden—watched Yanwei.
He was still breathing. Barely.
His body twitched. Steam rose from his back. His scent was wrong—too hot, too cold, too much like not-alive. But he was alive.
Still.
She had seen him do strange things before. Stay up for days. Bleed and not stop. Sit in silence with eyes too still for too long.
But this—
She flicked her ear.
This was worse.
The air around him shivered. The stone floor was warm under her paws, and not from the sun. Something inside him was burning. Something inside him was freezing. Both at once. She didn't understand it.
Didn't need to.
She was a cat.
So she waited.
She did not meow. She did not whine.
She simply crouched.
Still.
Watching.
Because in the days she had followed him — through trees, through rain, through silence — something had changed.
He had not told her to go.
He had not kicked her away.
He had not called her by name, but once, he had let her curl beside him when the wind was too cold. Once, he had shared a piece of dried meat — without looking at her, without saying a word. Just tossed it toward her and turned away.
That was enough.
Now, his breath hitched. His fingers dug into stone. The stink of pain rose from his skin like heat from fresh kill.
She took one step forward.
Then another.
She stopped beside him. Close, but not touching.
The heat rolled off him in waves.
Her whiskers twitched.
She sat.
And stared.
Nothing else.
Because there was nothing else she could do.
She was not a healer.
She was not a savior.
She was a cat.
But she was his cat.
And if something came into this cave—while he was like this, broken and open and bleeding—she would tear at it with tooth and claw.
Because he was not allowed to die yet.
Not while she was still watching.
Time passed.
Maybe an hour.
Maybe more.
The cave was still now. No more heat rippling the air. No more sounds of bones straining or breath clawing out of a crushed chest.
The stones were gone—nothing left but dust and thin cracks scorched into the rock around Yanwei's body.
He lay there, motionless.
Not unconscious.
But close.
His fingers twitched weakly, curling and uncurling against the cold floor. His skin was drenched in sweat. His breathing, though even, sounded shallow. Every inhale was dragged from deep inside, like his lungs were sore from the effort of living.
His body had survived.
But that was all.
It felt hollow inside. Burnt out. Like something had scraped him clean from within and only barely stitched the walls back together.
His arms didn't want to move. Neither did his legs. Even turning his head felt like asking a mountain to shift.
And his mind—
Even his mind, forged and tempered through years of silent struggle, felt blurred. Blunted.
He hadn't passed out.
He hadn't screamed.
But he had come close.
He opened his eyes.
The ceiling stared back at him. Black stone. Cracked, like his bones. Unmoving.
Then—
Warmth.
Faint. Fleeting.
Something soft pressed against his side.
He didn't flinch.
Didn't have the strength.
His gaze slid down slightly. Just enough.
A small black shape.
Wuyan.
She had curled against him.
Not on top of him. Not purring or mewling like some pet. Just… beside him. Close enough to share warmth. Close enough to guard.
Her eyes were closed. But her ears still twitched every so often.
Still listening.
Still alert.
A part of him wanted to say something. But his throat was dry, his tongue thick, and what words were there?
Thank you?
No. That didn't fit.
She was a cat. And he was… him.
So he said nothing.
Just breathed.
In.
Out.
In.
Out.
And let the silence stretch.
His breath was steady now.
Shallow, but steady.
The storm within had passed. His body felt like scorched earth—torn, raw, reshaped. Even his thoughts moved sluggishly, like walking through mud. But beneath all that…
There was satisfaction.
Quiet. Faint.
But real.
He had done it.
Rank 2.
It sounded small. Insignificant. In the eyes of most cultivators, it was barely a beginning—just one step up from being powerless. Geniuses broke past it before they could even name every element.
But for Yanwei, it had been one of the greatest hurdles of his entire path.
And it wasn't because Rank 2 was high.
It was because Rank 1 was so low.
At Rank 1, a cultivator was still fragile. Their body wasn't tempered. Their blood hadn't adapted. Their internal structure—meridians, bones, organs—was still mortal.
Breakthroughs weren't just about absorbing energy. They were about transformation. Pressure. Change. Pain.
At higher ranks—Rank 3, 4, 5—those changes were more violent, yes. But the cultivator was stronger, too. Their body could handle more. Their inner world had defenses. Even if the breakthrough was dangerous, their foundation was solid.
But not at Rank 1.
There was no foundation. No shield. No buffer.
You were vulnerable.
And when you tried to force power into something that wasn't ready to carry it… it broke.
That's what made this step so cruel.
So many underestimated it.
So many assumed the early stages were easy.
But they weren't. Not if you were alone. Not if you had no guidance. Not if you were devouring raw elemental stones instead of gently refining them over months.
Not if you were Yanwei.
This wasn't the hardest thing he would ever face.
But it was one of the few things that nearly crushed him before he could even stand.
And he had survived it.
He didn't smile. Didn't clench his fist or shout triumph into the shadows.
He just breathed.
Because survival was enough.
For now.
His body still ached.
His muscles screamed with every twitch, and his bones pulsed like cracked stone still cooling from the forge. But he sat up — slowly, steadily — and crossed his legs again.
His breath came ragged at first.
Then, with effort, it steadied.
Inhale. Hold. Exhale.
He began to circulate what little energy remained. Not to gather strength — he had none left — but to stitch his battered body together. Letting the raw fragments settle. Letting his core adjust to its new shape.
Rank 2.
He wasn't strong.
Not by any stretch.
He was far from being a threat to anyone truly powerful. There were still hundreds — thousands — above him. People who could kill him with a glance. Crush him with a word.
But now…
He had something.
A thread of power.
A sliver of protection.
And most importantly—
A path.
He could finally move forward.
Not in the dark. Not blindly clawing for scraps. He had endured one of the harshest steps in cultivation. And though his thoughts were scattered, his head still ringing with the echoes of pain—
That didn't matter.
He had lived too long in chaos to be thrown off by a little mental noise.
His thoughts were messy.
But his will?
Unshaken.
The plan that had long lived in fragments across his memory — whispered to himself under breath, rewritten countless times in the dark — was now within reach.
He didn't need to win yet.
He didn't need to conquer.
He just needed to move.
Wuyan stirred beside him but didn't rise. Her tail flicked once, acknowledging his shift in posture, then went still again.
Yanwei exhaled one last time.
Slow.
Calm.
Focused.
Then, he opened his eyes.
No longer just a survivor.
But a cultivator with direction.