The knife hovered midair—quivering, unnatural.
Arin stood frozen, chest heaving. The pendant pulsed faintly against his neck, then surged with heat. A metallic ring cracked the silence as the blade clattered to the wooden floor.
Across the room, Kael cradled the shaken girl protectively.
Not a scratch on her.
Arin stared at his own hands, shaking. He hadn't meant to hurt her. Had he? His thoughts swirled in chaos—rage, blinding and suffocating. The knife hadn't moved on its own.
It had responded.
Kael's eyes—usually carved from ice—flickered with something close to fear. His voice, though, remained cold. "You've inherited more than blood."
He turned without another word, boots striking sharp against the wood. The girl glanced back once—uncertain, wary.
Arin was left alone. With silence.
And shame.
Three Days Later
Lady Lian Aria's grave lay beneath an old willow, far from the Shen family shrine where honored ancestors slept beneath polished stones.
No rites. No mourning banners. Just Rika, the maid who'd once brushed Arin's hair before bed, standing beside him with a single white lotus in her hand.
"She knew something," Rika whispered. "That's why they silenced her."
Arin didn't answer. But his fingers tightened around the pendant beneath his robe. It was warm. Almost… breathing.
That Night
The estate dimmed. Lanterns flickered out one by one. Arin slipped into his mother's study—the one Kael had ordered sealed.
He expected guards. There were none.
He expected resistance. But the lock clicked open the moment his pendant brushed the door.
Dust clung to every surface. The scent of dried ink, smoke, and something faintly metallic hung in the air. Scrolls lay unraveled, some sliced through by heat or claw. A journal, half-burned, rested beside blueprints drawn in layers of ink and blood.
On the far wall—etched into stone—were symbols: metallic beasts, fractured stars, and humanoid figures infused with unnatural light.
At the edge of a scorched diagram: a single phrase in red ink—
"The Chain Is Not Broken—Only Sleeping."
He placed his palm on a rune.
A jolt ripped through him—images, voices, sensations.
A shattered city. Lightning towers bleeding energy into the sky. Warriors clad in ironbone armor. Titans howling across the void.
"When Terros fell, cultivation was reborn."
His mother's voice. Faint. Remembered.
From Her Notes:
Soulforging – Merge your will with alloy. Strength is your discipline.
Beastpulse – Tame mutation. Command blood. Let instinct guide.
Technomeld – Synchronize mind and machine. Memory is your weapon.
And then, in rushed, half-mad handwriting:
The legacy hidden in Arin is neither of blood nor clan.
It is older.
It is choosing.
He stumbled back, overwhelmed.
What had she been protecting him from?
The Next Morning
Kael's voice was unreadable when he summoned Arin to the courtyard.
"You leave for Crimson Halo tomorrow," he said. "You will be a cultivator. Like your mother once was."
Arin's breath caught. "You said I wasn't worthy of the Shen name."
"I didn't say you were worthless," Kael replied. "Only that names are a currency. You haven't earned one."
He handed Arin a sealed letter and turned.
"You'll be known there simply as Arin. No surname. No shield."
From the balcony above, his step-siblings watched, smirking.
Arin didn't flinch.
But as he walked away, something twisted inside. A war between resentment and resolve. You haven't earned one.
"Names don't shape the soul," his mother had once whispered in the dark. "You do."
That night, he stood beneath the willow tree, staring up at the night sky of Terros—scarred with orbital wreckage from the Old War, glittering like fractured glass.
"I'll find out why you died," he whispered. "And I'll make them see me. Not as a mistake. But as something they fear."
The pendant warmed against his chest.
Ashes cooled.
Embers stirred.