A scream pierced the forest.
Yuan Shen opened his eyes.
He stood at the edge of a ridge, rain falling softly on his shoulders. His mind had wandered—memories, fragments of scripture, and the sound of wind across stone. The scream came again, higher this time, laced with panic.
He stepped through the trees.
Below, on a muddy road, a caravan lay in ruin. Wagons were overturned and crates burst open. A pair of horses bucked in their harnesses, bleeding and terrified. Six men surrounded a young woman in soaked silk robes. She clutched a talisman and her face was pale. Blood ran from her cheek down her neck.
One of the men kicked the talisman away and sneered.
"Expensive talisman for a merchant brat," he said, eyeing her torn sleeves. "Where'd you steal it from?"
Another laughed. "It's not from any sect. It has no brand and no seal. Probably some abandoned daughter trying to act important."
"She's got decent spiritual bones," a third muttered. "If she keeps struggling, I'll sell her for parts. Otherwise, she'll fetch a good price whole."
The woman backed up against a wagon wheel. "My father is a sect elder. If you hurt me—"
A slap cut her off, sending her sprawling in the mud.
"If your father cared, you wouldn't be here."said the man who hit her,
Yuan Shen watched in silence. He could help, but he didn't. He coudln't care less.
Then he closed his eyes and expanded his divine sense.
The continent below him was small. Fifty thousand kilometers wide, scattered with forests, mountains, and modest cities. Three kingdoms, a dozen minor sects, and countless wandering cultivators. The strongest person here cultivated quietly beneath a waterfall—mid Heaven Immortal, with a diluted Dao aura and weathered soul. He was old, slow, and irrelevant. It seemed that he was hiding from someone.
Most of the continent's so-called clans were led by Foundation Establishment cultivators. Golden Cores held regional power. Nascent Souls were considered elite.
Weak, but not worthless.
Yuan Shen rose into the sky. The clouds curled around him, parting where his presence passed. His robe fluttered in the wind. Below, the road and caravan became no more than dots.
He raised his right hand.
Scarlet light gathered at his palm, spreading out into an intricate pattern. Runes shaped by his bloodline flared around him. This was a technique unique to the Yuan Shen Clan—refined across generations, known only to his people.
The sky deepened to crimson.
A red palm materialized in the clouds above. Its edges stretched wider than mountain ranges. Pressure rolled down, cracking the sky. Space groaned under the weight of the technique.
Far below, the attackers froze. One of them pointed upward. "What is that?"
They had no time to flee.
The palm fell.
Entire cities vanished before they could respond. Barrier formations detonated. The land split. Trees ignited. Cultivators screamed and died. Their bodies tore apart, their souls scattered before they even understood they had been attacked.
The elder beneath the waterfall rose, his aura flaring. He formed layers of shields, activated old talismans, and summoned an ancestral weapon.
The palm did not slow.
He dissolved before it touched him.
In the Immortal World, Heaven Immortals were laborers, border guards, and functionaries. They cultivated for millions of years just to become tools. Yuan Shen's Nirvana Realm had been forged at the peak of that world. Every layer of his body, soul, and spirit had been tempered with superior methods. This was not merely a realm gap—it was a difference in quality. Cultivation formed through flawed scriptures and diluted bloodlines could not rival the foundation of a true Immortal Clan.
When the technique faded, the continent was gone.
The land had been reduced to molten stone and drifting ash. Oceans boiled, storms scattered. The crater left behind stretched beyond the horizon.
Yuan Shen floated above it.
The technique had left traces. Glyphs. Aura strands. His bloodline could be identified if someone with the right knowledge searched carefully enough. That was a mistake. He wouldn't use it again unless necessary. He couldn't afford to draw attention from above—not yet.
He turned his awareness inward.
The True Scripture of Dao Harvesting activated. Its Mortal Chapter found nothing left to consume. The cultivators had died too quickly, their Qi shattered on impact. He moved deeper, into the Immortal Chapter.
Soul fragments still lingered.
A Nascent Soul elder had sealed herself in a cave beneath a ruined sect. Her mind was a tangle of fear and hope. He pulled her soul into his sea of consciousness and devoured it.
A Golden Core youth had survived in a formation pocket, clutching his younger sister's corpse. Yuan Shen absorbed his last thoughts and moved on.
He gathered hundreds of such fragments. Emotions. Memories. Cultivation paths. Secret arts. Most were weak, but a few held value—an advanced movement technique that twisted wind, a talisman refinement method, a unique poison formula. He took them all.
His soul pulsed. His Nirvana core expanded, refined by the devoured insights.
He stepped forward in realm.
Perfected Nirvana.
A group of survivors flew over the crater edge. Two Nascent Souls and a small group of mortals. They looked down in horror.
"What happened here?" one of them whispered.
"The whole province… it's gone…"
"Was it a calamity? Did some divine beast fall from the sky?"
Yuan Shen appeared behind them.
Their faces turned pale, as they were about to scream.
He raised one hand.
Their souls were torn from their bodies and drawn into his core.
Millions of kilometres away, in a cloud palace hovering above a divine lake, a True Immortal who was fishing turned toward the west. He narrowed his eyes, sensing a faint fluctuation.
"Did something happen?"
An elder at his side activated a mirror talisman. "The west… shows energy residue. A red force. Faint, but strange."
"Send a lesser cultivator to investigate," the True Immortal said. "No need to move ourselves."
Back above the crater, Yuan Shen landed on a stretch of blackened stone. The sea had receded, exposing bones and shattered weapons. He picked through the remains without interest.
He had gained nothing valuable from the people themselves.
But their deaths had reminded him of something important.
He had used a technique tied to his bloodline. That could not happen again.
He would have to join a sect.
Blending in was tedious, but necessary. It would give him access to cultivation resources, identity papers, and perhaps useful disciples to harvest later. Sect techniques in lower realms were often crude, but some might serve as foundations.
The True Scripture calmed.
Its second chapter had been fed. The souls it consumed now echoed within his mind—screams, memories, broken regrets. He silenced them one by one.
Far away, the sun began to rise again. Smoke drifted across the sky, but it would clear. Rain would fall again. Forests would regrow. Mortals would resettle the land. None of that mattered.
There was no need to reflect on what he had done.
It was their fault for being weak.
He turned away from the sea and began flying north.