The fire crackled. Crickets chirped in the woods like a band of offbeat drummers. Somewhere in the dark, a fox barked.
Chase sat cross-legged on the cold earth, sweat dripping from his brow despite the cool breeze. His shirt stuck to him, soaked, and his ribs screamed with each breath. His hands trembled—not from fear, but from exertion. His body ached. His pride ached worse.
"You call that a punch?" Mason's voice echoed like a whip crack.
Chase gritted his teeth. "I can't even see the tree, old man."
"Bah! Trees don't move. The fact you still missed tells me your brain is filled with goat dung."
He heard the crunch of Mason's sandals, the swish of the old man's robe, and the sharp poke of a stick jabbing him in the side.
"Ow! What was that for?!"
"To remind you that pain teaches faster than words," Mason said cheerfully. "Now again. Use your ears. Feel the bark. Listen to the wind bounce off its trunk. You are not blind—you are awakening."
Chase muttered under his breath and took position again. He threw a jab, then a kick.
Thud.
His foot connected.
"…Finally," Mason murmured, then louder, "Congratulations, you have officially injured one tree. Shall I summon the forest spirits to hold a banquet in your honor?"
Chase slumped to the ground. "How long are we going to keep doing this?"
"Until your hearing replaces your sight, your instincts override your fear, and your fists stop being made of tofu." Mason plopped down beside him with a sigh. "We've got seven years, kid. You're barely in year one."
Seven years. That number echoed through Chase's skull like a tolling bell.
The next week passed in a blur of torment.
Mason didn't teach. He terrorized.
He had Chase catch falling leaves by sound alone.
He had him cook breakfast without seeing the ingredients—leading to one particularly horrifying rice soup that Mason swore gave him food poisoning for three days.
Chase slept in trees to sharpen his balance, trained under waterfalls for pain resistance, and once, was tasked with outrunning a very angry boar in the middle of the night.
"You released the boar?" Chase shouted after the chaos.
"I told you not to eat all my jerky," Mason replied, grinning behind his beard.
Despite the madness, something changed.
Chase began to sense the world through vibrations in the air, the patterns in echoes. He could tell when birds landed. He knew when Mason was close—his cane always tapped the earth in a three-beat rhythm, the left foot slightly heavier.
He could even "feel" the moonlight on his skin. Not see it, but know it was there. Subtle warmth. Gentle pressure.
And one night, sitting beneath the stars with his staff beside him, he realized his body no longer burned from exhaustion. It was growing stronger. Even without a dantian, something was stirring inside him.
"You've got darkness and lightning in you, boy," Mason said a few days later, while adjusting a kettle over the fire. "Not the most common mix."
"How can I even use that without a dantian?" Chase asked. "They destroyed mine."
Mason stirred the tea. "They destroyed your core, not your will. Big difference."
Silence followed. The old man handed him a cup. Chase smelled pine and herbs.
"So what now?"
"Now I teach you how to feed the darkness."
"That sounds like something a villain would say."
"Good," Mason grinned. "You'll need to become one in someone's story if you want revenge."
Chase went quiet.
Revenge.
The word was fire in his chest. He could still hear the screams. The lies. His cousin's voice—soft, breaking, false. His father's glare. The pain when his core was shattered. The forest ambush. The blinding flash—
No. He wasn't ready for that memory.
He sipped the tea instead.
It was bitter. Like truth.
"Tell me about your family," Mason said one night, casually.
Chase hesitated. "You sure you wanna hear this?"
Mason shrugged. "I'm old. I've got time."
Chase inhaled slowly. "My father… Lim. Patriarch of the Cloud family. Respected. Proud. Always said I was going to be the jewel of the clan."
Mason snorted. "Until you weren't."
"Until Clara lied," Chase muttered. "I overheard it, later. The family was under pressure. If they didn't eliminate the 'genius'... the clan would fall. So they made a choice."
"Cowards always do," Mason said.
Chase's hands clenched. "She looked at me with tears in her eyes. I thought… I thought she was scared. But I think she was sorry."
"Pity makes for poor forgiveness."
Chase said nothing. The silence was heavy.
Mason poked the fire. "You still hate them?"
"…I don't know. I think I want to beat them first. Then I'll decide."
Mason cackled. "Now that's the spirit."
A few months later, Chase stood on a mountaintop with his staff in hand. He no longer stumbled. He no longer fumbled. His ears could count raindrops. His breath moved with the wind. His instincts were sharper than a blade.
And one day, something clicked.
He was meditating when the world lit up in his mind—not with sight, but with presence.
He felt a bird's wings slice the air before it dove. He sensed a deer grazing a hundred feet away. He could count insects crawling beneath the bark of a tree.
He rose slowly.
"I… I can see."
Mason, watching from a rock nearby, raised a brow. "What do you mean?"
"Not with eyes. It's different. It's like I can feel everything around me. Not just hear. Not just guess."
Mason's smile widened. "Spiritual sense."
Chase blinked. "Wait—spiritual what?"
"It's the sense cultivators usually unlock in the sixth or seventh realm. You, however, cheated."
Chase blinked again. "So I'm strong?"
"No. You're lucky." Mason sipped his tea. "Also, you're strong."
Chase beamed.
Then Mason threw a pinecone at his head.
That night, they sat watching the stars. Mason handed Chase a rough wooden carving.
"What's this?"
"A training talisman. From now on, I'll start teaching you the darkness path."
Chase traced it with his fingers. "And after that?"
"You'll learn lightning. Then weapons. Then how to slap the face of every young master who ever looked at you wrong."
Chase chuckled. "Sounds like a plan."
He turned his face to the sky. The wind whispered through the trees.
The spear beside him hummed faintly, as if eager.
And Chase knew—this was only the beginning.