"You will never rise again, Ji Tian."
"Your era ends here."
"The heavens themselves reject you!"
Flashes of memory crashed like thunder in the void. A thousand voices, once silent, now screamed in betrayal.
Ji Tian—The Tyrant of the Nine Skies.
He had stood atop creation, his blade splitting comets, his name sung in fear and reverence alike. Ten thousand sects bowed to him, even immortals whispered his name with caution.
And yet…
> "Brother… you taught me everything."
"You were like a father to me."
"Then why…?"
The faces of the betrayers blurred in the dark. Those he had once protected—laughed with—bled for… had turned on him in the moment of his ascension.
A divine spear through his back.
A poisoned palm through his heart.
An array carved into his soul, tearing it apart before he could resist.
Ji Tian died, not in battle, but at the hands of those closest to him.
But death was not the end.
---
🔥 Present Day — Dustfall Continent, Outer Region
Jiang Clan, Mistshade Province
The world was quiet.
Then—gasp.
The broken body of a sixteen-year-old boy convulsed violently on a dirt floor. His eyes flew open, and air ripped into lungs long thought useless.
"Cough! Cough…!"
Blood spilled from the corner of his lips, thick and black. Pain lanced through every muscle. But it wasn't his pain—at least, not Ji Tian's.
This body… this place…
He looked down at trembling fingers, soft and pale. No calluses. No scars from a hundred battles. No celestial tattoos of the Tyrant's path. Just weakness.
A sudden flood of foreign memories pierced his mind.
> Jiang Chen.
Born weak. Spirit Veins shattered by birth.
Laughed at. Beaten. Rejected by his clan.
Recently crippled further by a rival—thrown into the Beast Pit to die.
A tragic, nameless youth…
Now… his vessel.
Ji Tian's soul pulsed within. Reincarnated. Caged in a shattered shell.
But his rage… oh, that remained untouched.
---
"Jiang Chen?"
A mocking voice echoed down the hallway of the decrepit servant quarters.
Two boys stood in the doorway, clothed in basic disciple robes, sneering.
"He's alive?" one of them whispered. "Impossible. The spirit wolves should've torn him apart."
"Maybe the beasts took pity on trash," the other laughed.
Jiang Chen—no—Ji Tian—looked up slowly.
His gaze wasn't weak.
It wasn't afraid.
It wasn't mortal.
It was the gaze of a man who had once conquered heavens.
And in it, the two disciples saw something they did not understand.
Terror.
"Get out," he said, voice like cracking stone.
The disciples scoffed… but stepped back unconsciously.
One spat, "Enjoy being trash, worm. You won't live long."
They disappeared into the shadows.
Ji Tian coughed again, blood dripping onto the dirt.
> "So… this is the game the heavens wish to play?"
"Then let the pieces move."
"The Tyrant shall rise again… and this time, there will be no mercy."
---
⚡ That Night
By candlelight, Ji Tian sat in meditation. His broken spirit veins refused to flow Qi. Every attempt sent shocks of pain through his body.
But he wasn't trying to gather new energy.
He reached within—into the shards of his once-immortal soul. The Tyrant's Soul was wounded, but it held secrets the current era had long forgotten.
> "I still have it…"
A fragment of the Void Heaven Scripture. A forbidden art lost to time, etched into his soul when he became one with the Void Realm eons ago.
But it came with a cost. Practicing it required a soul furnace—burning part of one's own soul to bypass spirit veins entirely.
> "Rebuild… from nothing."
"My spirit, my body, my power…"
> "BURN."
He bit his tongue and chanted ancient syllables, so old the air itself twisted in resistance.
The candle flickered. The ground trembled.
A pale violet flame burst to life around him—cold and divine.
Inside his core, pain erupted like wildfire.
He screamed—silently. Not aloud, but through every atom of his being. His bones cracked, reformed. His meridians twisted, realigned. His dantian pulsed, shivering in pain—and then:
BOOM!
A surge of black-gold energy erupted from his chest, blowing out the walls of the hut.
---
🌙 Morning
In the ruins of the training yard, disciples gathered.
"What happened here?"
"Was it… an attack?"
"No, look—there's someone in the crater!"
As dust cleared, Jiang Chen stood alone, shirtless, hair flowing in the wind, eyes glowing faint violet. His aura was unstable—but terrifying.
One elder stepped forward, frowning.
"You… you were crippled. This should be impossible."
Jiang Chen tilted his head.
"Do you know what's more impossible, Elder?"
The man blinked.
Jiang Chen smiled coldly.
> "Living… after betraying me."