Capital City, Longsheng

  After a grueling two-month journey, Zhang Qiang and Li Yuxue finally arrived in the capital. The trip had been far from easy, fraught with dangers along the way, but the three Bone Forging experts accompanying them had successfully repelled most threats.

  The two sat across from an elderly man, Li Shao, Li Yuxue’s uncle. Having long retired from the Silver Crane Martial Hall, he had chosen to remain in the capital as a liaison for the school. He let out a heavy sigh and said, “It’s good that you’re safe, Yuxue’er. Now, you must focus on your training. Reaching Middle Stage Skin Refining is impressive, but it will not be enough. With the immortal recruitment less than two years away, you need to strive harder and grow stronger.”

  Li Yuxue nodded respectfully. “Yes, uncle.”

  Zhang Qiang leaned forward, eyes sharp. “Elder Li, is it true that Elder Zhou Henge survived?”

  Li Shao nodded. “Yes. He is in the capital right now, under the protection of the Second Prince.”

  Zhang’s eyes widened in disbelief. “The Second Prince?!”

  Li Shao continued calmly, “Elder Henge has always served the Second Prince. He was in Lian City to monitor the movements of the city lord. The Silver Crane Martial Hall’s destruction was an undeserved calamity—a massive misunderstanding.”

  Zhang’s brow furrowed. “How could that be?”

  Li Shao sighed deeply. “The Second Prince and the city lord were both racing to uncover a rumored immortal legacy in Lian County. Each side suspected the Silver Crane Martial Hall of scheming. That’s the whole story.”

  Li Yuxue’s voice trembled with emotion. “What about those who were killed… what about my father?!”

  Li Shao shook his head slowly. “It is useless to dwell on such things when you are weak. In a world ruled by strength, no one cares about your innocence. Mere suspicion is enough to seal someone’s fate. If you truly want revenge, you must first be chosen by the immortals. That is why your training must be your main focus. The stronger your body, the greater your chances of survival when you are selected.”

  Li Yuxue’s brow furrowed. “How do the immortals choose?”

  Li Shao’s eyes softened. “It depends on fate. Those with spiritual roots can embark on the path of immortal cultivation.”

  Li Yuxue’s confusion lingered. “Then why is training so important if it depends on luck?”

  Li Shao’s expression turned grave. “The immortal world is infinitely more dangerous than our mortal one. At the very least, with strong foundations, you can defend yourself against some threats and avoid being completely vulnerable. All who are chosen are exceptional talents. Conspiracies, rivalries, and jealousy among them are constant—only the strong survive.”

  Li Shao let out a quiet sigh and continued, his tone firm yet restrained. “Then again, all of this is nothing more than speculation for people like us. The will of the immortals is unfathomable. What we can do is only one thing: strive, work hard, and be prepared. Fate may open the door, but only those with strength are qualified to step through it.”

  Jian City

  Commander Qi sat behind a heavy desk, methodically reviewing the stacks of profiles his subordinates had compiled. Each document represented a suspect, a shadow that might conceal the boy he was hunting. Standing a few steps away was a young man with a stiff, fearful posture. If Chen Mo were present, he would have recognized him at once. Jia Tao.

  Surviving the dungeon had been a blessing wrapped in thorns. Jia Tao was among the few who lived through the annihilation of the Silver Crane Martial Hall, but his family had not been so fortunate. That loss had hollowed him out, leaving behind resentment sharp enough to cut steel.

  Commander Qi raised his gaze. “You were closest to that boy. I will show you several portraits. Look carefully. Do not disappoint me.”

  “Yes… yes, my lord,” Jia Tao replied hastily. In truth, he wanted to help. In his heart, Chen Mo was the root of everything that had gone wrong, the spark that burned his family to ashes.

  One by one, Jia Tao examined the portraits. Faces passed before his eyes. Some too old, some too refined, some simply wrong. Time stretched. Then his hand paused.

  He stared at one portrait longer than the rest, hesitation flickering across his face. His brows knit together as he leaned closer. “My lord… this one is the most likely,” he said slowly. “But I cannot be completely certain.”

  Commander Qi took the portrait from the table beneath it. “Jiang Mo,” he read aloud. “Muscle Refining realm. Recently registered with the Mercenary Hall two months ago. Origin unknown. No completed tasks. However…” His eyes narrowed. “He purchased information about caravans heading to the capital, and about the so-called immortal event.”

  A sharp glint flashed through Commander Qi’s eyes.

  Muscle Refining already? His thoughts raced. If this truly is him, then his talent is terrifying. Caravans. The capital. The immortal descent. Everything aligned too neatly.

  Either a hidden genius nurtured by some force, Qi thought, or a fugitive trying to flee to the capital and hide beneath the immortals’ shadow.

  And with wanted posters spread across the kingdom, such a choice made perfect sense.

  Commander Qi let out a long sigh and waved his hand dismissively. “You are dismissed.”

  Jia Tao bowed hurriedly and retreated, his steps light yet hurried, as if afraid that lingering even a moment longer might draw unwanted attention.

  Once the door closed, Commander Qi turned slightly and gestured to a guard standing at the side of the hall. His voice was calm, but carried the weight of command.

  “Investigate this person immediately. I want to know whether he has already left Jian City, and if so, whether he departed with any caravan.”

  “Yes, my lord,” the guard replied without hesitation.

  Qi’s fingers tapped lightly against the desk before he continued, eyes cold and focused. “Also, send people to the Imperial Trade Hall. Have them release the information we requested. Pay special attention to any records mentioning this name.”

  He paused, a thin smile forming at the corner of his lips. “That should narrow the search considerably.”

  The guard clasped his fists. “It will be done, my lord.”

  Unaware that danger was quietly closing in, Chen Mo immersed himself in arduous training. He found a small cave by a secluded lake and moved in entirely, cutting himself off from the city. There was no time to waste going back and forth, and the newly posted wanted notices had truly startled him. Now that the government itself was hunting him, caution was no longer optional.

  The Hua Empire was no paper tiger. Its power was at its peak, its grip over the land ironclad. Eyes and ears were scattered everywhere, from bustling cities to remote towns. Even those labeled as “rebels” struggled to survive, forced to hide deep in the mountains, where survival meant contending not only with pursuit but with deadly beasts and unforgiving terrain.

  Compared to that, Chen Mo knew his situation was even more precarious. One misstep, one trace left behind, and the empire’s machinery would grind him into dust. And so, in that quiet cave by the lake, he trained relentlessly, racing against time while the noose slowly tightened around him.

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  Another two and a half months slipped by in silence.

  Chen Mo consumed seventeen of the eighteen pills he had stockpiled, squeezing every drop of value from them. The pain never truly left him. Day after day, his muscles were torn apart and reforged, his body pushed to the brink and dragged back again. By the end of it, he had finally stepped into the late stage of Muscle Refining.

  And today, something was different.

  As he sat cross-legged in the cave by the lake, breath slow and deep, a strange pull seized his awareness. The familiar sensation returned, as if his consciousness were being gently but irresistibly drawn away from the physical world. His surroundings blurred, the aches in his body fading into distant noise.

  Once more, he entered that familiar space.

  But this time, it was not for incremental progress.

  This time, it was the threshold of a major breakthrough.

  Inside that boundless space, Chen Mo saw himself training through countless years, cycles of motion repeating until time itself lost meaning. Strike, temper, break, rebuild. Again and again. Then, without warning, everything converged.

  At the peak of Muscle Refining, Chen Mo’s body reached a terrifying harmony. Skin like tempered iron bore muscles coiled tighter than siege cables. Each breath felt heavy and dense, as though his very weight had increased. Every casual movement carried dreadful power; a single strike already held the force of thirty tons. And yet, beneath that overwhelming strength, something remained… hollow.

  The bones.

  When the breakthrough arrived, it did not begin with pain.

  It began with silence.

  The qi he had refined for years no longer rushed through his flesh like a raging river. It slowed, thickened, and sank inward. A profound chill spread from his spine, followed by an all-encompassing pressure, as if an unseen hand were crushing his skeleton from every direction.

  Then the pain came.

  It was not the burning agony of muscle tearing, nor the sharp torment of skin splitting. It was deep, resonant, and absolute. His bones vibrated. The sound could not be heard, only felt, a low hum reverberating through marrow and spine, echoing in his very existence.

  Qi seeped into the bones themselves.

  It flowed into microscopic fissures, forced impurities out like dust shaken from ancient stone, and condensed without mercy. Chen Mo clenched his teeth as his skeleton was reforged, every bone undergoing brutal refinement.

  They grew heavier. Denser.

  The marrow ignited, glowing faintly as qi and blood fused into something new and profound. Where power once traveled through muscle only to dissipate, it now anchored itself deep within his frame, rebounding and returning in perfect cycles.

  His body no longer felt like flesh wrapped around bones.

  It felt like a living weapon.

  Bones became the core, unyielding and absolute. Flesh was reduced to a sheath, skin merely a vessel. With every breath, strength no longer leaked outward. It accumulated, settled, and waited.

  At that moment, Chen Mo crossed the threshold.

  Bone Forging.

  As Chen Mo opened his eyes, he rose slowly.

  The ground beneath his feet could not bear the change.

  A single, casual step sent cracks racing outward, stone splitting in a spiderweb pattern. He drew back his fist and struck the air.

  Boom.

  The punch never touched anything, yet the shockwave detonated forward, flattening grass and snapping trees in half as if an invisible wall had swept through the clearing. Where muscle once granted him power, bone now gave him authority over that power.

  His strikes no longer scattered force.

  They condensed it.

  Strength surged again, not in wild leaps, but in something far more terrifying: stability. Forty tons. Fifty. Even more when fully exerted. His frame did not tremble. There was no backlash, no tearing strain. Recoil vanished entirely, absorbed and recycled through forged bone and burning marrow, returning to him whole and ready.

  It was not brute strength anymore.

  It was efficiency.

  His breathing slowed, each inhale deep and controlled. The lingering pain dissolved like mist under sunlight, leaving behind only a dense, grounded presence. Chen Mo stood there, unmoving, yet the world around him felt suddenly fragile.

  Bone Forging had changed everything.

  He was no longer merely strong.

  He was solid.

  “So this is power…” Chen Mo murmured.

  The words left his lips softly, yet his heart tightened instead of swelling with arrogance. Unbidden, his thoughts returned to that night, to the shadow that had chased him through the dark. A Bone Forging expert. At the time, the pressure had been suffocating, each breath borrowed, each step stolen from death itself.

  Only now did he truly understand how terrifying that man had been.

  Chen Mo exhaled slowly and restrained his aura, the newly forged might sinking inward like a beast returning to its cage. The oppressive presence vanished, leaving him looking no different from an ordinary youth. With a thought, the familiar panel unfolded before his eyes.

  Name: Chen Mo

  Age: 15

  Realm: Bone Forging (Initial) 1 / 900

  Cultivation Art:

  Primordial Body Art (Incomplete)

  Skills:

  Archery (Perfect)

  Threaded Movement (Perfect)

  His gaze lingered on the last line.

  Perfected Threaded Movement… paired with Bone Forging strength.

  A faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. This time, it was not reckless confidence, but something colder and steadier. If he were hunted again, he would no longer be a cornered prey scrambling for survival.

  Now, he had the means to choose when to fight… and when to disappear.

  For the first time since becoming a wanted man of the empire, Chen Mo felt truly reassured.

  Chen Mo’s brows slowly knit together.

  “But what if an Organ Refinement expert is hunting me…”

  The thought refused to fade. His last escape had carved a lesson into his bones deeper than any cultivation art ever could. Never assume the enemy’s ceiling. Always expect the worst.

  Bone Forging was strong, undeniably so, yet he knew its limits now. Against Organ Refinement, speed alone would no longer guarantee escape. Against Innate…

  Chen Mo let out a quiet breath and shook his head.

  “Innate…” he muttered inwardly.

  That was unlikely. No matter how valuable a bounty was, no dignified Innate master would personally hunt down a single fugitive youth. Such figures guarded sects, commanded armies, or secluded themselves to comprehend heaven and earth. For someone like him, dispatching subordinates would already be excessive.

  Unlikely… but not impossible.

  And that sliver of possibility was enough to keep his heart vigilant.

  He clenched his fist, feeling the dense, unyielding strength in his bones respond instantly, obedient and stable. He was powerful now, far stronger than before. Yet power did not mean the journey was over. It only meant he had survived long enough to continue walking it.

  Sixty thousand taels.

  The number surfaced in his mind like a quiet flame. A fortune large enough to drown an ordinary family in wealth for generations. For him, it was time. Time bought with pills, techniques, recovery medicines, information, and opportunities.

  Chen Mo’s eyes sharpened.

  He would spend it carefully. Ruthlessly. Every tael turned into strength, survival, and leverage. Until the day came when even Organ Refinement would think twice before reaching for him.

  The road ahead was still long.

  But now, he was no longer walking it empty-handed.