Chapter 17: A Seven-Year-Old’s Shadow

  The words "Written in blood" hung in the air, heavy and metallic, silencing the murmurs of the Golden Hall.

  King Cheng’an gripped the arms of his throne, his knuckles bleaching white. He wanted to scream. He wanted to order the guards to snatch the bow from his son’s hands and drag him back to the safety of the inner palace. But his voice died in his throat.

  There was something in Xuanming’s posture—a rigid, ancient stillness—that forbade interference. It was the same stillness the King had seen on Mount Penglai twenty years ago, when the Patriarch had sat unmoving while the King’s army surrounded him.

  "You are mad," Minister Zhang whispered, his face gray. "The Prince has gone mad."

  The Western Envoy, however, was delighted. He slapped his thigh, the sound echoing vulgarly in the refined court.

  "A bet is a bet!" the Envoy roared, turning to his retinue of soldiers. "Did you hear that? The little lamb wants to play wolf! If he fails, I take his head. If he wins, he takes mine!"

  The barbarian soldiers erupted in laughter, a chorus of barks and jeers. They looked at the small boy standing amidst the vast emptiness of the hall, dwarfed by the pillars, dwarfed by the drum, and dwarfed by the massive iron bow in his hand.

  It was a ridiculous image. The Black Iron Tire Bow was nearly five feet long. Xuanming was barely four feet tall. The lower limb of the bow scraped against the polished granite floor.

  "Do you need a stool, Your Highness?" the Envoy mocked, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes. "Or perhaps you need your wet nurse to help you pull the string?"

  Xuanming did not answer. He did not even look at the Envoy.

  He was busy.

  Deep within the meridian channels of his small body, a complex hydraulic process was engaging. The Pre-Natal Qi, stored in his lower dantian since birth, began to rotate. It wasn't the chaotic, explosive surge that General Liu Feihu had used. It was a cold, precise spiraling current.

  His young bones were still soft, like green bamboo; they would snap under the crushing weight of the iron bow if he used mere flesh. He had to rely on his Qi, wrapping his skeleton in a sheath of invisible energy to bear the burden that his body could not.

  Xuanming looked down at the floor.

  There, lying in a patch of dust, was the iron arrow that General Liu had fired. It was a heavy, ugly thing, forged from cold iron with a tip shaped like a diamond drill.

  Xuanming crouched down. His purple robes pooled around him.

  "He's giving up," a soldier whispered. "He's kneeling to beg for mercy."

  The Envoy grinned, stepping forward, his hand resting on the hilt of his saber. "Smart boy. Kowtow three times, and I might only take your ear instead of your head."

  Xuanming’s fingers closed around the shaft of the fallen arrow.

  He stood up.

  He inspected the arrow tip. It was blunted slightly from the impact.

  He spotted a minute imperfection—the tip was bent ever so slightly, a flaw invisible to the mortal eye. It would drift in the wind. He would have to compensate by spinning the shaft, forcing it to drill through the air rather than glide.

  He looked at the Envoy. "Stand aside. Unless you wish to die before the arrow hits the drum."

  The Envoy’s smile twitched. The boy’s voice was too calm. It lacked the tremor of fear. It lacked the bravado of a child pretending to be brave. It was the flat, monotone instruction of a butcher telling a cow to hold still.

  "You possess a sharp tongue," the Envoy snarled, his good humor evaporating. "Shoot, then! Let us see this miracle!"

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  The Envoy retreated to the side, crossing his arms over his chest. He stood next to the drum, confident in the twelve inches of spirit bronze that protected his life.

  Xuanming turned his body. He placed his feet shoulder-width apart.

  He didn't stomp the ground like General Liu. He simply settled, his weight sinking into the floor as if his boots had grown roots that pierced deep into the earth.

  He lifted the bow.

  It was heavy. Physically, his seven-year-old muscles strained against the weight of the iron. His arm trembled slightly.

  "He can't even hold it steady!" General Zheng lamented from the sidelines, covering his eyes. "This is a tragedy. The executioner is already sharpening his blade."

  Xuanming ignored the trembling. That was just flesh. Flesh was weak.

  He nocked the heavy iron arrow onto the string.

  Breath in.

  Breath out.

  The air in the Golden Hall seemed to grow colder. The torches flickering on the walls dimmed, as if the oxygen was being sucked toward the center of the room.

  Xuanming closed his eyes for a heartbeat. When he opened them, the pupil-less golden light of the Dark Heaven Sovereign flashed in the depths of his irises.

  He began to draw.

  He didn't use his fingers. He used his mind.

  He visualized the string not as a physical object, but as the concept of potential energy. He visualized his arm not as bone and meat, but as a lever of hydraulic pressure.

  Creaaaak.

  The sound was agonizingly slow.

  The heavy iron limbs of the bow began to bend.

  The Envoy’s eyes widened. He stopped leaning against the pillar. He straightened up, his mouth opening slightly.

  "Impossible," he muttered. "The boy... he has no muscles. How?"

  Xuanming pulled. The string cut into the jade-like skin of his thumb, but no blood flowed. A layer of invisible Qi coated his skin, harder than diamond.

  He drew the bow halfway.

  The trembling in his arm stopped. He was locked in. His posture was perfect—a geometrical masterpiece of tension and balance.

  But it was his shadow that terrified them.

  The afternoon sun was streaming through the high lattice windows of the hall, casting long shadows across the floor. As Xuanming drew the bow to its limit, his shadow stretched out behind him.

  But the shadow did not match the boy.

  The boy was small, delicate, a child in silk robes.

  The shadow on the floor was massive. It was the silhouette of a giant, robes billowing in an ethereal wind, long hair flowing like a river of ink. The shadow held a bow that seemed to span the heavens.

  General Liu Feihu, who was still kneeling on the floor in shame, saw it. He gasped, scrambling backward, his eyes bulging.

  "The Patriarch!" Feihu wheezed. "I see the Patriarch!"

  The pressure in the room spiked. It wasn't physical pressure; it was spiritual weight. The civil officials felt their knees buckle. The air became thick and viscous, hard to breathe.

  The Envoy felt it too. The hair on his arms stood up. The instinct that had kept him alive through a dozen border wars was screaming at him.

  Danger. Predator. Run.

  The Envoy took a half-step back. "You... what sort of trick is this?"

  Xuanming didn't answer. He was no longer in the Golden Hall.

  In his mind, he was back in the Void. He was the Northern Sovereign, standing atop the 33rd Heaven, aiming at a star that had dared to defy the celestial order.

  The bow was fully drawn. The iron arrow tip aligned perfectly with the center of the bronze drum.

  Distance: Twenty paces.

  Wind: Zero.

  Target Density: High.

  Penetration Required: Absolute.

  Xuanming adjusted his grip. He applied a subtle, twisting torque to the string. He wasn't just going to loose the arrow; he was going to spin it.

  He looked at the Envoy.

  "You bet your head," Xuanming whispered, his voice sounding like grinding stones.

  The Envoy panicked. The sheer malice radiating from the child was suffocating. He drew his saber, roaring to break the fear that was freezing his blood.

  "Shoot, you demon brat! Shoot if you dare!"

  Xuanming smiled. It was a small, cold smile that didn't reach his eyes.

  "As you wish."

  He released the string.

  But he didn't just let go. He snapped his fingers forward, imparting a final, violent rotation to the shaft.

  Technique: Piercing The Nine Heavens – Spiral Drill.

  The sound that followed was not a thwong.

  It was a scream.

  The air in front of the bow collapsed, creating a visible vacuum tunnel. The arrow didn't fly; it teleported. It became a streak of black lightning, tearing through the sound barrier within the confines of the throne room.

  The windows of the hall shattered from the sonic boom.

  The civil officials were thrown to the ground. King Cheng’an shielded his face as a shockwave of dust and pressure swept over the dais.

  Time seemed to suspend in that fraction of a second.

  The Envoy saw the black streak coming. He saw his death. He tried to move, to dodge, to raise his saber, but his body was moving through molasses while the arrow moved at the speed of judgment.

  The arrow hit the drum.

  Author's Notes: The Dao of Aura

  1. The "Shadow" Projection:

  In high-level cultivation novels, "Intent" (Yi) is strong enough to warp reality. When a master focuses completely, their "Dao Form" or "True Soul" becomes visible to those with spiritual sensitivity. The shadow appearing as a giant or the Patriarch isn't a ghost; it's the sheer density of Xuanming's spirit distorting the light. It signifies that while his body is seven, his soul is ancient.

  2. The Fear Response:

  Why does the Envoy panic? Cultivators—even low-level martial artists like the Envoy—have a "Sixth Sense" for danger. When Xuanming locked onto him, the Envoy's primitive brain recognized he was standing in front of an apex predator. It’s the feeling of a mouse suddenly realizing the rock it's standing on is actually a sleeping tiger.

  3. The Mechanics of the Draw:

  Xuanming doesn't use muscles. He uses "Bone Stacking" and Qi reinforcement. By aligning his skeletal structure perfectly, the bones take the compressive load, not the muscles. This is how internal martial arts masters (in real-world theory) generate force disproportionate to their muscle mass.