The mountain was quiet.

  The Bloodspawn were ashes.

  The Demon Envoys were dead.

  But Li Fan couldn’t sleep.

  He sat beneath the moonless sky, the Starforged Blade resting across his knees. It pulsed gently—less like a weapon, more like a heartbeat.

  He stared at the horizon.

  And remembered a sky filled with fire.

  The Divine Root had cracked more than just his spiritual seal.

  It had unlocked a memory.

  A battlefield. A shattered realm. And nine immortal kings kneeling before a man cloaked in shadow and stars.

  “You bear the Sin of Ascension,” one had whispered.

  “You climbed where none should tread.”

  The man—Xinghua—had not answered.

  He had simply raised his blade…

  …and cut the sky in half.

  Li Fan found Yue Xian in the courtyard garden, beneath a drifting sea of white blossom petals.

  He bowed. “You knew.”

  She didn’t deny it.

  “Not your name, but the moment you touched the Divine Root… I saw the stars hesitate.”

  She turned, eyes distant. “I once glimpsed you in a vision. Not as you are now—but as you were. Xinghua, Emperor of the Fractured Crown. You stood alone, one arm shattered, still holding the heavens at bay.”

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  Li Fan frowned. “Why did I fall?”

  She shook her head slowly. “Not fallen. Sealed. The gods feared what you knew.”

  And then she whispered:

  “You remembered the truth: that even the Dao has a beginning… and an end.”

  Back in his chambers, Li Fan sat cross-legged before the Starforged Blade.

  Its presence stirred the ocean of his consciousness.

  He reached inward, and for the first time, truly saw the imprint left by his past life—a constellation array, burned deep into his soul.

  It began to rotate.

  Stars aligned.

  And from the memory, a technique emerged.

  [First Form: Heaven’s Divide] A blade art that splits spiritual attacks and severs energy lines, originally used to deflect the divine bolts of tribulation lightning.

  He practiced once.

  And the entire Pavilion shook.

  Far across the continent, nine figures knelt before a throne built from black wings and screaming mouths.

  Atop it sat the Golden Immortal Demon Emperor, his hands folded over a sphere of flickering stars.

  “Xinghua walks again,” he rasped.

  “But he is weak. Unforged. Mortal.”

  He looked to the tallest figure among the nine—cloaked in white, faceless, surrounded by golden mist.

  “You will go, White Phantom. Test him. See if the soul of the Starsever still remembers how to bleed.”

  That night, Li Fan stood atop the Pavilion’s highest cliff.

  The wind carried whispers.

  And the stars above pulsed once—then rearranged themselves.

  A celestial omen.

  Yue Xian joined him, silent.

  “They’re watching,” he said.

  She nodded. “They always have.”

  Li Fan turned to her. “I’m not afraid of the Ninefold Profane Court.”

  “No,” she said quietly. “But you should fear yourself.”

  And as the wind died down, Li Fan clenched his hand.

  “Let them come.”

  “This time… I won’t shatter the sky.”

  “I’ll burn the whole heaven.”