As the days passed, Ming drew closer and closer to his village.
At this pace, he would arrive within a single day.
Along the way, Jinhai continued to help—without asking, without speaking.
Every morning and every night, he prepared simple meals and placed them quietly near the fire.
At first, he tried to hide.
Later… he stopped.
He simply walked behind them.
Not beside.
Not ahead.
Always a few steps back.
Wrath noticed it immediately.
Her patience thinned with every passing hour.
Finally, she turned, eyes blazing.
"Why are you still following us?"
Jinhai didn't answer.
He only lowered his head slightly and continued walking.
Wrath's hand clenched. Frost gathered faintly around her fingers.
She wanted to drive him away—
no, she wanted to freeze him where he stood.
But she didn't move.
Ming hadn't said a word.
And that silence… was permission.
With a sharp click of her tongue, Wrath turned away, seething.
As they walked deeper into the forested paths, Ming slowed.
His gaze drifted across the land.
These woods…
these trails…
he knew them all.
Long before cultivation.
Before blood and death.
Back when he was only a woodcutter's son.
Memories surfaced uninvited.
He remembered following behind his father, carrying an axe too heavy for his arms.
He remembered the smell of fresh-cut wood, the sting of blisters on his palms.
Life had been difficult.
The meals were small.
The winters were harsh.
But… it had been peaceful.
Happy.
He remembered his father's rough hand patting his head.
The sound of laughter echoing through the trees.
Ming stopped.
For just a moment.
Wrath noticed and slowed as well, glancing at him in confusion.
Ming said nothing.
But his eyes… were no longer cold.
Behind them, Jinhai watched quietly.
He didn't interrupt.
Didn't speak.
For the first time, he understood.
This wasn't just a journey forward.
It was a return.
Ming continued walking.
The forest slowly began to thin.
The dense canopy above broke apart, allowing light to spill through in widening gaps.
Sunlight crept across the ground, brighter with every step.
Then—
the trees ended.
The open land stretched out before them.
A village.
Ming didn't hesitate.
He followed the familiar dirt path without slowing, his steps steady, unchanging. People began to notice him—this tall, unfamiliar man walking with quiet authority. Whispers followed in his wake.
"Who is that…?"
"I've never seen him before."
"Is he a martial artist?"
Ming ignored them all.
He walked straight through the village.
Past the houses.
Past the well.
Past faces filled with curiosity.
Then—he stopped.
Just before the village ended.
His gaze locked onto a place that no longer belonged to the living.
A ruined hut.
Blackened wooden beams lay collapsed. The ground was scorched. Ash and debris marked where walls once stood.
Burned.
Destroyed.
That place… had been his home.
Before the Emperor came.
Before his family was slaughtered.
Before he was hunted like a dog.
Everything he had once been… had started there.
Wrath felt it instantly.
The air around Ming changed.
It grew heavy—
tight—
as if something enormous was being forced back down.
His breathing slowed.
Too slow.
Wrath glanced at him, unease flickering across her face. She had never seen him like this—not even in battle.
A villager passing nearby noticed them standing still. He followed Ming's gaze, then sighed softly.
Stepping closer, the man asked cautiously,
"Gentleman… why are you looking at that place?"
Wrath didn't answer.
She only looked at Ming.
Ming slowly turned his head.
His eyes were calm.
Too calm.
"Do you know," Ming asked quietly,
"who burned it down?"
The man blinked and studied Ming's face.
He didn't recognize him.
How could he?
Ming's body had changed completely through cultivation—his presence, his frame, even his eyes were different. The boy who once carried firewood through the village no longer existed.
No one who knew that Ming… could recognize this one.
He stood at the edge of the clearing, silent and still, his shadow stretching toward the ruins before him. What once had been a home was now nothing more than a blackened skeleton—collapsed beams, scorched earth, and the faint stench of old ash clinging stubbornly to the air.
A man from the village stood nearby, pointing casually at the wreckage as if it were no more than an abandoned shed.
"A year ago," the man said with a shake of his head, "a family of woodcutters lived here."
Ming's fingers twitched.
"They were poor," the man continued, voice thick with false certainty, "but the son was greedy. He tried to steal money from a physician. Not only that—he even dared to raise a blade against the Emperor himself."
Each word fell like a hammer.
"The Emperor had no choice but to execute them," the villager said solemnly. "And this house? We burned it ourselves. To cleanse the place. To make sure their bad karma didn't affect the rest of us."
The man spat to the side, as if ridding himself of filth.
"People like that deserve no grave."
As the final words left his mouth, something inside Ming cracked.
His teeth ground together so hard it hurt. His hands clenched into fists, nails biting into his palms until blood welled. His chest rose and fell in sharp, restrained breaths as he fought—desperately—to keep himself in control.
Lies.
Every word was a lie.
Yet they spoke it so easily. So calmly. As if repeating a well-practiced truth.
Ming's vision trembled. The ruins blurred, replaced by memories—his sister's laughter, his father's quiet presence, his mother's weak but gentle smile. Then blood. Screams. Silence.
His heartbeat thundered in his ears.
Control it.
Control yourself.
He forced his body to remain still, even as rage surged like a flood tearing through a broken dam. His meridians screamed. His dantian churned violently, Qi boiling and compressing as if it could no longer be contained.
The ground beneath his feet began to tremble.
A low, primal sound tore from Ming's chest—a roar born not of the throat, but of the soul itself.
His Qi exploded outward.
Invisible pressure slammed into the air, whipping dust and ash into a violent spiral. Cracked stones shattered. The remaining beams of the hut groaned and collapsed completely, crushed by the force of his unleashed fury.
The villager staggered back, face drained of color, legs giving way beneath him.
Ming stood at the center of the storm, eyes burning with a cold, murderous light.
This was how the world remembered his family.
This was the truth power had written.
And in that moment, among the ashes of his past, Shen Ming swore silently—
One day, every lie would burn.
Every voice that twisted his family's fate would be crushed beneath the weight of the truth.
"…among the ashes of his past, Shen Ming—once just Ming—swore silently…"