Back to the past.
Back to the moment Kai's consciousness sank inward falling, drifting, descending into himself like a stone slipping through still water.
When the Trial of Awakening released him, he did not simply "wake up."
He opened his eyes into a different world entirely.
The Core World.
A place constructed not from physical matter, but from spirit, essence, and the fragile laws of a cultivator's inner being.
Everyone had a Core World some vibrant, some dull, some empty, some vast and each reflected the nature, potential, and fate of its owner.
Kai's Core World… was strange.
It should have been a sea colored by his element.
It should have been flames, yes crimson, bright, fierce, or golden-red like the typical fire affinity.
But what Kai saw when he looked down…
…was a black sea.
A sea made of black fire.
Flames that moved like ink.
Flames that flowed like oil.
Flames that ate light instead of giving it.
It was completely silent, yet every ripple felt like a whisper.
A whisper from something ancient.
Or broken.
Or both.
Kai stood at its shore, barefoot, the warm black flames licking at his ankles without burning. The sensation was wrong comforting and unsettling at the same time as if something was gently breathing against his skin.
His gaze lifted.
Before him stood the statue, the representation of his stage.
All cultivators had one.
It always resembled the cultivator at their current realm Awakening, and for Kai their was no different…
But there were two statue one that looked like Kai and the other was shattered.
Its head was broken off, lying on the ground.
The statue's neck was cracked, jagged, tilted unnaturally.
The torso was chipped, as if something had struck it a long time ago. But the statue was talking to him
But for the one that looked like Kai there were Symbols swirled around it mysterious characters that represented rank, affinity, stage but many were dim or flickering like dying embers.
Kai swallowed.
"Why… is the statue broken talking?"
No answer came.
But the head of the statue lying on the black shore began to glow. Pale light pulsed behind the stone eyes. Its mouth cracked open and a low, monotone voice emerged, as if speaking from the bottom of a well.
"Name: Kai Valeria
Stage: Awakening
(Would you like to proceed to evolve into an Awakening?)
Element: Fire
Blood Lineage: Crimson Eyes of Truth
(Would you like me to read you the details?)
Affinity Rank: Unknown. ????"
Kai let out a slow, shaky breath.
"Unknown… That's still weird," he muttered.
And it was.
Affinity Ranks had been deciphered over generations.
Five ranks existed public, accepted, unchanging:
1. Echo Affinity: the lowest, weak, unstable
2. Veined Affinity: average, flexible
3. Heartbound Affinity: strong, steady, trusted
4. Soulwoven Affinity: elite, rare, sought after
5. Divinal Affinity: god-touched, legendary, nearly extinct
Kai should have had something.
Even Echo.
Even the lowest rank.
Anything.
But his affinity came up as Unknown ???, which normally meant a system error, a flaw, or something beyond the five ranks entirely.
He glanced back at the black-flame sea.
Not pure.
Not bright.
Not normal.
Not readable.
If anything… it looked corrupted.
"…so I'm below an Echo?" Kai mumbled to himself. "Or maybe the statue can't even register whatever this is."
The thought wasn't comforting.
Still, he pushed it aside.
Affinity was only one part of cultivation.
He still had to face something far worse:
The Curse.
Every bloodline had a curse.
Especially divine ones.
Especially broken divine ones.
Kai took a deep breath.
"Alright… read it."
The head glowed again.
"Curse: Echo of Truth
Would you like me to read the meaning?"
Kai's answer was immediate.
"Yes."
The voice droned on.
"The Echo of Truth is the natural curse of anyone born with the Eyes of the Broken One."
Kai stiffened.
He knew the name the Broken One, the god whose eyes were torn out, the god whose sight ended creation.
His sister told him each lineage carried a curse, but hearing it from the statue… felt darker.
The voice continued:
"It activates whenever the bearer attempts to see beyond mortal limits gazing deeply into an element, a being, a memory, a law, or the world itself."
Kai frowned.
"Meaning… whenever I use my eyes seriously."
The flames of the black ocean rippled at his words, responding like a living creature.
"The Eyes reveal the truth.
The world forces the truth back into the mind.
This 'return wave' is the Echo."
Return wave.
The world's revenge.
The backlash of knowledge.
Kai had no idea what that meant.
Not yet.
The statue continued with the
[Effects].
1. Emotional Resonance
"He instantly feels the strongest emotional or elemental truth of what he saw."
Kai blinked.
"That just means… I'll feel weird emotions?"
It sounded manageable.
Maybe.
He didn't understand the problem yet he was thirteen.
Emotions were confusing already.
2. Mental Shock
"The mind receives a jolt from absorbing truth it was not meant to carry.
Symptoms include:
— Piercing headaches
— Disorientation
— Emotional bleed-through
— Eye bleeding if severely overused
— Loss of balance
— Sudden vertigo"
Kai pressed a hand to his forehead.
"…a curse that gives me headaches. Seriously? Of all the scary curses… that's it?"
It sounded almost funny.
Until he re-read the part about eye bleeding.
He didn't want that.
Not even a little.
Still, compared to what he imagined death, corruption, soul rot this seemed… tame.
The statue wasn't finished.
3. Memory Imprint (Brief)
"For a few seconds, what he sees echoes in his mind like an afterimage."
The head began listing examples:
"The feeling of a burning world.
The regret of an ancient being.
The instinct of a beast.
The cold logic of an elemental law."
Kai's small shoulders tensed.
He didn't understand most of that.
He barely understood the idea of imprints.
He barely understood what a world's regret even meant.
He was thirteen.
His biggest regret so far was knocking over his sister's collection of glowing stones.
But deep inside… something else stirred.
Something in the black flames… pulsed.
Like it had been waiting for this moment.
Like it recognized the curse intimately.
Kai swallowed.
He didn't understand the last part.
He didn't understand the depth of memory echoing.
He didn't understand why his sea was black.
He didn't understand why the statue was broken.
He didn't understand why his affinity was "Unknown."
He didn't understand any of it.
And he wasn't meant to.
He was thirteen.
Barely awakened.
Barely beginning.
But the Core World didn't care about his age.
The black sea didn't care.
The broken statue didn't care.
The curse didn't care.
He was already stepping on a path carved by a god who tore out his own eyes.
A path that didn't wait for maturity or understanding.
A path that would break him long before it made him strong.
Kai exhaled shakily, staring at the sea.
"At least… at least it's not killing me."
The black flames rippled again.
As if amused.
As if whispering:
Not yet.