Rivan had never thought his life was special.
He woke before sunrise, chopped wood, fetched water, and helped in the small house at the edge of the village. The roof leaked when it rained. The walls were patched with mud and straw. But it was home.
Inside, on a thin bed near the window, his little sister Lira slept restlessly.
She wasn't his real sister. He had found her years ago, crying beside the road after a caravan attack. She had no memory of her past, no family, nothing except a fever that came and went like a curse.
Lately, it had been worse.
Her breathing was shallow. Her skin too pale.
Rivan placed a damp cloth on her forehead. "I'll find medicine," he whispered.
He didn't know how.
But he had to.
He stepped outside as the sky slowly brightened.
That was when the world tilted.
A sudden ringing filled his ears. His vision blurred. The ground rushed up.
He didn't even have time to call out.
Darkness swallowed him.
When he opened his eyes, he was lying on the ground outside the house. The morning sun was already higher.
His head throbbed.
"…Did I faint?"
He pushed himself up slowly.
Something felt different.
The air looked… clearer. Sharper.
When he blinked, faint lines appeared in his vision — thin flows moving through trees, soil, even the air itself. They pulsed softly, like invisible rivers.
He rubbed his eyes.
They didn't disappear.
A strange warmth lingered behind his pupils, as if his eyes were not the same anymore.
He looked at the old wooden fence.
A thought surfaced in his mind — not words he heard, but something he simply understood.
Weak essence. Can be absorbed.
Rivan froze.
"Absorbed…?"
He shook his head, trying to clear it. "I must've hit my head too hard…"
But when he looked at his hands, he felt something deeper — a quiet, heavy presence inside him, ancient and still.
He didn't know what it was.
He didn't question it.
Lira coughed weakly inside the house.
That mattered more.
The village healer had already said the rare herb that could reduce her fever grew only in the outer forest.
A place people avoided.
Demon beasts were said to roam there — creatures twisted by wild energy.
Rivan didn't hesitate.
He took a small knife, a rope, and a sack.
And walked toward the forest.
The air changed the moment he entered.
The light dimmed under thick branches. The forest felt alive — not peacefully, but watchfully.
The strange lines in his vision grew brighter here.
Energy was denser.
His heart beat faster.
A low growl echoed from the bushes.
Before he could react, a shadow lunged.
A wolf-like beast, larger than normal, eyes glowing faint red, claws sharp as blades.
Rivan barely raised his knife in time. The impact knocked him down.
Pain shot through his arm.
The beast attacked again.
Something in him moved on instinct.
He saw a thick line flowing through the beast's body — brighter than anything he had seen before.
Without knowing how, he reached toward it.
Not with his hand.
With his will.
He pulled.
The beast suddenly staggered mid-attack, as if weakened.
Energy rushed into Rivan's body — hot, violent, overwhelming.
He shouted, stabbing forward.
The knife pierced its throat.
The beast collapsed.
Silence returned.
Rivan knelt there, breathing hard.
Warmth spread through his limbs.
Strength he had never felt before.
In his mind, understanding surfaced naturally:
Energy can be taken. Refined. Used.
He didn't know why he knew.
He just did.
As the warmth settled, something deeper stirred inside him — like a locked door opening slightly.
A method, ancient and vast, unfolded in his thoughts.
A way to circulate energy through his body.
To refine it.
To grow stronger.
It felt older than the world.
He didn't know its name.
But if it had one, it would be something like a Primordial Chaos Sutra — a way to absorb all things and turn them into his own power.
Because he felt the power beyond time , beyond anything, he just knew that it should not exist.
Rivan sat there among fallen leaves and began to breathe as the instinct guided him.
Energy flowed.
His body changed quietly.
By the time he opened his eyes again…
He was no longer an ordinary boy.
He had stepped onto the path of cultivation.
And he didn't even realize it.