The wind howled across the shattered peak of Voidweave Mountain, carrying the stench of blood and ruptured strands.
Mo Fang stood alone amid the ruins, black robes tattered and soaked crimson. His body was a map of wounds, deep gashes where binding techniques had torn through flesh and essence alike. Around him, the air shimmered with hostile domains: countless Tapestry Masters and Fate Weavers from the major righteous alliances had encircled the mountain, their combined weaves forming an inescapable net of tightening knots and severing blades.
"Mo Fang! You demonic scourge, hand over the fragments of the Grand Unweaving Codex and we shall grant you a swift end!" The voice of the Grand Loom Elder of the Heavenly Knot Sect boomed like thunder, heavy with righteous strands that sought to bind will itself.
"Old Demon Mo, cease your futile resistance! Today the great sects of the Eastern and Central Regions have united to crush your lair. This place is already a death trap, no escape remains. Your head will decorate the Hall of Justice before the sun sets!"
"Mo Fang, you heartless fiend! For the sake of your mad pursuit of ultimate power, you slaughtered thousands, twisted the fates of entire clans, and provoked Reverberations that swallowed cities whole. Your sins cannot be washed away even if the Grand Tapestry itself unraveled!"
"Demon! One hundred years ago you betrayed me, stole what was mine, massacred my kin across nine generations. Today, I will personally cut the strands of your miserable existence!"
Accusations rained down from every direction. Faces twisted in hatred, eyes burning with vengeance. Some wept for lost families. Others laughed with grim satisfaction at the long-awaited reckoning.
Mo Fang's expression did not change. His dark eyes remained cold, detached, as if he were merely observing an uninteresting spectacle. Blood dripped steadily from his lips, yet his breathing stayed even. He had long since grown accustomed to such scenes. In his thousand years of cultivation, he had stood in this position many times, surrounded, cursed, yet always the one who walked away while others became loose threads in the Tapestry.
He had killed without hesitation. Betrayed allies the moment they ceased to be useful. Harvested emotion strands from screaming victims to fuel forbidden weaves. Deliberately triggered small Reverberations on rivals, watching them unravel under the universe's own backlash while he shielded himself with layered calculations. Love, loyalty, mercy, these were foreign concepts, mere tools weaker cultivators clung to. To Mo Fang, every living being was simply raw material: strands to be tugged for advantage, knotted for temporary gain, or severed when they lost value.
All of it had been for one purpose.
To stand above the Grand Tapestry. To unweave its laws and become something eternal, unbound by balance or consequence.
Now, at the climax of his final ritual, he had fallen short. The cataclysmic pull on the forbidden strands had invited overwhelming Reverberation. His Loom-Heart was scarred, his Weft Essence nearly depleted, and the living threads he once commanded had turned rebellious, lashing back with vicious force.
Yet as the righteous cultivators closed in, their techniques blazing, fire-strands that burned concepts, severing cuts aimed at his core threads, Mo Fang felt no regret. No fear. Only the same icy clarity that had carried him through centuries of demonic cultivation.
He had come from nothing. Dragged into this strand,woven world from a mundane existence on a distant plane called Earth, he had adapted instantly. No morality held him back. No sentiment clouded his judgment. He climbed by any means necessary, weaving his path through blood and schemes until he stood at the precipice of true transcendence.
And even now, facing annihilation, his heart remained unchanged.
Mo Fang's lips curved into the faintest, coldest smile.
"In the end… the Grand Tapestry still resists," he thought. "But a demon's heart never bends."
With the last fragments of his will, he reached deep into his damaged Loom-Heart. There, hidden among the chaos of the failing ritual, lay the single thread he had prepared decades earlier, a fragile Reincarnation Strand, dyed with his own unyielding demonic intent and anchored precisely three hundred years into the past.
He tugged it.
The strand activated in silence, a quiet defiance against the roaring net of righteous techniques closing around him. Reality blurred. The infinite weave of existence twisted momentarily as his soul tore free from the dying vessel, slipping backward through layers of time and fate like a needle drawn through silk.
The voices of his enemies faded into nothingness.
Darkness swallowed everything.
Then, light returned, weak, ordinary morning light filtering through a paper window.
Mo Fang opened his eyes.
He lay on a thin bamboo mat inside a cramped wooden hut that smelled of cheap incense, damp wood, and distant mountain rain. His body felt small, weak, unfamiliar. The Loom-Heart within his soul was underdeveloped, barely able to perceive the basic strands of flesh and blood circulating through this sixteen-year-old frame.
This was the body of an insignificant no name outer disciple in the minor Shadow Loom Clan of the Eastern Fringe Province. A backwater place where even reaching the Thread Binder realm was considered a triumph for someone of low birth.
The original soul had already been crushed the instant his ancient will flooded in. There was no resistance, only the faint remnants of petty dreams, loyalty to the clan, affection for a childhood acquaintance, vague hopes of advancement. Mo Fang severed those emotional strands with casual precision. The memories remained as useful information, but the feelings attached to them vanished like smoke.
He sat up slowly, testing the limbs. Sluggish. Brittle. The muscles were thin, the blood flow timid. In his previous life, this body would not have lasted a single serious exchange.
Useless, for now.
Mo Fang stood and moved to the small bronze mirror on the wall. The reflection showed an ordinary youth: pale face, black hair falling straight to the shoulders, dark eyes that now carried an ancient, predatory depth. Nothing remarkable. In his last life he had worn many masks, scholar, elder, monster. Appearance was irrelevant. Only function mattered.
He tested his voice, speaking softly to the empty room. "Three hundred years earlier… The Shadow Loom Clan remains untouched. The Strand Nests of the Eastern Fringe have yet to be fully exploited. The scattered fragments of the Unweaving Codex still lie hidden and unknown."
His tone was flat, devoid of excitement or satisfaction. Merely stating facts.
A soft knock interrupted his thoughts.
"Fang'er, are you awake? The clan elder has called all outer disciples to the Loom Square for the annual Strand Awakening Ceremony. Don't be late again."
It was his aunt in this life, Mo Qing. According to the memories, she had occasionally helped the original boy with food and minor protection. A kind woman, by ordinary standards.
Mo Fang felt nothing. No warmth, no obligation. She was a potential resource, nothing more.
He opened the door, composing his face into a polite, unremarkable expression. "Thank you for the reminder, Auntie. I will go at once."
Mo Qing smiled and patted his shoulder gently. "That's a good child. Work hard today. Perhaps the heavens will smile on you this year."
As her hand touched him, Mo Fang's Loom-Heart stirred faintly. He located the thin karmic strand linking them, a pale thread colored by her past acts of care. With precise control, he infused a drop of awakening Weft Essence and gave it a subtle twist. From now on, her goodwill would serve his interests more reliably. When she no longer held value, the strand could be cut without cost.
She withdrew her hand, unaware, and left with lighter steps.
Mo Fang closed the door. His expression returned to cold neutrality.
He sat at the simple table and closed his eyes briefly, allowing the damaged Loom-Heart to continue drinking ambient strands. Colorless Weft Essence circulated slowly at first, then with increasing strength. Already he could sense the faint tensions in the local tapestry: minor rivalries among disciples, the distant pulse of the clan's defensive formations, the living threads of birds and insects in the surrounding woods.
His mind turned to the immediate path ahead.
Pass the Awakening Ceremony and claim whatever reward he could. Identify the outer disciples who would soon attempt to rob or suppress him, eliminate them quietly through indirect strand manipulations. Forge the first basic Anchor Thread within his Loom-Heart. Seek out the nearest untouched minor Strand Nest in the mountains and harvest it using knowledge no one in this era possessed.
And beyond that… the same eternal goal.
Power. Absolute and unchallenged.
He would exploit the living nature of the strands more ruthlessly than before. Provoke Reverberations on enemies while dodging the balance through careful preparation. Bind powerful threads through deception rather than force. Rewrite small fates, accumulate advantages, and eventually challenge the Grand Tapestry once more, only this time, with foreknowledge and an undiminished demonic heart, he would succeed.
Mo Fang opened his eyes and adjusted his plain outer disciple robes. He stepped out of the hut into the narrow paths of the clan's outer district. Other disciples hurried past, chatting or complaining about the ceremony. None paid him any mind. Perfect.
As he walked toward the central Loom Square, his steps were steady and unhurried. Internally, however, the ancient will burned with cold purpose.
The Grand Tapestry had given him this second chance through its own mechanisms.
He would use it to tear the entire weave apart.
The morning breeze stirred the leaves overhead, carrying faint, invisible threads. Mo Fang extended the slightest perception and tugged one experimentally. It responded without resistance.
A faint, almost imperceptible smile touched his lips for a single instant, then vanished.
The heart of a demon never regrets, even in death.