The chains clinked in the darkness, slick with blood and rust.
Li Xuan lay in the pit, motionless. Around him, bodies twitched—or didn't. The overseers had thrown them down one by one—slaves who had collapsed in the mines, too weak to lift another pickaxe. Not worth feeding.
"Another rat for the worms," one guard had laughed as he'd tossed Li Xuan in. That was two days ago. Maybe three. Time was strange down here.
But Li Xuan wasn't dead.
Not yet.
Something was calling.
It began with a whisper. A breathless hum in the walls of the abyss, behind the stone. He felt it more than heard it. Like cold fingers running along the inside of his skull.
Come.
He didn't know why he crawled. His limbs were half-broken, one eye swollen shut, ribs sharp under his torn skin. But he moved anyway. Something ancient stirred beneath this pit. Something… alive.
Come, little shadow. Feed me your hate.
Li Xuan reached the crack in the stone. Black mist seeped from it. Not smoke—mist that slithered like it had thought, like it was hungry. He didn't flinch. He reached inside.
And screamed.
Visions tore through his mind—mountains burning, oceans of blood, a shadow walking alone beneath a sky of black fire. A throne made of skulls. A lotus, blooming in eternal night.
And then... silence.
When Li Xuan woke, he was no longer in the pit.
He stood in a chamber carved from obsidian. Floating above a cracked altar was a flower—black as the void, each petal pulsing like a heartbeat. Around it, glowing runes twisted and twitched as if they resisted being read.
A voice echoed in his skull.
I am the Lotus of Ruin. The last remnant of the Crimson Emperor. You touched my seed, slave. Now we are bound.
Li Xuan staggered. "What… are you?"
The lotus pulsed.
I am what the heavens fear. I am the flame that devours the sky. And you… are nothing. Yet.
He laughed then—a hoarse, broken sound. "Then teach me to burn."
Silence.
Then: Good. First, kill the others.
Li Xuan turned.
Behind him stood the other slaves. Dozens, maybe more. Some were boys he'd eaten with. Others had beaten him for scraps. All looked as hollow as he had once been.
He saw their eyes, wide with confusion.
He saw the rusted pickaxe near the wall.
And he moved.
The first head cracked like a melon. The second cried out—"Wait! We can esc—" but Li Xuan didn't listen. The lotus demanded blood, and he obeyed.
By the end, his hands dripped red. The runes glowed brighter.
His eyes burned black.
The Lotus whispered, Bone-Forging has begun. Feed me more. And I will give you the power to crush worlds.
Li Xuan looked up.
And smiled.
From that moment on, the boy named Li Xuan was dead. In his place walked something else—something colder, sharper, and far more dangerous.
The Crimson Path had claimed its first step.
The mine was burning.
Not with fire—but with something worse.
As Li Xuan rose from the pile of corpses, the lotus pulsed behind his eyes. He could still feel it—coiled in the hollow beneath his ribs, beating like a second heart.
The demonic flower wasn't just inside him. It was him now.
His body groaned with change. Bones cracked as marrow boiled. Black veins surged across his skin like creeping shadows. The air around him shimmered, and then twisted—as if reality flinched at what he was becoming.
Bone-Forging Realm, First Layer achieved.
The words etched themselves across his mind like a divine brand. But unlike the polished calligraphy of orthodox cultivators, this felt brutal. Carved in ash and fury.
He staggered to the wall and clawed free a rusted sword buried in the stone—an old relic, forgotten like everything else down here. The blade crumbled at the edge, but he felt its thirst. This was no weapon. This was a wound, meant to be opened.
From above, voices rang out. Torches flickered beyond the iron grates.
"That noise... from the pit!"
"Light a flare—wake the supervisor!"
Li Xuan's blackened lips curved.
Too late.
He raised a hand. Shadows coiled around his fingers, sharp and smoky, shaped like claws. The sword in his other hand groaned, metal hissing like it remembered blood.
With a breath, he leapt—higher than any mortal should. Bones cracked again. This time, it felt right.
He smashed through the grate.
The guards had no time to scream.
One fell with his spine snapped in a hook of shadow. The other raised his spear—only to see it melt as Li Xuan's sword struck. Not from heat, but corrosion. The very law of decay bent to his will.
"MONSTER!" the last one yelled.
Li Xuan grinned through black blood and whispered, "Correct."
He moved like a ghost through the mining camp.
The slaves were corralled in barracks—thin wood, nailed shut from the outside. Their faces were hollow, beaten. But some watched him through the slats. Silent. Watching the way he moved. The blood on his hands. The twitch of something not quite human behind his shoulder.
He didn't free them.
He didn't speak.
This path was not for the weak to follow.
And then—a shriek.
Not from a man.
From beneath the earth.
The ground trembled. The sky turned red—though it was still night.
He spun, eyes narrowing. The lotus pulsed. Something ancient stirred deeper in the mine. Something... watching him.
The Lotus of Ruin stirred.
A rival awakens.
A beast that once devoured cities, buried and forgotten. Now, drawn by the scent of demonic fire.
Li Xuan laughed.
Perfect.
He descended into the earth again—but this time, deeper. Past the pit. Past the sealed tunnels the miners were forbidden to enter. Each step closer, the walls bled red light. His skin peeled and healed and peeled again, the pressure tearing at his lungs.
But he didn't stop.
He could smell it now.
Blood.
And sulfur.
The final chamber was a cathedral of bones.
A thousand skulls, fused into pillars. Rib cages formed bridges over rivers of black sludge. Floating at the center of the room—a beast made of eyes.
A Dread Serpent, extinct for centuries. Its body was a coil of shadow, its face a spiraling horror of lidless orbs. One glance shattered sanity.
But Li Xuan didn't flinch.
The Lotus screamed inside him—devour it.
He stepped forward.
The serpent roared, and the air cracked. Reality bent—the chamber stretched into an impossible length, the serpent suddenly above, below, behind.
But he moved.
His sword struck—not the flesh—but the reflection of the beast in the air.
A shriek erupted.
And for the first time, the beast bled.
He had seen its weakness.
A mirror being, vulnerable only through its shadow, not its form.
The battle tore space apart.
He lost an arm.
Then regrew it—imperfect, bone exposed.
He screamed—not in pain, but in fury.
With every strike, he poured not just Qi, but hatred, memory, hunger. Everything the world had taken from him.
The serpent lunged.
He let it swallow him.
Inside its throat, he struck one last time—with soul fire blazing from his chest. The Lotus laughed.
And the world went silent.
When he emerged, he held its eye.
Still beating. Still twitching. Still alive.
The Lotus pulsed within him again.
You have conquered your first true beast. You have earned your title.
From this day... you are Demon Disciple of the Crimson Path.
Outside, thunder rolled across the sky.
The heavens had taken notice.
Li Xuan looked upward. Into the dark.
And smiled.
Again.