The next three days passed without further disturbance, though Hazelrun itself remained far from peaceful.
Lyn stayed inside his small hut and pretended to be ill while sect members moved through the village. Their visits were brief and perfunctory. They checked his condition without interest, asked a handful of routine questions, and left as soon as they had enough information to complete whatever record had brought them to his door.
The investigation accounted for the destruction of Vale Ridge, the disappearance of the overseer, the dead miners, and the casualties suffered within the village. Lyn's name appeared nowhere important within that collection of losses, and no one returned to question him more closely.
What could a lowly outer disciple possibly know that the sect's own envoys did not?
He remained indoors until the investigation ended and the last of the envoys departed Hazelrun. Only then did he step outside, where the sharp calls of birds greeted him from the nearby rooftops with enough persistence to grate against his patience.
Can they not be quieter?
The irritation followed him only as far as the small market near the centre of the village. Several stalls had reopened, offering fresh produce, basic materials, and low-tier shards, though few people had come to buy anything. Most of Hazelrun's attention remained fixed upon the dead. Graves needed to be dug.
While moving between the stalls, Lyn noticed an old woman sweeping dust from the threshold of her home. The slow motion of her hands and the curve of her back stirred an ache beneath his ribs before he could prevent it. Mago and Khor returned to him with the memory.
Khor had cut trees for a living, while Mago sold fruit and whatever other produce she could obtain from nearby villages. Their work had never made them wealthy, yet it had sustained the quiet life they shared before Lyn entered it. Khor found him beneath a crooked tree near the edge of a forest. Dirt covered the ground, but none of it had marked Lyn's skin. He had not been crying when the old man approached, nor had fear appeared in his expression. He had simply lain there, gazing into the vast and empty sky.
Confusion had drawn Khor closer. Pity had persuaded him to carry the child home. Neither he nor Mago had ever been able to have children, yet their age did not stop them from adopting one when the opportunity arrived without explanation. They already knew they would not live to see most of Lyn's life, but that knowledge had mattered less to them than the fact that he possessed no one else.
Khor showed him how to split wood without exhausting himself, while Mago taught him to count Contribution Tokens carefully enough that merchants could not cheat him without effort. Together, they taught him when to lower his head before someone stronger, how to recognize danger before pride made retreat impossible, and how to survive without waiting for fairness that would never come. They died shortly before Lyn became old enough to support himself properly, passing from old age only a day apart.
He buried them behind the house. The memory remained long enough to deepen the ache before Lyn pressed it back into the place where he kept everything that could no longer be changed.
His attention shifted inward toward the ashrain fragments resting within his Vessel Realm. Their combined weight remained slight, though their value mattered far more than their burden upon the Sea.
If I exchange all of them, I should have enough Contribution Tokens for food and perhaps one Rank One Information Shard.
The tokens taken from the miners had not been enough. A miner earned only two or three Contribution Tokens per day, and many of the corpses had carried none when Lyn searched them. Knowledge demanded considerably more. The Ashen Light Sect distributed common information through Rank One and Rank Two Light Information Shards, which contained maps, local politics, cultivation theory, and other material considered useful but not precious. Anything more valuable remained inside written books, where access could be restricted through formations and price.
Both methods were expensive, especially for someone whose income had come from Vale Ridge. Lyn swallowed the irritation rising in his throat and continued toward the Contribution Office. The elder on duty stood behind the main desk within a workshop, arranging several materials into separate groups. Three grey braids fell behind his shoulders, while faint Fire Essence leaked from his body despite the absence of any active technique.
The leakage revealed his cultivation clearly enough. Rank Four, Stage One.
"What do you want?" the elder asked, keeping most of his attention upon the materials before him.
"I came to exchange something."
"Show it."
Rather than approaching immediately, the elder finished arranging the objects deeper within the workshop. Only after each piece had been placed to his satisfaction did he cross toward the desk, where the impatience in his face suggested that Lyn had already occupied too much of his time.
"Well, then? Open your Shard Gate and show me the material."
Lyn formed an opening no larger than his fingernail and allowed a single fragment of ash to pass through. The sight stripped away the elder's boredom before the residue had fully emerged.
"Rank Four ashrain residue!?" His gaze moved from the fragment to Lyn's lowered face. "How did you obtain this?"
Lyn bowed his head and allowed uncertainty to soften his voice.
"I overslept, Elder. By the time I woke, the ridge had already been covered. I collected what little remained."
The elder clicked his tongue, though suspicion had already replaced impatience in his eyes.
"You slept through an ashrain? Lucky fool. You are one of the miners, then?"
Lyn offered no more than a slight nod and kept his gaze lowered. The explanation did not satisfy the elder.
How did a Rank Three junior gather Rank Four material?
Only a few possibilities presented themselves, and none fit comfortably.
Either he is a Rank Four Dao Chosen concealing his cultivation, or he possesses a method capable of harvesting the residue despite the difference in rank and Path. A technique like that would not be cheap.
The second possibility clashed with Lyn's clothing, occupation, and apparent status.
But he is a miner. Why would someone wealthy enough to own such a method work at Vale Ridge? And if he is truly Rank Four, why would the higher-ups waste him in a mine?
Lyn remained silent while those doubts passed visibly through the elder's expression. After several breaths, the old man returned his attention to the fragment, tested it, and accepted the remainder through Lyn's Shard Gate. The exchange produced a small pouch of Contribution Tokens whose weight disappointed Lyn before he even counted them.
Far less than I expected. At least he forgot to inspect my Truth Carvings.
Nothing in his expression revealed the annoyance. The elder had good reason to doubt what he had seen. For all he knew, the residue might have been falsified.
The sect had established procedures for irregularities long ago, after a Dao Chosen concealed his actual Truth Carvings and brought disaster upon the region. Those procedures should have compelled the elder to investigate Lyn more carefully, but routine had weakened them. The sect paid him to manage exchanges, not to chase every inconsistency that passed across his desk. Like many elders assigned to poor villages, he valued the free hours remaining in his day more than the possibility that one insignificant miner might conceal something unusual.
Lyn bowed, secured the Contribution Tokens, and left before that indifference could change. The moment he stepped outside, intuition urged him toward the market. He trusted the impulse and quickened his pace without looking back.
Only after Lyn had disappeared among the village paths did the elder reconsider the exchange. The boy had presented Rank Four Fire material, yet no trace of Fire Path cultivation had appeared within the Essence leaking from his body.
The realization drove the elder from the office, but by the time he reached the road, Lyn had already vanished from sight. Finding him presented an inconvenience the old man had no desire to accept. Lyn rarely visited that part of Hazelrun, leaving no obvious place to begin, and although the village was small, it was not so small that searching every road and house would be effortless.
Urgency faded as the elder stood outside the office. The boy would return eventually. Or he would not. Neither outcome seemed worth the trouble. By then, Lyn had reached a stall selling plain bread and dried meat. Food consumed a noticeable portion of the Contribution Tokens he had received, hunger offered little room for negotiation.
The Light Path stall stood several rows away. A young disciple, perhaps twelve or fifteen years old, watched the sky from behind the display with the vacant expression of someone whose attention had drifted far from his work.
"I want to purchase a Rank One Light Information Shard," Lyn said.
The disciple startled badly enough to jolt the stall.
"O-of course."
After hurriedly straightening himself, he selected a thin, glass-like shard whose surface contained faint lines of writing. Lyn paid the required tokens, accepted it, and transferred it into his Vessel Realm. He expected the familiar resistance that accompanied a new Heavenly Shard as the Sea adjusted to its presence. Even weak shards normally disturbed the surrounding power before settling into place. This one entered without resistance. The sensation resembled a key sliding into a lock so perfectly maintained that metal never touched metal. Lyn noted the absence, though the low price of the shard offered an easy explanation.
Perhaps it is simply poor quality.
He steadied his breathing and poured Essence into the shard to refine it. As he did, he focused his intent on perceiving its contents. Knowledge unfolded across his awareness in a sudden rush. The Light Information Shard contained a map of the Ashen Light Sect's territory, classifications of resource points, the names of notable local elders and disciples, cultivation ranks, theories concerning Truth Carvings, common bottlenecks, and the political relationships shaping the region.
Lyn absorbed every detail without difficulty; much of it he already knew from his previous Information Shard. The repetition dulled any sense of discovery, none of it inspired the awe one would normally expect from knowledge sold by a sect.
My sect is not particularly impressive.
The conclusion remained with him as he returned home. Being born within such a mediocre power seemed unfortunate, but the realization awakened neither loyalty nor resentment. He had never felt much for the Rootless people of Hazelrun, nor had the Dao Chosen of the Ashen Light Sect given him reason to respect them. Mago and Khor remained the only people he had ever loved.
Night settled over Hazelrun beneath damp air that made the lantern flames gutter. Their light cast trembling shadows across mud-choked streets, while crickets called from the darkness beyond the houses. Laughter occasionally rose from barns, courtyards, and groups wandering between homes. Hazelrun's small population ensured that most people had known one another for years, and hardship often drove them toward drink and familiar company.
Lyn had never shared that need. He had formed no friendships within the village and found little value in the conversations that occupied those around him. While voices and laughter drifted through the streets, he sat cross-legged inside his hut and directed his awareness into his Vessel Realm.
The golden Sea lay beneath the endless Sky, with his Heavenly Shards resting deep within it, suspended between the galaxies reflected across its depths. His Light Path Truth Carvings occupied the Sky as a cluster of dwarf stars, each one gathered near others of the same Path.
Far beyond that cluster hung the golden symbol—too vast to be called a dwarf star, larger than any celestial body Lyn had ever seen. No dwarf stars orbited it, nor did it appear drawn toward the familiar Light Path formation. Whatever Path it belonged to, Lyn possessed no knowledge capable of naming it.
When Truth Carvings solidify, they become dwarf stars and gather according to Path. Light remains with Light, as though they form families.
His attention remained fixed upon the solitary object.
But this one stands apart.
Nothing in the newly acquired information explained such behaviour. The Star neither interacted with the surrounding Truth Carvings nor revealed any obvious purpose, leaving Lyn with observation but no conclusion. By the time he withdrew his awareness, one decision had become unavoidable.
The following day, he would visit the sect library. Spending more Contribution Tokens troubled him, especially after the cost of food and the Light Information Shard, yet uncertainty surrounding the golden symbol carried risks he could not measure. He needed to determine whether it possessed some use or resembled a sickness that had entered his Vessel Realm and needed to be cut out.
When morning reached Hazelrun, that question remained at the forefront of his thoughts. Lyn sat upon the edge of the bed instead of leaving immediately, reviewing the foundations of cultivation in the hope that some overlooked connection might provide an answer.
Can I determine what the star is from what I already know?
Cultivation began at birth, when every person entered the world as either Dao Chosen or Rootless. A Dao Chosen possessed a Vessel Realm, an inner organ existing beyond ordinary flesh and anchored near the heart. Without it, power could neither be stored nor shaped. The Rootless lacked that organ entirely. Every Vessel Realm contained two separate spaces: the Sea and the Sky.
The Sea appeared as an endless expanse of white, milky liquid, though its visible breadth did not reveal its true capacity. What mattered was depth. A Rank One cultivator could look across the same shoreless expanse as an elder, yet his Sea might bear only a handful of weak shards before instability began to spread through it.
Did Lyn's Sea even deserve to be called a sea anymore? What sea held galaxies within its waters? The question troubled him, but his Shards showed no sign of rejection. His Essence remained intact and functional, and for now, that mattered more than naming what his Sea had become.
Everything stored inside imposed weight, although not in a physical sense. Heavenly Shards burdened the Sea according to rank, beast materials carried remnants of law, and foreign objects disturbed the natural flow of Essence. If too much entered the Vessel Realm, the Sea would not expand merely to accommodate it. Its surface would begin to tremble, Essence would leak, and eventually the object would be rejected or the Vessel Realm itself would suffer damage.
The Sea existed to store neutral power, Heavenly Shards, and other objects capable of remaining within its depths. When inactive, it appeared calm and inert.
The Sky served another purpose entirely. Although it seemed equally vast, it could hold neither shards nor power. It existed only for Truth Carvings. Truth Carvings represented condensed understanding. Within the Sky, they appeared as dwarf stars, each one carrying authority over a particular Path such as Light or Fire.
That authority determined how power behaved after activation. Two Dao Chosen might use the same shard and expend the same amount from their Seas, yet the one possessing more Truth Carvings would create the stronger and more precise effect. Lyn compared those principles with the golden star, but the resemblance weakened under closer examination.
Truth Carvings are condensed understanding, and dwarf stars rise from the Sea. The golden symbol did not rise from anything. It invaded my Sky instead.
That difference made it difficult to classify it as a Truth Carving, so he continued through the remaining foundations. Heavenly Shards served as the tools of cultivation. They were crystallized, glass-like fragments of law that allowed cultivators to affect the world, and every activation demanded Essence.
Essence appeared only when the Sea stirred and began to move. Once a cultivator awakened, even an apparently calm Sea produced a faint, continuous flow throughout the body.
Activating a shard intensified that movement and converted neutral Sea power into Essence. Any amount left uncontrolled could escape into the surroundings, creating the subtle leakage through which perceptive cultivators sensed another person's rank and Path.
Could the golden symbol be some kind of Heavenly Shard?
The idea seemed no more convincing than the last. How could a Heavenly Shard be so massive? And it wasn't glass—it wasn't some fragile sphere of glass. God, no.
He focused his awareness, drawing it toward the Golden star. Yet, as he drew closer, he felt as though his awareness itself were burning, forcing him to quickly pull away.
His limited experience prevented him from rejecting the possibility completely nonetheless . Lyn had owned few Heavenly Shards and understood only their most basic properties. The reasoning carried him back to the same uncertainty with which he had begun.
The star belonged among the many things about himself that Lyn had never understood. He already knew that certain laws of the Dao did not apply to him in the same way they applied to others, though he had never cared enough to search for the reason. Other cultivators required Truth Carvings matching the Path of a material before they could harvest it. Fire materials required Fire Truth Carvings, and the same principle governed every other Path.
Lyn required no such compatibility.
That difference had existed for as long as he could remember, but the golden star was too significant to ignore with the same indifference.
If answers exist, they probably will not be contained within information sold openly. Even so, I need to exhaust every option available to me.
With that conclusion settled, Lyn left the bed, stepped outside, and closed the hut behind him. The sect library stood deeper within Hazelrun. Few villagers visited because access cost more than most could afford, but the price reflected the amount of knowledge stored inside.
Unlike Information Shards sold at market stalls, the library preserved its contents within written books. A formation concealed every page from anyone who entered without paying or lacked sufficient rank. Once the required Contribution Tokens had been provided, access lasted only for a limited period. When that time ended, the words vanished again.
The books contained far more than the inexpensive shards sold in the market, which made the restrictions understandable even if they remained unpleasant. While walking, Lyn calculated what remained of his resources.
I should have enough Contribution Tokens to enter and still retain something for food and basic necessities.
The estimate did little to ease the pressure of the expense. The library distinguished itself from the surrounding buildings before he reached its door. Most structures in Hazelrun consisted of timber, brick, or ordinary stone, whereas the library had been constructed from Wood-refining Ore.
When properly refined and shaped, the material strengthened formations considerably. Formations were, in simple terms, area effects created through combinations of Heavenly Shards and specific materials. In the library, the formation had been built directly into the walls and shaped so that its influence remained restricted to the interior.
Despite the value of its construction, the building appeared plain. Only the dark colour of its walls set it apart, resembling wood from Earth that had been blackened by fire. The cost of entering explained why so few people approached it. Six Contribution Tokens had already gone toward food, while fifteen had purchased the Rank One Information Shard. Another fifteen would disappear simply to grant Lyn one hour inside the library.
Almost nothing would remain afterward. The calculation drew a quiet breath from him before he opened the door. Cold air settled against his skin as soon as he entered. The interior felt noticeably colder than the village outside, and the temperature sharpened when the door closed behind him.
Another door waited ahead, while a disciple stood to the right behind a narrow desk. He appeared to be in his mid twenties, with long hair and a stern gaze that looked practiced enough to have become habit.
"Welcome. State your name, Path, whether you belong to the inner sect, sect proper, or outer sect, your occupation, and provide fifteen Contribution Tokens."
Contempt stirred within Lyn, though he concealed it beneath a polite smile.
"Of course, sir. My name is Lyn. I primarily cultivate the Light Path, and I am an outer disciple. Until recently, I worked at Vale Ridge."
He placed the required tokens upon the desk while adding a slight nervousness to his voice, encouraging the disciple to see nothing more than a harmless miner. Outer disciples rarely deserved attention within the sect. They cultivated fields, mined materials, carried supplies, and performed the physical labour upon which those above them depended.
The disciple examined Lyn without interest.
"Rank Three? You may enter the Basic Section for one hour. Once the time expires, the formation will withdraw access and the books will become unreadable."
A sharper anticipation entered his gaze as he continued.
"Do not attempt to copy information, steal anything, or interfere with the formation. If you do, it will activate and paralyze you."
The satisfaction hidden beneath the warning suggested that he hoped Lyn might try. Anyone immobilized within the library would be helpless before the disciple. Killing a thief caught violating sect rules could easily be framed as a righteous act, and the reward for protecting the library would likely make the effort worthwhile.
"Of course," Lyn replied.
The disciple handed him an iron key engraved with faintly glowing golden letters. Section Basics. The door ahead opened without being touched. Once Lyn crossed the threshold, it closed behind him and sealed away the entrance.
Three additional doors stood within the chamber beyond, each formed from a material he did not recognize. The left door bore the words Section Basics, while Section Experienced marked the middle and Section Honorable the right. Questions would not change which one he could enter, so Lyn inserted the key into the lock of the Basic Section without wasting time.
The door opened upon a space far larger than the building's exterior should have contained. Shelves extended into the distance beneath the formation's pale light, filled with more books than Hazelrun appeared capable of holding.
How can the interior be so much larger than the building outside?
Lyn moved between the shelves while reading the signs marking each subject. Shard theory, history of the known world, maps, politics, elementary formation knowledge, basic combat insights, naming conventions, identifying useful materials, and countless other topics occupied their own sections.
Most offered nothing relevant to the question that had brought him there. He continued deeper, searching for anything connected to the event above Hazelrun.
Is there no section concerning natural disasters?
Frustration tightened his expression, though he refused to let it slow the search. After passing another row of shelves, his attention settled upon a sign farther ahead.
'Rifts and Disasters.' Interest returned to his eyes as he approached the section.