In the third moon of the season, the Zhao Clan gathered.

  Not for war, nor mourning but for reverence.

  The ancestral grounds stirred with footsteps.

  Young disciples dressed in silk and steel lined the stone path,

  spirit beasts glowing faint behind them phoenix wings, tiger eyes, cranes of silver wind.

  The Awakening Ceremony was not for the weak.

  Nor for the cursed.

  Yet Zhao Wei stood among them, draped in plain white.

  No embroidered spirit.

  No guardian behind her.

  A paper lantern in a storm of fire.

  A gong echoed thrice.

  The Patriarch emerged beard long as winters, eyes like carved jade.

  Behind him, elders.

  And beside him, the visiting envoy from the Lu Clan, his son standing straight as a spear, a cold smile playing at the corners of his lips.

  Lu Shenyang, they called him.

  Wolf-quiet. Storm-born.

  His gaze swept the rows.

  Paused on her.

  Lingered for a while.

  Then moved on.

  Elder Zhao Tian cleared his throat.

  “We are gathered to honor those awakened,” he said, voice like cracked stone,

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  “and to remember those who… have not.”

  He didn’t look at her.

  He didn’t have to.

  Whispers curled like smoke around Zhao Wei’s ankles.

  “Still no spirit?”

  “A shame. She shames the bloodline.”

  “She should’ve been left in the mountains.”

  Zhao Wei did not blink.

  She bowed her head not in submission, but to see better from below. The fox bows only to learn the shape of your throat.

  The younger disciples took turns sparring displays of strength, grace, and control.

  Feiyan twirled with her phoenix flame,

  Lin roared with his tiger fists.

  Cheers.

  Then… her name.

  “Zhao Wei.”

  Laughter followed.

  She stepped forward.

  Barefoot on cold stone.

  Her opponent was a stocky boy, bored, confident, and far too eager.

  “You sure you’re not here to sweep the floor instead?” he sneered.

  Zhao Wei tilted her head.

  “I could,” she said calmly.

  “After wiping it with you.”

  Gasps.

  The boy charged, fists wide, form sloppy with pride.

  She sidestepped not fast, but precise.

  One movement.

  A hand to his wrist, a shift in weight and he was on the ground, breathless.

  No spirit.

  No flare.

  Just technique.

  And silence.

  Later, when the crowd had swallowed its laughter,

  the Patriarch said nothing.

  But Elder Tian hissed, “Tricks do not make a cultivator.”

  Zhao Wei smiled gently.

  “Neither does blindness, Elder.”

  That night, as the moon skimmed low, she walked alone through the garden paths, a ribbon in her hair, blood beneath her nails.

  A figure stepped from the shadows.

  Lu Shenyang.

  “Where did you learn that hold?” he asked.

  “Books,” she replied.

  “And the confidence?”

  She looked up, eyes reflecting moonlight like twin blades.

  “From dying.”

  He studied her.

  Then: “You’re not like the others.”

  “No,” she said. “I remember who I was.”

  A breeze passed.

  Plum blossoms danced.

  Somewhere in the trees, a fox cried.

  And behind her, where her shadow should have been, a flicker of something darker pulsed.

  Not a spirit.

  Not yet.

  But it watched.

  And it waited.