Jin stepped through the rift.
The air changed first. From silence to noise, from ash to wind, from the crushing stillness of the void to the chaos of the living.
He was home.
Or… what was left of it.
He stepped onto soil that once belonged to the mortal plane. But something was wrong.
The sun above was dim, almost hesitant. Clouds dragged themselves like corpses across the sky, stitched with veins of unnatural lightning. The very spiritual essence of the realm—once radiant and free—now felt stagnant. Bound. Tamed.
He narrowed his eyes.
"This qi… it's sick."
A flock of birds passed overhead. Or what should've been birds. Their wings were thin as knives, bodies half-metal, half-flesh, stitched with chains and talismans.
They didn't chirp.
They screamed.
Jin's expression didn't change. He walked.
His feet carried him down the winding mountain paths of the Hollowspine Range—once sacred ground, once under the protection of the Dead Heavens Sect. Once his home.
It took less than a day to reach the valley.
And when he saw what stood there, even after ten thousand years, his breath caught.
Not from nostalgia. Not from grief.
From rage.
The gates of the Dead Heavens Sect still stood.
But they had changed.
Gone was the pure obsidian stone and silver latticework of stars. In its place was a monolithic arch of white bone, fanged and weeping blood from unseen wounds. Above it, nailed to the sky by five spears of heaven-forged steel, floated a throne.
Empty.
But pulsing.
A heartbeat of ruin.
And behind the gate, the sect sprawled like a tumor—temples twisted into towers, disciples marching in silence, their faces wrapped in veils of sorrow. A black sun hovered over the central peak, rotating slowly, dragging shadows across the land like chains.
This was no longer the Dead Heavens Sect.
This was something else.
This was the Withered Crown.
Jin stepped forward.
A bell tolled.
Instantly, ten disciples dropped from the walls like spiders, robes fluttering like shredded banners. They landed around him in a perfect ring—swords drawn, talismans glowing, killing intent like a blade across the throat.
But Jin didn't stop walking.
One of them stepped forward. A young man, pale-eyed, with a branding mark across his chest in the shape of a thorned halo.
"Halt. Outsiders are not permitted beyond the Withered Gate."
Jin looked up. "Is that what you call this now?"
"The old name is dead. Like the old world. Speak your name and intention."
He held out his hand.
A bone-white token appeared in his palm, etched with an ancient symbol: three stars above a grave.
The sigil of the true Dead Heavens Sect.
The disciples froze.
For a heartbeat.
Then the air ignited with motion. Four of them struck at once—one from behind, two from the flanks, one from above.
Jin's hand rose lazily.
A pulse of will flattened the ground around him in a perfect circle. The disciples hit the dirt like broken dolls, their weapons shattering mid-swing.
Only one remained standing—the leader.
He looked shaken, but not afraid. Not yet.
Jin took a step closer.
"Who sits the throne now?" His voice was soft. Controlled.
The disciple didn't answer.
Jin's eyes narrowed. "It used to be mine."
The man's jaw clenched. "You lie."
Jin said nothing. He simply turned his gaze toward the great peak at the center of the valley.
Once, he had stood there—above the stars, watching over the world.
Now it was hollow. A tower of bone and ash.
Without another word, Jin walked through the gate.
No one stopped him.
Not because they couldn't.
But because they didn't understand what had just happened.
—
He passed through the outer courtyards. Gone were the prayer wheels, the training arenas, the ancestral altars. In their place: crucifixes of shattered jade, blood-offering basins, and pillars of screaming stone.
Everything sacred had been inverted.
Every vow twisted.
He passed a child—a disciple no older than ten—kneeling before a basin of thorns, bleeding from both palms as she recited mantras carved into her own skin.
Jin paused.
She looked up at him with hollow eyes.
"Do you suffer?" he asked.
She blinked. "We are taught to."
He kept walking.
By the time he reached the inner sanctum, a crowd had gathered.
Disciples. Elders. Cloaked figures with faces erased by tattoos of devotion. They parted as he passed, unsure whether to stop him or fall to their knees.
Most chose stillness.
Because in his presence, something primal stirred. A memory buried in bone.
They didn't know his name.
But their bodies remembered the man who taught death to kneel.
At the entrance to the throne chamber, a single figure waited.
An old man. Long robes. White beard dipped in ink. One eye missing, replaced by a burning shard of crystal.
Jin stopped before him.
"Elder Mou."
The man's breath hitched.
"Jin," he whispered. "It cannot be. You were—"
"Buried. Sealed. Forgotten."
He stepped closer.
"And yet here I stand."
Elder Mou lowered his head. "I never wanted this."
"Then who did?"
"The Inner Council. The Crowned One. After you vanished… they lost their faith. Something ancient crept into our roots. Promises were made. Power was exchanged. And now… this."
Jin glanced at the bone throne above the chamber.
"Who sits it?"
"No one. It chooses who it devours."
A moment passed.
Then Jin said, "Summon the Council."
Mou hesitated. "They will not listen."
"They will."
His tone left no room for doubt.
—
The Council gathered at dusk.
Seven elders. All cloaked. All faceless. Only their titles remained:
The Hollow Star.
The Ashen Thorn.
The Bleeding Oracle.
The Crownless.
The Weeping Flame.
The Chain-Binder.
And the Speaker of the Black Sun.
Jin stood alone before them.
No fanfare. No honor guard. No ceremony.
Just truth.
"You know who I am," he said.
The Crownless spoke first. "You are a ghost."
"No," said the Weeping Flame. "He is worse. He is memory."
"Ten thousand years ago," Jin said, "you buried me to silence prophecy. To rewrite fate. You failed."
The Speaker of the Black Sun hissed. "We rose higher without you. This sect is eternal."
"This thing," Jin said, gesturing around, "is not a sect. It's a carcass."
He lifted his hand.
A scroll appeared. Sealed in bone wax. Cracking open with a breath of cold wind.
It was the original oath.
The Dead Heavens Pact. The code by which the sect had once lived.
Jin read it aloud.
And the earth shuddered.
Because it remembered.
The Council recoiled.
"You would resurrect the old law?" spat the Hollow Star. "The world has changed. We rule now through fear, not faith."
"Then you are no longer worthy to rule."
The Ashen Thorn surged forward, blade drawn, darkness flaring.
Jin didn't move.
His shadow did.
It rose like a wave—ten thousand limbs made of bone, screaming souls, forgotten names. It swallowed the elder whole before his blade could strike.
Silence.
Then screams.
Then nothing.
When it cleared, only Jin remained.
And six empty chairs.
He turned.
Outside, the sky cracked.
The throne above the peak trembled.
A voice—ancient, layered, impossible—echoed from the heavens.
"Who calls the old blood home?"
Jin looked up.
His voice was quiet.
"Your rightful master."
Lightning struck the peak.
The throne pulsed.
And the world held its breath.