Yes — here is:
Chapter 17: Shattered Parameters and Broken Oaths
The storm had not yet passed.
In the wake of the Veilborne strike, the Ashen Sovereign Sect smoldered in grim silence. Repairs were underway, defenses fortified, and the disciples trained harder than ever—but an invisible weight pressed down upon the mountain.
Inside the heart of the Lotus Flame Chamber, Shen Liang stood motionless, hands hovering over the tablet Yue had entrusted to him—the last living copy of the Celestial Root Code.
He inhaled slowly. The moment he interfaced with it, he would be doing more than violating the laws of system-bound cultivation.
He would be trying to rewire a divine relic.
Access Denied
He knelt and initiated the connection.
[System Sync: Ashen Lotus Core…] [Status: Flame-Bonded | Host: Shen Liang | Authorization Level: Seeker-Prime] [Access Request: Celestial Root Tablet – Integration Protocols Initiated] [Warning: Interference Detected — User Risk Class: Oathbreaker Level 3]
Oathbreaker?
The screen shimmered, flashing crimson.
[Access Denied — Root System Bound to Original Realm Protocols] [Recommendation: Cease interference or face System Cascade Failure]
Shen Liang's breath caught. "It's locked behind oath logic... an old celestial rule system?"
Yue entered silently, sensing the spike in energy.
"Did it reject you?" she asked.
"Yes," Shen Liang said. "But not because I lack access. It's... judging me."
Yue knelt beside him. "Then we rewrite its judgment."
They activated a dual-script cascade—his flame-born logic string, hers spun from ancient frost and memory.
The Root Tablet responded.
A new interface opened. Alien, massive, and beautiful—like a lattice of stars woven through fire and ice.
[Welcome, Last Echoes of the Celestial Order] [Node 731 Unlocked: Fatespindle Tethering] [Node 945 Unlocked: Organic Will Override — Partial Sync] [Node ??? Detected — Warning: Unstable Fracture]
It was working.
Shen Liang reached deeper. The unstable node flickered—its description half-corrupted:
"Memory of the Void Spiral. Contains behavioral logic from the Fall Protocol…"
"...Last administrator: Yue Shanshui."
He froze.
"Yue…" he turned. "You were an administrator?"
Ash and Memory
Yue's face was still.
"I told you I trained gods. I never said I wasn't part of their making."
The chamber felt colder. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I was afraid," she whispered. "Of what you'd do. Of what I'd remember."
A silence stretched between them—long and brittle.
Shen Liang turned to the interface again, heart heavy.
He could feel it now—not just system energy, but ancient pain woven into every layer of the Root Code. Yue wasn't just part of the Fall.
She may have helped cause it.
Rival Shadows Rise
On the distant edge of the continent, in a sunken library beneath a glacier, the Veilborne Council convened.
Their leader, a woman named Mo Lian—the Sable Oracle—spoke calmly as she examined a shifting map of qi fractures across the world.
"They've touched the Root," she murmured. "The boy... he's interfaced with the Celestial lattice."
A ripple of unease ran through her lieutenants.
"They've activated Fatespindle?"
"Yes," she said. "And soon, they'll seek to rewrite the Pillar Laws."
A man clad in crimson spoke. "Then we strike."
"No," Mo Lian said, eyes narrowing. "We unleash what we've kept sealed."
She turned toward the depths.
"And we awaken the Writ-Eater."
Training the Next Flame
Back in the Ashen Sect, Shen Liang gathered the core disciples in the training court.
Lei Fen, Jian Yu, and three new initiates stood before him.
He drew the Lotus Fire into the center of the arena.
"This is not about fighting harder," he said. "It's about fighting cleaner. Sharper. Faster. The Veilborne use shadow systems. That means… counter-code."
He tossed them manual sigil plates.
Each one had a modified technique encoded by his partial system rewrite.
"Counter-sequence scripts?" Jian Yu asked, eyes lighting up.
Shen Liang nodded. "Hybrid programming. System-cultivation fusion."
Yue watched from the high perch, silent.
Even in training, she was thinking deeper—past the battle, past the flame.
To the Writ-Eater node.
It had awoken, barely tethered.
Veilborne Retaliation
Night fell.
The Ashen barriers pulsed weakly. A second storm hit.
But it wasn't snow this time.
It was black rain.
And then—screaming.
A Veilborne envoy had broken through the outer gate. Not dozens—hundreds.
At their center, chained and roaring with null-fire, was a creature that looked like a boy—but its mouth was stitched shut with golden thread.
The Writ-Eater.
It fed on systems.
And it was heading straight for Shen Liang.
Shen Liang activated the Lotus Core.
But his techniques fizzled.
The Writ-Eater pulsed. Code bent around it. Techniques rewrote themselves mid-cast. One disciple's fireball turned into ice. Another's sword chant unbound his limbs.
Chaos.
Shen Liang screamed, "Fall back to the core chamber! Protect the Root Tablet!"
Yue descended from above, blade drawn—not to fight, but to speak.
She stepped directly before the creature.
"Writ-Eater," she whispered. "Do you remember me?"
The boy twitched.
His golden threads writhed.
Yue unbound her frost seal, revealing the crest of the original Admin Council.
"I was your creator," she said.
The creature stilled.
Then screamed—and launched itself at her.
Revelation and Flame
Shen Liang's heart cracked open as he moved to intercept.
His palm met the Writ-Eater's chest. It felt like pressing against time itself.
He activated the unstable node.
Code burned his arm. Blood dripped into the flame. The Root Tablet began to fracture.
[WARNING: System Divergence Threshold Crossed] [Secondary Awakening Imminent] [NEW SKILL ACQUIRED: System Immunity — Flameborn Exception]
He absorbed the feedback, forming a seal of pure contradiction—a logic flame.
With a cry, he slammed it into the Writ-Eater's mind.
And for a moment—the creature wept.
The threads dissolved.
The boy fell.
Yue caught him in silence.
Behind them, the battlefield lay smoking.
Shen Liang turned to his disciples—shaken but alive.
The war had begun.
And the system… had blinked.