Sunrise crowned the green mountains with gold, painting peaks and valleys in the warm colors of morning. The forest bloomed with life—birds calling to each other, insects beginning their daily work, small animals emerging from burrows and nests. Clouds drifted overhead, changing course with winds that cared nothing for the paths of men below. Morning was fine like aged wine, settling beyond the sky with the promise of another day.
Day two.
*I can't use Will,* Zhung thought, the frustration carefully contained beneath his usual cold exterior. *How could I use something I don't understand? Even when I try using the body tempering methods from my dream-life to activate Will, it doesn't work. Will has a different method, different principles, different fundamental requirements.*
*That world had internal energy cultivation, refining the body's natural essence through meditation and breath control. But Will... Will is something else entirely. External. Environmental. And I have no teacher, no manual, no guidance except what I can piece together through observation and experimentation.*
He lay in his tent alone, staring at the canvas ceiling as dawn light began filtering through the fabric. His body was still, but his mind raced through possibilities and theories, trying to solve a puzzle with incomplete pieces.
*I can still use some body tempering methods from my dream-life,* he reminded himself. *That much works. The demonic essence in my Aperture can be circulated through my physical form to enhance strength and durability. But true cultivation techniques—the kind that let cultivators throw fire or shatter stone—those require understanding Will, and Will remains a mystery.*
He sat up slowly, disturbing no one with his movement. The tent was small, cramped, but sufficient for sleeping. Through the fabric walls, he could hear the faint sounds of the camp—someone snoring (probably Hu), the occasional shift of bodies, the normal sounds of people deep in sleep.
Zhung stepped out from the tent, his dark eyes immediately scanning his surroundings with practiced efficiency. The sky above was caught in that liminal space between night and day—not quite dark, not yet bright, painted in shades of gray that would gradually warm to blue and gold.
The ground was cold beneath his feet, and the breeze carried the bite of frost that promised winter wasn't far off. Although the temperature should have bothered him, although he should have felt the chill seeping through his black hanfu, he only felt hollow. Empty. As if the cold was simply one more irrelevant detail in a world full of them.
Still, he was standing. Alive. About to embark on day two of a journey that would end with him killing someone on Li Huang's orders—another step down the path he'd chosen, another compromise with the darkness that seemed to follow him across lifetimes.
He took a step—small and quiet—then another. He walked into the depths of the forest without clear destination, simply moving because stillness felt suffocating. His feet found a narrow path between trees, and he followed it deeper into the woods.
Eventually, he reached a clearing—a space where trees had fallen or failed to grow, creating an open area perhaps thirty feet across. The ground was relatively flat, covered in dead leaves and exposed stone. It was a place clear of the forest's usual clutter, clear of the cover of life, open to the sky above.
Zhung stopped and looked up. The sky was still dark, still holding onto the last remnants of night, though gray was beginning to overtake black at the eastern edge. Dawn was coming, slowly but inevitably.
As he was about to continue walking, simply to move and think, he heard something that made him pause.
A loud sound—a crack of impact, stone striking stone. And beneath it, around it, something else. A feeling. A pressure in the air that made his empty Aperture pulse in his chest with uncomfortable recognition.
*Will,* he realized. *Someone is using Will.*
Zhung walked toward the sound, following it through the trees with careful steps, until he reached another clearing—this one larger, more deliberately chosen for its open space and large boulders scattered across the ground like giant's toys.
A familiar figure stood in the center of the clearing.
He was majestic despite—or perhaps because of—his unusual appearance. His golden eyes caught the faint pre-dawn light and reflected it back like a cat's. His white hair, short and neatly kept, seemed to glow against the darkness behind him. His pale skin, corpse-like in its lack of color, somehow appeared healthy and strong rather than sickly.
Bai.
He stood in a fighting stance, his clothes soaked with sweat that ran from his face down his neck and chest. Before him, a boulder—easily twice his size—bore fresh cracks radiating from a central impact point. His hair swayed with the cold wind, and when his gaze shifted to the side, his golden eyes locked onto the dark, empty eyes watching him from the tree line.
"Oh, just awake?" Bai asked, his voice flat but carrying a hint of distance, as if he was marking Zhung's presence but not particularly interested in it.
"Yes," Zhung replied coldly, then paused to analyze what he was seeing. The boulder. The cracks. The residual feeling of Will in the air. "What were you doing?"
"Just refining my technique and Will," Bai said simply. His golden eyes remained sharp, studying Zhung with the analytical gaze of someone trying to determine motivation and threat level. "Can't let my skills rust. Assassination work requires precision, and precision requires constant practice."
The two stood in silence for a long moment. The breeze swayed their clothes—Bai's sweat-soaked shirt, Zhung's black hanfu—making the fabric ripple and snap. Just two figures with different paths and focuses, each measuring the other, neither quite sure what the other represented.
Then Zhung spoke, and the words came out before he fully decided whether revealing this weakness was wise: "I don't actually know how to use Will."
His gaze remained cold as steel, his expression never reacting, giving away nothing of the vulnerability implicit in that admission.
Bai's golden eyes widened fractionally—surprise quickly masked but present for just a moment. "You... don't know how to use Will?" He turned to face Zhung fully now, his stance relaxing from combat readiness to something more like curiosity. "But you have an Aperture. I can sense it. How did you form an Aperture without understanding Will?"
"I consumed demonic blood," Zhung said flatly. "It opened the Aperture. But no one taught me how to use it. I've been... experimenting."
Bai was quiet for several seconds, his expression thoughtful. Then, unexpectedly, he smiled—a small expression, but genuine. "You formed an Aperture and survived the transformation without any guidance? And Li Huang recruited you without teaching you the basics?" He shook his head. "That's either incredibly brave or incredibly stupid. Possibly both."
"Does it matter which?" Zhung asked.
"Not really." Bai gestured to a large, flat stone nearby. "Sit. If you're going to be on this team, you need to at least understand the fundamentals. Can't have you dying because you don't know how to defend yourself with Will."
Zhung moved to the stone and sat, his posture straight, his attention focused entirely on Bai. This was information he desperately needed, knowledge that could mean the difference between life and death.
Bai remained standing, beginning to pace as he spoke—not from nervousness, but as if movement helped him organize his thoughts.
"Will is the fundamental power of this world," he began, his voice taking on the tone of a teacher explaining concepts to a student. "It's external. Environmental. It exists all around us, in the air, in the earth, in everything that has substance and existence."
He gestured broadly at the clearing, the trees, the sky. "All of this—everything you can see and touch—is permeated with Will. It's the fundamental energy of existence itself. Every stone, every leaf, every breath of wind carries traces of it."
Zhung listened without interrupting, his mind absorbing and filing away every detail.
"The Aperture," Bai continued, pointing to his own chest, "is the organ that allows us to interact with Will. Think of it as a... a lens, or a filter. It takes the demonic or divine blood stored inside it and uses that blood as a medium—a bridge between your consciousness and the Will that exists outside your body."
He paused, making sure Zhung was following. "The blood in your Aperture is like oil in a lamp. When you use Will, you're burning that oil to create light—to create effects in the world around you. The more Will you channel, the more blood you consume. And when the blood is depleted..." He made a gesture like water draining from a cup. "You're powerless until it refills."
"How long does refilling take?" Zhung asked, thinking of his own week-long wait after body tempering.
"Depends on your Aperture's location and quality," Bai said. "Mine is in my head—took me three weeks to fully refill the first time I emptied it. Now I'm more efficient, but it still takes two weeks minimum for a complete refill. It's like a glass sphere being filled drop by drop, endlessly slowly."
*Two weeks,* Zhung thought. *Mine takes a week. That's an advantage I should keep quiet about.*
"The blood doesn't regenerate on its own," Bai continued. "Your Aperture slowly absorbs ambient Will from the environment and converts it, but the process is glacially slow. That's why cultivators are always hunting beasts—we need fresh blood to maintain our power and advance in rank."
He stopped pacing and faced Zhung directly. "Now, here's the important part about actually using Will. Are you paying attention?"
Zhung nodded once.
"Will is based on imagination and intent," Bai said, his golden eyes intense. "What you can imagine, you can potentially create—but only if you understand the fundamentals. You need structure. You need a method to channel the Will from the environment, through the blood in your Aperture, and out into reality."
He raised his right hand, forming a specific gesture—index finger extended, other fingers curled into his palm, thumb pressed against the side. "This is a hand sign. Every technique requires one. Some techniques use the same sign but different intent. Others use complex sequences of multiple signs. The sign is the physical anchor—it helps focus your Will and gives it direction."
Zhung studied the hand sign carefully, memorizing the exact position.
"There are two paths to learning techniques," Bai explained. "First, you can copy someone else's technique—learn their hand sign, understand their intent, and replicate what they do. Second, you can create your own technique from scratch—design your own hand sign, define your own intent, and experiment until it works. Most cultivators do both—copy fundamentals, then modify and create as they advance."
He lowered his hand. "I'm going to demonstrate a technique I created myself. Watch carefully."
Bai moved back to the center of the clearing, facing one of the large boulders. He raised his right hand again, forming the same pointing gesture—index finger extended straight forward, aimed at the boulder.
"The technique is called Stone Bullet," he said, his voice carrying clearly despite the distance. "Watch the tip of my finger."
Zhung focused his attention on Bai's extended finger, his enhanced senses noting every detail.
Bai's expression became concentrated. The air around him seemed to shift, to become heavier, and Zhung felt that pressure again—the distinct sensation of Will being gathered and shaped.
At the tip of Bai's finger, something materialized.
It was small—perhaps the size of a marble—and appeared to be made of stone. Not carved or shaped by tools, but condensed directly from the air itself, particles of earth and stone drawn together by Will and compressed into a dense projectile.
Then Bai's finger moved slightly—a small flick, almost dismissive—and the stone bullet shot forward.
The impact against the boulder was surprisingly loud—a sharp *crack* like a hammer striking stone. A visible divot appeared in the boulder's surface, chips of rock flying outward from the point of impact.
The bullet itself had shattered on impact, but the damage it caused was significant—far more than any thrown stone could achieve, because it had been compressed and accelerated by Will to speeds and densities beyond natural limits.
"That's Stone Bullet," Bai said, lowering his hand. His breathing was slightly heavier, and Zhung noticed his skin looked fractionally paler—the technique had consumed some of the blood in his Aperture. "Simple, efficient, and adaptable. You can make the bullets larger or smaller depending on how much Will you channel. Larger bullets are slower but hit harder. Smaller ones are faster but do less damage."
He turned to Zhung. "Now you try."
Zhung stood from his stone seat and moved to stand beside Bai, both of them facing the damaged boulder.
"First," Bai instructed, "form the hand sign. Exactly as I showed you."
Zhung raised his right hand, extending his index finger while curling the others. He adjusted the position based on his memory until it matched Bai's demonstration as closely as possible.
"Good," Bai said. "Now, this is the difficult part. You need to do several things simultaneously: sense the Will around you, draw it toward your Aperture, let it mix with the demonic blood inside, and then push it out through your finger while imagining—visualizing with absolute clarity—a stone bullet forming."
"All at once?" Zhung asked.
"All at once," Bai confirmed. "That's why it takes practice. Most cultivators fail dozens of times before their first successful technique. Don't be discouraged if nothing happens."
Zhung closed his eyes and turned his attention inward, toward the Aperture in his heart.
He could feel it clearly—a hollow organ, a vessel designed to hold power. Inside, there was... something. Not much. The demonic blood from his last cultivation session hadn't fully regenerated, and what little had accumulated was barely enough to sense. It felt like a few drops of liquid swirling in an otherwise empty container.
*Not full,* he noted. *Nowhere near full. But it should be enough for one attempt. Maybe two if I'm careful.*
He opened his eyes, maintaining awareness of his Aperture while also focusing on the world around him.
*Sense the Will,* he commanded himself, following Bai's instructions.
At first, there was nothing. Just the ordinary world—trees, stone, air, light. No different than it had always been.
Then, gradually, he began to perceive something else. It was subtle, like seeing stars for the first time after your eyes adjusted to darkness. The air wasn't just empty space—it was filled with something. The stone wasn't just inert matter—it held something within it.
Will. Everywhere. Permeating everything.
*Draw it toward my Aperture.*
This was harder. The Will didn't want to move. It was content to remain diffused, spread through the environment like water in a vast ocean. But Zhung focused his intent, his consciousness reaching out and pulling, coaxing, demanding that the Will come to him.
Slowly—so slowly—he felt currents of Will beginning to flow toward him, drawn by his Aperture's gravity. The sensation was strange, like feeling wind that couldn't be touched but was definitely present.
The Will reached his Aperture and mixed with the remaining demonic blood inside. He felt the blood activate, felt it begin to burn—not with heat, but with potential, with possibility.
*Push it out through my finger while imagining a stone bullet.*
He focused on his extended index finger, visualizing the path—from Aperture, through his arm, to his fingertip. He pushed the activated blood outward, forcing it to travel where it naturally wouldn't go.
And in his mind, he held an image with absolute clarity: a small sphere of stone, dense and solid, compressed to the limit of what stone could be without breaking down entirely.
At the tip of his finger, something began to form.
It was crude—rough-surfaced and irregular—but it was definitely there. A stone bullet, approximately the size of a marble, hovering at his fingertip with visible instability.
Zhung felt the blood in his Aperture suddenly deplete—the few drops he'd accumulated vanishing in an instant, burned to fuel this one technique.
*Now shoot it.*
He flicked his finger toward the boulder, imagining the bullet flying forward with speed and force.
The stone bullet shot from his finger, wobbling slightly in flight, and struck the boulder several feet below where Bai's had hit.
The impact was less impressive than Bai's demonstration—the bullet shattered immediately, creating only a small chip in the stone rather than a proper divot. But it had worked. The technique had succeeded.
Zhung lowered his hand, examining his finger as if expecting to see some change. It looked the same as always.
"Not bad for a first attempt," Bai said, and his tone carried genuine approval. "Most people can't even form the bullet on their first try. You have good visualization skills and decent control. With practice, you'll be able to make them faster, denser, more accurate."
"Also this technique isn't truly mine but I refined and change it's fundamental to had more damage." Bai said telling the truth.
Zhung turned his attention inward again, checking his Aperture. As he'd suspected, it was now completely empty—the small amount of blood that had been regenerating was gone, consumed entirely by that single technique.
"My Aperture is empty now," he said flatly. "How long before I can use techniques again?"
"If it was nearly empty before, probably a week before you have enough blood to make it worthwhile," Bai replied. "You can use techniques with very little blood, but they'll be weak and inefficient. Better to wait until you have a decent reserve."
He studied Zhung with those analytical golden eyes. "You should practice the fundamentals while your blood regenerates. Form the hand sign repeatedly until it becomes automatic. Meditate on sensing Will in the environment—that's a skill that improves with time and doesn't require using your blood. The physical training you've been doing is also good. A strong body makes channeling Will easier."
"Thank you," Zhung said, the words simple but carrying genuine gratitude. This knowledge was valuable—possibly invaluable. Bai had no reason to teach him, could have kept these secrets to maintain his own advantage, but had chosen to share them anyway.
Bai shrugged, a casual gesture. "Can't have my teammates dying because they're ignorant. Bad for business." But his small smile suggested the reason went deeper than mere pragmatism.
He turned to leave the clearing, heading back toward camp. "Come on. The others will be waking soon, and Hu gets cranky if breakfast isn't ready when he wants it."
Zhung followed, his mind already working through everything he'd learned, organizing the information, planning how to practice these fundamentals.
*Stone Bullet is simple but versatile,* he thought as they walked. *A ranged attack that can be performed quickly. Good for assassination work—quiet, no distinctive features that could be traced back to the user. And the fundamental principles... those can be adapted. If I can compress stone into a bullet, what else could I compress? What other materials could I shape with Will?*
*Possibilities. So many possibilities.*
They reached the camp to find Hu already awake and building up the fire, cursing under his breath about the cold and the lack of tea. The driver was emerging from his tent, mask already in place, moving to check on the donkey.
"About time," Hu grumbled when he saw them approaching. "I was starting to think a beard bear had eaten you both."
"Just morning training," Bai said casually, moving to help with breakfast preparations.
Zhung returned to his tent to gather his belongings, packing everything methodically. As he worked, he practiced the hand sign repeatedly—forming it, relaxing, forming it again—until the gesture became automatic, requiring no conscious thought.
*One day of travel complete. One morning of unexpected education. One technique learned.*
*Progress.*
---
**Two hours later**
The four of them sat in the covered cart once more, the donkey pulling them steadily along the road toward Xia Lu Town. The sun had fully risen now, painting the world in warm autumn colors.
Hu sat in his usual position, occasionally taking swigs from his wine bottle despite the early hour. Bai had returned to his meditation, eyes closed, breathing slow and steady. The masked driver guided the donkey with minimal effort, his attention seemingly focused on the road but probably listening to everything around him.
And in the back, Zhung sat with his arms crossed, his dark eyes watching the landscape pass by while his mind continued to work through cultivation theory and practical applications.
His fingers twitched occasionally, unconsciously forming the Stone Bullet hand sign, then relaxing, then forming it again. Muscle memory building. Neural pathways strengthening.
"You're practicing," Bai observed without opening his eyes. "Good. Repetition is how techniques become instinct."
Zhung didn't respond, but he didn't stop either.
The cart rolled on, carrying four assassins toward their target, while the morning sun climbed higher and the day grew warmer. Birds sang in the trees. The breeze carried the scent of fallen leaves and distant rain.
It was peaceful. Almost beautiful.
But all four of them knew this peace was temporary—a calm before violence, a brief respite before blood would be spilled and another life would end.
For now, though, they traveled in relative comfort, each lost in their own thoughts, each preparing in their own way for what was coming.
Zhung's fingers formed the hand sign again, held it for a three-count, then relaxed.
*Stone Bullet,* he thought. *A beginning. The first technique of many.*
*The Broken Path continues forward, one step at a time, one technique at a time, one death at a time.*
*Until I'm strong enough that no one—not Li Huang, not fate, not Heaven itself—can use me as a tool anymore.*
The cart's wheels turned steadily, eating the distance to Xia Lu Town, while above them the sun shone with indifferent radiance on the just and unjust alike.
---
**End of Chapter 19**