It is said in ancient scrolls and among tombs of immortals that time is not a straight river, but a coiling serpent—biting its tail, circling the world.
And in rare, soul-searing moments, one may catch a glimpse of the eternal coil... and return.
Rain had long stopped, but the chill remained.
Li Qiong awoke where blood had dried into stone and skin, his robe soaked and stiff with filth and cold. The courtyard was empty. Birds refused to sing.
He sat up slowly, dizzy. Blood loss made his vision blur.
In his past life, he would've groaned, cried, even begged.
But now?
He clenched his teeth and tied wild herbs and ragged linen around his split palms and bleeding scalp. No medical pills. No elixirs. No warm hands to take care.
He pushed himself up. The stone was cold beneath his bare feet. His knees wobbled.
He limped to the corner, picked up a broom, and began sweeping.
"If I rest, I don't eat."
He remembered clearly: the sect provided food only if work was done.
He swept slowly, each drag a struggle.
He was pale as bone. Yet his eyes? Brighter than ever. Cold, bottomless.
Those who passed by—the outer disciples, junior stewards—paused, frowning.
"Why is he still alive?"
"Just seeing him offends me."
They spat.
But none dared meet his eyes for more than a second. Something had changed. The boy's posture. His gait. His aura.
It wasn't arrogance.
It was certainty.
The Emerald Jade Valley was a thousand-year-old power, standing tall atop the sprawling heights of Jade Mountain. Its compounds stretched like veins over the ridges—six in total, forming the spine of its grand cultivation system.
The outer courtyard teemed with low-ranked disciples who swept paths, tended fields, and carried water for their own meals. The inner courtyard gleamed with qi harmonizing pools and martial arenas, where those selected trained under sharp-eyed instructors and feasted in warmth.
Elder halls brimmed with teachings of Body Tempering and Qi Gathering.
Core disciples trained within deeper chambers of the sect's heart, learning breakthrough techniques under the eye of Nascent Soul experts in the high Nascent Tower.
At the summit sat the Jade Pavilion, where Elders, Hall Masters, and finally, the Patriarch, ruled.
And somewhere, far beneath all this splendor, in mud and silence, lived Li Qiong.
Not as a disciple. Not even as a mortal with hope.
But as the sect handyman—"outer servant," the title given to him because of his birth. A shame. A mistake the sect could not erase, but refused to acknowledge.
His mother had once enchanted the capital. A woman of unmatched beauty, she returned from the Imperial Dao Court with shame in her belly—triplets born from a man cloaked in gold, vanished like smoke. The sect tolerated her because of her blood, and her sons because of potential.
The younger two had proven themselves.
Li Hongye, eleven years old, was the pride of the outer court. Handsome, bright, already at Qi Gathering. His blade techniques were praised at every ceremony.
Li Wuji, the youngest at ten, was already stepping into early Core Formation. No child in fifty years had managed such a feat. Elders gave him pills. Instructors fought to guide him.
And Li Qiong?
The firstborn.
The one never tested. Never chosen.
The one assigned no cultivation, denied the root test, left nameless among the records.
While his brothers trained beneath glowing talismans and sparred on engraved stone floors, Li Qiong swept dirt from the corners of their robes and scrubbed the blood off their boots.
He bled, bruised, and disappeared.
He lived not in the quarters for servants, but in the farthest northeast cliff.
There, where wind bit the bone and the rocks hung loose, stood a hut that could barely be called shelter.
Its wood had rotted long ago. Roof tiles hung loose, many missing entirely, so rain and moonlight fell together. Wind whistled through the walls, and the floorboards remained slick year-round. Rats nested beneath the mildewed straw. Snakes visited during monsoon nights. Once, even a starving fox had curled in beside him.
There was no bed—only refuse.
No light—fire was forbidden.
He cooked field mice and stolen roots behind the wall where wind couldn't snatch the flame.
Not even a stray dog would stay here.
But Li Qiong was no disciple.
He was the shame of the sect.
The Patriarch himself had called him a stain.
And yet, none knew the truth.
Li Qiong was not a boy.
He was a man who had once walked the Nine Heavens.
A man who had stood atop a mountain of corpses, his robe drenched in blood, his hands stained with karma.
He had mastered techniques long since lost.
Burned beneath divine spears.
Watched empires crumble.
Defied fate once.
And fate, now, had bent to his will.
He had returned.
By the time the sun pierced the mist, Li Qiong had already swept the courtyard, gathered firewood, cleaned the elders' path, and washed the disciples' robes—his own blood vanishing into the stream.
He ate nothing.
Drank nothing.
Yet he stood tall.
A servant passed. She dropped her bucket.
Another disciple bumped him, then turned back in confusion.
"What... was that?"
Tomorrow would be the Awakening Ceremony—the day every child of the sect was tested.
Spirit roots would be measured.
Talents ranked.
C-ranks would become Outer Disciples.
A-ranks became seeds of the future.
Trash?
Trash was thrown away.
But Li Qiong didn't care.
By noon, his chores were done.
As usual, they denied him food.
If it was the twelve-year-old Li Qiong, he would've stood there, waiting, maybe even begging.
But not today.
Today, he turned and left without a word.
He made his way down the back mountain to the hidden stream.
There, he jumped. A koi flailed in his grasp.
He roasted it quietly near the rocks, hiding the fire behind collapsed stone.
As he ate, he planned.
Because this life was different.
"They think I do not see the strings. That I am merely a puppet twitching in the fog.
But I've walked the paths of madness and returned with clarity.
Let them smile their smiles and make their moves. Time is patient. And so am I."
He remembered where the founder hid the Jade Body Scripture.
He remembered the ancient vault buried beneath Jade Mountain, crawling with beasts that the sect had forgotten.
He remembered the spirit beast that would one day massacre the sect—
and how to tame it.
He remembered everything.
And when he looked up, the clouds parted.
He smirked.
This time, everything was within reach.
Time.
Knowledge.
A chance, a second chance.