by ArkGodZ | DaoVerse Studio
The seventh mountain was not the highest of the Eternal Peaks.
But it was the quietest.
It stood at the farthest edge of the Seita Flor Eterna's territory, where petals no longer danced in the wind and silence pressed against the trees like snow that never melted. It was said no disciple ventured there without reason. It was also said that those who did… rarely returned unchanged.
Jian Yu moved without speaking.
Yuan followed close behind, her robes drawn tighter than usual. Her eyes scanned every shadow, her spirit coiled like a blade not yet drawn.
They were alone.
Or so it seemed.
The mountain path was narrow, coiled like a serpent's spine, its stones etched with faded glyphs no longer found in seita records. Twice, they passed old statues of masters long forgotten — eyes chipped, but still watching.
Once, they passed through a gate made of petrified wood and bone.
It didn't creak.
It exhaled.
"Are we being followed?" Yuan whispered.
"Yes," Jian Yu replied. "But not by enemies."
She tilted her head.
"Then by who?"
"By the mountain."
It was nearly midnight when they reached a hidden alcove — a hollow arch of stone veiled by old illusions. The scroll from Elder Mei shimmered faintly in Jian Yu's hand, reacting to the symbols carved into the stone.
He pressed it against the glyph.
A pulse.
And then… the mountain opened.
Not a gate. Not a portal.
A breath.
As if something within had been waiting for him.
Inside, it was not a cave.
It was a sanctum.
Torches flickered to life on their own, lining a spiral descent of smooth, obsidian stairs. Murals lined the walls — ancient scenes of cultivators in flame-colored robes, meditating beside titanic lotuses that bloomed from fire and shadow.
One showed a man—barefoot, eyes closed—standing unburned in the center of a volcano.
Another, a woman with six arms, each holding a different sword of emotion: Joy, Rage, Lust, Grief, Devotion, and Resolve.
And at the very center of the final mural:
A serpent and a lotus, intertwined.
Jian Yu touched the stone.
The Sutra pulsed inside him, low and deep, like thunder hiding beneath skin.
"They remember," he whispered.
"They never forgot," a voice said.
Yuan turned sharply.
From the lower steps, four figures emerged.
Not masked.
Not armed.
But veiled in power that pressed the air flat around them.
They wore no seita robes. No sect colors. Only dark cloaks with the Sutra's emblem burned subtly at the chest — serpent and lotus, in deep crimson.
The one who had spoken stepped forward. A woman, tall and lean, her hair silver as moonlight, her gaze unreadable.
"You are late, heir."
Jian Yu blinked. "You were expecting me?"
"No," she said. "We were waiting."
"You are late, heir," the silver-haired woman repeated.
Jian Yu held her gaze. "And you are bold to call me that so easily."
She didn't flinch.
"We are Rememberers. Titles mean nothing to us unless earned."
Yuan stepped forward, eyes narrowing. "Then why summon us? Why open this place if all you offer is doubt?"
Another Rememberer — a young man with a jagged scar across his lips — spoke with a low voice that rippled like a second echo.
"Because doubt is the only proof that truth still matters."
Jian Yu lowered his hand. The scroll Elder Mei had given him was now dull, its glow gone.
"Why now?" he asked. "Why appear only after I awakened the Sutra?"
"Because you were the first to awaken it fully," the woman replied. "Others touched it. Tasted it. But none embraced it without falling into madness or lust. You... walked through the fire."
"Barely."
"And yet, you did not burn."
The four figures led them deeper into the sanctum. The walls changed — less murals, more mirrors. But not ordinary ones. These reflected not the body, but the soul.
Jian Yu saw himself in one: young, uncertain, but with a golden flame flickering behind his heart.
He paused.
"Is this…?"
"The Mirror of Origin," said the scarred one. "It shows you as the Sutra sees you."
Yuan looked at hers — and said nothing. Her reflection wore the same face, but with eyes that held stars and ruin together.
Jian Yu whispered, "What do you want from me?"
The silver-haired woman stopped before a stone altar. A lotus, carved in perfect detail, floated above it.
"We don't want anything," she said. "We're here to remind you of what was taken."
She gestured, and the lotus split open.
From within, a scroll rose. Bound in golden thread.
Jian Yu's breath caught. The Sutra recognized it immediately.
"The Second Verse," the woman said. "The piece sealed before the Great Purge. Only the heir can unbind it."
Jian Yu stepped forward. The air tightened, like glass waiting to shatter.
He placed his hand upon it.
And the world disappeared.
He stood not in the sanctum, but in a sky of flame and silk.
Thousands of voices sang.
He saw the Ancients — men and women with eyes like galaxies, cultivating not through silence, but through desire, longing, hunger, love.
They weren't weak.
They weren't evil.
They were radiant.
And then… he saw the betrayal.
The burning of scrolls. The sealing of temples. The rise of fear.
The Sutra… broken.
But not dead.
A voice whispered in his ear, soft and feminine:
"We are not lost. We are waiting."
He gasped as the vision ended.
Yuan caught him.
He didn't speak for several breaths.
Then:
"I saw it."
"We know," the silver-haired woman said. "And now… you remember."
Jian Yu's chest still heaved as the echo of the vision faded. His hand trembled, fingers hovering above the now-dormant scroll. Yuan held him steady, her warmth an anchor in the ocean of memory and fire that raged inside him.
Across the chamber, the silver-haired woman nodded, as if she had seen it all through his eyes.
"We are called Rememberers, yes," she said. "But we are more than witnesses. We are shards of a broken legacy, waiting for the right hands to gather us."
Jian Yu looked up. "Then tell me your name. I'm tired of shadows."
She inclined her head. "I am Meiyan. Once a disciple of the Nine-Petal Path, before they branded me traitor for following the Sutra. Now, I am the keeper of its Second Verse."
The man with the scar crossed his arms. "Tian Ren. Sword cultivator. I lost my voice when I tried to recite the Third Verse aloud... and my sect tried to silence me."
The third was a woman with bronze skin and vine tattoos spiraling across her collarbones. She stepped forward with calm grace. "Lei Xun. Alchemist. I followed the Sutra's path not for power, but for understanding. They burned my research. I burned their archives."
The last was silent for a time.
Then a young boy—barely older than fifteen—spoke in a whisper that trembled the ground beneath them. "I am called Yan. I remember because I was born with the Sutra branded on my soul. I don't know where I came from. Only that I was waiting for you."
Jian Yu looked at them all, then back at Meiyan.
"You say I'm the heir. But to what, exactly? A forgotten Dao? A philosophy crushed under centuries of fear? Why keep this hidden?"
Meiyan's gaze hardened. "Because truth requires timing. You were not ready. The world was not ready. Now... maybe it is."
He stepped closer. "And if I say no? If I walk away from this path?"
Tian Ren raised his hand. "Then you walk. No blade would chase you. But the Sutra would."
Yuan narrowed her eyes. "Is that a threat?"
Lei Xun interjected quickly, raising both hands. "It's a warning. The Sutra... calls. Once it recognizes its heir, it cannot be silenced. It will shape your spirit with or without your consent."
Jian Yu closed his eyes. "Then I want to understand it before it consumes me."
He turned to the altar.
"I want to unlock the Second Verse."
The scroll began to glow again.
But this time, it did not pulse with warmth. It flared with contradiction — heat and ice, love and fear, clarity and madness.
A wind swept through the chamber, though no doors were open.
Jian Yu's voice trembled as he spoke.
"What must I do?"
Yan stepped forward and laid a small hand over his.
"You don't read the Second Verse," he said softly. "You feel it. With every piece of you that was broken. And with every part that refused to stay shattered."
The scroll unraveled on its own.
From it came no words — only light. Gold and black, entwined like lovers dancing in the void. The light spiraled around Jian Yu, slipping beneath his skin, crawling along his spine, threading through every meridian.
He didn't scream.
But he almost did.
Because in that moment, he remembered everything.
His clan's destruction.
The betrayal of Elder Mo.
The voice of his mother before the fire swallowed her.
And something else — something far older, something he had never known but somehow always carried:
A woman's laughter.
Soft. Familiar.
Cruel.
Jian Yu collapsed to his knees.
Yuan was at his side instantly.
"Enough," she barked. "This isn't training. It's torture."
"No," Jian Yu whispered. "It's truth."
He looked up at Meiyan, eyes glowing faintly with Sutra-light.
"I saw her again. The one from my dreams."
Meiyan's expression darkened. "Then the Third Verse is already stirring."
A long silence followed.
Then Tian Ren stepped forward, laying a sword wrapped in dark silk at Jian Yu's feet.
"When you leave here, enemies will follow. Some from your past. Some from ours. You should carry a blade worthy of your burden."
Jian Yu unwrapped it.
The sword wasn't beautiful — it was honest. Steel forged with raw emotion, its hilt wrapped in black silk stained with red thread. When he touched it, the blade hummed with recognition.
"This was mine?"
"No," Tian Ren said. "But it should have been."
As Jian Yu stood, Meiyan offered him a small pendant — a serpent wrapped around a lotus in miniature.
"Wear this," she said. "It will identify you to our kin. And protect you… when the Sealed Paths begin to open."
He took it without hesitation.
Yuan watched him closely.
Later, when they walked alone down the obsidian stairs, she spoke.
"You changed."
"I remembered," he replied.
"Will you forget me?"
He stopped.
He cupped her face in both hands.
"You're the only thing I never forgot. Even before I knew what I'd lost."
She kissed him.
Softly. Fiercely.
As if sealing something sacred into the space between them.
Far above, in the sky beyond the mountain, a crack formed in the clouds — brief, like lightning without sound.
And through it… something watched.
🔹 End of Chapter 32 – Beneath the Seventh Mountain
🔹 Next Chapter: The Third Verse Stirs
🔹 Join the Discord https://discord.gg/y8xDvzAX
🔹 Audiobook https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXbcND2G3qQ&t=2s
🔹 DaoVerse Studio https://daoversestudio.com