The sun dipped low over Nuoding City, casting golden rays across the spires of the Spirit Master Academy. While other students enjoyed rest, Tang San walked the alleyways of the outer city, his eyes sharp and movements efficient. Each step he took was measured—not just through the streets but through destiny itself.
His outward appearance remained humble: a young student of the primary spirit hall with average spirit power and talent. No one suspected that his cultivation had subtly surpassed his peers, not because of some explosive leap, but through slow, focused dedication. The Mysterious Heaven Technique he practiced—while known to a few—was merely a cloak. What truly fueled his advancement was the black stone's hidden technique, the one that no soul could replicate without dying.
Tang San had tested it with a sliver of energy on a dead spirit beast bone. The result was terrifying: the bone exploded in waves of spatial turbulence, dark mist surging from it before vanishing into void. It confirmed what the clocked man had warned: this technique was meant for one existence only—Tang San.
He'd spent every night reinforcing his control, meditating, and letting the slow strengthening of his spirit foundation occur naturally. The stone's method did not skyrocket his strength—it improved his potential, bit by bit. His spiritual roots were now firmer, his perception sharper. It was like forging a divine blade over countless strikes rather than pouring it from molten gold.
By day, he continued to attend classes. Grandmaster's teachings, though rigid, offered valuable frameworks. Tang San never disrespected them but merely interpreted them through his own superior clarity. At night, he took odd jobs around Nuoding City to earn coins—not out of poverty, but to purchase herbs and materials to support his silent cultivation.
Cleaning warehouses, delivering medicine, assisting in apothecaries—each job honed his physical body while hiding his inner growth. Coin by coin, he collected the spiritual ingredients he would one day need to forge talismans and hidden weapons. Even now, his mind sketched diagrams of his previous life's tools, already adjusting their design to fit this world's spiritual physics.
Grandmaster noticed his subtle progress. He didn't voice it aloud but took note of Tang San's remarkable stability in cultivating to Rank 15 without visible strain. Tang San played the role well: a respectful, curious disciple with slightly above-average talent. But the truth was, his inner sea of spirit energy flowed with surprising purity. Thanks to the hidden technique, his body could now absorb spirit energy at a rate at least twice that of normal students, and this gap would only widen over time.
But Tang San never let his guard drop. Even in solitude, he masked his cultivation. He never invoked the black stone technique where it could be sensed. When he meditated beneath the moon, he dug a chamber beneath a crumbling shed outside the city and practiced there—sealed by hand-carved talismans of concealment and silencing.
There were times the black stone would glow faintly in his palm, pulsing with a heartbeat not of this world. Tang San's sharp instincts warned him then: this stone came from beyond the God Realm. The cloaked man, whoever he was, had merely found it. Its origin was older, deeper, and more terrible than he could yet comprehend.
He engraved that fear into his heart and used it as fuel to remain cautious. He could not be tempted into recklessness. His path was long, and the prison of the God Realm still loomed as his enemy. He had no interest in becoming a god within another's system. He would forge his own.
On the morning of his next class, Tang San arrived with calm composure. Xiao Wu teased him about overworking, but he simply smiled and said he liked "feeling productive." She, like others, noticed he was maturing quickly, but no one questioned it too deeply.
Tang San, meanwhile, was preparing. His first spirit ring had been a modest leap, and he knew the second one had to be more powerful—perhaps even double the age that others dared to absorb. But he wouldn't rush.
He needed control. Mastery. A soul that could endure.
And in the darkness beneath Nuoding's streets, a boy with calm eyes meditated alone, while a forbidden black stone hovered silently beside him, spinning slow circles in the void.
To be continued..