Darkness.
That was the first thing Ashen Wu felt—thick, endless, suffocating. It pressed against his senses like a shroud of eternity, cold and unrelenting. For a moment, he thought this was the final oblivion. That death, after all the blood, screams, and betrayal, had finally taken him.
Then came the pain.
It wasn't the pain of a sword through the gut, or a heart crushed by betrayal. No, this pain was low and constant, like fire simmering beneath the flesh. His throat burned. His limbs were heavy. His stomach—empty. Starving.
A gasp tore from his lips as he sat up.
Ashen Wu opened his eyes.
The world greeted him with filth.
He lay on a straw mat soaked in rot, inside a mold-dark shack made of warped wood and cracked tiles. The scent of old sweat, blood, and mildew filled his nostrils. Rats scurried in the corners. Outside, the sound of a bell clanged three times—dull and lifeless.
He touched his face. It felt wrong—thinner, weaker, unfamiliar.
A puddle of water near the door reflected his image in faint moonlight.
Not his face.
A boy. Pale, sickly. Cheekbones sharp with hunger. Eyes sunken, but wide with confusion. His once-long, obsidian hair—now short and ragged. No cultivation robes. Just torn rags clinging to a thin, bruised body.
Then it came—the memory.
Not his. Someone else's. A boy named Wu Shen, age fifteen, a servant in the Hollow Cloud Sect. Born rootless, beaten for sport, discarded by outer disciples like trash. A worm beneath their boots.
Ashen Wu stared at the reflection for a long time.
He laughed.
It was a dry, hollow sound. No joy in it. Just the bitter irony of a man who had once stood at the peak of the world… and now returned at its bottom.
"They really sent me back," he whispered.
The last thing he remembered before death was the sky splitting open.
A heavenly tribulation. Thirteen heavenly bolts in one breath. The punishment for breaking the world's law.
The Heaven-Eating Scripture.
Ashen Wu had cultivated what no man dared. He hadn't ascended—he had devoured. He crushed golden cores, drank sacred blood, stole techniques by force, and stood above even the immortals.
But in the end, heaven does not forget.
He had been struck down… and yet now, he lived.
In the body of a crippled servant.
His fingers curled into fists.
"Not yet," he muttered. "You thought you ended me. You only made me hungry again."
Suddenly, the shack's door slammed open.
"Wu Shen! You dog, get up!" barked a voice like rusted metal. A heavy boot smashed into his ribs, sending him sprawling.
Ashen gasped as pain bloomed through his chest. He looked up.
A boy—sixteen, maybe seventeen—stood above him in the simple robes of an outer sect disciple. His hair was tied in a sloppy bun, and his eyes glinted with cruelty. Two other disciples stood behind him, laughing.
"I said clean my latrine pit before daybreak, you useless trash," the older boy sneered. "You sleeping in shit again?"
Ashen Wu didn't speak.
The old him might have bowed. Begged. Obeyed.
But the man who devoured heaven did not kneel.
"You deaf?" The boy raised his foot again.
Ashen caught it mid-swing.
His grip was weak. No qi. Just raw instinct. The disciple staggered slightly, surprised.
"You—!"
Ashen released him and lowered his gaze. "Forgive me, Senior Brother. I slipped."
The disciple growled. "Next time you touch me, I'll break your hands. Now crawl."
Ashen lowered himself to the floor and crawled forward without complaint.
The laughter of the others echoed as they left.
But Ashen wasn't crawling out of shame.
He was feeling.
This body was weak. Brittle. Malnourished. No cultivation root. No qi. The perfect vessel for erasure. Heaven had sent him here to rot like an insect.
But something stirred in his gut.
A low hum. A whisper.
He waited until nightfall.
When the sect bells rang for the final time, Ashen slipped from the shack and made his way to the rear cliffs, where discarded pills, spoiled herbs, and failed elixirs were thrown into a waste pit. The area stank of decay, but he didn't care.
He searched with trembling hands.
Rotten, melted, cracked… but then—
A single broken pill. Faintly red. Laced with impurities. Useless to anyone else.
He ate it.
The taste was bile. His throat burned. His stomach churned. He fell to the dirt, gagging.
Then the hum returned.
Low… deep… old.
The darkness in his soul stirred.
A glyph bloomed behind his eyes—the first symbol of the Heaven-Eating Scripture.
A serpent consuming its own tail.
A truth forbidden.
Ashen's body seized.
He saw visions—not of this world, but of his past self devouring beasts whole, ripping cores from geniuses, swallowing flame and shadow.
And then—the hunger came.
It wasn't normal hunger. It was bottomless. Soul-deep. The kind that couldn't be fed with food or drink.
Only essence could satisfy this hunger.
Ashen gasped and sat up.
In his palm, a faint black-red mist swirled. The afterimage of devoured energy. The waste pill was gone—burned to ash in his veins.
It wasn't much. Not even enough for a mortal stage breakthrough.
But it was something.
And it meant one thing.
"The scripture followed me," he whispered.
Even after death. Even after judgment. Even in a body with no spiritual root.
The Heaven-Eating Scripture still lived within him.
And with it—he could begin again.
He could devour his way to the top.
Ashen stood, swaying slightly. He turned back toward the servant's quarters. Toward the tower where outer disciples trained. Toward the inner sanctums where the elders plotted.
Toward heaven itself.
"I won't climb," he said softly. "I'll eat my way up."
And this time, no god, no law, no sect would stop him.