The Eternal Empire:The Frost That Listens
Lady Yueh narrowed her gaze. Ren's blade sliced awkwardly through the air, his footing uneven, his posture abysmal. It was not a technique. It was noise. Yet as she watched, something in her stirred.
A shift.
A ripple.
Then a surge.
Her cultivation pulsed once—twice—then broke through into Early Step Seven. No intention. No breakthrough insight. Just... his clumsiness, her witnessing, and the Dao beneath both revealing itself.
"It makes no sense," she whispered, her voice flickering like wind across frost. "His swordplay is in disorder. But my cultivation..." She paused, eyes narrowing with reverent confusion. "There's more to him than meets the eye."
Fairy Jin stepped into view, her twilight robe catching motes of stray starlight. Her gaze lingered on Shen Wuyin—not with amusement, but deep calculation.
"I felt it too," she said. "Step Seven came, unbidden. He dresses plainly. Moves stupidly. Speaks even less. But he's hiding something. I saw it the moment I met him. Like the Dao itself is pretending to be a fool."
They watched together—two paragons of clarity, elevation, and control—staring at a man who couldn't hold his blade straight… and who was somehow shaping them both.
When Ren finally sheathed his sword—a crooked arc that would make most elders cringe—he sat beneath the pines and began refilling his qi. His breath was slow, his posture flawed, but the spiritual energy still circled him, patient and unbothered.
The squirrel still rested on his shoulder, nestled like a tuft of living fur, asleep and unafraid. It had been there for days now—uninvited, undisturbed, undeterred.
Ren gently woke it with a bit of dried fruit. The squirrel blinked once, yawned, and nibbled with comical reverence—as if the morsel were divine tribute.
And somehow—absurdly, impossibly—it was now the same cultivation level as Ren.
No training. No martial technique. Just sleep and proximity.
It had simply stayed on his shoulder, and the Dao had done the rest.
Fairy Jin had noticed days ago. She hadn't said a word—just observed, lips pursed.
Lady Yueh had tried to rationalise it, with charts and qi resonance diagrams, before conceding:
"This squirrel is ascending. And I have no idea why."
But Ren didn't care. He just smiled faintly, scratched behind the squirrel's ear, and leaned back beneath the pines.
The sect whispered theories.
Some said it was a hidden artefact.
Others thought the squirrel was Ren's proper form.
One elder proposed it was the reincarnation of a rogue celestial.
Ren never confirmed anything.
And the squirrel?
It just sat there, silent, growing stronger.
Ren awoke beneath the same pine, limbs crooked, qi threadbare. His sword practice resumed with all the grace of a drunken crane stumbling through fog. His form was fractured, his angles were offensive, and his momentum was nonexistent.
And yet...
By midday, he had ascended into Mid Step Five.
It made no sense.
Fairy Jin, who had once seen talent bloom slowly across decades, watched in quiet disbelief. This was not progress—it was narrative collapse.
On Ren's shoulder, the squirrel stirred. Yawned. Blinked once with imperial disinterest. Then nestled back into sleep. And somehow, it too now radiated Mid Step Five cultivation.
No effort.
Just divine proximity.
The elder guard—plump, previously irrelevant, spiritually stagnant—had begun preparing tea. By dusk, he was calling Ren Senior Brother with genuine awe.
"Your blade form... it confuses me," he said, eyes moist with confusion and reverence. "But when I watch it, my qi dances. It feels... provoked."
Ren had now mastered ten sect techniques, each consumed with impossible speed and just enough imperfection to make instructors reconsider their syllabi.
Gao Yun, once too lazy to kneel, now followed Ren with fanatical devotion: half butler, half bodyguard, complete disciple. Ren never acknowledged him.
And the squirrel?
It nibbled slowly on a walnut.
Commanding with its eyes.
A flick of its tail sent Gao Yun scrambling for snacks. A twitch of its whiskers launched protective formations. It had become more than a pet—it was an administrator of absurd destiny.
Even Gao Yun's cultivation had surged—Late Step Three, stable and glowing.
Meanwhile, Liáng Xu and Fei Yan watched in horrified silence.
This elder—once dismissed as sect furniture—had nearly matched their rank, simply by orbiting Ren and appeasing his squirrel.
Liáng Xu's calligraphy grew erratic, his brush trembling like a leaf. Fei Yan nearly struck a willow tree.
"The heavens have cursed us," Fei muttered, voice taut with disbelief. "First Ren. Then his pet. Now the fat guard. What is happening?"
Their glory? Gone.
Their thunder? Hijacked.
Their narrative? Rewritten as supporting roles in a squirrel's cultivation saga.
But humiliation breeds fury.
Driven not by enlightenment, but by rage against rodent hierarchy, they plunged back into cultivation.
Late Step Four.
Still behind.
But climbing.
Not out of faith in the Dao—
But because they refused to be outranked by a squirrel.
The squirrel had become a fixture of sect life—quiet, fuzzy, sovereign.
It did not speak, but its gaze carried a sense of authority. Anyone who came near Ren was met with a cold, blank stare that stopped them in their tracks. Disciples learned quickly. Elders bowed instinctively.
Only three were permitted to approach him:
Fairy Jin, whose bond with Ren transcended words.
Lady Yueh, whose presence the squirrel tolerated with solemn approval.
And Ren himself, of course—though even he had earned his place slowly, one nut at a time.
Cultivators began calling it "Dao-Furred Sentinel" behind closed doors. One junior attempted to touch Ren's robe and woke up four days later, claiming to have seen the karmic ledger of squirrels past.
Meanwhile, Fairy Jin and Lady Yueh approached Step Eight—a feat so rare it echoed across the entire Level Ten Providence, where sects rose and fell like tides. The Glass Lotus Sect, already mythic, was now spoken of with reverence and envy.
Banners unfurled. Elders wept with pride. Sect alliances shifted.
But within the celebration, a quiet truth emerged:
None of this had begun with intention.
Ren had not sought glory. The squirrel had not sought power.
And yet, their quiet absurdity had become the axis of the sect's destiny.
Soon, it wasn't just a squirrel. It was a movement.
The original—the one who slept on Ren's shoulder and cultivated without care—became known as Thousand-Nut Patriarch, a title whispered reverently among the forest-dwellers of the outer sect.
Each day, more squirrels arrived. Not scampering. Not erratic. They walked with purpose—tails raised, eyes gleaming with respect, as if drawn by some spiritual gravity emanating from Ren's very bones.
They did not disturb him. They gathered nearby, sitting in meditation, forming tiny circular formations that mirrored human cultivation arrays.
By the seventh day, a junior disciple reported that one squirrel had achieved Step Two. Without training. Without qi pills. Just by gazing at Ren while he napped.
It became clear:
They worshipped him.
Not with shrines or chants, but with presence.
He was their axis. Their living Dao.
Fairy Jin observed quietly, arms folded.
Lady Yueh feverishly recorded data in her private journals, barely concealing the word "divine anomaly."
The sect itself began constructing squirrel-size pavilions near Ren's courtyard—just in case this phenomenon was the start of something even stranger.
Some elders scoffed.
Others watched with awe.
But none could deny:
Ren, unknowingly, had become the master of a spiritual squirrel sect.
Ren stopped training.
His sword rested, forgotten, against the pine. His posture remained uncorrected. His squirrel snored softly beside him.
And yet, he had reached Late Step Six.
No breakthroughs.
No heavenly insights.
Just... clumsiness, naps, and luck so obscene it bordered on divine comedy.
The elders couldn't explain it.
Fairy Jin no longer tried.
Lady Yueh had resorted to silence—her only refuge from mounting disbelief.
Within the sect halls, a new proverb was whispered:
"Heaven is cruel. And Heaven loves Shen Wuyin."
No one argued.
Because the heavens—those eternal arbiters of fate and trial—had decided to pick favourites.
Not through righteousness.
Not through talent.
But through narrative.
Shen Wuyin was ascending not in spite of his foolishness, but because of it.
And the squirrel?
It was already halfway to Step Six, nibbling walnuts like heavenly tributes and radiating smug approval.
Ren decided, quite suddenly, to accelerate his cultivation. No careful pacing. No strategic restraint. Just quiet resolve—like someone sprinting down a mountain to see how many trees they could dodge.
Late Step Six arrived within days.
It was absurd.
It wasn't very kind.
It was divine favouritism, carved into reality like a prank played by the heavens.
And as if summoned by the tension in the air, Liáng Xu and Fei Yan approached.
They had ascended to Peak Step Five—dragged upward by rage, pride, and the stubborn refusal to be remembered as footnotes in a squirrel's mythology.
Their robes were immaculate. Their expressions composed.
But their eyes betrayed the truth—still clinging to elegance, still aching for acknowledgment dressed as reverence.
Behind them, a quieter tragedy unfolded.
The women they had seduced—disciples, elders, childhood partners, the whole constellation of hearts once pulled by their orbit—were waking up.
Not to illusion.
But to reality.
Their lives hadn't been guided by the heavens.
They had been controlled. Tilted. Rewritten by something they couldn't name.
And under that weight, their true will had been undone.
They hadn't meant to betray the ones they loved.
They never would have—if they'd been truly free.
But they weren't.
And now, the illusion had cracked.
Their eyes opened.
Too late.
Their Dao partners—the men who had once stood beside them with loyalty and dreams—were gone.
Vanished like morning mist.
Carried away on winds that no longer looked back.
There were no apologies strong enough.
No path tender enough.
Only silence.
Only grief.
Ren felt it all—sensed the weight in the space between steps and breath.
He watched the two approach.
Didn't greet them.
Didn't flinch.
Just looked.
With complete indifference
Because what had they truly lost?
Not status.
Not lovers.
But the illusion—that beauty could bend the Dao.
That charm could substitute mastery.
That elegance could erase consequence.
If the moment demanded it—
If they chose violence—
Ren would respond without hesitation.
One slap.
A clean death.
Not cruelty.
Inevitability.
Because he would never be challenged by men who mistook charisma for cultivation.
Not now.
Not ever.
Ren watched with quiet ache.
Not for Liáng Xu or Fei Yan—he couldn't care less about them.
Let sculpted smiles and silk-soft voices seduce others. Ren saw only the wreckage they left behind.
His sorrow was for the ones wounded in their wake.
Women once anchored by love and loyalty, swept into a storm they never chose.
They hadn't fallen for romance.
They'd been pulled under by control—refined, seductive, insidious.
Yes, Liáng and Fei were handsome.
Painted by heaven's most vain brush.
But beauty, Ren knew, should never command the heart.
Real strength lies in resisting the illusion.
And these women… they hadn't been weak.
They'd been misled. Entangled in something far darker.
Their fates weren't failures—they were distortions.
Drawn into a narrative they didn't write.
And the cost was steep.
Ren saw the aftermath:
Boyfriends. Husbands. Fiancés—men who had built lives hand-in-hand.
Cast aside for fantasies spun in silk.
But amid the ruins, mercy bloomed.
The men moved on.
Not with bitterness, but with women of conviction—
Women who saw past elegance and charm to truth.
Women unshaken by prestige.
Women who stood firm in clarity.
Ren didn't feel rage.
He wasn't vindictive.
He simply mourned for all of them—the deceived, the discarded, those who wore invisible bruises.
Not for Liáng or Fei.
His sorrow belonged to those who had deserved better.
If those two ever crossed the line again—
If hands were raised instead of eyebrows—
Ren would not hesitate.
There'd be no ceremony.
No warning.
Just one strike.
Swift. Clean. Inevitable.
And the heavens would remember:
Favouritism has consequences.
Ren, for all his accidental ascendance and cosmic inconvenience, had never cared much for right or wrong.
Not out of cruelty—
But because he understood something quieter, older:
Everything rested on choice.
Not morality.
Not doctrine.
Just decisions—praised by some, condemned by others, depending on who did the seeing.
He didn't chase virtue.
He didn't fear consequences.
He chose.
And whether those choices raised others or ruined them was never his to define.
He walked his path.
Sometimes that path carved rivers.
Sometimes it splits mountains.
But Ren never apologised.
To apologise was to assume authority over someone else's pain.
And Ren had none.
He was not righteous.
Not wicked.
He was… inevitable.
Before Ren could respond—before the squirrel even blinked—Liáng Xu and Fei Yan lunged.
Their pride had swollen past containment.
Being ignored by Ren, dismissed by the heavens, reduced to footnotes in a squirrel's ascension—it was too much.
Their attacks were elegant. Furious.
Formations flared. Qi surged.
But neither touched him.
Because before they reached striking range—
Fairy Jin appeared.
One hand to Liáng Xu's cheek, the other to Fei Yan's—two crisp, ceremonial slaps that echoed through the courtyard.
Lady Yueh followed half a breath later, striking each of their backsides with a flicker of qi-infused discipline—the ancient sect's punishment for spiritual misconduct.
"Control yourselves," Fairy Jin said coldly, folding her arms.
"You're not just failing the Dao," Yueh added. "You're embarrassing it."
Liáng Xu staggered back, stunned and stinging.
Fei Yan blinked twice, eyes watery with humiliated rage.
Ren said nothing.
He resumed sitting, eyes glazed, squirrel still balanced perfectly on his shoulder.
In truth, he hadn't noticed the fight.
He was trying to decide whether the dried fruit in his sleeve was a walnut or a chestnut.
Ren sat, squirrel draped across his shoulder like a royal sash of unearned prestige, and let out a slow breath beneath the pine. His sword leaned against the bark, crooked as always. The sun refused to scold him. The Dao declined to discipline him.
He was taking this new identity a bit too seriously.
The fool.
The background character.
The cosmic inconvenience.
But gods—it was fun.
He wasn't righteous.
He wasn't humble.
And he knew it drove people mad—disciples, elders, even a few divine archivists quietly cataloguing his anomaly.
They wanted declarations. Intentions. A reverent bow to tradition.
They wanted rules acknowledged. Power explained.
But Ren had none of that.
What could he offer?
He wasn't the protagonist.
Yet the world bent anyway.
Techniques obeyed.
Squirrels ascended.
Status followed.
This wasn't destiny.
It was momentum—unintentional, unrelenting.
And Ren, stumbling through plot holes and cultivating by accident, had stopped resisting the ride.
Far away—within the flaming void of his inner domain—Emperor Shadow lounged upon his obsidian throne.
Dragon armor pulsed with restrained chaos.
Fire swirled. Shadows curled.
And beneath that helmet sat a grin far too entertained for a creature of wrath.
Together, they played an unscripted game:
Ren in the realm.
Shadow in the flame.
Two halves of a paradox, smiling back at a universe that had run out of explanations.
And the squirrel?
It was already dreaming of Step Seven.