Chapter 9: Bloodlines in Silence

The scent of burning incense filled the Imperial War Pavilion, yet it couldn't mask the staleness of fading life.

Lu Tianming walked through the towering doors in silence. The guards bowed low, their faces unreadable. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath. No servants. No physicians. Only the heavy quiet of inevitability.

The room was dim, lit only by lanterns that flickered as if mourning.

At the center lay Emperor Lu Wuyue—the once-invincible monarch, the man who had built the Great Empire with sword, strategy, and sacrifice. Now, he was but a pale silhouette against snow-white silk bedding, his breath thin and slow like dying embers.

Lu Tianming approached quietly. His steps echoed in the chamber, but his expression remained cold. Calm. Detached.

To the world, Lu Wuyue was a ruler, a war deity, a beacon of strength.

To Lu Tianming, he was something much rarer—a father.

And in both his lifetimes, the only person who had ever felt like true family.

He had never met his mother. Not once. Her name was absent from palace records, her presence a ghost even in the minds of servants. He knew she lived—somewhere—but her absence had left no ache. She was a void he had long accepted.

But this man before him, frail and dying... he had mattered.

Lu halted at his bedside.

Even without reaching out, he could feel it—his father's life was hanging by a single thread, so fragile it could snap with a breath.

The Emperor stirred. His eyelids fluttered open with effort, the sharp gaze dulled by fatigue. But when he saw Lu, a smile tugged faintly at his lips.

"...Tianming," he rasped, voice barely more than a breath. "You came."

Lu Tianming didn't kneel immediately. For a long second, he simply looked at the man before him. So many questions had once burned in his heart—why was his father so distant? Why had he been sent away during his youth? Why had the emperor never told him about his mother?

Now, none of those questions mattered.

He knelt.

"I came," he said simply.

The Emperor's eyes shone with satisfaction. "I'm glad. There is... something I must tell you. Something I should have said long ago."

Lu didn't speak. He listened.

The Emperor's voice was weak but resolute, pulled from the depths of his will. "You were not the only child born that year."

Lu's brows twitched.

The Emperor continued, eyes fixed on the ceiling, as if peering through memory. "Your mother... after your birth, she gave birth to twins. A boy and a girl."

Shock flickered across Lu's eyes.

"They were special. Blessed. One had the Divine Thunder Body... the other, the Divine Flame Constitution."

Lu Tianming's heartbeat quickened. Those physiques were legendary. Cultivators would kill for even a drop of such power, let alone a full bloodline inheritance.

"The moment your mother's clan learned of it, they came back."

Lu's jaw clenched.

"They had cast her aside before. But now... now they saw value. They came cloaked in robes and arrogance, speaking of duty, of destiny. But I saw the greed in their eyes. They didn't come for family. They came for assets."

The Emperor coughed harshly, a spasm of blood staining his lips. Still, he pressed on.

"I tried to stop them, Tianming. I fought with everything I had. But there was one among them... an old man. Silent. Cold."

The Emperor's hands trembled at the memory.

"He struck me down with a single blow. Just one. My cultivation was nothing to him. Even now... I believe he was Peak Level 9, perhaps higher."

Lu's eyes narrowed. That was near the limits of mortal cultivation. Beyond that lay Ascension—myth and legend.

"When I awoke, they were gone. Your mother. The twins. Everything."

The Emperor's voice cracked. "I searched. I sent spies, assassins, emissaries. But... nothing. They were swallowed by a power I couldn't touch. That's when I understood—your mother's background is far deeper and more dangerous than I ever imagined."

A heavy silence followed.

The Emperor turned his gaze back to his son. "I did not tell you this for revenge. I don't want you to stain your hands for my past. But... you deserve to know the truth. You deserve to know your bloodline."

Lu Tianming was still. His thoughts spiraled like a storm, but his face remained calm.

"Your siblings... if fate brings you together, protect them. Or, at the very least, do not harm them."

He reached beneath his pillow with effort and pulled free a jade pendant, crescent-shaped and glowing faintly with the imperial seal.

"This... is the royal heirloom of the Lu bloodline. And this—" he handed over a thin, intricately carved token, "—this belonged to your mother. Should you ever meet her, show this. She'll know you."

Lu Tianming took them both.

The jade felt warm in his hand. Heavy. Symbolic.

The Emperor's breathing grew labored.

"One last thing," he whispered, "don't forget... who you are. Not the world's version of you. Not the Crown Prince... but Lu Tianming, son of Lu Wuyue. Live not for duty, but for your will."

A faint smile crossed the emperor's face.

Then, his chest rose one final time—

—and fell.

The flame of the Great Empire's sovereign was extinguished.

Lu Tianming sat still. No tears fell. No sound escaped his lips.

But something inside him had broken.

Not with sorrow.

With rage.

The Demon Ancestor who had wounded his father—he would die.

The man who shattered his family with a single blow—Lu would find him.

The mysterious clan that swallowed his mother and siblings into silence—he would uncover them, strip away their secrets, and stand above th

em.

He was no longer just a prince, nor a prodigy.

He was a scar upon the world. A scar that would never heal.