The world was a study in white and silence. A Month deep into the mountain range, the snow fell in a constant, gentle curtain, muffling all sound and painting the jagged peaks in soft, heavy layers.
On a wide, windswept ledge, Gen moved.
His feet traced arcs in the deep powder, his arms cutting through the air in slow, deliberate forms. Every extension, every pivot, was an exercise in reinforcing his body's connection to the ground, to the air, to his own intent. The fight with the Wild Edge Sect Leader had sharpened something in him. His understanding of **Shidow**—of feeling the flow of things, of the energy in the falling snow, the latent cold in the stone beneath his feet—had deepened. It was like Ting had once tried to teach him: feeling the river's current instead of just trying to swim against it.
As he practiced, circulating his Qi in a steady, warm current from his core down his limbs and back, he focused on another, more elusive principle. He had never neglected the teachings Master Yujin had drilled into him about **Zhidow**, the Wheel of Creation in the sky ocean. He had the theory, the mental diagrams, but the gate—the Heart Acupoint—had remained stubbornly closed.
Now, as he gathered his Qi along his arm during a sweeping block, he felt a subtle shift *within*. Not in his muscles, but deeper, in the center of his chest. A pressure, like a sealed door flexing against its frame.
He completed the block, then reversed the motion into a slow, pushing palm strike. He did not just push air. He pushed his will, his intent to *make*, not just reinforce.
A puff of snow erupted from his palm. But it was wrong. It didn't scatter like powder. The flakes hung in the air, glittering, and for a heartbeat, they *held a shape*—a dense, churning cocoon of white light that crackled faintly with his own Qi before dissipating.
Gen stopped, his breath stalling. He stared at his hand, then at the space where the light had been.
He let out a long, slow breath. A plume of white vapor joined the falling snow.
He had done it. The pressure in his chest was gone, replaced by a new, humming channel. The Heart Acupoint was open. **Zhidow** was within his grasp.
He bailed his fist, feeling the new pathways light up alongside the familiar golden flow of Jingdao and the mercurial sense of Shidow. *Three Wheels. Now I just need Fendow and Heidow. Then… then I can start to understand the last one. The one only Father truly grasped.*
The thought should have been fire. It was ice. It had taken him over two years to open these three gates. How many more years to master the final three? The Damocles didn't grant years. They took them.
He turned from the empty air, his eyes finding the still, dark shape seated at the ledge's edge.
Buqu sat in a perfect lotus position, dusted with snow, eyes closed. He hadn't moved in days. *He's been like this for over a month now,* Gen thought, a knot of frustration tightening in his gut. All they had done was travel deeper into these endless, frozen peaks. Where they were going, Gen still had no idea.
He walked to the cliff's edge, gazing out at the labyrinth of mist and white stone. The peaks ahead seemed to form a vast, yawning mouth, shrouded in cloud. He couldn't be sure.
A gentle tap on his shoulder. He turned.
Lorel stood there, a dazzling smile breaking across her face, her cheeks flushed pink from the cold. Looking at her smile, something in Gen flickered, a warmth that fought the mountain's chill. "You did it, right?" he said, already knowing.
She nodded, the motion eager, like a child with a secret. "My Jingdao Acupoint," she said, her voice clear and proud against the quiet. "It is fully open now."
Gen's own smile came easier. "Perfect. With that, you shouldn't have any problem standing on the front line with me now." Lorel had opened her gates in a different order: **Zhidow** first, then **Shidow**, and now **Jingdao**. It explained the incredible, precise strength of her constructs—her foundation was creation, her manipulation guided it, and now her own body could be reinforced to match. It was a path of elegant, layered power.
She pointed a slender finger toward the distant, mouth-like formation. "It looks like some sort of beast, do you not think?"
"Indeed," Gen said, following her gaze. "Would you like us to take a look there?"
Lorel's eyes brightened, but before she could answer, a bulky, shivering shape lurched from behind a rock. Chubbs was buried in oversized robes, his hands tucked deep into his sleeves, hopping slightly to keep warm. "Stop trying to act cool, you two! I know you feel the cold same as I do!"
Gen turned to him with a faint smirk. "If you do not progress, you will be left behind in it."
Chubbs bailed a fist, his breath puffing out in an aggrieved cloud. "My Jingdao and Shidow are open! The Creation Acupoint is next. I want to follow the normal path. Like you." He said it with determination, but his teeth were beginning to chatter.
Then, a whisper of displaced air. Liang descended from the grey sky, alighting on the opposite side of the ledge. Snow dusted his broad shoulders. At eighteen, his frame had filled out completely, the lines of his face sharper, more defined. *He's starting to look extremely handsome,* Gen thought, with a flicker of amusement.
Liang smiled, brushing snow from his robes. "All of us have progressed. I can feel my strength getting… stranger." His path was the most unusual of all: **Zhidow** first, then **Jingdao**, and just recently, **Shidow**. His power was a patchwork of conflicting foundations, but it was immense and uniquely his.
Gen nodded. "The order of the openings is indeed interesting." It defined them, he realized. It wrote the first line of their story as cultivators.
A cascade of snow slid from a still form as Buqu stood. He did not stretch. He simply rose, the accumulated frost falling away like a shed skin. His dark eyes opened, finding Gen first, then the others. A smile touched his lips, but it held no warmth, only a hunter's anticipation.
"I can feel your fists getting harder," Buqu said, his voice the low rumble of shifting glacier. "I cannot wait to break them when the time comes." He wiped a fleck of snow from his nose with a thick finger, then turned to gaze toward the beast-mouth peaks without looking back at them. "The top of that mountain is our final destination. Follow me."
He stepped off the ledge and began to walk on the air, his steps heavy and sure as if climbing an invisible staircase toward the distant formation.
Gen, Lorel, Liang, and a grumbling Chubbs followed in silence, lifting into the cold air with pulses of **Shidow**.
Gen bailed his fist as he flew behind Buqu's broad back. *He is really ordering us around.* This past month, Buqu hadn't treated them like servants—he'd largely ignored them—but the sheer force of his will, the inescapable fact of their captivity, was an insult to Gen's pride. He could only endure. For now.
A flicker of shadow and cheerful motion appeared at the forefront of the group. Bax zipped into view, waving an arm. "Master Bu! Little kids! This way! I found an interesting pathway towards the Mouth of the Winter Monarch!"
"The Winter Monarch?" Chubbs called out, curiosity cutting through his complaints. "What is that?"
Buqu and Bax surged ahead. Bax's voice trailed back to them, cheerful. "Master Bu asked me to find an area that can test the limits of the body and soul! The closest thing I could think of was a Damocles, but that is… out of range. However, within the Winter Monarch's domain, there is this *place*. Ideal for that!"
Buqu cracked the knuckles of one massive fist. "If it can force the being in him to react, then great. Well played, Bax."
Bax raised his shoulders in a happy shrug. "Serving Master Bu is not really hard!" He was starting to like this Divine General more and more.
Noticing Gen's stony expression, Bax fell back slightly, looking at Buqu's back as he spoke to them. "If he was not with the Divine Generals… he would be a great person."
Gen let out a short, mirthless laugh. "Has servitude ridden you of your honor and pride?"
Bax shook his head, his expression uncharacteristically serious. "Depending on how you look at it, the Divine Generals are more than just world-destroyers. They are cultivators with their own path, too."
Gen smirked, floating forward. "A path to hell, indeed."
Beside him, Liang flinched almost imperceptibly at Bax's words. *Each cultivator had their own path.* For an unknown reason, the phrase hit him with a strange, heavy weight. The Divine Generals were their doom. They had to be destroyed. That was all that mattered. He reminded himself of it, forcing the other thought down.
On Gen's other side, Lorel kept her attention fixed on Buqu's ascending form. He was that impossible wall they would have to climb. If she one day wanted to reach the rank of Immortals, she would have to reach and cross his level. More than looking at him as an enemy, she saw him as the benchmark to cross. She bailed her fist, the new, solid strength of her **Jingdao** a comforting pulse in her veins.
Far behind, Chubbs was still complaining, his voice growing faint. "My toes are becoming little ice sculptures! Have mercy!" He cursed, putting on a burst of speed. "Wait for me!" he called out, a dark speck chasing after them through the endless, falling snow, toward the great stone mouth that awaited them all.