In the far reaches of the Veil, where reality frayed and time pulsed like a dying heartbeat, the Hollow Crown stirred in its slumber.
The coffin that sealed it—formed not of stone or wood, but compressed memory and forbidden fate—cracked.
Hairline fractures spiderwebbed across the surface, and with each crack, a whisper escaped into the void.
A name.
A curse.
A promise.
And as the last shackle shattered, the thing inside opened its eyes—though it had no form to house them.
The Hollow Crown had returned to the world.
Not alive.
Not dead.
But hollow, and hungry.
Jin stood at the edge of the floating isle, the mists clearing beneath his feet.
The First Forbidden loomed ahead, a statue larger than a fortress, bound in golden thorns and chains that pulsed with seals older than any sect.
The Weaver of Forgotten Names had disappeared, leaving only her whisper behind:
"He remembers what the world chose to forget. But memory comes with madness."
Jin inhaled.
The air was thick here—denser than any spiritual field he had crossed. Each breath pressed against his lungs like a thousand years of dust.
He stepped forward.
The ground shifted. It wasn't rock—it was petrified bone.
Old bones.
Ancestor bones.
His own blood responded, a faint resonance thrumming through his veins like an echo trying to find its source.
As he approached the statue, he noticed the runes etched into the chains. They weren't in any known cultivation script.
But somehow, he understood them.
Because they were written in the language of his first self.
The self before the grave. Before betrayal. Before even names.
"Who bound you?" Jin whispered.
The statue's blind face cracked open.
Not the eyes—those remained shut.
But the mouth.
It moved, stone grinding against stone.
"We… bound… ourselves."
Jin flinched.
The voice was not one voice, but many layered atop each other.
A chorus of identities.
"We knew… what we carried. We sealed it away. So that the world… might live."
Jin stepped closer. "Then why am I here?"
"Because… the seal is failing. The Sovereign knows. And you… are the last."
"Last of what?"
"The last of the Line Without Origin."
Jin's breath caught.
He had heard the name once—in a fragment of an old forbidden scroll buried under ten thousand corpses in the depths of the Underspire.
A lineage that was said to predate the heavenly laws.
A bloodline that held the concept of creation unbound.
Not by the Dao.
Not by the Heavenly Court.
But by choice.
"I don't want to become a monster," Jin said. "I've seen the shards. I know what I could turn into."
"You were never meant to become anything. You were meant… to choose."
"And if I choose wrong?"
The statue tilted its head. Golden vines tightened around its throat, as if resisting the answer.
"Then the Hollow Crown will choose for you."
Jin's body froze.
The name echoed in his mind.
He saw a vision—brief but searing.
A crown of roots.
A throne made of mouths.
Eyes that bled light.
And at its center, an empty place where a soul should be.
"What is it?" he asked, voice low.
"It was born when our line tried to create a perfect cultivator. One without flaw. Without fear. Without… heart."
"We succeeded."
"And then… we buried it."
Jin clenched his fists. "Then the Sovereign just released it."
The chains on the statue began to rattle, wind screaming through the ancient isle.
"Then you must act now."
Jin's soul trembled.
A sigil began to burn on his chest—emerging from his skin, not drawn upon it. A spiral, inverted. The Mark of Unbinding.
"Where do I go?" he asked.
"You don't go anywhere."
The island began to sink.
The bones beneath his feet crumbled, turning to dust.
The chains recoiled into the earth.
And the statue began to move.
The blind eyes opened.
Inside them swirled stars.
"You bring the fight to you."
Back in the Heart of Empire, Sovereign Lin Vo stood at the pinnacle of the Obsidian Spire.
His expression was calm. Serene, even.
Below him, the world was trembling.
The Hollow Crown had awoken in the Eastern Rift.
Three sects had already vanished overnight.
A fourth sent a desperate transmission before falling silent:
"There was nothing inside. Just… hunger. And reflection. And us."
The Sovereign sipped from a cup of wine.
It turned black in his hand.
"They'll flock to him," murmured his first disciple, kneeling nearby. "The broken. The forgotten. The ones you exiled. He'll have followers."
"Let them come," Vo said, eyes fixed on the horizon. "He will either become a martyr… or something worse. And when he does, the world will beg me to kill him."
He raised a hand.
"Activate the Silver Circle."
The disciple blinked. "My Lord—that will destroy every anchor in the lower sects."
"Exactly. Let Jin rise," Vo said. "Let him build. Let him feel hope. Then we'll rip the ground out from beneath him."
His smile did not reach his eyes.
Jin awoke on a new island—though he hadn't traveled.
The First Forbidden was gone.
Or perhaps it had returned within him.
The Mark on his chest glowed faintly, threads of silver weaving into his bones.
He looked around.
The island was barren but not empty.
Spiritual energy here was sharp. Painful.
Like blades dancing in the air.
A voice echoed behind him.
"You bear the mark."
Jin turned.
A woman stood on the edge of the ridge. Hair white as salt, wrapped in crimson armor made of woven glass. Her eyes shimmered with a brilliance that rivaled stars.
"I am Xue Qilin," she said. "The last Guardian of the Line Without Origin."
Jin bowed cautiously. "And I'm the last… of the line."
"I know."
She walked forward, extending a hand.
"You're going to need a weapon. One worthy of your blood."
He blinked. "I already have—"
She cut him off. "No. The Scabbard is only half of the equation."
She pulled a blade from her back.
It was not metal.
It was made of forgetting.
Jin's breath hitched.
He could not remember what the blade looked like, even while staring at it.
"This is Nihil," she said. "The Sword of No Shape. Forged in the void between names."
She handed it to him.
The moment he touched the hilt, memories flooded his mind—not his, but those of every wielder before him.
A boy who used it to cut his name from the heavens.
A girl who used it to slay her own reflection.
A father who died with it buried in his heart, laughing.
And now… Jin.
The sword pulsed once.
Accepted.
Xue Qilin nodded. "You'll face the Hollow Crown soon. You'll need more than strength. You'll need to understand what it truly means to walk this path."
"What path?"
She smiled grimly.
"To be forgotten by the world, yet still change it."
Jin looked down at Nihil in his hand.
His blood hummed.
The stars trembled.
And somewhere, far away, the Hollow Crown turned its empty gaze toward him.