Chapter 0: Ashes Before the Flame
The night sky was painted in layers of crimson and black, as if the heavens themselves bled in silence. Stars blinked faintly behind a thick shroud of spiritual mist, covering the world like a burial veil. Mountains floated across the sky, suspended by ancient arrays, their peaks glowing with faded runes carved long before memory. This was the Realm of Jingzhao (京照) — once the heart of all spiritual civilization… now nothing more than a fractured land of forgotten war.
The wind carried whispers — broken chants from tombs no mortal dared approach. Beneath the hanging temples and levitating cities, lay a lone valley known only in forbidden scripts: Qìhǎi de Kūluò (气海的枯落) — The Withered Core of Qi Sea.
And it was here, in this cursed basin, that a boy's fate had already begun to rot.
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1. The Death Before the Beginning
He had no name — not anymore.
They called him Yīnghuǒ (萤火), the firefly — for he was born during the Falling Flame Festival, under a sky burning with thousands of floating lanterns. But now, even that name was forgotten.
Sixteen winters old. Bones like reeds, eyes dull as ash. His body carried more wounds than memories, and his cultivation was stuck at the lowest mortal stage: Qi Condensation - Stage 1 (气凝境 第一重). Among the world of sky-breaking geniuses, he was the invisible one… the boy born to fall.
But even so, he clung to life.
Wrapped in tattered robes, he wandered the edge of an abandoned battle plain where once the Heavenly Fire Sect (天火宗) had made its last stand. Charred skeletons lay like broken prayers across the ground, many still fused with their burnt spiritual weapons — spears made of living jade, swords forged with beast marrow.
A thunderous voice echoed from the heavens — a voice not from the living world.
> "You are not worthy of the Flame Sutra."
The boy coughed blood but kept walking.
> "Turn back, Insect. You were not chosen."
Lightning cracked. Rain of molten gold began to fall. And still, he walked.
> "Your soul is broken. Your core is withered. Even your Dao is forgotten."
He fell to his knees at the mouth of a shrine built into the ribcage of a massive beast fossil — the last remnant of the Crimson Sky Dragon (赤空龙).
"I don't need to be chosen," he whispered. "I just need… to steal it."
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2. The Forbidden Sutra and the Rebirth Ritual
Inside the beast-bone temple, fire danced along the walls without any fuel. The walls bled slow streams of crimson spiritual blood. Dozens of corpses — cultivators from every sect imaginable — lay petrified in eternal kneeling postures, their spiritual cores burned black.
At the altar, a single scroll floated in midair, sealed in six elemental chains:
Flame
Thunder
Bone
Void
Blood
Echo
This was The Sutra of Immortal Flame (不灭火经) — a forbidden cultivation manual said to contain:
The Dao of Undying Fire (不死之炎的道)
The Heavenly Bone Pillars Technique (天骨柱术)
And the legendary True Flame Rebirth Cycle (真炎重生轮回)
No one had ever succeeded in comprehending it fully. All who tried… died.
But Yīnghuǒ didn't hesitate. His hand burned as soon as he touched the first chain — the Flame Chain. Skin peeled, bones cracked… and a strange voice laughed from deep within the scroll.
> "If you seek death, mortal, then burn with me."
And he did.
His body erupted into golden fire.
His screams echoed across the valley — but none heard. His soul was torn apart. Memories shattered. Emotions melted. His very Qi Sea was turned into dry dust. He was dying. Again.
But just before total annihilation, something happened.
His tears — which fell into the flame — shimmered with a strange silver.
The fire paused. The scroll shivered. And the six chains cracked all at once.
> "…You're not just seeking power… you're grieving…"
"...So be it. Burn not for yourself — but for those you lost."
With a final scream, his body vanished into flame.
And from that fire… a new soul emerged.
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3. The Awakening: Fire That Weeps
Yīnghuǒ awoke beneath a tree of glass — its roots floating in midair, its leaves dripping golden embers like snow.
His wounds were gone. His skin now had strange flickering patterns like living flame veins. His eyes… no longer human.
He was no longer at Qi Condensation Stage 1.
> 🌟 Cultivation Stage: Phoenix Embers Foundation - Stage 1 (凰焰基境 第一重)
(A rare path reborn from destruction — only granted to one who dies while touching the true flame.)
His meridians had mutated. His bones were now semi-elemental. His dantian had merged with something new — a Burning Core (燃核) that pulsed like a second heart.
And floating above his hand… was a single ember.
It whispered in an ancient voice:
> "Your flame is sorrow."
"Your Dao is pain."
"Your rebirth has begun."
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4. World of Beasts, Battle, and Blood
As he took his first steps in this reborn form, the world reacted.
Sky beasts cried out in instinctive fear — thunder lions, bone serpents, flying blade falcons… they all began migrating away from the valley. The Heaven-Eyed Sect (天目宗) sent scouts to investigate.
But what they found was not a boy… it was a crater.
And inside it, a lone figure floating — surrounded by burning petals of ash — eyes closed, breathing embers.
> "One of the Forbidden Sutras has… chosen again?"
The word spread like wildfire.
Eight great sects across the continent declared war on one another, believing the Sutra had been reborn in their lands.
The balance of the Three Flame Continents (三焰大陆) shattered.
But none knew… the Sutra hadn't chosen a sect.
It had chosen a broken boy.
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5. The Sutra's First Ability: Echo Flame Strike (回响炎击)
In his first real battle against a rogue Thunder-Eater Beast (雷噬兽), Yīnghuǒ discovered the Sutra's terrifying technique:
🔥 Echo Flame Strike:
A flame attack that records the spiritual pattern of an enemy's technique and reflects it back 2x stronger after a delay of 3 seconds.
He used it instinctively.
The beast roared, shooting thunder fangs. The flame around Yīnghuǒ recorded the spiritual frequency, and three seconds later — he returned it with a burning thunderstorm of flame.
The entire valley turned to glass.
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6. Secrets of the Past & the True Cultivation Path
As days passed, fragmented memories returned — not from his own life, but from the Sutra's former wielders:
A maiden who burned an entire sect to protect her l