Path of the Forgotten.

The teleportation array flared, light swallowing their silhouettes.

A moment later — silence.

Then, the world returned. Lin Feng landed softly on damp stone, boots crunching moss. The air here was colder, heavier, like breathing through soaked cloth. Around him, the other disciples staggered upright, some vomiting from the distortion. But Lin Feng… stood still.

The Ruins of the Hollow Vein Realm.

Long abandoned. Once home to an ancient sect whose name had been forcibly erased from even the oldest scrolls. Now, only cracked pillars and shattered towers remained — their walls etched with markings that pulsed faintly with forgotten power. A ring of jade tokens floated into the air and snapped into each disciple's hand — including Lin Feng's.

> "Survival tokens," one elder announced. "Lose yours, and you are disqualified."

Ji Wuyou chuckled from the rear, his token already shimmering with protective sigils. "Or dead."

The group split.

Outer disciples, inner elites, special envoys — everyone broke off into factions or solo pairs, already moving toward the broken structures ahead.

Lan Xueyin walked alone, Lin Feng walked alone.

Han Yu, unnoticed, vanished into the mist — his gaze never leaving Lin Feng's back.

> "The tides are beginning again," Han Yu thought. "Last time, I stood too far behind. This time… I'll walk beside him. Or through him."

---

Lin Feng didn't follow the others.

The deeper he moved into the ruins, the more the silent it became. Birds avoided this place. Insects didn't chirp. Even wind passed around it, not through it. It was deathly quiet. Until it wasn't.

> A pulse. A beat. A pull.

He turned left, then right, guided by instinct. He stopped at a crumbled archway — just tall enough to crawl through. Beyond it, blackness.

The moment he stepped inside, the light from the ruins flickered — and the ground rejected him. He fell Silently.

---

Unknown Depth – He landed on soft soil. The world down here was pitch black… and then it blinked open. One by one, ancient lanterns lining the walls began to burn — with fire.

A stone chamber, untouched by time. Statues of faceless cultivators in kneeling poses. A cracked altar at the center. And behind it — a sealed cocoon of black crystal… chained in silver threads. Lin Feng stepped forward — and something cracked beneath his foot. He looked down.

> Bones. Thousands of them. Children, elders, cultivators. All kneeling toward the altar. His vision swam. A whisper brushed his ear — not in sound, but in memory.

> "You were not meant to come here… yet."

His body shook and his chest pulsed.

And the cocoon reacted. It trembled… then split slightly open, revealing a fragment of darkness within that made the lanterns dim. Neither evil nor divine. And from within, a small piece of it — just a mote — shot into Lin Feng's chest like a needle.

He didn't scream. He didn't even blink. But in his eyes, something seems to awake.

---

At that exact moment, Lan Xueyin paused mid-step, head whipping toward the east.

> "...What was that?"

Han Yu staggered behind a boulder, clutching his chest, cold sweat dripping down his brow. > "No… not now. That presence — it can't return yet…"

And Ji Wuyou? He just smiled. > "Good. It's waking up."

---