This was a world that obeyed no gods, no mercy.
Only power.
In Zhenlan Country, everything was governed by the brutal law of the jungle. The strong ruled. The weak were crushed. Even children were taught from the moment they could walk: If you do not cultivate, you do not survive.
Cultivation — the practice of refining one’s spirit through heaven and earth’s qi — was everything.
To cultivate, one needed a spiritual root.
And Feng Wu... had none.
Each person was born with a dantian, a core nestled in the lower abdomen that stored spiritual energy. But unless one was born with a spiritual root — the bridge between body and qi — the dantian would remain empty, forever dry.
Most people had a root. Even if weak, it allowed them to begin their journey.
Spiritual roots were graded by color, from lowest to highest:
Red Root – Fragile, impure, the weakest.
Orange Root – Slightly better, but still unimpressive.
Yellow Root – Average, common among minor cultivators.
Green Root – Rare and efficient, seen among clan elites.
Blue Root – Strong and refined, often seen in sect geniuses.
Indigo Root – Very rare, usually associated with top sect disciples.
Violet Root – Incredibly rare; signifies monstrous talent.
Gold Root – Once-in-a-century genius.
Celestial Root – Theoretical. A myth. A root said to communicate with the heavens.
But Feng Wu?
She had nothing.
No color. No root. Her dantian was a hollow shell.
The clan physician had tested her when she was six. The elders had laughed.
“A waste,” they said. “Heaven has abandoned her.”
Her grandfather tried to argue — that perhaps her root was sealed, or hidden — but when he vanished, the clan treated her like trash confirmed.
Now, years later, she returned from the edge of death with that very same “worthless body.”
Feng Wu sat beneath the plum tree in her crumbling courtyard, the faded blossoms drifting like soft snowflakes around her. Cracks ran through the worn flagstones at her feet, a reflection of what the Feng Clan had become to her — fractured, forgotten.
Her fingers rested idly on her lap, but her mind wandered far, tracing the path of power in this world where the strong rose like stars and the weak were trampled into dust.
Cultivation — the road every man, woman, and child was expected to walk. It began with the body, but did not end until one grasped the laws of heaven itself.
There were twelve known realms. Twelve gates that separated mortals from immortals. Twelve thresholds that only the most determined could cross.
The first realm was the most basic — the tempering of the body. Bones, skin, blood, muscles — each was hardened and reforged to hold qi. It had nine sublevels, each step tougher than the last. Most commoners never passed beyond this stage.
Next came the gathering of qi into the dantian — the condensation of spiritual energy from heaven and earth. It also had nine layers. Here, a cultivator began to truly feel the flow of power, and some began to wield simple techniques.
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