Compared to the vast expanse of heaven and earth, a mortal body was an insignificant thing.

And yet, even drawing on the smallest fraction of what that vastness contained was enough to stand above the ordinary world entirely.

What the Thunder-Wind Scripture described, at its core, was using the diluted essence found in medicine to gradually temper the body — conditioning a mortal frame, step by patient step, until it could bear the weight of heaven and earth’s true breath.

Shen Yi had long since passed that stage.

What remained was simply time. Slow, patient accumulation. Filling the twelve major apertures one by one.

Without rare medicines to accelerate the process, it would be gradual. But the one thing Shen Yi had no shortage of was time.

【Remaining Demon Lifespan: 76 years】

【Threshold Realm · Thunder-Wind Demon-Subduing True Interpretation — Untrained】

【Five years pass. You use the breath of heaven and earth to repair the damage to your body, clearing accumulated ailments built up over years.】

【Year fifteen — your calm disposition has kept the path smooth. No complications. You fill the first major aperture without difficulty.】

【Year thirty-five — three apertures complete. Thunder-Wind Demon-Subduing True Interpretation: Novice.】

【Year thirty-eight — your progress begins to slow. After careful examination, you discover the cause: the breath stored within the apertures has taken on traces of your own essence, creating friction against the pure breath of heaven and earth.】

【There is no remedy for this. Only a settled mind and the passage of time.】

【Year sixty-five — five major apertures filled. One step from Minor Mastery of the Thunder-Wind Demon-Subduing True Interpretation.】

【Remaining Demon Lifespan: 1 year】

【Personal Remaining Lifespan: 46 years】

For the first time, his personal lifespan had overtaken his demon lifespan reserves.

Shen Yi sat on the stone steps outside the alley, eyes closed, taking in the altered landscape of his own body.

The additional twenty-five years of lifespan were welcome — but the deeper source of his satisfaction was internal.

Five apertures, each full and gently circulating, their breath flowing through his limbs and bones like something rich and warm drifting across still water.

He raised his palm and half-curled his fingers.

A faint white mist rose from his fingertips, threaded through with the faintest traces of red.

The Thunder-Wind Demon-Subduing True Interpretation carried that quality — born as it was from a method discovered by grinding a body down to nothing and converting qi and blood through the Solarblade, the pure breath of heaven and earth it drew in had been lightly stained with vital essence ever since.

Any cut he made now would far exceed yesterday’s Demon-Subduing Solarblade.

And it no longer consumed his own body to do it. The force came from the apertures.

He had reached the Threshold Realm. The old Solarblade — a workaround, a temporary bridge, a technique that borrowed what it couldn’t truly claim — was already beneath him.

Shen Yi stood and walked out of the alley. His body felt so light he half-expected his next step to take him off the ground entirely.

“Getting a little carried away…”

He steadied his thoughts. Suddenly acquiring this much power had left him briefly unmoored.

He had made enemies of three demon factions simultaneously. The situation was genuinely precarious. He’d been lucky enough to gain more than forty years of lifespan — it would be a particularly bitter irony to throw it away now.

That said — if any of them had the audacity to appear in front of him, he wasn’t opposed to finding out exactly how sharp this new edge was.

Only one year of demon lifespan left. That’s deeply uncomfortable.

The yamen duty room.

The sun had climbed well past its midpoint.

Six constables stood in rigid lines in the courtyard, eyes fixed on the smashed door frame.

Song Changfeng had taken up position inside from early morning — forehead wrapped in bandage, face dark, barely having shifted in hours.

Chen Ji let his gaze drift downward.

Two bodies under white cloth. The same two men who’d come to fetch Shen Yi the previous night. The smell had begun to turn. They were very thoroughly dead.

On most days, Shen Yi’s men had little genuine respect for Song Changfeng — enough performance to keep things civil, nothing more. But people were dead now.

Across the courtyard, a group of constables from other divisions stood with their arms folded, carrying themselves with the practiced arrogance of people who’d arrived expecting to be in charge.

Song Changfeng had brought them personally. That wasn’t normal.

It also wasn’t normal for outsiders to reach a scene before the people who were supposed to manage it — and yet here they were.

What made Chen Ji most uneasy was simpler: Shen Yi still hadn’t appeared.

“…”

Then a tall figure came through the gate.

Every head in the courtyard turned at once.

The moment the other divisions’ men recognized who it was, the casual posturing vanished. Hands moved to hilts.

Song Changfeng had summoned these particular men at dawn — each of them handpicked. That alone signaled a shift in the yamen’s position. The implication was clear: Constable Shen’s days of doing as he pleased were likely over.

Shen Yi’s own men exchanged alarmed looks. Only Chen Ji stayed still, brow furrowed, hand settling wordlessly onto his own hilt.

The courtyard held its breath.

Then Song Changfeng pushed himself out of his chair, moving with the careful deliberateness of a man whose body had been through a difficult night. He limped to the doorway, braced himself against the frame, and produced a labored smile.

“You’re here.”

Shen Yi nodded. “Mm.”

He had no idea why the old man wasn’t home recovering, but at least he’d shown the sense to have someone manage the aftermath. That saved Shen Yi a conversation.

“I thought you wouldn’t make it until afternoon.” Song Changfeng extended a hand in welcome.

“Mouse in the walls. Couldn’t sleep. Figured I’d come in early.” Shen Yi stepped inside, settled into his seat, and looked up. “Something the matter?”

Outside, the assembled men glanced instinctively at the sky, then back at the room.

Shen Yi at his desk. Song Changfeng standing at his side, one hand on his lower back.

Hands on hilts loosened, almost involuntarily.

Song Changfeng’s fear of Shen Yi wasn’t exactly a secret. But showing up in person, with a contingent of picked men, only to stand deferentially beside the man in question — that was a different kind of spectacle entirely.

What in the—

The visiting constables were quietly dying of embarrassment and thinking about how quickly they could leave.

Then Song Changfeng turned and pointed at them.

“Would you like a few of them? To fill out your roster. Personally selected.”

The color drained from several faces at once.

Baiyun County was small and gossip traveled fast. Falling in with Shen Yi meant comfortable pickings — but the man’s methods left a stain, and once that stain set, no amount of washing would shift it. Half a day was all it would take for a reputation to become permanently attached.

The genuinely shameless didn’t care. But anyone with even a passing concern for how they were perceived had no interest in standing outside the door while Shen Yi terrorized decent people inside.

“Are they worth having?”

Shen Yi raised an eyebrow and took a genuine look.

The thought had actually crossed his mind. The predecessor was gone — and since he was hoping to join the Demon Suppression Division, operating with the old crew didn’t sit right. He had one real requirement: at minimum, the ability to come back alive from something like what happened at Liuli Temple village.

That comment hit the visiting constables where it stung. A man famous for dissolute living, who hadn’t touched his own martial arts in years, questioning their competence.

But before any of them could respond, Song Changfeng let out a tired smile that said everything.

“Depends on the comparison. Certainly not against you.”

Straightforward enough words. And yet they landed with a very strange weight.

The room chewed on that for a moment.

Chen Ji rolled his eyes with the expression of someone who found this entirely unsurprising.

Given those outrageous natural gifts — and with the seventy-eight-character scripture now in Shen Yi’s hands on top of everything else — a few more years and the man would probably sprint through both the Tendon and Bone stages and be chasing mortal peak before anyone caught up.

(End of Chapter)