The duel between Yun Che and Fen Juecheng burned like wildfire.
Swords clashed. Flame exploded across the arena. The crowd roared.
But Li Fan didn't watch from the balconies or outer cliffs this time.
He was beneath them. In the hollows of Heavenly Sword Villa. Among the shadows beneath the stands, where only mice and old bones lived.
But even there, the fire reached.
The heat of Yun Che's Phoenix Flame art rippled through stone. Dust fell from the rafters. The scent of char and scorched pride was everywhere.
"So this is the Phoenix bloodline," Li Fan murmured, eyes closed. "Not bad."
But he wasn't focused on Yun Che.
He was focused on what Yun Che would leave behind.
---
Amid the crowd of sects and sword masters, one elder had taken heavy damage during Yun Che's opening flame barrage. He had been standing too close, too proud. His protective artifact activated too slowly.
A core elder of the Burning Heaven Clan. Mid Earth Profound. Deep flame affinity.
He'd staggered out of the arena under escort, muttering about the "insolence of mutts" and "payback tenfold."
Li Fan followed.
Like a shadow crawling along the inside of a wound.
---
The elder was taken to a secluded medical ward behind the west garden—a place where honored guests were treated in silence.
He screamed once as the healer applied a soul-soothing jade paste.
Then he was alone.
And that was all the opportunity Li Fan needed.
---
He entered without opening the door.
The room's temperature dropped by three degrees in a breath.
The elder blinked.
Then tried to rise—
"You... who are—?"
Li Fan laid two fingers against the elder's chest.
The man flared his qi—but the flame sputtered. His meridians, damaged by Yun Che's Phoenix fire, leaked energy like a cracked urn.
"Your fire's wounded," Li Fan said. "So it can't protect you from mine."
The elder's pupils shrank.
"Yours? What fire—"
Li Fan smiled faintly, then opened his mouth.
He didn't breathe in the man's energy.
He devoured the memory of it.
Like chewing on the structure of his cultivation, the pathways, the flame alignment within the bones and organs. A knowledge his body could interpret, not mimic.
In that moment, Li Fan's veins lit with heat.
But not Phoenix heat.
Something older. Bitter. Raw.
Flame that moved like serpents. That burned inward. Consumed silently.
"This isn't just Burning Heaven Flame…" he whispered.
"This is… fragmentary dragon flame."
The elder gasped, blood frothing at his lips. "That… technique… is forbidden… it—"
He didn't finish.
Li Fan touched his forehead.
And erased what was left.
---
Later that night, Li Fan sat alone atop a pine tree just beyond the Villa's walls. The moonlight filtered through his sleeves as his hand trembled—not from weakness, but change.
Beneath his skin, something writhed.
Not just qi.
Not just muscle.
His bones were shifting—twisting around the new flame structure now woven through them. The stolen fire was alive, not spiritual energy, but concept: a burning that fed on the body itself to fuel raw destruction.
"It's like Phoenix flame," he whispered, "but inverted."
"This flame doesn't grant rebirth."
"It grants annihilation."
He coughed.
Smoke curled from his mouth.
Not black. Not red.
Blue-white. Bone-deep.
---
Meanwhile, in the great audience hall of Heavenly Sword Villa, Yun Che stood before sect masters and elders with blood still drying on his sleeves.
He did not bow.
He smiled.
And every master who saw him had the same thought:
'This boy is too dangerous.'
But far beyond the echo of their thoughts, up in the pine trees where no light reached, Li Fan's eyes were watching.
And he was thinking something else.
"You shine too brightly."
"And you don't realize yet… that there are things watching you who will never step into the light."