The path grew darker with each step.
The walls of the mountain narrowed around Zhu Yan, twisting like the ribs of a dying beast. The air itself was denser here—not with pressure, but with memory. Every inch of stone whispered. Names long forgotten. Sins never forgiven.
He descended.
The Manual's voice had gone silent. No glowing script. No riddles. Only instinct guided him now—a pulse within his bones that tugged him deeper, like a tether to the abyss.
Until he found it.
Not a gate, not a seal—but a grave.
A wide chamber lay before him, carved not by hand, but by agony. At its center: a tree. Black as night, with roots that coiled like veins across the stone floor. It bled—not sap, but something thick and crimson. Blood.
And from its bark, names pulsed. Thousands. Tens of thousands.
Zhu Yan stepped closer.
Each name was a memory.
Each memory, a life once consumed by the path he now walked.
> "You have reached the Third Gate: Bloodroot Sigil."
The voice returned. Not the Manual, but something older. Deeper. The voice of the tree.
> "This gate is not opened with strength. It opens with sacrifice."
Zhu Yan did not flinch. "Then tell me what must be given."
The tree did not answer. Instead, one of its roots lashed out—piercing his palm.
Blood flowed.
Not outward.
Inward.
His essence pulled into the tree like ink spilled on parchment. Visions flooded him. Ten lifetimes of war. Betrayal. Glory. Pain. None his own. All now part of him.
> "To take the Sigil is to carry the weight of the fallen." "Their will. Their wrath. Their memory." "And should you falter, they will consume you."
Zhu Yan's body convulsed.
Flames danced beneath his skin.
The blood of the dead surged in his veins.
Their screams clawed at his sanity.
> "Endure."
He dropped to one knee.
Sweat poured from his brow, but his eyes burned brighter still.
> "I am not their grave." "I am their blade."
With a roar, he stood—and the bloodroot pulsed.
A symbol burned into his chest. Jagged. Irregular. Alive.
> 「Third Gate: Bloodroot Sigil – COMPLETE」
The chamber trembled.
Stone cracked. The tree writhed.
But Zhu Yan remained still.
He had survived not by shielding himself, but by surrendering.
He now bore the burden of thousands.
But in that burden, he had found power.
His eyes lifted.
There was no more path.
Only a wall of solid stone.
Yet the bloodroot behind him whispered:
> "The Fourth Gate lies beyond death."
Zhu Yan smiled.
Then I will die again.
And rise stronger.