The Truth of the Tribe, Alliance with New Power

After that sharp crack beneath his foot, the stone slab made no further movement.

Chen Wuya did not lift his foot at once. Instead, he slowly shifted his weight backward, letting the edge of his right foot glide lightly across the stone's surface to probe out a gap barely half an inch wide. Holding his breath, he drove his true qi upward from his dantian and forced it into the Foot Shaoyin Kidney Meridian—an energy route marked as "disordered channels" in the fragmentary Canglang Art. Yet just as his breath was about to collapse, a tremor ran through his body, as though an invisible force had reconnected the tangled paths of power.

Misaligned Practice Connects to Spirit—judgment effective.

He withdrew his foot and landed steadily on a level slab beside it. Bai Zhi followed close behind, her steps light as fallen leaves. Her knees bent slightly as she landed, bleeding away every trace of force. Her gaze swept over the rock walls on either side. The carvings were no longer blurred totems, but clear scenes of ritual: a crowd knelt before a massive stele where a wolf head intertwined with a crescent moon, holding broken swords aloft as blood dripped into cracks in the earth.

"These aren't battle scars," she said softly. "They're oaths of alliance."

The old man stood three paces ahead with his back to them, holding the short sword Chen Wuya had handed him earlier. He did not turn around, merely ran his thumb slowly along the sword's spine, as though confirming something. After a moment, he thrust the sword into a crack in the rock beside him, his motion crisp and decisive.

"Follow me."

He stepped onto the stairs, his footfalls still soundless. Chen Wuya glanced at Bai Zhi and nodded. The two followed.