The caravan master's name was Bo Lin, and he knew more than he let on.
"That pendant," he muttered as they rode, "isn't something a Violet Thunder servant should have."
Ling Tian kept his mouth shut.
Qing'er, surprisingly, intervened. "He's with me now."
Bo Lin's eyes narrowed, but he said nothing more.
Three days later, the Azure Cloud Sect came into view—a sprawling complex of white towers and floating pavilions, nestled between mist-shrouded peaks. Disciples in azure robes practiced sword forms in courtyards, their movements precise as clockwork.
The Recruitment Trials had already begun.
"First test," Bo Lin announced, "the Thousand-Step Stairway."
A massive staircase carved into the mountainside stretched upward, its steps shimmering with faint runes.
"Ascend under the weight of the gravity array. Fall behind, and you're out."
Ling Tian joined the line of hopefuls—nobles in silk, peasants in rags, all dreaming of immortality.
A sharp pain pricked his thigh.
He turned to see Bai Zhan, a sneering youth in embroidered robes, withdrawing a thin needle.
"Oops," Bai Zhan smirked. "Clumsy me."
Ling Tian's vision swam as poison burned through his veins.
Then—the dragon mark on his chest flared.
The toxin evaporated like morning dew.
Bai Zhan's smirk vanished as Ling Tian yanked the needle from his own leg and stabbed it into the noble's thigh.
"Clumsy me," Ling Tian echoed.
Bai Zhan howled.
The proctor's voice boomed:
"BEGIN!"