# Chapter Three:
Ling Han carried the short sword with him; it had become an extension of his arm, a silent witness to the transformation that was beginning to rage within him. He was no longer just a lost blind child, but a small ghost haunting the forest, searching for anything that could extinguish the burning fire of hatred in his chest, or perhaps, to find a way to die trying.
Days passed as he trained instinctively. At first, he swung the sword randomly, striking tree trunks or cutting through thick grass. His movements were clumsy and unrefined, but with each strike, he felt a strange power growing in his thin arms. The whispers of his family still accompanied him, but they began to take a different turn at times. His sister Xiao, instead of just blaming him, started guiding him in his waking dreams, describing how he should hold the sword, how he should breathe, how he should feel the movement of air around him to anticipate the attacks of an imaginary opponent.
"Feel it, Han..." her voice would whisper. "The sword is not just cold iron. It's an extension of your soul. Let your anger flow through it. Let your pain guide your strikes."
Once, while training near a small river, he stumbled and fell, and the sword struck a rock, creating sparks. Suddenly, Ling Han felt something strange. It wasn't just ordinary sparks. There was... a faint energy, barely perceptible, that emanated from the rock for a moment. He focused all his senses and touched the rock with his hands. It was cold and solid, nothing special. But he was certain of what he had felt.
"What is this, sister?" he asked the whisper that accompanied him.
"That is the energy of the world, Han..." Xiao's voice answered, carrying a tone of ancient knowledge she hadn't possessed in life. "It's everywhere. In rocks, in trees, in water, and even in the air you breathe. Some people can feel it, and fewer can control it. This is the beginning of the path of cultivation, the path of the Morim you used to dream about."
Cultivation. The word that had echoed in her stories. Ling Han didn't fully understand what it meant, but he felt a strange excitement. Could he become strong? Strong enough to take revenge?
"How... how do I do that?" he asked eagerly.
"Pain, Han..." his mother's voice came this time, harsh and sad. "Pain is your teacher. The more you hurt, the stronger you become. Remember our suffering. Make it your fuel."
Ling Han began deliberately striking the sword against rocks, trying to sense that faint energy again. He would strike until his hands swelled and bled. The pain was intense, but he tasted in it a strange satisfaction, as if he were punishing himself for his weakness, and at the same time, approaching something unknown and powerful.
One day, while chasing a wild rabbit to kill and eat it (after several painful and failed attempts to learn primitive hunting), he heard human voices again. This time, they were very close. He froze in place and gripped his sword tightly. His heart was racing, not just from fear, but from a mixture of anticipation and hatred.
There were two men, speaking in low voices. From what he could gather from their conversation, he understood they were hunters, or perhaps highway robbers. They were complaining about the scarcity of prey and talking about a nearby village that could be plundered.
A village. People. Like those who had killed his family.
Xiao whispered to him: "Your chance, Han. Prove you're not a coward. Prove you deserve revenge."
Ling Han felt a coldness running through his veins. He didn't know how to fight real people. He was just a blind child with a sword. But the image of his sister and parents being tortured and killed was burning in his mind. The hatred boiling inside him overwhelmed everything else.
He moved very slowly, using his extraordinary sense of hearing to locate the two men. They were sitting under a tree, their backs to him. They were engrossed in drinking something from a water skin, laughing loudly.
Ling Han approached, step by step, his heart pounding as if it would burst from his chest. He was just a few meters away from them when he stepped on a dry branch, making a slight sound.
"Who's there?" shouted one of the men, rising quickly with his sword in hand.
Ling Han froze. He had been discovered. Now or never.
"It's just a child!" said the other man, laughing. "What are you doing here, little one? Are you lost? And what's that you're holding? Is it a toy?"
Ling Han didn't respond. He was focusing all his energy, all his hatred, all his pain, in that moment. He remembered his sister's whispers, "Let your anger flow through it."
He lunged toward the standing man, swinging his short sword randomly, but with desperate force. The man easily avoided the strike and laughed again. "What a little troublemaker! Are you trying to hurt me?"
The man raised his sword to strike Ling Han, perhaps just to scare him, or perhaps to teach him a lesson. At that moment, Ling Han stumbled and fell forward. And by blind chance, or perhaps guided by a dark fate, his short sword thrust upward, piercing the man's thigh.
The man let out a piercing scream of pain and fell to his knee, blood flowing from his wound. He looked at Ling Han with eyes wide with shock and anger.
The other man, who had been watching the scene in astonishment, rushed toward Ling Han with his sword raised. "You little wretch! I'll kill you!"
Ling Han had no time to think. Adrenaline was flowing through his body. He rolled on the ground, barely avoiding the sword strike. He rose quickly and swung his sword again, and this time, he felt something different. He felt that faint energy he had been searching for, flowing from his body into the sword. It wasn't strong, but it was there.
The sword hit the second man's arm, creating a superficial wound, but it was enough to make him step back, in pain and surprise.
The first man was still on the ground, trying to stop the bleeding in his thigh. He was screaming curses and threats.
Ling Han knew this was his only chance. If he didn't end it now, he would be killed. He rushed toward the wounded man, and all that was in his mind was the image of his sister being killed. He stabbed him again, and again, and again, in his chest and stomach, not knowing exactly where he was striking, but striking with all the strength and hatred he could muster.
The man was screaming, then his voice began to fade, until he fell completely silent.
Ling Han stood over the corpse, panting, blood dripping from his sword. His body was trembling, not from fear this time, but from a mixture of excitement, horror, and disgust. He had killed. He had taken a human life.
The second man, who had seen his companion killed so savagely by a blind child, froze in place for a moment, fear paralyzing his limbs. Then he turned and ran, fleeing as fast as he could.
Ling Han didn't try to chase him. He was completely exhausted. He fell to his knees beside the corpse of the man he had killed. He touched the warm blood that was still flowing. Its smell was strong and penetrating. It wasn't like the smell of his family's blood. It was different. It was... sickeningly satisfying.
"Did you see, sister?" Ling Han whispered, his voice trembling. "I killed one of them. This is the first drop of blood in the sea of my revenge."
His sister's whispers didn't come this time. There was only the silence of the forest, the sound of his panting breath, and the smell of blood that was beginning to fill his lungs.
He felt a sudden nausea and vomited everything in his empty stomach. Then he began to laugh. A hysterical, insane laugh, a laugh that didn't belong to a child, but to a demon just born from the womb of hell.
That was Ling Han's first murder. And it wouldn't be the last. He had tasted blood, and he knew he would never be satisfied until the whole world drowned in a sea of blood.