Jade Throne Realm – Central Mainland – Flying Sword Sect Territory
Year of the Jade Rooster (Time to Shine)
It was an utterly unremarkable spring morning.by Flying Sword Sect standards, which meant the peach trees were crying tears of spiritual dew, the qi-infused koi had formed a synchronized formation shaped like the sect insignia, and one of the mountain's minor spirits had begun reciting sword poetry to itself in a drunken slur.
In the middle of this sublime absurdity, something genuinely unusual happened.
At the heart of the sect grounds, veiled behind twelve formation layers and the passive, lazy disdain of the Sword Mountain's protective spirit, lay a quiet pond.
This pond was sacred, though no one made a fuss about it. After all, everything in Flying Sword Sect was sacred if it behaved nicely and didn't try to kill someone before breakfast. But this pond.this was different. For nestled at its center were two lotus buds. Closed. Silent. Still.
They had not bloomed in thousands of years.
One was ivory-blue, rimmed with hoarfrost, its petals sharper than blades of winter wind.
The other burned with color: deep scarlet veins running through gold, a quiet sizzle of steam constantly rising from its edges.
The Frost Lotus and the Sun Lotus.
Born of the union between celestial fire and glacial death, they should have destroyed one another. Instead, they sat.side by side tensionless, humming in a harmony so alien even the pond spirit sulked in confusion.
Then came the change.
A ripple. A breath. A rustle of petals.
One unfurled.
And the other followed.
Blossom.
Heat and frost erupted in the quiet pond with equal serenity, a gentle spread of opposing power that did not clash but coalesced. Steam hissed, then settled, blanketing the air in velvet mist. A light broke across the water blue and gold interwoven, like Yin and Yang threading through silk.
Deep within Sword Mountain, the ancestors stirred.
"Aiya," muttered the Fourth Ancestor, Xu Feiyu, as he reclined upside-down on a cloud of wind qi. Despite being well past 19,870 years old, he insisted on looking thirty-five because, and I quote, "Wrinkles imply worry, and I haven't worried since that ridiculous Immortal Rabbit tried to marry me."
He squinted through the misty image projection. "Look at them. Frost and Sun, blooming side by side. That shouldn't happen."
The Seventh Ancestor, Xu Yuling, divine of brow and blessed with a tea addiction so potent it had gained spiritual sentience, raised one delicate brow. "Should we call a meeting?"
"We're having one," Feiyu pointed out. "You're here. I'm here. Third Brother's meditating with that rock again. That counts."
Yuling poured tea. "You do realize those lotuses are no longer just flowers, yes?"
Feiyu grinned. "They were never just flowers. They were waiting."
Meanwhile, in the inner sanctum, surrounded by a ten-layer spiritual array humming softly in minor chords, Sect Mistress Xu Minzhi lay in rest.
She had not moved in two days, and the healers.well, the ones not nervously biting through sleeves.were pacing furiously outside the chamber. Her pregnancy was progressing strangely. Not dangerously. Just… peculiarly. The qi in her dantian had become unnaturally still, as though meditating with purpose. Her body, however, was subtly shifting in resonance.
Something was attracting her.
Her husband, Sect Master Xu Zhongshan, sat by her side with the impassive calm of a mountain carved from jade, but his hands were tight-fisted in his lap.
"She's been calling to the pond," murmured Elder Zhou, peeking nervously through the formation.
"She hasn't left this chamber," Elder Lin Qian snapped.
"She shouldn't be able to call to the pond," Zhou whispered back.
Zhongshan stood abruptly, brushing the thought aside. "Let the ancestors see to it. My wife is carrying our children. That is enough to command the heavens themselves."
And the heavens.for once listened.
From within Xu Minzhi's womb, twin hearts beat in perfect discordance. One cold and silent like falling snow, the other burning bright like a phoenix's cry. And despite being nothing more than spiritual masses yet unnamed, they plotted.
Somehow.
The warmth of love from their mother cocooned them. The iron resolve of their father steadied them. But their infant souls had already recognized the world was dangerous, unjust, and quite frankly, stupid. There were traitors. There was the attacker, the one who had dared strike at their mother when she was vulnerable. That person—they didn't yet know names—would be unmade.
A flicker of killing intent pulsed inside the womb.
"Did you feel that?" Minzhi murmured weakly. "I think… they're angry."
Zhongshan blinked. "They're not even born."
"They know, Zhongshan. They know."
Back in the ancestor chamber:
Feiyu had flipped upright, still holding a pipa he did not know how to play, using it purely to emphasize dramatic points.
"Oh, they'll be terrifying," he said cheerfully, stroking his nonexistent beard.
Yuling sipped her tea with a hum. "Frost and Flame… paired. Born of our line. This will attract enemies."
"It'll attract everyone," Feiyu said, clearly enjoying the mental image. "Allies and enemies alike will salivate. Celestial-grade constitutions? Born naturally? Twin lotuses? Oh, we're going to have war proposals and assassination attempts before they even learn to crawl."
"And what will we do?"
Feiyu's grin sharpened. "We'll teach them to crawl over corpses."
Outside, the pond mist faded. The lotuses now bloomed full—neither dominant, both pulsing with qi, as if waiting. Watching.
A tiny lotus seed drifted into the sky, caught in a breeze.
Across the continent, a seer went blind.
In the Hell Sect, a musician's strings snapped with no cause.
In the Heaven Sect, a sword cracked along its edge without being touched.
None of them knew why.
Not yet.
But somewhere in the heart of the Flying Sword Sect, nestled safely inside their mother, two unborn cultivators curled tighter. Dreaming. Listening.
Waiting.
Time to shine, whispered the Year of the Jade Rooster.
And the future agreed.