The iron had spoken.
But the mountain was only half climbed.
Redleaf Town's central square had grown quieter. The excitement of the first trial—the bursts of strength, the gasps when the pillar turned red or yellow—had faded. A hush settled like dust, heavy and fine. Even the cultivators of the Chasing Clouds Sect, who had once stood with relaxed postures and bored expressions, now shifted with intent.
The next trial was not about impressing a stone.
It was about surviving something that stared back.
Of the hundreds who had tested their might, only a few dozen remained. They stood close to one another, glancing around as if suddenly aware of how thin their company had become. Most bore banded markers showing orange, yellow, or red. A few still had bruises on their hands from the impact of striking the iron pillar. One or two had blood at the corners of their mouths from pushing too hard.
Now, the cultivators brought out a box.
It was squat, wide, and sealed beneath a thick cloth. Four disciples carried it together with both hands, stepping carefully. They didn't treat it like a relic. Nor like treasure.
They carried it like a beast still breathing.
When the cloth was removed, the crowd leaned forward. Even those standing on the outskirts of the town square—bystanders, shopkeepers, a few curious older villagers—grew quiet.
It was a statue. Roughly knee-high, carved from stone black as soot. Not a polished or artistic piece, but a snarling, muscle-bound thing with claws like curved swords and a mouth that seemed perpetually frozen in a soundless roar. Its hunched frame and thick tail suggested power. The eyes—two gem-like spheres of dark crystal—reflected no light.
But they watched.
At the statue's base, faintly etched, were old seals. Not decorative. Binding.
Around it, a white circle was drawn. Chalk lines, wide and unbroken. Seven paces across. The kind of circle a person could sit in.
But not escape quickly.
The lead cultivator—a man in his twenties with fine robes and a thick braid tied behind his shoulder—stepped forward and raised his voice.
"This is your second trial. It will test not strength, but will."
He gestured to the statue. "This beast is not a toy. It is a vessel. Bound within it is the sealed spiritual pressure of a creature that once roamed the high peaks of Cloudfang Mountain. It does not breathe, and it does not move. But its presence still lingers."
The murmuring began again.
He let it run, then cut it off with a raised palm.
"You will sit within the circle. The pressure will be released. You may shift, flinch, struggle to endure—none of this matters. But if you leave the circle... or lose consciousness... you fail."
A beat of silence.
"This is not a test of pain tolerance. It is a test of who you are when faced with something greater than yourself. Those who pass may walk further. Those who fail… may not walk at all."
The finality in his voice sent a ripple through the candidates.
Still, no one moved.
Until Meifeng did.
The tall woman who'd broken her knuckles against the pillar walked forward without a word. She sat cross-legged at the edge of the circle, facing the beast, her scarred arms resting lightly on her knees.
Then Huani and Huayun stepped forward together, twin shadows echoing one another's stride. They sat side by side.
A fourth. A fifth.
And then, Li Yao.
His expression was unreadable, his hands loose at his sides. He sat with the ease of someone who'd spent entire seasons in stillness. The blade remained on his back, tightly wrapped, unmoving.
But Li Yao felt it then.
Not with his hands, nor even his spiritual sense.
With something deeper. A hum in his blood. As though the weapon waited.
In total, thirty-two candidates entered the ring.
No one from Green Pine Village.
Not anymore.
A disciple passed among them, checking posture, offering final warnings. Then he stepped back, and the lead cultivator raised a sealing talisman.
"This begins now."
He pressed it to the base of the statue.
There was no explosion. No wind. No obvious change.
But the air collapsed.
Not literally. But it felt that way.
The first wave of pressure rolled out like a thick fog, unseen but undeniable. It pushed down on shoulders, backs, ribs. It pressed behind the eyes and inside the lungs. It made skin prickle, hearts skip.
And it grew stronger with every breath.
One of the candidates gasped aloud and gripped his temples.
Then he slumped sideways.
A disciple rushed in, talisman in hand. The boy was pulled out of the circle and laid to the side, chest rising shallowly.
He did not wake.
Another cracked moments later. She screamed—just once—and fled the circle sobbing. Blood streamed from her nose.
A third sat frozen, eyes wide, breath fluttering like a trapped bird.
Then he vomited and passed out.
He was pulled clear.
None of the three passed.
Twenty-nine remained.
Li Yao's breath came short.
The pressure was like drowning in warm stone. It didn't claw at him—it sank, slow and sure. Not just into flesh, but into memory. Into certainty.
He remembered the shame on his father's face the day he failed the spirit root test.
He remembered Auntie Mu looking away when he asked if she thought he'd ever get stronger.
He remembered the endless ache in his fists when he trained alone, hitting bark until the skin split.
And deeper still—he remembered the silence when no one believed.
The pressure forced those things to the surface. It didn't attack them. It revealed them. Laid them bare.
Li Yao shook.
Not from fear.
From strain.
But he did not move.
Stone Root.
That was the method. That was the name he'd given it, half as a joke, half as an act of defiance.
He was not fast. Not clever. Not gifted.
But stone did not need to be any of those things.
It only needed to endure.
And he did.
Around him, others cracked.
Meifeng trembled, blood in her teeth, but she sat upright.
One of the twins flinched so hard he smacked his brother's shoulder, but neither fell.
Ying, the scarred girl, had tears running down her face, her hands clenched into claws against her knees.
But none left.
More minutes passed.
Then another collapsed.
This one fell face-first, his breath rattling. A disciple checked his pulse, dragged him clear.
He did not die.
But he had failed.
The rest sat in hell.
And Li Yao, deep within his own storm of pressure, did not see the blade at his back begin to vibrate faintly—wrapped still, but alive. The iron length shifted a single fraction, not enough to be noticed.
But if he had looked, he might have seen how the cord binding it pulsed once, as if echoing his thoughts.
Kill, something inside him whispered.
Not in hunger.
In recognition.
The pressure surged one final time.
And then stopped.
No fade. No gentle ebb.
It vanished like a curtain pulled back, revealing only sunlight and air.
The candidates gasped. Some fell to their backs, too dazed to even weep. One began to laugh, a brittle sound. Others rocked forward, breathing like drowning men finding air.
Nineteen had endured.
Three more had lost consciousness and were pulled out—marked as failed.
Ten had fallen or fled before the pressure ended.
Only those who remained seated and awake were acknowledged.
Li Yao rose slowly, like a mountain unsticking itself from the earth.
He looked around.
No familiar faces. No shared glances.
He was alone, but not small.
And deep in his chest, where the pressure had once wrapped itself around his heart, something had hardened.
It was not pride.
It was not power.
It was a kind of quiet center—a calm refusal to ever yield again.
He had not bested the pressure.
He had survived it.