Chapter 1: The Ceremony of Shame**

The air in the Grand Training Hall was thick with anticipation, smelling of polished stone and the faint, sweet scent of burning incense. Sunlight, sliced into long, golden bars by the latticework of the high windows, illuminated the hundreds of young boys and girls gathered below. Today was the Awakening Ceremony, a rite of passage that would determine their fate within the **Xiao Clan**. For a youth of the clan, one's bloodline was everything. It was a preordained path to glory, a measure of one's worth, and a guarantee of their place in the world.

For twelve-year-old Ren, it was a moment of utter dread.

He stood in the back row, his small frame almost lost among the taller, more confident youths. His heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs, a drumbeat of anxiety he was sure everyone could hear. He had watched as each of his peers stepped forward, his body taut with a fear that had been building for years. There was Kai, a youth from a cadet branch of the clan, whose hand flared with a brilliant, emerald light when he touched the Awakening Crystal—a sign of the Swift Wind Bloodline. Then came a girl named Ling, who commanded the very ground beneath her feet to tremble, a clear manifestation of the Earth Titan Bloodline. The elders watched from a raised platform, their faces a mask of solemn approval as each child’s destiny was revealed.

The grandest display, however, belonged to his cousin, Lei. Lei was the son of his father’s older brother, a youth who had always carried an air of effortless superiority. He strode to the crystal with an arrogant smirk, his posture a mirror of his father’s immense pride. As his hand made contact, the crystal didn’t just glow—it erupted in a crimson flash that warmed the entire hall. A faint, ethereal dragon, wreathed in fire, briefly shimmered behind him. The **Fire Dragon Bloodline**. A gasp of awe rippled through the crowd. Lei, basking in the glory, held a small, perfect flame in his palm, a silent symbol of his preordained power. The elders on the platform nodded, their approval clear and unanimous. His father, Elder Xiao Hua, smiled a rare and tired smile at his brother, a smile that conveyed a sense of relief and shared pride.

Finally, the grand master called his name. “Ren.”

The sound echoed through the silent hall, a single, sharp syllable that cut through the anticipation. Ren’s throat felt dry as sand. His legs felt like lead as he walked to the center of the hall, the weight of a thousand eyes on his back. He could feel the expectations—not of a prodigy, but of a son of a powerful elder. The silence grew heavy, expectant. He saw his father’s face on the platform, his expression unreadable but stern, as if silently urging him to succeed.

He placed his hand on the cold surface of the **Awakening Crystal**.

For a moment, nothing happened.

A second passed. Then a third.

The crystal, which had just moments ago shimmered with the light of a dozen different powers, remained stubbornly dull. Not a flicker of light, not a hint of warmth. Nothing. It was as lifeless as a common rock.

A few children in the crowd began to snicker. Ren felt a flush of heat rise to his face, a different kind of shame than the one he’d felt before. This was a public, undeniable failure. The murmurs from the crowd grew louder, a buzzing that sounded like a swarm of angry bees. He heard whispers of “no talent” and “a waste of an elder’s bloodline.”

He looked up at the platform. The other elders looked away, their faces a mixture of pity and disappointment. His father, **Elder Xiao Hua**, the most powerful man in the clan, his face had gone ashen. The sternness in his eyes had been replaced with something far worse: a profound, bone-deep sorrow. His father’s gaze did not meet his, and in that moment, Ren knew that the shame of this failure was not his alone. It belonged to his father as well.

“The ceremony is over,” the grand master announced, his voice devoid of emotion. “The young ones may begin their cultivation training.”

The hall buzzed to life as the children rushed to join their respective training groups, their laughter and excited chatter a stark contrast to the hollow silence that now enveloped Ren. He stood alone in the center of the hall, the last one to leave, a statue of failure. The Grand Training Hall, once a place of hope and power, now felt like a cage of humiliation. He walked out of the hall not as the son of an elder, but as a boy with no destiny, a void in a world of power. His peers were at the **Initial Foundation Establishment** stage, on the path to greatness, while he was, for all intents and purposes, a commoner.

_________

Cultivation Level System**

The journey to become a powerful cultivator is divided into several major realms, with each realm having its own stages.

* **Foundation Establishment:** The first and most crucial stage. This is where cultivators build a solid foundation by absorbing ambient qi into their meridians. Most young disciples are at this stage.

* **Stages:** Early, Middle, and Late Foundation.

* **Spirit Awakening:** The second realm, where cultivators learn to sense and manipulate the spiritual energy around them. This is a major leap in power.

* **Stages:** Initial, Profound, and Greater Spirit.

* **Spirit Core:** The third realm, where a cultivator's spiritual energy condenses into a tangible core, granting them immense power and longevity.

* **Ascendant:** The final realm, where a cultivator transcends mortal limits and becomes a legend, their power capable of shaking the very heavens.

### **Chapter 2: A Void in a World of Power**

The Awakening Ceremony was over, but the whispers had just begun. Ren’s “phaseless” status, a new and humiliating term coined by his peers, had spread like a plague through the **Xiao Clan**. He was a curiosity, a living testament to failure. His name was no longer a symbol of his father's prestige but a mark of shame.

His father, **Elder Xiao Hua**, was a shadow of his former self. He rarely looked at Ren, and when he did, it was with a guarded, pained expression. The disappointment hung in the air between them, as tangible as the dust motes in the morning sun. His mother, however, did her best to shield him, her love a quiet, fierce defiance against the clan’s cold judgment. But even her comfort was not enough to fill the void that had opened up between him and his family.

Cultivation training was a daily torment. The children were separated into groups based on their awakened bloodline. The Fire Dragons trained in the scorching heat of the Volcano Peak. The Earth Titans wrestled with boulders that weighed more than they did. Ren, with no bloodline to guide him, was relegated to the “basic” group—a handful of children from commoner families who were still attempting to awaken a minor bloodline. He was the only child of an elder in this group, a constant reminder of his fall from grace.

He would attempt to practice the foundational techniques, the ones meant to draw in and circulate ambient qi. While his peers would feel a gentle warmth or a rush of energy, Ren felt nothing. The qi flowed around him, a river that refused to touch him. He would sit in quiet meditation for hours, his mind a blank slate, while the others, including his cousin Lei, began to advance into the **Middle Foundation** stage, their meridians pulsing with newfound strength. His body refused to cooperate, a stubborn, unyielding vessel that would not accept the gift of cultivation.

One day, while practicing a basic energy manipulation skill, his cousin Lei approached him, a smug look on his face. Lei held a perfectly formed, humming fireball in his hand, its heat radiating across the training field.

“Still trying, cousin?” Lei sneered, his voice dripping with condescension. “I heard the grand master said your meridians are like dried riverbeds. Nothing can flow through them.”

The other children around them giggled, their faces a mixture of pity and amusement. Ren’s cheeks burned with a familiar shame. He clenched his fists, the humiliation a bitter taste on his tongue.

“It’s not my fault my bloodline is different,” Ren muttered, the words barely a whisper.

“Different?” Lei laughed, his voice ringing with disdain. “You have no bloodline, Ren. You’re a phaseless void. You will never amount to anything.”

The words struck Ren with the force of a physical blow. A phaseless void. It was the truth. He was nothing. He had nothing.

After that encounter, Ren stopped attending public training sessions. The Grand Library became his refuge. It was a vast, ancient building, filled with countless scrolls and books on cultivation techniques, clan history, and the great deeds of past heroes. The very air in the library smelled of parchment and wisdom, and he found a strange sense of solace there, a place where he could be alone with his shame and his despair.

He read everything, from the clan’s proud history to obscure texts on failed cultivation theories. He was searching for something, anything that could explain his condition. He devoured scrolls on ancient, forgotten bloodlines, hoping to find a hint of his own. But every text described bloodlines with clear, powerful abilities—some commanded the very essence of the sun, while others could speak to beasts. There was no mention of a bloodline that was nothing, that was a void. He was a unique kind of failure, an anomaly that had no place in the world.

He spent his days in the deep, quiet aisles of the library, the only sound the soft rustle of paper as he turned a page. He was a ghost in the clan’s house of knowledge, a boy who had lost his future. He wasn’t looking for glory anymore. He was just looking for an answer. And in the forgotten corners of the library, among the scrolls no one bothered to read, he found a faint flicker of hope, something that would change everything.

### **Chapter 3: The Blank Scripture**

The scent of aged paper and dry ink filled Ren’s nostrils as he ventured into the deepest, most forgotten section of the **Xiao Clan**’s Grand Library. Dust motes danced in the slivers of light that filtered through the grimy windows, illuminating rows of scrolls that hadn’t been touched in generations. The clan’s history and cultivation secrets were all here, but he had read every one that was relevant to his situation. He was just wasting time, he knew, but it was better than facing the pity and contempt of his family.

He ran a hand along a shelf, his fingers tracing the worn bindings of scrolls whose names he no longer recognized. He coughed as a cloud of dust erupted from a particularly thick scroll. He was about to turn away when his hand brushed against something cold and rough behind the shelf. Curious, he pushed aside a loose-fitting shelf and discovered a small, hidden alcove.

It was no larger than a cupboard, and the air within was stale and musty. There were no scrolls, no books, no artifacts. Just a single, ancient-looking object sitting on a stone pedestal. It was a scroll, but it was unlike any he had ever seen. Its binding was a deep, dark ebony wood, and the parchment itself was a pale, almost ethereal white. It was completely blank. There was no title, no clan seal, no words or diagrams of any kind. It was… empty.

A surge of curiosity, a feeling he hadn’t felt in years, overtook him. This was the first object he had seen in the library that was as empty as he felt. Was this a test? A joke? He reached out and gently placed his hand on the scroll.

The moment his fingers made contact, a warmth unlike any he had ever felt spread through his palm. It was not the burning heat of fire or the shocking jolt of lightning, but a gentle, comforting warmth that flowed up his arm and settled in his mind. For a fleeting instant, a torrent of information, not in words but in images and feelings, flooded his consciousness. He saw a vast, empty void, and within it, countless stars, each one a different shape and color. He saw a river that absorbed everything into itself, yet remained clear and pure. Then, he heard a name, a name that was not spoken but simply *known* in his mind: **Phaseless Bloodline Scripture**.

He stumbled back, his heart pounding in his chest. The scroll, which had seemed so utterly blank, now felt like a living thing in his hands. He picked it up, his hands trembling. The warmth was still there, but the torrent of information had subsided. He held the blank scroll, the weight of it feeling like a burden and a gift at once.

He had no idea what it was. It wasn’t a conventional cultivation technique. It was a guide, a path, but not for a fire-breathing or earth-shaking bloodline. It was a path for something else. For nothing. For a void.

Ren’s mind, which had been so dark and desolate for so long, felt a sudden, profound spark of hope. This wasn’t a text for a powerful bloodline. It was a text for *his* bloodline. He was not a failure. He was not a void. He was **Phaseless**, and this was his scripture.

He glanced around the empty library, a profound sense of secrecy washing over him. The elders would not understand this. They would see it as a blank sheet of paper, a worthless piece of junk, or worse, some forbidden art. He had to keep this a secret. This was his path, and his alone.

He slipped the scroll into his robes and, with a new sense of purpose, left the Grand Library. The world outside looked the same, but to Ren, it had changed forever. He was still a void in the eyes of others, but now, he knew that within that void, there was a hidden universe of power waiting to be unlocked.