Chapter 7: Dreams of Immortal Mountains
Kael stopped dreaming like a human.
Sleep no longer brought the dull, shapeless grey of fatigue, nor the old nightmares of childhood shame, where his magic refused to manifest and his mother's voice rang sharp in the darkness. No—those dreams had withered the day he touched Ashrend.
Now, when he slept, he fell into visions—not memories, not fantasies, but whole other worlds.
Worlds that shouldn't exist.
That night, he collapsed in the corner of the ruined training hall, wrapped around the blade as he always was. His wrists were bruised. His body screamed with exhaustion. Blood caked under his nails. But as soon as he let his eyes slip shut, the world shifted.
He stood at the edge of an impossible cliff.
Miles high, the clouds spun like silk below him, vast rivers of mist rushing past emerald peaks and silver pines. The mountains were too tall to be real, cutting through the sky as if they meant to wound the sun itself. Temples hung from the cliffs by chains of gold, floating in the wind like lotus petals. Disciples in flowing robes soared through the sky with swords drawn beneath their feet, light trailing behind them like banners of fire.
A thousand waterfalls thundered in the distance. A thousand stars hung motionless in a twilight sky that never ended. The air tasted of ozone and snow and ancient breath.
Kael stepped forward.
He wore no academy robe here. His clothes were simple: black cloth bound at the wrists, a long coat that fluttered in the breeze. Ashrend was still at his side, but it looked... different.
No longer rusted. No longer broken.
It gleamed, blacker than night, etched with lines of pale silver that shifted when he moved—like the blade itself was watching.
And for the first time, it sang.
Not with sound. With presence. The world around him bent toward it—trees leaning, mist parting, birds circling and then fleeing, their wings twitching with fear.
He looked up.
High above, two figures clashed in the sky. Their swords cracked against each other with such force the clouds shattered. Wind shrieked as if alive. The very sky bled light, torn from horizon to horizon. One of them wore white, his robes untouched by gravity, face half-hidden beneath a silver mask. The other was cloaked in flame, eyes glowing with divine madness.
They moved too fast to follow. Each stroke collapsed distance, as if space obeyed their blades, not the other way around.
Kael stared in awe. This was the world he had longed for. This was the dream that had haunted him since childhood—the world he was meant for.
The realm of sword immortals.
Xianxia.
But something was wrong.
Behind the awe, behind the beauty, he felt the ache again. That deep, yawning grief that lived inside Ashrend. The blade pulsed at his side—not in approval. In mourning.
He turned.
And saw the mountain begin to die.
It started with a crack at its base—just a sound, a small fissure—but it spread fast. Too fast. The ground ruptured. A fissure of black light tore through the peak. Trees withered into ash. The sky dimmed. The temples began to fall, one by one, their golden chains snapping as though cut by invisible swords.
Then came the scream.
Not human. Not even mortal.
It rang through the dream like a bell from the underworld. Kael dropped to his knees, clutching his head, eyes burning.
Ashrend had brought him here.
And Ashrend remembered this place.
This was not fantasy. Not some delusion crafted by a tired boy desperate for meaning.
It was memory.
Ashrend had once lived in this world. And watched it fall.
He felt the blade's sorrow twist around his heart like thorns. Felt its fury. Its refusal to forget. Its endless, bitter need for something no magic could give it.
Not redemption.
Vengeance.
The dream shattered like glass.
Kael awoke with a gasp, cold sweat clinging to his skin. His eyes wide, his body trembling.
The sword lay across his chest, as always.
But something had changed.
The rust had faded.
Barely. Just a flake. Just enough for him to see the steel beneath, gleaming through like a sliver of bone under torn flesh.
He reached out with shaking fingers and touched it.
The sword throbbed. Once. Deep.
Ashrend was waking.
And it was dragging him with it—into something older, darker, and far more dangerous than anything his world of spells and sigils could fathom.
Kael pressed his palm to the blade and whispered like a prayer:
"I saw it. The mountains. The sects. The sky-swords. That was your world, wasn't it?"
Ashrend did not answer.
But the wind outside the ruined hall changed direction.
And somewhere deep inside his chest, Kael felt his soul shift.
Not toward magic.
Not toward power.
Toward something else entirely.
Toward transcendence through the blade.
Even if it meant madness. Even if it meant death.
He would climb that mountain.
Even if he had to drag his broken world behind him.