On the Path to the Great Dao

Chen Shi had started noticing the oddities about his grandfather. There was the faint stench emanating from him, his peculiar fondness for the scent of incense, and how he’d stopped eating normal food. Instead, his grandfather secretly devoured candles, gnawing through them one after another as though they were carrots!

Chen Shi even suspected that the mysterious deaths of chickens and ducks in the village were his grandfather’s doing—that he’d bitten them and drained their blood.

But no matter what his grandfather had become, to Chen Shi, he was still his closest family.

“Black Pot, take him to drink his medicine,” his grandfather said flatly.

Outside the Chen family’s courtyard, a large black dog wagged its tail obediently. It bit the hem of Chen Shi’s clothes, tugging him toward home.

Behind them, the massive floating head loomed closer.

In the center of the village, the ancient tree stirred as though alive, one of its branches whipping out like a lash. With a loud crack, it struck the enormous head, sending it flying.

The pungent smell of herbs wafted through the air. Chen Shi sat in a cauldron of bubbling medicinal decoction, his stomach bloated from the liquid. The cauldron doubled as his evening meal.

A fire burned beneath the cauldron, and the black dog, though clearly an animal, had an oddly benevolent expression. When the flames died down, it fetched a log in its mouth and tossed it into the fire.

The cauldron’s bubbling intensified, steam rising as Chen Shi winced and cried out, “Black Pot, stop! You’ll cook me alive!” The dog, Black Pot, had earned its name from how it often took the blame for the grandfather-grandson duo’s misdeeds. It cocked its head, blinked, and defiantly added a few more logs to the flames, seemingly curious if Chen Shi could indeed be boiled.

Chen Shi’s protests gradually subsided as he got used to the heat.

The boy leaned back comfortably against the edge of the cauldron, reaching a hand to the long scar on the back of his head.

He didn’t remember much about the injury—or anything else from before the age of nine.

He couldn’t recall his parents, whether he’d ever attended school, or the incident where his skull had been split open.

All he remembered was waking up to excruciating pain in his head, surrounded by darkness and cold.

In that darkness, strange, ancient voices seemed to call out, guiding him.

He followed the voices, walking for what felt like an eternity until he finally saw a sliver of light.

When he stepped into the light, the darkness retreated like a tide, and everything became brighter.

As his eyes adjusted, he found himself sitting in a massive cauldron filled with bubbling medicinal liquid. The acrid smell was overwhelming. Beside the cauldron stood a tall, burly, white-haired old man and a black dog tending the fire.

When the boy opened his eyes, the old man was overcome with emotion, pulling him into a tight embrace.

Later, Chen Shi learned that the man was his grandfather and that he had been unconscious for a long time. His grandfather had used countless rare herbs to sustain him.

Having lost all memory of his life before the age of nine, Chen Shi’s memories began anew after that fateful awakening. In many ways, he was like a two-year-old.

“So... I became like this because someone took my divine embryo.”

Recalling the conversations he had overheard between the purple-clad woman and her group, Chen Shi clenched his fists. “I wasn’t born broken. I can cultivate! I can be a favored child of the heavens! Li Xiao Ding, son of the county magistrate of Shuiniu, what grudge did I have with you?!”

Rage swelled in his chest.

For the past two years, he had been confined to this medicinal cauldron, enduring countless concoctions made of unnameable herbs—and sometimes poisonous snakes and scorpions.

He’d always assumed he was just sick, but now he finally understood the source of his suffering: Li Xiao Ding, that esteemed young master.

“But…”

A puzzled look crossed Chen Shi’s face. “The wound on the back of my head has already healed. So why does Grandpa still insist I soak in the cauldron every day?”

The two walked deeper into the house. Chen Shi’s thoughts were interrupted by the faint scent wafting from his grandfather. It was unlike the medicinal aroma he was used to—a subtle, odd smell, like decayed meat, but not quite.

And yet, the familiar herbal scent of his grandfather overshadowed it.

As they passed through the village streets, doors and windows closed. Parents pulled children inside, and shadows flitted behind paper-covered windows.

“They’re back,” someone whispered in the darkness.

“Good men die young, but these scourges keep returning,” said another.

Chen Shi heard the murmurs, his unease growing. “Have they noticed something wrong with Grandpa?” he thought anxiously. “Will they harm him?”

The temperature in the room dropped once more, so cold that even the flames beneath the medicine cauldron began to dim, shifting from a golden yellow to an eerie green.

It was because his grandfather had entered.

Chen Shi stole a glance and saw his grandfather standing in the corner, shrouded in shadows. His face was obscured, and his actions were unclear. Yet Chen Shi felt his grandfather’s gaze on him—sometimes tender, but other times brimming with murderous intent.

He had seen such a murderous aura once before, from a gravely injured leopard he had tried to approach and bandage. Its piercing eyes radiated the same primal, deadly aura of a beast sensing its own demise.

After a while, his grandfather walked out again, and the flames under the cauldron roared back to life as the room warmed.

Chen Shi exhaled softly in relief.

Black Pot, the family dog, also sighed as it dutifully added logs to the fire. However, its movements were shaky, a clear sign that even the dog had felt the oppressive aura of danger emanating from the old man.

Both man and beast could sense that while the figure looked like his grandfather, it was no longer entirely him.

The man his grandfather used to be had warmth, humanity.

This one did not.

The medicinal broth in the cauldron gradually became clear. Chen Shi felt peculiar streams of energy seeping out of the liquid, wriggling into his skin like countless tiny worms. They burrowed into his muscles, organs, and even his bones, igniting a sensation that was akin to being engulfed in flames.

Though he was no stranger to this pain, his body still shivered involuntarily.

When the medicine was finally spent, and the liquid in the cauldron turned crystal clear, Chen Shi climbed out.

On the left side of his chest, near his heart, there was a faint blue claw-shaped mark. Five long fingers stretched outward, as if a ghostly hand were grasping his heart. After each medicinal bath, the mark would fade slightly, only to reappear more vividly days later.

This mark had been with him for as long as he could remember, never disappearing entirely.

Dressed, Chen Shi stepped into the courtyard.

From the adjacent room came the muffled sound of his grandfather’s voice:

“…Ah Tang, when will you come back? I know you’re busy, but no matter how busy you are, you should come home sometimes… I’m old. I won’t live much longer. Little Ten is still young. He needs someone to care for him. Take him to the city… I know life in the city is hard, but he’s your son. Even if you don’t acknowledge him, he’s still your son…”

Chen Shi stood motionless in the courtyard, listening silently.

His grandfather, a cultivator of unknown strength, had always been a guardian to him, leading him through countless perilous situations in the mountains.

Now, it seemed, he was using a distant sound transmission talisman to speak to Chen Shi’s father, Chen Tang.

Chen Shi had never met his father—not even once.

The same was true for his mother.

Shaking off his thoughts, Chen Shi began practicing the Three Radiances Qi Technique. Starry lights descended from the sky, nourishing his body and invigorating his qi.

But as always, the qi dissipated shortly afterward, unable to remain within him.

Still, he persevered.

Late into the night, after finishing his cultivation, he lay down to sleep.

Not long after, his grandfather entered his room like a sleepwalker, soundless and eerie. He stood at the bedside, his shadow cast over Chen Shi’s face.

The old man’s posture shifted between leaning forward and tilting back, yet he made no noise.

The same bone-chilling murderous intent began to pervade the small room.

The air grew heavy, oppressive.

After what felt like an eternity, the window creaked open on its own, and his grandfather suddenly straightened, stepping through the opening with unnatural fluidity.

“I’m… hungry…”

The old man’s voice was like a murmur in a dream. His body leapt into the courtyard, disappearing into the night.

Black Pot stirred, lifting its head briefly before curling back up and resuming its sleep.

On the bed, Chen Shi opened his eyes, exhaling in silent relief.

“Grandpa must be ill,” he thought to himself, trying to push away his unease. “He doesn’t really want to hurt me.”

Just as he calmed his nerves, a searing pain tore through his chest. It was so intense that his body curled into a tight ball, resembling a boiled shrimp.

His skin turned red, veins bulging as beads of sweat poured from him.

Biting down on his blanket to stifle his screams, Chen Shi trembled violently. When he looked down, the blue ghostly claw over his heart had shifted, its fingers tightening as though trying to crush his heart.

“This again…”

He had endured this agony countless times before. Each episode left him on the brink of unconsciousness, haunted by dreams of immense, terrifying shadows stretching scaly black claws toward him in the darkness.

In the past, his grandfather had always been there to save him, pulling him back from death.

But tonight, his grandfather was gone.

Chen Shi forced himself to move, his legs giving way as he fell from the bed. Gritting his teeth, he struggled to his feet and began stepping through a series of precise movements, following the patterns of the Big Dipper.

His hands formed seals, fingers pressing against one another in practiced rhythm.

Walking the Seven-Star Steps, he silently recited the incantations of the Three Radiances Qi Technique:

“In the beginning, Heaven reigns supreme, and only the divine is revered. Chaos breeds evil, obscuring the true god. Observe the heavenly way, follow its path, cultivate righteous qi, and refine the holy embryo.”

As starlight entered through the open window, faint like fireflies, it seeped into his skin and deeper into his flesh.

The pain began to subside. The blue ghostly claw slowly loosened its grip on his heart, its spectral fingers retreating.

“What is this ghostly claw on my chest? Why does it haunt me?”

Even after the pain subsided, Chen Shi’s heart was heavy with questions.

“The Three Radiances Qi Technique can suppress the pain, but if I could channel sunlight and moonlight, refining true righteous qi, maybe this torment would finally end. But why can’t I draw upon the sun or moon’s light?”

A sudden thought struck him:

“The sun is the eye of the True God. The moon is its vertical pupil. But then why do people speak of sunrise, sunset, or the moon’s phases? Could there be other suns and moons? Is the Three Radiances Qi Technique actually drawing from these other sources?”

Leaning out the window, he gazed curiously at the moon—a serene, enigmatic presence.

It was, after all, the vertical eye of the True God.

“If these other celestial bodies exist, why can’t I see them in the sky?”

As Chen Shi pondered, far above the mountains, the massive floating head was struck by a piercing beam of cold light, plummeting into the forest below.

A towering figure emerged shortly afterward, crouching over the fallen head to gnaw at its flesh.

“Delicious… Even better than humans…” it murmured between bites.