Today was not an ordinary morning.

  Today marks the start of the Outer Court selection.

  Mist lay low across the Chen Clan's outer courtyards, thin as a veil and cold enough to sting the throat. Lanterns still burned along the stone walkways, their flames steady in the windless dawn, as if the world itself were holding its breath.

  A bell rang once from the direction of the outer court testing ground, deep, metallic, and final. The sound traveled cleanly over tiled roofs and silent courtyards, slipping into every doorway and under every sleeve like an uninvited truth.

  The children came in small clusters, guided by adults who tried not to look anxious. Some parents were stern, some pale, some angry in a way that had nowhere to go. A few refused to watch, standing with their backs turned as if denial could soften what fate might do.

  In the end, only seventeen youths stood at the edge of the testing ground.

  Ten had chosen not to come.

  Those ten weren't mocked. Not openly. The Chen Clan did not waste breath mocking children who knew their limits. Most of them had awakened basic tools, items meant for living, not fighting. A pestle that could crush herbs. A needle that could stitch cloth without tearing. A small furnace core that burned hotter than normal fire. Useful. Honest.

  But not worth gambling blood for.

  To walk the cultivation road with a tool spirit item was to accept a life of being stepped on by those born with weapons and battle wills. Some would still try. Many would fail. The ten had looked at the road, weighed the cost, and stepped aside before the first cliff.

  No one wrote their names into the outer court ledger.

  No one called them cowards, or even remembers their names.

  They had simply chosen a different kind of survival.

  The seventeen who came stood in a loose line facing the testing ground's central platform.

  Stone tiles stretched wide like a flat battlefield. Around its perimeter were wooden posts with rope barriers, beyond which a handful of clan members gathered, mostly branch elders, attendants, and relatives who were permitted to watch from a distance. Parents were not allowed inside the test circle itself.

  Chen Ning stood among the permitted onlookers, hands clasped tight enough that her knuckles were pale. Her eyes kept drifting to the same spot in the line, returning like a compass needle.

  Chen Ba did not look back.

  He didn't need to.

  He could feel her worry pressing at him from behind, warm and aching in a way that had nothing to do with Qi.

  He stared forward instead.

  The Black Pole was strapped behind his shoulder, wrapped in cloth, silent and heavy. Beneath his robe, the cold key-shaped pendant rested against his chest. It was still, cold.

  Outer Court Elder Chen Zhaolin stood atop the test platform.

  He wore dark robes bordered with faint silver thread, the insignia of an outer court authority. His hair was tied high and tight. His face was plain in a forgettable way... until he looked at you.

  Then you would understood why most of the outer court disciples feared him.

  His gaze swept the seventeen youths once, slow and deliberate, as if counting their hearts rather than their bodies.

  "Outer Court Selection," he said, voice carrying across the stone without effort. "There will be a total of three tests. Fail one, and you are disqualified."

  The words were simple. The finality was not.

  "This selection exists because resources are limited," Elder Chen Zhaolin continued. "The outer court does not feed hopes. It feeds results."

  A pause.

  His eyes moved to the platform beneath his feet.

  "Look closely," he said. "This is not a contest of who shouts loudest or swings hardest. It is a contest of foundation, talent and willpower"

  He pointed and channel his Qi into the stone platform.

  A faint, geometric shimmer crawled across the platform's surface, lines of pale light surfacing like veins beneath skin. The formation array had been carved into the platform long ago, its channels hidden until activated.

  The moment the array awakened, the air changed.

  It thickened.

  Not like fog.

  Like weight.

  The pressure did not come from the elder's body. He was not releasing aura or intent to crush them. He stopped after the initial activation with his Qi and simply stood there as the formation array began to breathe.

  And when it breathed, the world pressed down.

  Several youths inhaled sharply and immediately regretted it. Their lungs had to work harder, their chests rising against invisible resistance. Standing upright suddenly felt like carrying a bucket of water on each shoulder.

  Elder Chen Zhaolin watched their reactions with cold patience.

  "All thirteen-year-olds begin at Qi Initiate Level One upon awakening," he said. "That is the first step. It is not mastery. It is merely the door opening."

  He lifted his hand again, pointing to a stone slab set at the platform's side. A bronze hourglass was embedded into it, already filled, its sand pale and fine.

  "The first test begins now," he said. "Twenty-four hours."

  A murmur ran through the line.

  Twenty-four hours under this pressure?

  Elder Chen Zhaolin didn't let the murmur grow.

  "To pass the first test," he said, voice sharpening. "while enduring the array's pressure, you will guide Qi into your meridians and reach Qi Initiate Level Three before the sand runs out."

  A few eyes widened.

  Level Three in a day was brutal.

  But the elder continued, as if stating a known fact.

  "The pressure helps. It compresses ambient Qi and forces your body to adapt. It makes it easier to absorb and circulate, if your mind holds."

  Then his gaze turned colder.

  "If your mind does not hold, you collapse."

  Silence.

  "If the collapse is severe, your meridians may suffer damage." Another beat. "If your spirit and soul are unstable… you may even lose your newly awakened spirit item."

  A sharp breath came from someone in the line.

  Lose it?

  That was not disqualification. That was a life sentence.

  Elder Chen Zhaolin looked over them again, and his voice dropped slightly, making every word land heavier.

  "Disqualification occurs in three ways. One: you fail to reach Level Three by the end of twenty-four hours. Two: you withdraw. Three: you lose the ability to continue."

  He turned his palm downward.

  "Enter the circle. Sit. Begin."

  The youths stepped forward into the formation's boundary.

  The pressure immediately increased by a clear margin, like stepping from shallow water into a deep pool. A few stumbled, caught off guard by how sudden the weight became.

  One boy, thin, nervous, with a small iron knife spirit item flickering near his waist was still waving to his parents standing outside the platform. Not concentrating, not prepared for the sudden pressure, staggered hard.

  His knees bent.

  He tried to straighten.

  The array pressed him down like a hand on the back of his neck.

  "I... I can't!" he gasped, panic flooding his voice.

  Panic was poison.

  His breathing turned ragged. His mind scattered. The Qi around him, dense and eager under the array's compression, surged toward his open meridians without guidance.

  It was like letting a river rush into a narrow ditch.

  Pain flashed across his abdomen. His face went white.

  He screamed! High and sharp, then collapsed forward.

  Two outer court attendants moved immediately, practiced and fast. They seized him under the arms and dragged him across the boundary.

  The moment his body left the formation's circle, the pressure released from him like a snapped rope. He crumpled to the ground, clutching his stomach, tears and snot mixing with dust.

  Disqualified.

  Before he even sat down.

  The remaining youths froze, watching.

  The lesson was immediate and merciless: the formation moved forward without warning, punishing you for being unprepared.

  Elder Chen Zhaolin's voice cut through the silence.

  "Sit," he ordered.

  This time, no one hesitated.

  The remaining sixteen youths lowered themselves to the stone, cross-legged, backs straight as they could manage under the pressure. Some trembled. Some clenched their jaws. A few stared at the ground as if trying not to be sick.

  Chen Ba sat among them, eyes forward.

  The weight pressed on his shoulders. Not just physical. It felt like the array was testing whether his bones were allowed to exist.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  He breathed in.

  Slow.

  Out.

  Controlled.

  He remembered Chen Ning's instruction from years ago, said in a tired voice after she'd come home with blood at the corner of her mouth from some failed attempt at cultivation.

  Don't chase Qi. Let it come. Your body is the door, not the hook.

  He let the pressure push ambient Qi against his skin. Under the array, the air was dense with it, cool, sharp, restless. It pressed against him like water against cloth.

  Then, gently, he opened his meridians.

  Qi slid inward.

  Not violently.

  Not forced.

  Slow, but guided.

  Pain bloomed anyway as the Qi tried to carve space in narrow channels that were still new. Chen Ba's jaw tightened. He did not make a sound.

  Around him, fifteen other began the same struggle in fifteen different ways, some careful, some desperate, some ignorant.

  Time crawled.

  Minutes felt like stones.

  The first hour passed under the same constant weight, the formation array unwavering, as if it had all day to crush them.

  Sweat formed on foreheads and dripped onto stone. Some children's breathing grew shallow. Others tried to breathe deeper and found their lungs resisting like stubborn doors.

  The pressure wasn't only on the body.

  It was on the mind.

  Staying calm under oppression was a skill. A rare one.

  By the second hour, several youths had learned to steady their breath. Others were still fighting their own panic.

  By the third hour, the sun had climbed higher, brightening the courtyard stones, but warmth did not enter the circle. Under the formation's pressure, the air felt cold and heavy regardless of sunlight.

  Then, just a little past the third hour, something shifted.

  A faint pulse of Qi spread outward near the left side of the circle, subtle enough that only those who were sensitive, or desperate, noticed.

  A girl sat there with her eyes closed, hands resting lightly on her knees, expression strained but steady.

  Chen Lanyue.

  She had been quiet all morning, not drawing attention, not shaking, not forcing. Her breathing was unusually rhythmic, as if she were listening to something no one else could hear.

  Now, her dantian tightened, then expanded.

  Her meridians accepted the flow.

  The Qi loop completed with a soft internal click.

  Qi Initiate Level Two.

  A faint greenish shimmer rippled around her for a heartbeat, like sunlight passing through leaves. It vanished almost immediately, leaving only a steadier aura within her body.

  Chen Lanyue's lashes trembled, but she did not open her eyes. She simply adjusted her breathing and continued circulating, stabilizing the level.

  Around the circle, several children felt it.

  Hope flickered.

  "Someone did it."

  "Level Two is possible."

  But hope could turn into impatience faster than fire spreads through dry grass.

  One boy tried to imitate the rhythm he imagined she used, forcing his breathing into a pattern that wasn't his. His meridians stung; he nearly choked, then caught himself, sweating hard.

  No one else broke through.

  Not immediately.

  And as the hours stretched on, it became clear that Chen Lanyue's breakthrough did not open the floodgates.

  It only marked the first crack in a wall.

  For the next four hours, no other breakthrough came.

  The formation continued pressing.

  The sun continued moving.

  The children continued suffering.

  Some reached the edge of Level Two, feeling their dantian swell, the meridians stretching as if about to accept the next step, only to falter because their minds wavered at the wrong moment.

  A slight panic.

  A breath too fast.

  A thought like what if I fail?

  And the Qi would scatter, slipping back like water through fingers.

  By the fifth hour, several youths had blood at the corners of their lips from biting too hard.

  By the sixth, their robes were soaked with sweat.

  By the seventh, some began to shake in exhaustion, thighs trembling from holding posture under constant weight.

  Elder Chen Zhaolin did not speak.

  He did not need to.

  The formation array was speaking for him.

  It said: This is what the road feels like.

  It said: Get used to pain, or leave.

  As the eighth hour approached, the light of day had shifted. The sun was no longer directly overhead. Shadows lengthened slowly beyond the rope barrier, creeping across the stone like patient fingers.

  Inside the circle, the children looked older than they had that morning.

  Not in years.

  In fatigue.

  In the way their brows furrowed, their jaws clenched, their shoulders tightened under weight.

  Then the dam finally gave, quietly, without drama.

  A boy near the center, Chen Fanyu, shuddered as his dantian stabilized, Qi flow smoothing as if a knot had been untied.

  Qi Initiate Level Two.

  No glow, only the subtle shift in his breathing and the way his posture suddenly stopped trembling as much.

  Minutes later, another child's Qi loop completed.

  Then another.

  Not rapid like falling dominoes.

  But steady.

  One by one, the formation forced adaptation.

  By the time the sun began to dip lower, more than half of the remaining children had successfully reached Level Two.

  Including Chen Ba.

  His breakthrough came without fanfare.

  He felt the moment the meridians widened enough to hold the new flow. He felt the dantian expand like a small chamber gaining space. The pain did not vanish, but it changed, becoming less like tearing and more like soreness after hard work.

  He exhaled slowly, careful not to let relief loosen his focus.

  He continued circulating, stabilizing, letting the new flow settle.

  Beyond the circle, Chen Ning saw his posture shift, just slightly, and her shoulders loosened for the first time all day. She pressed a hand to her chest, as if holding her heart in place.

  Chen Ba did not look back.

  He kept his eyes closed.

  He kept moving Qi.

  Because Level Two was not the goal.

  It was only proof that he could survive the first half of the day.

  As afternoon deepened, the test circle looked like a field of silent statues, children sitting in disciplined lines, bodies trembling under pressure, faces drawn tight with concentration.

  There were still those who had not reached Level Two.

  Three remained stubbornly stuck at the threshold, their Qi unstable, their minds flickering between determination and panic.

  Elder Chen Zhaolin finally spoke again near the late afternoon, his voice carrying cleanly.

  "Do not mistake Level Two for safety," he said. "Level Two is merely the point where your body stops screaming and begins negotiating."

  His gaze moved across the sixteen.

  "Level Three is where your will becomes visible."

  He said no more.

  The sun slid lower, nearing the horizon.

  The light changed, turning warmer and softer outside the circle, but inside the array the air remained heavy, indifferent to beauty.

  Beyond the rope barrier, the watchers shifted restlessly. Some parents whispered prayers under their breath. Some branch elders watched with calculating eyes, already evaluating which children were worth future investment.

  The shadows stretched longer.

  The sky began to dim at the edges.

  But the moon was not yet up.

  The day was turning, slowly, toward night.

  Inside the circle, the children had reached a grim rhythm: breathe, guide, endure.

  Now it was not about proving they could adapt.

  It was about proving they could keep adapting.

  Because the first test was not finished.

  And the formation array had not weakened.

  It continued pressing with the same unrelenting weight, as if the platform itself had become a mountain.

  Elder Chen Zhaolin stood above them, unmoving, the hourglass sand still flowing steadily.

  His voice came once more, calm as winter.

  "The first gate has opened," he said. "If you want to pass through it, do not collapse before it closes."

  The sky dimmed further.

  The last bright edge of sunlight thinned.

  Evening approached like a silent judge.

  Inside the circle, sixteen children sat under crushing pressure, sweaty, shaking, stubborn, each one fighting their own mind as much as their meridians.

  No one had reached Level Three yet.

  Not a single one.

  And as the day leaned into dusk, with the moon still hidden beyond the horizon, the first test continued, unyielding, patient, and hungry, waiting to see who would break before night truly arrived.