Outside Han Ye's room, where the boy sat lost in a half-mad trance, Elders Xian, Meng, and Ji lingered silently. Watching from a distance, they observed his strange behavior with increasing unease. Elder Meng activated a subtle perception technique, the same one he'd used earlier.

  "He's gone mad, hasn't he, Elder Ji?" asked Elder Xian through Qi transmission.

  "I think so," Elder Ji replied ftly.

  "Have you tried using Mind Reading?" Elder Meng asked, eyes still locked on Han Ye.

  "I have. But his mind... it's filled with incomprehensible symbols. Glyphs, formus, entire sequences I can’t even begin to decipher. It wasn’t like anything from this world."

  "He's not chanting. He’s not cultivating. He’s not even moving his lips, but I can feel a disturbance around him," Elder Xian muttered.

  Elder Meng narrowed his eyes. "It’s as if… something is rewriting him. From within."

  They all fell silent. The only sound was the faint rustling of trees and the occasional flicker of Qi stirring the air around Han Ye’s room.

  "Should we stop him?" Elder Xian finally asked.

  Elder Ji shook his head. "And risk triggering whatever is evolving inside him? No. For now, we watch. And wait."

  "But if he loses control—"

  "Then we’ll be ready."

  As the elders stood in grim contemption, a soft pulse of energy(?) resonated from within the room. A moment ter, an eerie silence fell—one that made even the seasoned elders hold their breath.

  From inside, Han Ye remained motionless, his fingers gently brushing over the cursed book resting in his p. His mind was drowning in fragments of knowledge not meant for mortals—concepts of space beyond dimensions, numbers that expined time itself, and whispers of ws that governed reality from behind the veil.

  A single thought rose in his mind:

  “There’s more. Much more. This world is but a shell.”

  And the hunger to uncover it all only grew stronger.

  The elders stood tense as the air around Han Ye thickened. The cursed book at his side pulsed faintly, its presence drawing in strands of ambient Qi like a bck hole inhaling starlight.

  Elder Meng’s eyes flicked to the distortion rippling in the space around Han Ye’s body.

  “Did you feel that?” he whispered through Qi transmission.“The space... it bent,” Elder Xian confirmed, his hand already gripping the hilt of his spirit bde.

  “No. Not bent,” Elder Ji corrected calmly, “It was rewritten.”

  The leaves around the courtyard had stopped rustling. The wind had vanished. Even the sun overhead seemed to dim, as if time hesitated to continue its flow. Around Han Ye, thin bck threads of energy(?) began to form intricate patterns in the air—symbols no mortal had ever learned, but which somehow echoed with power far beyond cultivation.

  “Reality is fracturing around him,” Elder Xian said, stepping forward. “This is not just some internal deviation. He’s affecting the world.”

  Elder Meng raised his bow. “If we don’t do something—”

  But then, before he could finish that thought, Han Ye suddenly trembled. His body jolted violently—once, then again—and then he colpsed, face-first onto the wooden floor of the room.

  A sharp snap echoed outward like a mirror shattering in reverse.

  And in that instant, all the anomalies—every distorted line, every eerie sound, every trace of alien energy—vanished.

  The sun returned to its natural warmth. The wind resumed its gentle movement. The cursed book no longer pulsed.

  Han Ye y there motionless, breathing slowly, as if nothing had happened.

  Elder Ji lowered his hand. “It stopped…”

  Elder Meng stared, brows furrowed. “He passed out again… but why now?”

  Elder Xian looked at the unconscious youth, his expression unreadable. “That book... it’s not just cursed. It’s alive. And I think it’s feeding him.”

  Elder Ji narrowed his gaze. “Feeding him with what?”

  They stood there in heavy silence, staring down at the young cultivator who no longer fit into any box the world had prepared for him.

  Moments after the anomalies vanished, the elders stepped into the recovery room. Their expressions were unreadable, their Qi restrained yet ready to be unleashed at the slightest provocation.

  Elder Ji moved silently, his eyes trained on Han Ye’s unconscious form. Elder Xian stood near the door, while Elder Meng’s fingers twitched toward the hilt of his bow again. None of them spoke—but their tension hung thick in the air.

  Then suddenly—

  Han Ye’s body jolted.

  His eyes opened wide, unfocused at first, then slowly narrowing in confusion. His breathing was shallow. His thoughts scrambled.

  What... what just happened? he asked himself, blinking at the hazy ceiling above. His head turned slightly—and then froze as he saw the three elders around him.

  Their bodies were tense, poised to strike.

  Elder Meng had already taken a stance that signaled one thing—preemptive elimination.

  Han Ye’s heart thumped in his chest.

  He quickly looked at his hands.

  The bck lines.

  They had returned.

  But now, there was something else.

  On his wrist, just below the web of shadow-like marks, a number glowed faintly:95%

  His pupils shrank. He instinctively knew what it meant.

  Sanity.That was his sanity level.

  And it wasn’t 100%.

  “W-What... is this?” he whispered to himself, mind racing.

  “Ah, you’re awake,” came Elder Ji’s voice, calm but unreadable. “How do you feel?”

  “Elder?” Han Ye blinked. “What happened to me? I don’t… remember much.”

  “Hmph,” Elder Meng grunted, lowering his stance reluctantly. “You’re back to normal now, I see.”

  Elder Xian crossed his arms, still staring. “And what is that number? What does it mean?”

  Han Ye gnced again at the glowing digits. His throat tightened. He wasn’t sure if he should speak the truth.

  But before he could answer—

  “No need to expin yet,” Elder Ji interrupted, stepping closer. “Rest for now. When you’ve recovered, you’ll expin everything… in front of the council of elders.”

  Han Ye nodded slowly, anxiety cwing at his chest.

  Because deep down, he knew something had changed forever.And 95% might be the st thread holding him together.

  “Elders… before you leave this room—why are you holding your weapons so tightly??” Han Ye asked, his voice quiet but steady. His eyes didn’t leave the weapons still held tightly by the three elders. “And why do you all look like you were about to kill me?”

  The room fell into a tense silence.

  Elder Ji exhaled slowly, his shoulders rexing only slightly. “Oh, long story short… you disturbed space.”

  Han Ye blinked. “Disturbed space?”

  “By tearing it open,” Elder Meng added, narrowing his eyes.

  “Like this, elder?” Han Ye raised one hand casually, and with a faint ripple of energi(?), reached into the air—and pulled.

  A line split open before them like a curtain being drawn back, revealing a writhing void of shifting, sickening colors behind it.

  “NO WAY—HEY!! CLOSE IT AGAIN!!” Elder Ji shouted in pure arm, his usual calm shattered as he rushed forward.

  “Sorry, elder.” Han Ye immediately waved his hand, and the space stitched itself shut with a faint shhhkk.

  A subtle ringing echoed through the room.Han Ye looked at his wrist.

  90%

  Then a second ter—95%

  ‘Oh… so that’s how it works.’He mentally noted the connection between his sanity and space manipution. He would have to be more careful in the future.

  But the unease hadn’t faded.The elders remained frozen.

  Because what Han Ye had just done wasn’t a simple technique or a normal spatial ability.

  It was an opening into a pce that should never be touched.

  A pce beyond comprehension.

  And they had felt it.

  All three elders and even Elder Xian whose senses were known to be numbed by age—had all felt a chill crawl up their spines the moment that space opened.

  It was not just spatial dispcement.

  It was something wrong.

  Something alive.

  They didn’t speak of it aloud.Not yet.But it was there, in their expressions.

  Elder Meng turned his eyes toward the door. “...We’ll speak again at the Elder Hall. Rest until then, Han Ye.”

  Without another word, they left the room, their footsteps oddly heavy despite their cultivation levels.

  Han Ye remained sitting upright on the bed, staring at his hand.

  95%.

  He didn’t know what would happen if it ever hit 0.

  And worse…

  He wasn’t sure he wanted to find out.