45th of Season of Fire, 56th year of the 32nd cycle,

the day of summer solstice

The mine shaft was dim, illuminated by the dull glow of spirit gem detritus embedded into the walls. The dry air suffused with fine dust hampered Newt’s breathing, still, the young man’s worn out pickaxe struck the granite with a bang, sending a spark and a trickle of crushed rock to the ground.

Nothing.

Steel struck rock again and again, much like it did the past three years, ever since Newt’s uncle had turned him into a slave and imprisoned him in the depleted spirit gem mine.

Digging for spirit gems was a fool’s errand, a prison, and a humiliation served all at once. And yet, Newt had no choice. In the early days, he was defiant, then he grew hungry. He started considering himself, his past actions, and how his decisions had led him where he was.

Day after day, month after month, the same questions haunted him.

Did this happen because of me?

Another spark burst into life before darkness swallowed it.

Would Uncle have defeated Father if he had not captured me and used me as a hostage?

He knew the answer, and the universe responded with another spark, a brief flare of light which illuminated the darkness.

Is this divine punishment?

Spark.

What happened to Mother?

Spark.

To Father?

Spark.

Will I find a stray spirit gem and get meat tomorrow?

Spark.

The youth toiled, producing flashes of light in the dark, digging inside what history has proven to be his ancestor’s ruinous mistake.

Newt’s ancestor, Lord Blazing Salamander, had purchased the Dragon’s Rest volcano seven cycles ago, in an age long forgotten. The patriarch of the once mighty Blazing Salamander clan had gambled all his wealth on a slim chance to increase his realm, to extend his longevity. He followed a folktale, which stated that the entire mountain range was a magma dragon’s burial ground.

The grand ancestor’s gamble failed. The mountain became his tomb, and his family declined, wasting centuries on digging and failing to find anything more extraordinary than a mid-sized spirit gem mine in the mountain’s bowels. A mine not worth the price they had paid.

Even after their great patriarch’s death, the Blazing Salamander clan searched for the dead dragon’s double core. Generation after generation, they grew poorer and poorer, weaker and weaker, swallowing humiliation and disrespect from local upstarts, until the mighty clan was but a pale shadow of its illustrious past.

Finally, they exhausted the spirit gem mine during Newt’s father’s reign, and the Blazing Salamander family plummeted, falling from the status of a small local power to a family of irrelevant, low-ranking cultivators living at the fringes of the empire.

And Newt, Newt wasn’t even a cultivator yet. He was sixteen; once a young master of a cultivator family, a shoo-in for a spirit beast’s core. And yet his uncle threw him into the gloom when he was merely thirteen. His scrawny hands clutched the pickaxe’s shaft, smashing at the rock with despair and impotent rage. Always asking the same question.

Is this my fault?

Metal met granite, and another spark flew in the dark as the sun blazed high above the ground, beyond Newt’s shadowy world. The gigantic celestial body reached its zenith, baptizing the forgotten grave with the purest fire energy.

The unremarkable spark, one of countless tiny flames Newt had offered as sacrifice over the years, froze mid air. Newt struck the rock again, sacrificing yet another handful of granite, and a second spark blossomed, freezing just beneath her sister. The cosmic power fueled the twins, and in an instant, they grew from imperceptible white dots into eye-sized white marbles, then into miniature suns larger than a grown man’s fist.

Newt covered his eyes to shield himself from the blazing orbs, frozen in shock and fear. The air shimmered with scalding heat. The localized conflagration should have turned Newt into a charred skeleton, but the burning fury disappeared, becoming a life-nurturing warmth.

“What the?” the youth said, his voice cracking, his throat dry.

He removed his hands from his eyes and gazed at the orbs. They were the same size, but of different colors. The lower orb pulsated like a heart, dark red, the color of spilled blood, marbled with crimson lines, throbbing with power. The upper orb was brownish-yellow, its tiny form pulsating with the weight of the world.

Newt gaped in wonder. He knew what had appeared before him. His father and mother had told him the stories and family legends since before he could remember. The stars which accepted him, which searched for a new master, were the dead dragon’s cores. The unreachable goal his ancestor struggled for centuries to find. They had to be.

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Newt reached for the lower orb, his hand shaking from excitement. The pickaxe clattered to the ground, and Newt’s heart trembled in euphoric excitement as his fingers crawled towards the fire which could burn bronze.

Suddenly, the tiny suns flickered. The stellar alignment which fueled them, which made their inner worlds visible, had passed, its energy receding.

The panicked young man pounced, his hand no longer inching forward, but darting for the cores. If he could reach them in time, if he could internalize the dragon’s cores, and claim the spirit beast’s cultivation, he would immediately become a powerhouse, a dragon’s scion.

His fingers passed through the illusory flame, grabbing nothing, and in that moment, Newt’s elation turned to despair.

“No!”

Newt’s head spun. He wanted to die then and there, to end himself with the pickaxe. He was too late. The chance had slipped through his hesitant hands. Once more he was the architect of his family’s doom.

Just as he screamed in despair and self-loathing, fire incinerated his heart, and a star exploded behind his eyes.

Writhing in pain, Newt collapsed, thinking himself dead.

He awoke drenched in sweat, blistering heat seared his skin and lungs, warm, hard rock pressing against his back. His eyes stung, and he squinted upwards before opening them wide.

He was in hell. The sky above burned, its expanse bright red, painting Newt’s blue eyes violet. Strange black pines obscured half the scene, and a sulfurous reek assailed Newt’s nostrils as he watched plumes of red smoke drift like clouds high above.

“Where am I?” he whispered in surprise before recalling the burning sensations which caused him to faint.

Newt clenched his chest, but the pain was gone. Still laying on the ground, he struggled to make sense of his situation. His mind raced before he sighed in dejection.

I failed to integrate the magma dragon’s cores, but at least I suffered no injuries. I either died instantly, or this is a secret realm created when the dragon died. Newt knew a lot of cultivation related information. He had spent most of his childhood preparing for the day he would integrate a spirit beast’s core to form a spirit root and start drawing in spiritual energy. The grand ceremony should have taken place on his fifteenth nameday, had fate not played a cruel game with his life.

Newt struggled to control his breathing, and after calming down enough, he scanned his surroundings, still remaining on his back.

He was in an unknown, exotic forest. The sloped ground was hard and black, like lava which had cooled. The steep incline indicated he was atop a mountain, his feet facing down. The trees were tall and the same shade of black as the ground, their leaves pinky-long spines, their conical crowns shaped like those of pines, with enough space between them to see the sky and red clouds, but probably not enough to fit another tree.

There was no movement nor visible danger, so after several minutes of lying patiently, Newt rose to his feet.

The pervading heat was insufferable and seemingly grew as he stood. It pinched and clawed at Newt’s skin, drilling through it, and yet it did not harm him. The needles of energy stabbing at his skin pierced into his flesh and followed a flow only to disappear between his eyebrows and within his heart.

Is this spiritual energy? But I haven’t manifested a spirit root. I can’t cultivate yet.

As these thoughts passed through Newt’s mind, a part of him could not help but hope. If he could cultivate, he might be able to find out about his mother’s and father’s fate. He could break his shackles and free himself. He could grow powerful and defeat his uncle, avenging all loyal relatives who had perished and suffered after the coup.

Newt forced himself to calm down and approached the closest tree, wishing to meditate next to its base, but the closer he drew, the hotter the air grew.

The heat is coming from the trees?

Newt squinted, examining the thick, black trunk, and saw the air shimmer around it. He also noticed that its rough, scale-like bark was calcified. It looked like stone from a long forgotten era, bleeding sap, which resembled fire frozen in time. The awed youth glanced up into the branches, finding fruits similar to pinecones, if pinecones were crystalline and translucent.

“Are those spirit gems?” the boy muttered in disbelief. The surrounding trees housed at least twenty, more valuable crystals than he had mined in the three years of his slavery. And not just that, the spirit gems were purer, more translucent than the inferior dregs he managed to scavenge in his family’s depleted mine.

Newt gulped, his eyes burning with desire. High quality spirit gems? Which realm? I’m rich, assuming I leave this realm alive.

The greedy thought stole Newt’s attention away from more urgent questions, but the problem was, he had nothing on him with which to carry the harvested gems. He was shirtless, his tattered pants barely covering his knees, and even if he knew how to weave a basket, which he did not, nothing in the inhospitable terrain looked like proper material for weaving.

And there was one final question burning in his mind. How do I pluck them?

He looked around, but saw no loose stones laying on the volcanic rock he stood on. There were no broken branches or bushes growing from the impregnable soil. The only choice he had, if he wanted to get those spirit gems, was to climb the calcified pine.

He who dares…

Newt drew a deep breath and hardened his resolve before advancing towards the rough, black tree trunk. The heat was infernal, but he endured. Sweat streamed down his scrawny back and bare chest. The muck and grime which had stuck to his skin in the mines fell off, washed away by perspiration. His skin was the tortured bone-white of those who had not seen the sun in years, all his ribs visible, his vertebrae forming a miniature range of ridges running down his back.

Persistence and despair forced his hand, and Newt plowed through the unbearable heat. He reached the dark bark and touched it. Sweat on his palm sizzled and turned to steam, but the blaze which should have seared his flesh became a nourishing warmth, passing through his skin. The energy followed a brand-new channel leading towards his heart, where it disappeared, satiating a hunger Newt did not know he suffered from.

This isn’t a real flame, it’s fire-attributed spiritual energy, and I can absorb it!

A tear of joy slid down Newt’s cheek, evaporating before it reached his smiling lips. He did not know why, or how, but somehow he had awakened a spirit root, and he met the minimal requirement to start cultivating.

His life was about to change. He would correct all the injustices he had suffered and restore his family. He would—

Sky’s red light dimmed.

Newt looked up, expecting to find a really thick cloud, but found a giant black blot covering the heavens. A pair of vicious red eyes, burning with hunger, scanned the forest, searching for food.

Newt swallowed a lump and cowered, almost hugging the rough, black pine for safety.

He hid from the colossal pterosaur, two words crossing his mind. The terror his father warned him of and scared him with when he misbehaved had appeared above him.

A heart demon.