The wooden steps creaked beneath Liu Wei's feet as he followed Master Chen up the ancient spiral staircase. Pale blue light filtered through paper windows, casting long shadows that danced across the walls with each passing cloud. The air grew thicker as they ascended, heavy with the scent of aged parchment and burning incense.

"Watch your step," Master Chen warned, his voice echoing in the narrow passage. "These stairs have witnessed ten thousand disciples' journeys, but they've never felt footsteps quite like yours."

Liu Wei glanced down at his feet, half-expecting to see the wooden steps deteriorating beneath him. Since the revelation of his copper meridians, he'd become hyperaware of every surface he touched. The strange hunger within his pathways seemed to pulse with each point of contact, eager to draw in the essence of the world around him.

They reached a heavy door marked with five concentric circles, each carved with characters so ancient Liu Wei couldn't decipher them. Master Chen pressed his palm against the center circle, channeling a thread of golden qi that made the characters illuminate briefly before the door swung open with a deep groan.

The study beyond defied everything Liu Wei had heard about cultivation masters' private chambers. Where he'd expected the typical displays of power and prestige – jade ornaments, golden talismans, and precious cultivation materials – he found instead a repository of what appeared to be cast-offs and curiosities. Ancient bronze vessels lined crude wooden shelves, their surfaces green with age. Weathered stones bearing strange markings sat on tattered cushions. Scrolls so old their edges crumbled at a touch were carefully arranged on blackened wood tables.

"Surprised?" Master Chen asked, noting Liu Wei's expression. "You expected something more... grandiose, perhaps?"

"I..." Liu Wei hesitated, not wanting to offend. "The other masters' quarters I've seen were different."

Master Chen laughed, the sound rich and genuine. "The other masters collect power, young Liu Wei. I collect mysteries." He moved to a massive desk that dominated the center of the room. The wood was unlike anything Liu Wei had ever seen – darker than ebony, with swirling patterns that seemed to move in the corner of his vision.

The copper meridians in Liu Wei's arms throbbed at the sight of it. The hunger that had awakened during the testing ceremony stirred again, stronger now.

"You feel it, don't you?" Master Chen asked, running his hand along the desk's surface. "This wood comes from the Heart of the Black Forest. A place where the barriers between essence and form grow thin. Even after three hundred years, it still pulses with power."

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Liu Wei nodded, unable to take his eyes off the desk. The hunger in his meridians had become almost painful. "What... what is happening to me?"

Instead of answering immediately, Master Chen pulled out a drawer and retrieved a scroll sealed with copper wire. The seal bore the same five concentric circles as the door, but these were etched in metal that matched the color of Liu Wei's meridians exactly.

"Your ability," Master Chen said, carefully unwinding the wire, "is mentioned in only one text I've ever encountered." He spread the scroll across the desk, revealing text written in what appeared to be metallic ink. "The Essence Absorption Art – a cultivation technique so old it predates the founding of our sect."

Liu Wei leaned forward, eager to understand, but the characters on the scroll shifted and blurred before his eyes. "I can't read it."

"Few can. It's written in the Old Tongue, from before the Five Kingdoms were united." Master Chen's fingers traced the lines as he translated. "It speaks of cultivators who walked a different path. Instead of gathering qi from the heavens and earth, they drew power directly from the essence of all things. They were called..." He paused, frowning at a particular character.

"Called what, Master?"

"The Devourers of Form." Master Chen's voice grew serious. "Though that translation doesn't quite capture the nuance. Perhaps 'Those Who Inherit Essence' would be more accurate."

A chill ran down Liu Wei's spine despite the warmth of the room. "But if this art is known, why haven't others practiced it?"

"Because, young man, no one has ever possessed the copper meridians required to attempt it. Until now." Master Chen rolled the scroll carefully and set it aside. "The text speaks of practitioners with 'paths of living metal' in their bodies, but in all my years of research, I've never found evidence that such cultivators actually existed. Most scholars dismissed it as metaphor or myth."

He fixed Liu Wei with an intense stare. "Yet here you stand, your meridians gleaming like freshly forged copper, hungry for the essence of all you touch. The question is not why others haven't practiced this art, but why it has chosen to resurface now, after so many thousands of years."

Liu Wei swallowed hard, looking down at his arms where the copper lines pulsed beneath his skin. "What does this mean for my cultivation? Can I still..."

"Become stronger?" Master Chen finished for him. "Oh yes. But not in the way you imagined." He stood and moved to one of the shelves, selecting a simple clay cup that looked as ordinary as any found in a peasant's home. "Your path will be different. Dangerous. And if the ancient texts are correct, potentially more powerful than anything the traditional cultivation world has seen in millennia."

He set the cup on the desk before Liu Wei. "Shall we begin?"

Liu Wei stared at the cup, feeling the hunger in his meridians rise again. Within his chest, his core pulsed with an alien rhythm, eager to draw in whatever essence the simple clay vessel contained. Part of him wanted to refuse – to beg for a normal cultivation path instead. But a deeper part, the part that had always felt out of place in the mundane world, reached out toward the cup with trembling fingers.

"Yes," he whispered. "Please teach me."

Master Chen's expression was unreadable as he began to explain the first technique. Outside the windows, storm clouds gathered, casting the study in deeper shadow. As Liu Wei listened to the ancient teachings, he didn't notice how the metal fixtures in the room had begun to tarnish, responding to the awakening power in his copper meridians.

His journey down the Copper Path had begun.