Kaede awakened in a body not quite his own.

He cultivated for a few hours only to realize he had four shattered meridians, which housed a wouned presence turtling away from the world. One bit at a time he managed to recall what happened to that body during the tournament, and felt the desperation "he" couldn't.

"Rest easy, Caedith. Now that I'm here I won't allow anyone to harm nor disrespect you in the future." Kaede told himself.

However, he could only rely on a single meridian left. On the flip side, his wounds didn't hurt at all.

"I didn't expect you to be awake." stated elder Garnlao approaching him, "You remember your name?"

"Kae... Caedith."

"Good, good, you're still there. Perhaps that Hyf Clan girl pulled her punches. Let me check your wounds and pulse." Garnlao placed two fingers on Kaede's wrists. "Interesting... Well the wounds are healing properly, in a month you'll barely even have scars. On the other hand I have no idea how can you even be conscious." he concluded.

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"What do you mean?"

"Well, at most I've seen people surviving a cracked meridian, although with an abrupt shift of their personality. You seem yourself even though your meridians are beyond repair." Garnlao was righter than he could have imagined.

"Beyond repair?"

"Yes, to use an analogy: repairing your meridians would be like reassembling a peppercorn after it has been ground up into a fine powder. Practically impossible. That's how damaged they are. It is such a pity, though. If only we had known of your tetrapathia..." Now that was the first thing the old man was wrong about, Caedith wasn't just born with four meridians, but who could imagine such a thing? "Actually, nevermind. You wouldnt have survived the persecution, no matter how special your body was. Perhaps this is the best outcome for you, at least you get to live."

"So what's going to happen now?"

"Well, you can't stay in the sect, obviously. People probably assume you died, don't give them any reason to think otherwise."