Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

The roar of clashing steel and the guttural shrieks of the dying became a singular, deafening storm that pounded against Shen Xun’er’s eardrums.

Rain mixed with soot began to pour from the ashen heavens, turning the blood-drenched battlefield into a churning morass of crimson mud.

Shen Xun’er led the charge.

She did not command with grand tactical flourishes or sweeping stratagems; she led through the sheer, unbridled ferocity of a wild beast refusing to be butchered.

Without a single thread of qi to bolster her limbs, every step was a battle against the crushing inertia of mortal fatigue.

Her lungs burned as though she were inhaling liquid fire, and the heavy, battered iron armor pinched viciously into her bruised collarbones with every frantic stride.

”Follow the girl!” the blood-stained mortal captain screamed, his voice cracking with desperate frenzy as he raised a splintered banner. ”Break through their vanguard! Charge!”

A ragged soldiers of a few hundred surviving men rallied behind her slender silhouette, drawn by the terrifying, blood-soaked momentum she carved through the front lines.

Shen Xun’er’s notched iron arming sword became an extension of raw muscle memory.

When an armored footman thrust a jagged spear at her throat, she did not even try to calculate defensive angles, instead, she simply slapped the shaft aside with her armored forearm, stepped inside his reach, and drove her pommel violently into his iron visor, crushing his nose before ramming the steel blade through his armpit.

When two spearmen lunged from her flank, she dropped low into the crimson mud, sweeping her leg to shatter the nearest soldier’s knee, using his falling body as a human shield against the second spear before rising to cleave through the exposed neck of the attacker.

CLANG! CRUNCH! SQUELCH!

Her body accumulated wounds with brutal and unforgiving speed.

A stray crossbow bolt grazed her left bicep, tearing through the leather undergarment and drawing a hot ribbon of blood.

A glancing halberd strike cracked the iron plate over her ribs, sending a sharp, sickening spike of pain through her torso every time she drew breath.

Her palms, slick with a mixture of her own blood and the gore of her enemies, blistered and tore against the rough leather wrap of her hilt.

Yet she did not stop.

She could not stop.

’If I fall here, I rot in the dirt... If I die, I will never see the young master again!’

That singular, frantic terror propelled her battered limbs forward.

After hours of grueling, visceral slaughter that felt like an eternity carved into her flesh, Shen Xun’er breached the enemy’s central command line.

Standing atop a mound of mangled corpses and shattered siege wagons was the enemy general—a towering warlord clad in obsidian plated heavy armor, wielding a massive, four foot wide dual headed great axe dripping with brain matter and viscera.

The general’s breath hissed through his horned helm like steam from a furnace, his cold, bloodshot eyes locking onto the petite, blood soaked girl who had butchered her way to his feet.

SWOOSH—!

The massive great axe swept downward in a thunderous vertical cleave, the sheer kinetic displacement of the heavy steel parting the falling rain.

Shen Xun’er rolled violently across the mud, the axe blade biting three feet deep into the earth where her boots had been, showering her with wet soil and shattered bone fragments.

Before the warlord could wrench the colossal weapon free, Shen Xun’er lunged forward like a rabid wolf.

She abandoned all refined sword forms, leaping directly onto the giant’s broad chest plate.

Her left hand clamped around the edge of his horned visor to anchor herself, while her right drove her notched, chipped sword straight toward the narrow slit of his eye.

”DIE!” she screamed, her vocal cords tearing.

CLANG!

The warlord’s armored gauntlet intercepted the blade, the thick steel fingers snapping the worn iron sword clean in half! With a savage backhand, the massive general struck Shen Xun’er across the face, sending her flying ten paces across the mud.

THUD!

Her vision flared with blinding white stars as she crashed into the dirt, spitting out a mouthful of blood and broken teeth.

Her broken sword hilt clattered uselessly into the mud.

The giant wrenched his greataxe from the earth, taking heavy, ground-shaking strides toward her, his weapon raised high for the executing blow.

Shen Xun’er scrambled backward on her elbows, her fingers frantically clawing through the mud and gore, until her hand wrapped around the jagged, snapped shaft of a heavy iron siege spear half-buried beneath a corpse.

NOW!

As the warlord brought the executioner’s axe down with all his titanic weight, Shen Xun’er did not try to roll away, instead, she planted the butt of the broken spear shaft firmly against a boulder behind her, angling the jagged, splintered iron tip straight upward toward the sky.

CRUNCH-SKRRRRR!

The descending giant impaled himself upon the jagged spear with the full force of his own momentum.

The splintered iron head punched cleanly through his throat, bursting out through the back of his neck in a fountain of thick, dark blood.

The massive great axe slipped from his lifeless fingers, thudding harmlessly into the mud beside her cheek.

The colossal warlord shuddered violently, his bloodshot eyes staring down at the battered girl beneath him, before his massive corpse collapsed heavily over her legs, dead.

BZZZZZZZZZZZZZT—HUMMMMMMM!

The instant the enemy general drew his final breath, the blood red sky, the rain of soot, the burning palisades, and the endless legions of roaring ironclad soldiers froze in place.

The entire apocalyptic battlefield dissolved into millions of fading, silver light particles, washing away the blood, the shattered armor, and the agonizing physical wounds from her body as the planar illusion collapsed back into pristine starlight.

”Haaa....haaa....” Shen Xun’er breathed heavily, blood and sweat oozing out of her skin and injuries.

But, she was happy

She had passed the first trial.

However, as adrenaline finally wore off, she instantly collapsed onto the glowing starlight floor of the inner trial chamber, panting heavily with her hands still trembling in phantom agony.

She doesn’t know this, but although she won, this triumph was not born of an enlightened, unyielding martial heart.

It had been carved out purely by her desperate, frantic need to survive and her suffocating terror of being cast aside.

Because that primal survival instinct had overridden all else, she didn’t fall into despair during the meat grinding war.

However, beneath the surface, her Dao heart remained deeply fragile, riddled with the same festering insecurities that had paralyzed her in the arena.

*

*

*

High above the trial chamber, suspended in the boundless cosmic space where swirling nebulae painted the void in violet and gold, Shen Haoran and Astraeus watched the scene fade from the astral mirror.

Astraeus, the God of Space, stroked his chin, his luminous eyes carrying a complex, slightly disappointed expression.

”She cleared the trial,” Astraeus spoke, his deep, resonant voice echoing through the vacuum. ”Her combat instincts and biological resilience are truly extraordinary for a mortal of her age. Yet, as you and I can both plainly see, her spirit did not evolve. She conquered the battlefield not because she believed in the supremacy of her own will, but because she was terrified of death and terrified of your rejection. Her Dao heart is still a cracked porcelain cup. If she enters the second trial in this state, where the void directly attacks the soul rather than the flesh, she will inevitably shatter.”

Shen Haoran stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his dark robes unruffled by the cosmic winds, a faint, calculating smirk resting on his handsome face.

”Indeed. A beast that fights only when backed against a cliff is dangerous, but it’s just that, dangerous. Danger can be overcome by overwhelming power,” Haoran remarked calmly, his golden eyes gleaming with dark intellect. ”She relies on fear as her fuel because she has forgotten what it feels like to possess that uncontested dominance. If the trial continues in its standard format, she will only find more reasons to doubt her own worth.”

Haoran turned his gaze toward Astraeus, his tone taking on a sharp, decisive cadence.

”We need to modify the second trial.”

Astraeus raised an eyebrow, intrigued. ”Modify it? That’s against the rules, but then again, I made this trial, and I’m the rules. So, go on, tell me how you want to change this trial.”

”Strip away the external enemies,” Haoran said smoothly, stepping toward the center of the astral platform. ”Do not give her an army to slaughter, nor a warlord to impale like the first one. Instead, he second trial must become a mirror of her own psyche. Force her to face the physical manifestations of her deepest insecurities—her fear of failure, her terror of abandonment, and the illusion of my disappointment. Strip away her excuses, isolate her soul within the crushing emptiness of the void, and give her no choice but to confront the weakness within her own heart.”

Haoran’s smirk widened, carrying the cold cruelty of a master artisan ready to hammer a flawed blade until the impurities were purged by fire.

”Make the trial so difficult that she either shatters into non-existence, or forcefully reforges her Dao heart into an unbreakable dragon capable of commanding your void.”

Astraeus looked at the ruthless young sovereign before him, a slow, approving smile returning to the ancient deity’s sculpted features.

”A trial of inner purgatory...” Astraeus murmured, the constellations across his robes rotating in harmonious alignment. ”Very well. Let us reshape the trial as you have said. If she emerges from the mirror unbroken, she will no longer be a lizard hiding from the storm, instead she shall become the master of the space itself.”

With a grand sweep of Astraeus’s starry sleeves, the ancient divine arrays within the temple shifted, weaving a terrifying, psychological crucible designed to reforge her shattered spirit from the ashes.

*

*

*

The fading silver light of the first trial dissolved into the dark like cold mist retreating before dawn.

The phantom ache of fractured ribs and the heavy, copper reek of mortal carnage evaporated from her senses as if they had never existed.

Shen Xun’er found herself now wearing her usual robes as she stood alone in a vast, dark, empty space where neither floor nor ceiling existed, only an infinite expanse of blackness punctuated by drifting specks of pale, silver-violet starlight.

Her breath came in deep, shuddering pulls as she looked down at her hands, turning them over in the dim light.

The blisters, torn skin, and soot from the battlefield had vanished.

Her skin was once again smooth, pale porcelain.

More importantly, the oppressive shackle that had suffocated her meridians was gone; the fiery qi inside her dantians stirred, circulating through her pathways with familiar, crackling warmth.

Yet, beneath that returning power, her pulse remained erratic.

The memory of the meat grinder, the sheer, naked helplessness of having her life balanced on a rusted iron blade, clung to her thoughts like an oily stain.

But before she could fully steady her racing heart, the vast, empty darkness rippled.

HUMMMMMMMMM—!

The deep, resonant voice of the God of Space, Astraeus, descended from the infinite expanse above, rolling across the void with majestic, detached authority.

”Congratulations to those who have endured the crucible of flesh. You have shed your reliance on circumstance, tasted the finality of mortality, and crawled through the valley of the dying to stand upon this threshold.”

The divine voice paused, vibrating with a subtle, ancient weight that seemed to press directly against her consciousness.

”The first trial measured your determination to overcome despair when all external power was stripped away.”

”But surviving the storm of the world as a mortal is a trivial feat compared to the true mantle of the deep space.”

”To wield this boundless emptiness, one must first conquer the chaotic empire within their own mind. Therefore... I declare the start of the second trial.”

FLASH—!

The dark, empty space around her shattered like fragile obsidian glass as the darkness gave way in an explosion of radiant, slate-grey light.

Then, a sudden rush of dry, pressurized air swept past her cheeks, carrying the faint, metallic tang of refined celestial iron and ancient stone.

When the blinding transition settled, Shen Xun’er found herself standing in the center of a vast, colossal training ground.

The arena was gargantuan, spanning thousands of paces in every direction.

It was paved with immense, interlocking blocks of dark, polished astral basalt that absorbed the light from the sky.

Colossal pillars of star-forged stone rose into a vaulted dome of rotating constellations, each pillar etched with ancient forgotten and spatial runes.

There were no spectator stands, no cheering crowds, and no exits—only an unbroken, arena ring sealed beneath the turning wheel of the cosmos.

Astraeus’s voice returned, echoing through the vast stone chamber with cold, uncompromising clarity.

”The second trial is not a contest against beasts, nor is it a war against legions.”

”The true enemy of the will is the doubt that festers within the mind, so to claim my inheritance, your second objective is to overcome yourselves.”

”Face your reflection. Slay your weakness. Or remain forever trapped within the cage of your own inadequacies.”

Overcome... ourselves?

Shen Xun’er’s purple eyes darted across the immense, empty expanse of the stone floor.

She lowered her stance, her boots lightly gripping the smooth basalt as she channeled her qi into her forearms, readying herself whatever comes next.

SKRRRRRRRR—SHUUUUUU!

At that moment, a few dozen paces directly opposite of her, the flat shadow cast across the astral basalt began to boil.

The darkness rose from the floorboards like thick, viscous pitch, swirling into a dense, humanoid silhouette.

Crimson sparks, dark and violent like dried blood, crackled along the edges of the coalescing shadow, hissing as they ate through the ambient light.

Standing in the arena, Shen Xun’er frowned deeply as she noticed the figure solidifying into physical reality.

The silhouette shrank, refined its contours, and took form—revealing a woman of familiar height, familiar build, and familiar features.

It was herself.

Yet, this was not a simple mirror reflection.

The woman standing opposite her was dressed in midnight black robes lined with blood red embroidery that seemed to pulse like exposed veins.

She possessed a short dark hair that ends with purple shade, her skin was stark, ghostly pale, contrasting sharply with the deep, bruised violet eyeshadow beneath her eyes.

Her lips were painted a dark, venomous plum, curved into an exaggerated, mocking grin that stretched far too wide, revealing sharp, predatory teeth.

Her eyes were the most horrifying feature of all—they were not Shen Xun’er’s warm, bright purple, but twin pools of black sclera framing glowing, blood-red irises that swam with unmasked malice, manic self-loathing, and naked, feral hunger.

It was a darker, more evil looking version of herself.

The dark reflection stood casually with her hands resting on her hips, her posture loose, insolent, and utterly devoid of the hesitant posture Shen Xun’er had carried for the past year.

Seeing Shen Xun’er staring at her with wide, tense eyes, the dark reflection let out a sharp, grating giggle that echoed off the high pillars like breaking porcelain.

The dark copy grinned wider, her blood-red eyes narrowing into two mocking crescents, and casually raised a pale hand to wave at her.

”Well, well, well... Look at what crawled out of the dirt,” the dark reflection greeted her, her voice an uncanny, distorted harmony of Shen Xun’er’s own voice laced with venomous, mocking cruelty. ”Hello there. This is the first time we have met, isn’t it.”

Shen Xun’er’s brow furrowed tighter, her knuckles whitening as her qi began to ripple all over her body. ”You...What are you?”

”What am I? How rude.” The dark Xun’er laughed aloud, clutching her stomach in theatrical amusement before taking a slow, rhythmic step forward across the dark stone. ”I’m you.”

The dark reflection stopped ten paces away, tilting her head with a sickly, condescending pity.

Shen Xun’er glared at her.

The dark reflection just chuckled.

”Astraeus said you have to ’overcome’ yourself... but tell me, Shen Xun’er... how are you going to overcome someone you’re completely terrified of becoming?”