I Pluck Three Thousand Weak Waters

Of three thousand waters, take only one dipper.

That's what other people say. Shen Yuansheng didn't take one. He was force-fed.

He was born with a perfect cultivation realm. Perfect comprehension, perfect fortune, perfect longevity, invincible among his peers. There was no move in the world he couldn't withstand. The sect treated him like priceless porcelain, and his junior disciples revered him as a prodigy. Only he knew one thing for certain: he had no idea where his strength came from.

The answer lay in a furnace halfway up Kitchen Mountain. That fire had burned for three thousand years, consuming the people of the Jiang family. Three thousand bodies born empty were drained inch by inch, their spiritual energy poured into an infant. The infant was named Shen Yuansheng.

And she was the only one who hadn't been burned away completely.

She was both sword and pool. Every ounce of his strength had to pass through her. Each time he used his full power, she became a little emptier. He saved everyone under heaven, while she remained inside the sword, slowly forgetting the way home.

He asked if she was in pain. She said she wasn't.

He asked if she was ill. She said no.

She smiled beautifully.

Until he found that family register among the furnace ashes. Three thousand names, each followed by a number: how much was taken, and into whose body it went. The last name was hers, and the space after it was blank.

That wasn't a family register. It was an invoice.

Heaven never creates prodigies. Heaven only keeps accounts.