In her previous life, Yan Tingxue fought across the Nine Provinces for her fiancé, Xie Xuance, helping him claim the position of leader of the Immortal Alliance. In return, she was publicly humiliated at their betrothal ceremony: her achievements were erased, her spiritual platform crippled, and she was expelled from her sect. Even the sect she had fought so hard to protect became a bargaining chip in the hands of the powerful.
Reborn on the day of the betrothal ceremony, she refused to bow her head again.
She tore up the marriage contract, refused to hand over her sword token, and left her old sect behind. Then she turned around and bought the poorest mountain in all the Nine Provinces, planting a sign that read "Zhaoye Mountain." Here, they would ask not where you came from, but whether you dared to draw your sword and could protect your companions.
Others laughed that she would dare call a ramshackle mountain a sect. So she fought from local sword contests all the way to debates among a hundred sects. When others blocked her resources and seized her spiritual veins, she led a group of "failed candidates" in tearing down the Immortal Alliance's old rules one by one. Xie Xuance wanted the strong to unite and rule the weak. She would make sure even small sects had a seat at the council.
But why did Lu Zhaochuan, the cold-faced sword cultivator rumored to have no regard for others, keep showing up whenever she was busiest?
He claimed he was clearing out old stock, but everything he brought was exactly what she used: wrist guards, pain-relief pills, and candied spirit plums. She thought he found her sword stance an eyesore, but he had already secured her escape routes for her next match.
Yan Tingxue had planned to take her revenge and then roam the world. Only later did she realize that her mountain now had people, that she had companions by her side, and that even that cold-faced Sword Lord was getting harder and harder to shake off. This time, she would win back more than her enemy's defeat: she would reclaim a life on her own terms.
