Su Mu bowed three times at the grave, packed his bundle, and left with frequent glances backward. He walked through desolate country, eating wild fruit when he was hungry and drinking from streams when thirsty. After about half a month he reached a small populated town and eventually made his way to Liangzhou.

　　In such a vast nation, finding a single relative across a province was like finding a needle in the sea. His clothes were tattered; he wandered the streets like a beggar.

　　Fortune smiled: he befriended an old beggar who helped him find Su Xiaoti.

　　Su Xiaoti was broad-minded. He had made some money in small trade, bought a house, and had a son and a daughter. Seeing Su Mu’s letter and that he was kin, he welcomed the boy.

　　Su Mu stayed with the Su family and attended the private school with their children, learning the Six Arts. Having grown without much contact, Su Mu remained quiet and reserved. The S u family treated him well, and after a year he had integrated with their children.

　　One day a shabby monk passed through Liangzhou and begged at the Su residence. Glancing at Su Mu, the monk ominously declared, “This child is ill-omened. He will bring disaster to the family.”

　　They at first dismissed the monk as a madman. But a month later, the Su family’s eldest son broke his leg falling from a tree, and the little girl fell ill. Su Xiaoti and his wife could not help but remember the monk’s words. Not wanting to cast out the child, they isolated Su Mu in an annex: someone brought him food each day, but he was otherwise kept apart.

　　Still, fate struck. Not long after, a meteor-like fire fell on the Su household, and flames engulfed it. In one terrible instant dozens of family members perished. Miraculously, Su Mu emerged from the inferno unscathed.

　　Surrounded by ruin and the stench of burnt timber, Su Mu wept. People pointed and whispered that he was a calamity — a harbinger of disaster. No one wanted him. An old beggar took him in; Su Mu survived on scraps begged by his rescuer.

　　One snowy night the old beggar slept in the city shrine and never woke. Su Mu truly realized then that he brought misfortune: his foster parents, the Su household, even the beggar — all had perished. From that moment he left Liangzhou, wandering alone and never again trusting others.

　　But fate’s wheel kept turning. At thirteen or fourteen he drifted to the border and by chance rescued a great general of the realm. Grateful, the general wanted to keep him in the army to serve the country.

　　Remembering past calamities, Su Mu resisted.

　　“A man’s ambition should be to serve the land,” the general urged. “You’re young and skilled — why not join the army?”

　　“I’m an ill omen,” Su Mu protested. “Those close to me meet bad ends.”

　　“Really? How so?” the general asked with interest.

　　Su Mu told him his life’s story. The general laughed heartily. “Natural disasters, sickness, death — these are part of life. You can’t blame a child for the world’s tragedies. You’re not the lord of fate. If you were truly unlucky, wouldn’t you be better on the battlefield than hidden away?”

　　Persuaded by the general’s frankness, Su Mu enlisted.

　　Under the general’s tutelage he trained and fought for years, winning honors across southern and northern campaigns. His prowess grew, and he rose in reputation — destined, it seemed, for a noble title.

　　Then the Canglong Kingdom sought an alliance by marriage.

　　After years of warfare the people were exhausted and the treasury drained. Negotiating peace pleased everyone. Canglong offered a royal marriage: their princess — the king’s beloved youngest daughter — was to be sent in alliance. It was said she once saw Su Mu’s battle posture and fell in love at first sight, insisting she would only marry him.

　　The wedding day was a national celebration. But on the wedding night the princess suddenly dropped dead. The scandal of a bride who died on her wedding night was huge. The general’s household tried to cover it up, but the news flew back to Canglong in an instant.

　　The Canglong king, enraged, raised his army to punish Zhuque. The general and Su Mu donned armor and marched, but they could not withstand Canglong’s forces. Lines fell, battle after battle; soon the capital itself was under siege. The Zhuque Kingdom fell. With Canglong’s troops overextended and unable to hold the frontier, neighboring kingdoms Xuanwu and Baihu struck. Chaos swept the land.

　　Su Mu watched his world collapse: generals fell, comrades died in bloodied fields; he was powerless. He believed himself a curse: the cause of his adoptive parents’ deaths, the Su household, the old beggar, and perhaps even the fall of a kingdom. “I did not kill Boren, yet Boren died because of me,” he thought.

　　He concluded: if he lived, more people would die. At the threshold of manhood, hair already snowed white with grief and tears that tasted of iron, he closed his eyes, raised his sword, and pressed it to his throat.

　　He did not die. At the last instant someone from Zhaoyao Mountain — an immortal sect — rescued him. When he opened his eyes he found himself on Lone Egret Peak: a single lonely mountain with no people in sight, only plants, animals, and a collection of scriptures and scrolls for study.

　　He couldn’t find a way down. He survived on zhuyu fruit and read by day and night, studying the arts of cultivation. His aptitude was extraordinary. In less than five years he taught himself enough to advance his cultivation and even obtain an immortal’s body. It was only then that he finally met the one who had saved him: a silver-haired old man with kind eyes and a long beard reaching his chest, his wrinkles full of serenity — the old master of Zhaoyao.

　　“You saved me,” Su Mu said, not a question but a certainty.

　　The old master nodded.

　　“Why save me?” Su Mu asked.

　　“Fate,” the old master replied. “Every person has fate and a mission. Your fate is not to die by your own hand to atone. Your mission is not yet complete.”

　　“What is my fate? What is my mission?” Su Mu asked.

　　“Stay by my side. When the time is right, you will understand,” the old master said.

　　“I will bring you harm,” Su Mu warned, believing himself a calamity.

　　“Are you overestimating or underestimating yourself?” the old master smiled. “You may have an unusual destiny, but I have cultivated for tens of thousands of years. If a little black aura could undo all this, then these years would have been in vain.”

　　Su Mu formally became the old master’s third disciple, devoting himself to cultivation and to restoring order. Over millennia his power grew until he nearly matched his master.

　　Surpassing his teacher, Su Mu became famed as Qiwu Jun.

　　Yet Lone Egret Peak lived up to its name: with time it truly became a lonely peak where nothing green thrived. To avoid repeating past mistakes — despite the old master’s assurances — Qiwu Jun refused to gamble with fate. He kept to solitude. When the last great immortal-demon war erupted a hundred years ago, the old master and other elders fought to the death protecting future generations and none survived. After that, Qiwu Jun never left Lone Egret Peak again.